My Favorite Tristan

George Preston, WNYC's Music Director

Is there an ideal recording of Tristan und Isolde for me? Not really. No single recording puts it all together, but I do have some favorite aspects of different recordings.

First off, here's some Wagnerian blasphemy. I don't like Lauritz Melchior's Tristan. I know he's probably the greatest Heldentenor voice to be recorded, but that's part of the problem. He makes it sound a little too easy! My favorite Tristan is Jon Vickers. Here's someone with a huge, dark, baritonal Wagnerian tenor voice, but he's also capable of the most melting and heart-rending soft singing. It isn’t crooning into the microphone either. I was lucky enough to hear him live a couple of times, and that sweet "mezza-voce" carried to the back of the house. The way Vickers uses his voice conveys a sense not only of great strength, but also of tragic vulnerability, and that's what I want out of a Tristan. It doesn't hurt that he's also one of the most intense actors ever to hit an opera stage.

Birgit Nilsson has long been my front-runner for Isolde on recording, but she's now getting some stiff competition from Christine Brewer, who has just in the past few years started singing Isolde. Truly, when I listened to Christine's Liebestod on her recording with Donald Runnicles, with that incredibly shimmery "Lust" at the very end, I snidely wondered how many takes it had required. Then, after a good 10 seconds of stunned silence, the audience started to applaud. Yes, it's a live recording, and it's fabulous. How wonderful that she has many years of Isoldes ahead of her.

I never paid that much attention to the role of King Marke, until I saw Rene Pape do it live at the Met. This is a performance of such depth, power, and majesty that it made me see Tristan und Isolde in a whole new light. The performance is preserved on video, with equally strong contributions from Ben Heppner and Jane Eaglen, among others in the excellent cast.

Although I love Tristan und Isolde on CD and DVD, I really think it is best experienced live in the theater. If you get the chance, go! Get in the Wagner zone, forget the real world for five hours, make the investment, and you’ll have the theatrical experience of a lifetime.

My Favorite Tristan, Part Two

John Schaefer, WNYC Host

You asked seven people for their favorite Tristan recording and if you don't get seven votes for the Furtwängler recording with the London Philharmonia for EMI, well then it's a mad, mad, mad world.

Which it is. So I nominate the Carlos Kleiber version done for DG with Wagner's own fave band, Staatskapelle Dresden. Okay, it's not as good as the Furtwängler, but I can't listen to five hours of mid-20th century recording technology, however well it was recorded and then later remastered. And maybe it's not as good as the Met recording from just a few years back with James Levine and a cast headed by Ben Heppner and Jane Eaglen — but THAT was only released as a DVD and I'm sorry, I can't suspend disbelief enough to watch that cast and imagine that they are beautiful young lovers. The Kleiber cast, on the other hand, sounds really good, and you don't have to look at them. But most of all, the orchestra sounds brilliant.