This performance seems to me an almost perfect example of what Wagnerian music-drama is about. There was sonething about Wieland Wagner's productions at Bayreuth that brought out the very best in the artists partaking. To be sure Greindl's singing is hardly bel canto, Silja's tone sometimes takes on an uncomfortable edge, Windgassen very occasionally goes just off pitch, but these seem tiny peccadilloes beside the conviction of the whole. Here, looking at it in a historical perspective, we have the last great generation of Wagner singers heard in their prime, every one, Bumbry apart, enunciating the text with the kind of total involvement so seldom found today, each singer so believable as the character he or she is portraying as to make the whole performance, indeed the opera itself, utterly convincing in a way none of its successors, for all their merits, has achieved. I know there are those who don't care for the coughs and evidence of stage movement that always affect these Bayreuth recordings but, for me, the sense of being at Bayreuth on a good night far outweighs such incidental drawbacks, and the actual sound of this recording, now heard in its full panoply on CD, is really excellent with a fair balance between stage and pit, and a forward sound overall that gives it special immediacy.
Silja's Elisabeth is the very epitome of dedicated womanhood, as she sings her Greeting with glorious elation, her Prayer with deep Innigkeit. Windgassen, once past some initial signs of weariness in the Venusberg scene, gives one of his most committed performances, sung with intelligence and confidence; the Rome Narration is indeed a great piece of singing and interpretation. Waechter's Wolfram is most warmly and tenderly voiced and phrased; only Husch from the distant past is his peer on record, and I don't forget Fischer-Dieskau. Bumbry sings securely and seductively as Venus, but not with the experienced and idiomatic diction on her colleagues. Stolze and Crass do well as the minor knights of song. Greindl is certainly having a rough evening, vocally speaking, but even he is forgiven for the sympathy and authority he lavishes on Hermann's music.
It seems to have been a notable year for both the chorus and orchestra, who respond eloquently to Sawallisch's loving yet never dawdling beat. As he explains in a note in the accompanying booklet, he opts for an edition that includes the ballet music of the Paris version then returns to the Dresden version, a solution authorized by Wagner that works well here, although we are, of course, denied the pleasure of seeing Bejart's notorious choreography that was used in the 1961-2 seasons. For the reasons I have given I have to make this my favourite CD of the work, but Solti (Decca) may be the 'safer' recommendation.'