WAGNER: DIE WALKURE - NILSSON, VICKERS, LONDON, LEINSDORF, LONDON PHILHARMONIC (3 CDS)

Possibly the most thrilling, sexually-charged ‘Walküre’ ever recorded, this CD features the sappy voices of Gré Brouwenstijn and Jon Vickers as Sieglinde and Siegmund coupled with two of the leading Wagnerians of their day – Nilsson and London – as Brünnhilde and Wotan. Also listen out for the wind machine introduced in the Prelude to Act I! This is real aural theatre.

‘…an exciting, eloquent, lyrical, and always vital account of the opera [it] draws splendid playing, of which the conductor must have been proud, and we should be, from the London Symphony Orchestra, all departments of which distinguish themselves. … Gré Brouwenstijn gives a most musicianly, youthful sounding and touching rendering of Sieglinde … Nilsson is glorious here, but one hardly needs to praise the greatest exponent of her part today … This wonderful Brünnhilde has worthy partners in George London’s Wotan and Jon Vickers’s Siegmund’ Gramophone

‘… one of the finest Wagnerian casts in recent memory under a vastly experienced ‘Ring’ conductor, and the result is a triumph … Perhaps the chief credit must go to the conductor, Erich Leinsdorf … possibly Leinsdorf’s greatest achievement is the way in which he maintains interest throughout the whole vast canvas. … and the final pages are more thrilling than I have ever heard them.’ Records and Recordings

RICHARD WAGNER
Die Walküre

Brünnhilde: Birgit Nilsson
Siegmund: Jon Vickers
Hunding: David Ward
Wotan: George London
Sieglinde: Gré Brouwenstijn
Fricka: Rita Gorr

Valkyries:
Gerhilde: Marie Collier
Helmwige: Judith Pierce
Waltraute: Margreta Elkins
Schwertleite: Joan Edwards
Ortlinde: Julia Malyon
Siegrune: Noreen Berry
Grimgerde: Maureen Guy
Rossweisse: Josephine Veasey

London Symphony Orchestra
Erich Leinsdorf