Wagner - Parsifal / Kollo, Frick, Fischer-Dieskau, Ludwig, Kélémen, Hotter, Wiener Phil., Solti

Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
Wagner coined a blockbuster word to describe Parsifal's genre--Bühnenweihfestspiel, or a "festival play to consecrate the stage." In this, his last work, Wagner returns to the Christian mythology that occupied his imagination earlier in Tannhäuser and Lohengrin. But Parsifal is fundamentally different from the earlier more simplistic, heroic works. Parsifal tries to put the church into the theater, instead of simply giving church themes a theatrical dressing. Parsifal is probably the least accessible Wagnerian opus--the dreamy 19th-century view of Christian mysticism being especially hard for a 20th-century intellect to come to terms with. But those who invest in the effort of understanding the score will be rewarded with a sense of the mystic communion. Though Kollo is sometimes overwrought as the Grail Knight, Fischer-Dieskau is an extremely pitiable and sympathetic Amfortas, and a generally excellent cast carries the day with Frick as Gurnemanz being the highlight. Solti conducts the Wiener Philaharmoniker (Vienna Philharmonic) with mystic solemnity. --Christian C. Rix

Tracks:

Parsifal: Act One: Vorspiel
Parsifal: Act One: 'He! Ho! Waldhuter ihr' (Gurnemanz)
Parsifal: Act One: 'Seht dort, die wilde Reiterin!'
Parsifal: Act One: 'Recht so! - Habt Dank!' (Amfortas)
Parsifal: Act One: 'He, du da! Was liegst du dorte wie ein wildes Tier?'
Parsifal: Act One: 'Das ist ein andres' (Gurnemanz)
Parsifal: Act One: 'Titurel, der fromme Held, der kannt' ihn wohl'
Parsifal: Act One: 'Vor allem nun: der Speer kehr' uns zuruck!'
Parsifal: Act One: 'Weh! Weh!'
Parsifal: Act One: 'Du konntest morden, hier, im heil'gen Walde' (Gurnemanz)
Parsifal: Act One: 'Wo bist du her?' (Gurnemanz)
Parsifal: Act One: 'Den Vaterlosen gebar die Mutter' (Kundry)
Parsifal: Act One: 'So recht! So nach des Grales Gnade' (Gurnemanz)

Tracks:

Parsifal: Act One: 'Vom Bade kehrt der Konig heim' (Gurnemanz)
Parsifal: Act One: 'Nun achte wohl, und lass mich seh'n' (Gurnemanz)
Parsifal: Act One: 'Mein Sohn Amfortas, bist du am Amt' (Titurel)
Parsifal: Act One: 'Nein! Lasst ihn unenthullt' (Amfortas)
Parsifal: Act One: 'Nehmet hin meinen Leib' (Stimmen)
Parsifal: Act One: 'Was stehet du noch da?' (Gurnemanz)
Parsifal: Act Two: Vorspiel
Parsifal: Act Two: 'Die Zeit ist da' (Klingsor)
Parsifal: Act Two: 'Erwachst du? Ha!' (Klingsor)
Parsifal: Act Two: 'Jetzs schon erklimmt er die Burg' (Klingsor)
Parsifal: Act Two: 'Hier war das Tosen!'
Parsifal: Act Two: 'ihr schonen Kinder' (Parsifal)

Tracks:

Parsifal: Act Two: 'Komm, komm! Holder Knabe!'
Parsifal: Act Two: 'Parsifal! - Weile' (Kundry)
Parsifal: Act Two: 'Ich sah das Kind an seiner Mutter Brust' (Kundry)
Parsifal: Act Two: 'Wehe! Wehe! was tat ich?' (Parsifal)
Parsifal: Act Two: 'Amfortas! - Die Wunde!' (Parsifal)
Parsifal: Act Two: 'Grausamer! Fdu im Herzen' (Kundry)
Parsifal: Act Two: 'Auf Ewigkeit wt du verdammt' (Parsifal)
Parsifal: Act Two: 'Vergeh, unseliges Weib!' (Parsifal)
Parsifal: Act Two: 'Halt da! Dich bann'ich mit der rechten wehr!' (Klingsor)
Parsifal: Act Three: Vorspiel
Parsifal: Act Three: 'Von dorther kam das Stn' (Gurnemanz)
Parsifal: Act Three: 'Du tolles Weib! Hast du kein Wort fh?' (Gurnemanz)

Tracks:

