As this performance has been available unofficially for some time, collectors may already know that ‘Kna’, the legendary dinosaur of Ring cycles and Parsifal, copes rather well with the variety of tempi (brisk not excluded) and musical humour required by Wagner’s mature comedy. Such information was already available a decade previously when Meistersinger became the only complete Wagner (with an experienced cast) that suspicious Decca would allow him to record in the studio, although the approach to tempi and balance is much more conventional there than in this Bayreuth adventure.

There are certainly some surprises here. In Act 3 a good minute is taken off most other maestros’ tempi for the Prelude (two off the old Decca recording), a good half-minute from the Quintet. The dances are real funfair stuff, bright and chirrupy, while the philosophical grass certainly doesn’t grow under the feet of Greindl’s bass Sachs in his two serious monologues. And the adventurous discordances of the Act 2 ‘riot’ music – both when first heard and quoted when Beckmesser revisits Sachs in Act 3 – are clearer (and better delivered) than in many rival versions. That said, the very steady tread at which the whole ‘riot’ ensemble is launched will not be for everyone – and isn’t for everyone onstage on this occasion in terms of pinpoint ensemble. In the middle of all this, Canadian Donald Bell is a subtly amusing Nightwatchman.

Josef Greindl, already established in the Festival’s ‘baddy’ roles, makes the transition to Sachs comfortably. However, he sounds a mite too dark and gruff giving out marching orders for departure for the Festival Meadow, or ‘Jerum! Jerum!’ – where the comedy of embarrassing Beckmesser overtakes the hints to Eva that Tomlinson (and Hotter and Norman Bailey) work into their performance. Among his fellow masters, Ludwig Weber is entertaining as Kothner sending up the pomposity of the Guild’s rules, and Theo Adam is mannered while not inappropriately young as Pogner, but Karl-Schmitt Walter’s Beckmesser comes across as penny-plain and straightforward. Elisabeth Grümmer (on instruction from conductor or stage director?) sounds as if she is trying to sound younger and more soubrettish than she naturally was – in fact more like Hilde Gueden, Knappertsbusch’s first Eva on record. Stolze, without any of the vocal over-acting assumed for his contemporary Decca recordings, is a fluent and natural David. Wolfgang Windgassen’s evident intelligence as the hero is unfortunately rarely matched by the beauty of tone one wants from a Walther.

The sound of this latest reissue is adequate for its period and source but it’s hardly a revelatory resurrection. The booklet messes up the track-listing of Act 2. Pace past reviews of this performance, you may find, this is certainly neither ‘the slowest Meistersinger ever’ nor Knappertsbusch’s ‘worst ever’ Wagner performance. Its main interest remains the curiosity value of hearing him conduct it, but I wonder why Orfeo did not choose the production’s 1956 Cluytens/Hotter first night and whether the company will risk the intriguing 1963 Schippers/Silja/Thomas version, Wieland’s next Bayreuth opening.