An incomplete tape of this recital from the 1953 Salzburg Festival first surfaced and was released by EMI in 1969. The intensity of the occasion was breathtaking, especially in the blazing rage of ‘Was soll der Zorn’ or the heartbreak of ‘Herr, was tragt der Boden hier’. Then the remaining nine songs performed at the Mozarteum came to light and in 1983 EMI was able to reassemble the complete recital. Now reissued on this References CD, the recording brings alive a unique partnership – the young Schwarzkopf captured in lovely fresh voice early in her career and Furtwangler in a rare appearance as accompanist.
Encountering it again after nearly 20 years brings forth renewed admiration and some disappointment. The first song, ‘Im Fruhling’, was not on the original disc and the poor quality of the recording (both the voice and the piano suffer distortion) comes as a bit of a shock, as does Furtwangler’s clumsy playing. But the technical standard quickly improves and the performances start to weave their spell anew.
Although Schwarzkopf was so well served in the studio, there is nothing like her live recordings to show her as she was at her best. Performances such as the highly charged ‘Lebe wohl’ or the playfully smiling ‘Die Sprode’ come off with a spontaneity that her comparable studio recordings do not quite match. Furtwangler challenges her with some slow speeds – even ‘In dem Schatten meiner Locken’ is half dreamily teasing – but the sense of stretching one’s imagination in search of deeper meaning is unmistakable. Wolf recitals like this do not come round very often.'