Parsifal: Act 3: 'In d Waffenschmucke?' (Gurnemanz)
Parsifal: Act 3: 'Heil mir, dass ich dich wiederfinde!' (Parsifal)
Parsifal: Act 3: 'O Gnade! Htes Heil!' (Gurnemanz)
Parsifal: Act 3: 'Nicht so! - Die heil'ge Quelle selbst' (Gurnemanz)
Parsifal: Act 3: 'Du wuschest mir die F(Parsifal)
Parsifal: Act 3: 'Wie dich doch die Aue heut so sch(Parsifal)
Parsifal: Act 3: 'Mittag. - Die Stund'ist da' (Gurnemanz)
Parsifal: Act 3: 'Geleiten wir im bergenden Schrein' (Ritter)
Parsifal: Act 3: 'Ja, Wehe! Wehe! Weh' ich' (Amfortas)
Parsifal: Act 3: 'Nur eine Waffe taugt' (Parsifal)

Amazon.com

Wagner coined a blockbuster word to describe Parsifal's genre--Bühnenweihfestspiel, or a "festival play to consecrate the stage." In this, his last work, Wagner returns to the Christian mythology that occupied his imagination earlier in Tannhäuser and Lohengrin. But Parsifal is fundamentally different from the earlier more simplistic, heroic works. Parsifal tries to put the church into the theater, instead of simply giving church themes a theatrical dressing. Parsifal is probably the least accessible Wagnerian opus--the dreamy 19th-century view of Christian mysticism being especially hard for a 20th-century intellect to come to terms with. But those who invest in the effort of understanding the score will be rewarded with a sense of the mystic communion. Though Kollo is sometimes overwrought as the Grail Knight, Fischer-Dieskau is an extremely pitiable and sympathetic Amfortas, and a generally excellent cast carries the day with Frick as Gurnemanz being the highlight. Solti conducts the Wiener Philaharmoniker (Vienna Philharmonic) with mystic solemnity. --Christian C. Rix

Customer Reviews:

PROBABLY THE BEST SUNG PARSIFAL.......2006-08-16

This is the recording that the hero of Simon Gray's play 'Otherwise Engaged' keeps trying to listen to, but keeps getting interrupted before he can get beyond a few bars.

What he would have heard if he'd got to the end would have been perhaps the best sung of all Parsifals. The cast is a starry one (certainly for its time) and they all acquit themselves with more than usual credit.

Top of the list belongs to Gottlob Frick singing this Gurnemanz as his swansong to the recording studio. If you think of him only as the pitch black villains of Walkure and Gotterdammerung or the authoritarian rulers of Lohengrin and Tannhauser, think again. This is a warmly wise mature Knight of the Grail whose every word and musical phrase is deeply considered and sung with meaning and understanding. No garrulous old bore, this. Fischer-Dieskau, too, brings all his experience of lieder singing to bear on the text and the music. This Amfortas is no mere cypher, but an honourable, flawed and deeply anguished man. Christa Ludwig presents all the sharply contrasted facets of this profoundly complex character to her portrayal of Kundry. Maybe she lacks just the last volt of electricity generated by Martha Modl in Act 2. The one slightly weak link in this estimable array is Rene Kollo, a rather bland Parsifal with insufficient distinction between the 'reine Tor' who erupts on the scene in Act 1 and the wiser, older, world-weary black knight who trudges into the final Act. A glance down the cast list reveals strength in depth right down to a list of Flowermaidens that includes Kiri te Kanawa and Lucia Popp.

As for the conducting, Solti is Solti - exciting, precise, a little hard-driven at times and inclined to be episodic. As always, he draws ravishing sounds from the Vienna Philharmonic and his familiar Decca engineers do him proud by the standards of the day.

This is certainly a candidate for a top recommendation Parsifal with its great singing cast and its (relatively) modern sound. Personally, though, I'd go back to the 1951 Knappertsbusch and settle for the more dated sound.

I owuld put four other Parsifals ahead of this one.......2005-09-05

Parisfal is a religious icon in its native Gremany, and there are performances that catch its essence, as the Solti reading does not. I love the Karajan on DG, the live 1961 Vienna State Opera performance, also under Karajan, on RCA, and at least two Knappertsbusch readings from Bayreuth, where he owned this opera--the 1964 with an incomparable Jon Vickers as Parsifal and the heralded 1951 with Windgasen. Once you've heard a Parsifal that combine passion and reverence, this version, with the crude-soudning, blatant Kollo, an aged Frick as Gurnemanz, and nobody else making much of an impression, feels superfluous, unless you value Solti's unrefined manner.

A Dramatic Parsifal.......2004-10-22

This is not as sacred as it could be but it's dramatic and has special magic and that does it for me.

