I was generalizing of course. I don’t expect to ever hear a better Adriana Lecouvreur than Gheorghiu a few years ago (Covent Garden), and we’ve had fantastic runs of Walkure and Tristan in Amsterdam in the last couple of seasons, as well as some excellent Verdi (with mostly good but less famous names).
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Ah yes, but no conductor of ‘Tristan’ has ever come close to Carlos Kleiber, either in his mid 70s radio relays from Bayreuth or in his definitive DG account from Dresden a few years later (one of DG’s first digital opera recordings).
If only some brave record company could have cajoled him into the studio (in Vienna, say) to record Wagner’s ‘Ring’. That would have been astonishing to hear.
(And yes, I know that CK never conducted the ‘Ring’, but I’m sure that he knew those masterpieces better than just about any conductor who performed or recorded them. And let’s not even think of what he could have achieved in Mozart’s great operas.)
Graham
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Hi Graham - I also enjoy Kleiber’s recording (which came out around the same time as Bernstein). Ironically its existence might very well be the reason he never made another studio recording again.
According to Kleiber’s biography (recommended read!), he clashed swords with René Kollo over the latter’s performance in Act III, stormed off set and believed the recording was left incomplete. In fact DG had left the mikes on during rehearsals, and were able to reconstruct the unfinished parts (apparently, the preludes) from test sessions. Kleiber felt betrayed and never came back to DG.
Cheers
EJ
EJ<, it was rather worse than that, sadly.
Carlos Kleiber was predictably furious, and vowed never to set foot in a recording studio again. And he never did after ‘Tristan’, his only other releases being his two matchless live recordings of his New Year’s Day concerts from Vienna in 1989 and 1992 (I think I have the correct dates) which were released on the Sony label.
(This has shades of an earlier sad run-in, when his only ever orchestral concert in London with Abbado’s London Symphony Orchestra was ecstatically received by the Royal Festival Hall audience - of which I was one - but savaged by the notices in the ‘quality’ press the following morning. Kleiber vowed never to come back to London, stayed true to his word and never came back.)
What a crying shame!
Incidentally, would you let me know what Kleiber biography you’re referring to. The Charles Barber account of his correspondence with CK, perhaps?
Regards.
Graham
Yup, Barber’s book based on his 15 year friendship with Kleiber. I wish it included a bit more on the recording sessions but it still includes a fair number of juicy details, especially the perspectives of others.
What isn’t in the book is that Kleiber still gave his written consent to DG to release Tristan, after some persistent chasing.
It’s a tragedy that Carlos Kleiber didn’t make more recordings. Just imagine a complete cycle of the Beethoven Symphonies (just 5,6 and 7 issued), the other three of the Brahms symphonies, perhaps a Schubert Great C Major (his recording of the Unfinished is superb). More Verdi operas - his Traviata is truly wonderful.
I believe there were for a short time, recordings of Carmen and Boheme which were quickly removed from the market as Kleiber didn’t approve them. I regret not buying them before they were withdrawn.
Sadly, Kleiber was his own worst enemy. He was a perfectionist and worked under extreme self-inflicted pressure. We can only reflect on what might have been.
Saw that too. Wonderful performance of singers and orchestra. Did you go to Meistersingers?
Hi EJ,
Got the tickets for La Traviata. Will check out the venue.
Covid restriction seems to varies by the country and venue. It looks to be I need a negative PCR test to attend in addition to a vaccine certificate.
What’s the mandatories to get into the Covent Garden? UK not allowing EU travellers?
Yes - I saw the current production about 4 years ago I think. I have several friends who think this his best opera but I was less than convinced. It was also very, very long!
We’ll see what happens on Thursday. For now, I need to be tested before both flights despite vaccinations.
I am so jealous of you guys on the European side of the pond (I assume you are on that side of the pond) in terms of your live opera options. Don’t get me wrong, the Metropolitan Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Chicago Opera, San Francisco Opera, Seattle Opera and several others over here are fantastic, but I can’t imagine how nice it would be to have Covent Garden, Paris, La Scala, Bayreuth, Vienna, etc. just a short drive, train ride or Ryanair flight away. I have caught some great performances in Europe on occasion, but to see La Traviata, La Boheme, Tosca or Rigoletto at La Scala, or the Ring at Bayreuth, or Der Rosenkavalier in Vienna, or the Salzburg festival . . . a guy can dream, can’t he? Once this blasted pandemic is behind us, a little trip to Austria and Italy for some musical nourishment is definitely where I will resume intercontinental travel!
