RECORDS Lieder Singer

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29900, 14 August 1962, Page 10

RECORDS Lieder Singer

HAYDN: Songs—Gebel zu Gott; Zufriedenhcit; Las Leben Ist tin Traum; Gegenliebe; Der Gleichslnn; Lob der Faulheit; Auch die Sprodesle der Schonen; Abschiedslied; Goti, erhalle den Kaiser; The Spirit’s Song; Fidelity; Recollection; Piercing Eyes; She never told her love; The Wanderer; Sailor’s Song. Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (baritone) and Gerald Moore (piano). H.M.V. mono MALP. 1829 (l?tn. 42s Ed.)

SCHUBERT: Die Wlnterreise. BEETHOVEN: An die Feme Geliebte. Op. 98 Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (baritone) and Gerald Moore (piano). Record Society RZ 6034 (two l?in, 60s).

WOLF: 30 songs from the Spanish Song Book Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (baritone) and Gerald Moore (piano). H.M.V. mono MALP.I7SO (12in. 42s 6d).

Few contemporary singers have such enormous reputations as Dietrich FischerDieskau. Hardly a month goes by without the issue in Britain of one or two new LP's by him. His recitals are said to have almost the atmosphere of religious ceremonies, with the baritone officiating as the high priest of lieder, and to suggest that one does not find him a truly great lieder singer is regarded as heresy by the faithful. < Devoted admirers need read no further: they need merely to note the issue of these records and make their choice.) , Fischer-Dieskau has already, at the age of 37, recorded more songs than any other singer in gramophone history. He has not been very daring in his choice of composers, but now that he has covered the outputs of Schubert, Schumann, Brahms, Wolf and Strauss with great thoroughness he has begun to stray from romantic fields. Haydn’s songs have been unjustly neglected. They do not conform to later ideas of the ideal relationship between words and music, but musically they are most rewarding, and there are a few masterpieces, such as "The Spirit's Song.” The English and German songs have a side each. Fischer-Dieskau’s English is excellent and he sings the songs quilt well, without ever suggesting that he feels very convinced about them. His delivery of “Gott, erhalte den Kaiser"—the Austrian national anthem—for instance, is disconcertingly bland

The immense facility which allows him to perform such a quantity of music also gives his performances a rather machine-made character. His singing is note perfect, but very often he presents only the letter of the score, and identification with the music is lacking. Nor are his purely vocal endowments so rich as to minimise this. There is a lack of clean, solid tone at medium levels of volume, with little transition between the sweet soft notes he uses so extensively and white, explosive loud notes. There is also frequent unsteadiness, or spread tone that obscures the basic pitch. These vocal inequalities are particularly noticeable in the Beethoven songcycle. which is finely sung until the last song, when explosive climaxes shatter the atmosphere.

The same happens in some of the ‘‘Winter’s Journey" songs—such as "Der Rucklick.” which is belted out with great harsh bangs. But there is something more fundamentally disturbing in his performance of this songcycle. Fischer-Dieskau is very responsive to words and he seems to neglect the music to characterise the selfpitying hero of Muller’s poems. Self - identification with these rather maudlin sentiments cannot be counted as a very great artistic feat, especially when Schubert has transcended them in his nobly tragic music. But Fischer-Dieskau is so preoccupied with changes of tone colour and verbal inflexions j —such as emotional wobbles I on the words for “me" and I “I” —that the vocal line often | becomes shapeless. There is less external emotion as the i cycle goes on, but even the , final “Der Leiermann." which [promises to be first-class, is

marred by shudders. Gerald Moore accompanies splendidly throughout. The Schubert first appeared in 1955 as a three-sided set, while the Beethoven came out in 1953, coupled with Schubert’s socalled "Swan Song.”. The Wolf disc is the best of the records under review. The selection comprises seven of the 10 religious songs and 23 of the 34 secular songs from the Spanisches Liederbuch—a collection of German translations of sixteenth and seventeenth-century Spanish poetry into which Wolf hurled himself in 1889-90. They include such glorious songs as "Auf dem grunvn Balkon" and “Nun wandie. Maria." Fischer-Dieskau is at his best here, singing the songs simply with care for the music and understanding of the texts. Nevertheless, to turn to the volumes of the pre-war Hugo Wolf Society and hear these songs sung by such singers as Alexander Kipnis. Gerhard Husch, Herbert Janssen and Elisazeth Rethberg—often also with Gerald Moore as the splendid accompanist—is like a change from monochrome to full colour. But until these wonderful 78 s are reissued on LP, collectors should become acquainted with the songs through Fischer - Dieskau’s singing of them, for it seems unlikely that any other singer will soon challenge him in this field. In both the H.M.V. and Record Society issues the recording is rough at climaxes.