The Vienna Philharmonic totally shines! The Cast is phenomenal!
And Solti captures the dramatic intensity perfectly and one understands Parsifal in a new way...in a joyful way!

Wagner's Final Masterpiece Is A Religious Experience.......2003-04-11

Richard Wagner's chose for his final opera the subject of the Holy Grail, drawing from the Arthurian legend and forging a spiritual drama that calls for tolerance and communion as humans as a single entity. The opera was performed in the late 19th century, as Wagner's ultimate masterpiece. It was staged in the Bayreuth Opera House, Germany, which Wagner built specifically for his operas. The Ring of the Nibelung enjoyed tremendous success years earlier. Parsifal was purposely staged to be avant-garde and unlike anything audiences had ever beheld. The orchestra, usually at the bottom of the stage, was concealed from the audience's view through a screen door. In this way, the music takes on a mystic element and provides appropriate underlining to the spiritualism of the opera. The opera house was very dark, the lights coming only from the stage- lights which changed colors from fiery red to peaceful light blue according to the mood of the drama's action. Wagner wanted his opera not only to be great theatrical drama, but a religious experience.

Parsifal is about the knight of the Round Table who was able to find the Holy Grail, what the knights gave up their own life to seek. It was the cup of which Jesus Christ drank during the Last Supper, itself a strong symbol of redemption, healing powers and hope. The Holy Grail in Wagner's opera is very much a symbol. Parsifal begins the opera lamenting he has no meaning or purpose in his life. The realm of Camelot is dying, as Arthur is (Arthur is never mentioned in the opera) and the only restoration is attained through the Holy Grail and the Spear of Destiny. The Spear was in the heads of the evil Amfortas. Parsifal journeys to the nether world of Amfortas layer and retrieves the spear. But first he must overcome the temptation of lust, provided by flower girls (an old-fashioned grand opera element of using a ballet) who dance suggestively and try to seduce him.

Kundry, Amforta's consort and herself a witch, attempts in vain to seduce Parsifal into the dark side. Kundry, in fact, repents, much like the Mary Magdalene did in the Bible and decides to devote her life to the higher spiritual calling. She bathes Parsifal's feet and joins him in the cause for the Grail. The finale is a rousing, spiritual chorus which declares purity restored, eternal happiness and redemption brought about by the communion with the Holy Grail. The music of Wagner's score for Parsifal is what most captivates the listener.

It is haunting, beautiful, aching music. The muted, soft strings appear celestial and ethereal, the orchestra takes on a mystic quality. The religious tone of music is incredible, hallucinatory, surreal. Music students and opera singers alike are very much in a state of awe upon hearing the grand music for Parsifal. This opera is a must have for opera fans. For fans of the Holy Grail legend, and as some would say, universal truth of human connection as people, this is an opera that beats the rest. Although Wagner was anti-semitic, we must look beyond the bad rap about Parsifals' supposed calling for Aryan or white supremacy. Everyone knows this is not so in the real sense. The opera's music is telling a different story. It is actually calling for the universal communion we must share as people, aside from religious differences, race and any other thing. Five stars.

Unearthly splendor..........2003-02-21

To call Parsifal "a great opera" would be to sell it short. That this music came from the mind of a human being is almost unbelievable! From it's first phrase, Parsifal unfolds like an unearthly dream. Rather than being made up of neat, pretty phrases, or calculating thrills after the manner of most of his contemporaries, Wagner reaches for more. Even the raging of riding Valkyries or Siegfried forging has mostly dissapated. This is music free from showiness or artifice--it's monumental power is essential. Parsifal is a long opera, at 260 minutes. It's first act is as long as many full lenth operas. It takes it's time. But Wagner's shifting, painful harmonies cut to the soul.

The story of the opera has been the subject of much analysis, much of it written by people with certain agendas, or unsympathetic with it's mystical, romantic, idealistic tone. But Parsifal isn't about Aryan supremacy. It's about the power of innocence and compassion to redeem the world, and it makes it's point with astonishing spiritual power. To those unfamiliar with the work, you'll understand it much better in the theatre. Four and a half hours of intense music can be daunting to the uninitiated. But repeated listening will deepen your appreciation for this music.

I love Solti's reading of this opera. I generally like all the cast. It's true that Rene Kollo has a unique voice, but it has a kind of innocent tone, free from histrionics which would be out of place in this opera. The recording quality is superb, and the orchestral playing is revelatory.

If I had to choose one work of music as the greatest ever written, Parsifal would probably be at the top of the list.

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