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Hope you’ll get to attend. Maybe stay in the UK for a weekend?
Speaking of Thursday, I will be attending CSO’s first concert of the season. The masks are required at all time during the concert and no intermission. No bars. Normalcy is not back yet in Chicago.
oh yes. Thanks to you I got this set a long time ago.
It is still one of my fave Tristan und Isolde set.
I need to revisit the set on a long winter night.
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Indeed we are blessed with some excellent opera houses and performances. Whilst travelling for work throughout Europe I made it a must to see all of the great houses. However my one regret that I hope to correct if there is a post covid world, is that I hope to attend a performance at the Met. One can dream.
Well, at least the music should be great! Those Chicago horns . . . . I have opted not to head back to our local concerts just yet for all the hassle you mention, but perhaps by spring things will loosen up a bit. I enjoy the “experience” of an evening of live music so much that I am sorry to say that social distancing, masks, closed intermission bars, etc., take me out of the moment.
Thank goodness for Naim and Focal, a comfortable chair next to a fireplace, good Kentucky bourbon, DG and Decca! That’s how I’ve scratched the itch for last 19 months!
The Met is truly a magnificent house, and while the casts are sometimes a bit predictable and safe, they are generally very strong, and occasionally transcendent. And some of the productions are visually stunning on that massive stage. For over a decade my wife and I have traveled to NYC for a few days each year just for music and dance, usually scheduled around the Met, but of course 2020 didn’t happen. You can cram a lot into a few days there. In 2019 we attended the Robert Lepage Die Walkure and Gotterdammerung at the Met, a Broadway show and the NYC Ballet in 4 days. Whew!
I sincerely hope you get there soon!
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Hello, Chris-G.
I am not aware of official (CD?) releases of Carlos Kleiber led recordings of Carmen or Boheme, and it’s hard to imagine circumstances in which such major releases could be recorded and released, but then withdrawn at the conductor’s request.
I have seen a few bootlegs of both (I seem to recall Isobel Buchanan taking the lead, or one of the principal roles, in Carmen), but these are by their very nature not officially released or pulled from the market.
As will be clear, I’m a bit dubious about this.
Graham
I may not have chosen words which were sufficiently clear. I don’t think they were official recordings. I don’t know how they were made, but they were of live performances. My recollection is that when Kleiber heard about their release he immediately got them withdrawn - I would imagine with a threat of legal action. I can’t remember which label released them, it certainly wasn’t one of the majors.
I saw at least the Boheme in a record shop and when I went back a few weeks later I was told it had been taken off the shelves, so I never purchased it.
I was curious about this (I know nothing of it, personally, but love what Kleiber recordings I do have), and found this thread on a random chat room:
"whatever happened to a whole swag of Kleiber recordings which were -
apparently - available some years ago on a pirate label (they were mentioned
in The Gramophone or perhaps Classic CD.) There were about fifteen to twenty
but they mysteriously disappeared and a few magazines referred to the fact
that the recordings had been “withdrawn” which sounmds to me like legal
ramifications. I can’t remember the name of the label but for some reason I
did think it was Exclusive. There were lots of them.Second, a few years ago, Sony advertised a disk featuring the elusive
conductor directing the Strauss Ein Heldenleben coupled with a Mozart
symphony (for some reason I think it may have been number 33). The orchestra
was the Vienna PO. This too seems to have disappeared although a friend of
mine swears to have actually sighted it in a record store before it vanished
into the mists of long lost CDs.Mike Willis Wednesday
The recordings you mention were indeed on an Italian label called Exclusive - they were around in London in early 1993 for a while, but they
were highly illegal and I did hear that Kleiber’s agent was going round Tower Records actually pulling them off the shelves at one point!
They included a number of opera performances - Traviata, Otello, Carmen, La Boheme, two different Rosenkavaliers and two different Tristans.
Also a number of orchestral items and an early 70’s Das Lied von der Erde. The sound quality is about what you’d expect for performances of
that vintage on unofficial Italian labels - not great but OK.
The Sony Heldenleben was announced but was apparently pulled at the last minute - I assumed for legal reasons, but I never heard the details."
Also, I found this:
https://www.broinc.com/media?s=Carlos+kleiber
So, it does sound like perhaps there have been some unauthorized recordings floating around out there from time to time.
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