Finding an accurate account of Eileen Farrell’s career as a soprano is no easy matter. This is one of those situations in which one encounters flaws (even if they are not monumental) on her Wikipedia page; and any attempt to establish a complete discography is likely to be frustrated. One reason for difficulty may be that, while the story of Farrell’s training is a relatively straightforward one, her career path almost immediately departed from what one tends to expect of a “serious vocalist.”
Basically, the major factor in the establishment of Farrell’s talent and the rise of her prestige was radio. Her first job, which began in 1940, was as a member of the “house chorus” for the CBS Radio network. However, someone at CBS quickly realized the extent of her talent; and, after only three months, she was given her own half-hour radio program. She was accompanied by the CBS Orchestra conducted by Howard Barlow, and her repertoire combined popular songs with the classical repertoire. That show ran through 1946, the year that marked the beginning of her recording career on the Columbia label (as was observed a little less than a week ago in time to mark Farrell’s 100th birthday). Her very first recording session took place on June 14, 1946, when she recorded four familiar Irish songs.
Having established herself as a radio personality, Farrell made her first tour as a concert singer during the 1947–1948 season, followed by a tour of South America in 1949. Her reputation as a classical soprano was established following a recital she gave in New York in October of 1950. This probably led to Dmitri Mitropoulos selecting her to sing the role of Marie in the concert performances of Alban Berg’s Wozzeck, which he would conduct in April of 1951, leading the New York Philharmonic. The recording of those performances led to her first appearance on Columbia Masterworks Records. Ironically, a little less that a year later, RCA Victor recorded her as the soprano soloist in a performance of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Opus 125 (“Choral”) symphony in D minor with Arturo Toscanini conducting the NBC Symphony Orchestra; but Farrell’s recording career would continue with Columbia, resulting in the recent release of a sixteen-CD box set of all of her American Columbia recording sessions.
Not counting the excerpts from George Frideric Handel’s HWV 56 Messiah oratorio, which provides the final tracks of a Carols for Christmas CD, nine CDs of classical music follow the two-CD recording of Wozzeck. Six of these are basically operatic, although Wozzeck is the only opera presented in its entirety. There may be some quibbling over the Richard Wagner CD sharing space with Ralph Vaughan Williams’ “Serenade to Music” performed at the very first concert to be held in the very first Lincoln Center building to be completed, known at that time as Philharmonic Hall. However, Farrell never recorded enough Wagner to fill a CD; and (for what it is worth) the conductor for Wagner was the same as the one for Vaughan Williams, Leonard Bernstein.
The major selection on this album is Brünnhilde’s “Immolation Scene,” which concludes both Götterdämmerung (twilight of the Gods) and the entire Der Ring des Nibelungen (the ring of the Nibelung) cycle. This is followed by the orchestral version of the five songs based on poems by Mathilde Wesendonck, originally composed for female voice and piano. Only the last of these, “Träume” (dreams), was orchestrated by Wagner himself. Felix Mottl orchestrated the other four after Wagner’s death.
Farrell never sang Wagner during her career with the Metropolitan Opera. For that matter Bernstein never conducted a Wagner opera at the Met either. Those who take their Wagner seriously will probably find themselves quibbling with the understanding of Brünnhilde brought to this performance by both Farrell and Bernstein. More casual listeners will probably still enjoy the mighty noise with which Valhalla goes up in flames. At the other end of the spectrum, the account of the Wesendonck settings is at best at the journeyman level with little suggestion of the erotic motives behind the texts.
However, that last sentence raises one of the greatest shortcomings of the entire collection. This is a rich collection of vocal material in a moderate diversity of different languages, but the package does not provide the listener with any of the texts, neither in the original language nor in English translation. You would that imagined that all of those texts could have been put on a single CD-ROM in PDF form in a way that would have satisfied most listeners; but, whether or not this was proposed, Producer Robert Russ failed to include such a resource as part of the package.
Beyond any shortcomings with Wagner, Farrell always seemed to bring just the right level of sensitivity to the operatic roles represented in this collection. I was particularly impressed with subtleties that she teased out in her Giacomo Puccini performances. In terms of her own qualities of interpretation, I found it interesting that, in La bohème, she could be just as convincing as Mimi as she was of Musetta; and, in the same context, her account in Turandot of Liù was as impressive as her handling of the title role.
Richard Tucker and Eileen Farrell (from the booklet from the collection being discussed, opposite the page with the track listing for the duets by Giuseppe Verdi that they recorded)
In the not-quite-opera category there is a CD of Bernstein conducting Beethoven’s Opus 123 Missa solemnis with Farrell as soprano soloist. As with the Wagner selections, one wishes she could have been paired with a better conductor; but both Bernstein and Farrell were “Columbia artists.” That leaves two art song albums with George Trovillo accompanying Farrell at the piano. These tend to be a-little-of-this-a-little-of-that recital programs. This should not be surprising, since the early Sixties were a time when recital programs were more about highlighting the vocalist, rather that providing the listener with some kind of coherent “journey.” Across these two albums what remains most strongly in memory are Farrell’s accounts of six songs by Ottorino Respighi that begin the very last CD in the collection, even though they are not organized around any overall narrative framework.
No comments:
Post a Comment