Richard Strauss; Richard Wagner - Four Last Songs; Arias from Tannhäuser (Lise Davidsen)

Information

Composer: Richard Strauss; Richard Wagner

• (01) Wagner - Tannhäuser: 'Dich, teure Halle' (Act II, Scene 1)
• (02) Wagner - Tannhäuser: 'Allmächt'ge Jungfrau!' (Act III, Scene 1)
• (04) Strauss - Vier Lieder, Op. 27
• (08) Strauss - Wiegenlied, Op. 41 No. 1
• (09) Strauss - Malven, TrV 297 (orch. Wolfgang Rihm)
• (10) Strauss - Vier letzte Lider

Lise Davidsen, soprano
Philharmonia Orchestra
Esa-Pekka Salonen, conductor

Date: 2019
Label: Decca
https://www.deccaclassics.com/en/catalogue/products/lise-davidsen-570

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Review

It’s been a long time since a singer has generated as much buzz as the Norwegian soprano Lise Davidsen, Gramophone’s current Young Artist of the Year, and her debut album for Decca was always going to be an event. She opts for Strauss and Wagner: no surprise given recent and current engagements, even if eyebrows might well be raised that a 32-year-old soprano should have chosen to record the Four Last Songs for her debut recital.

But Davidsen is no ordinary singer. Throughout the whole album one marvels at the voice, its easy grandeur and sheer size, its steely focus and security – all well captured by Decca’s engineers. The timbre has a default cool beauty but she can flood it with warmth to fill out a phrase magnificently. These gifts are matched by the maturity, honesty and integrity of Davidsen’s approach.

The operatic extracts make an impressive opener – confident and superbly sung. But she’s even better in the earlier Strauss songs, where we get a real sense of tension in a terrific ‘Ruhe, meine Seele!’ and plenty of Schwung in ‘Cäcilie’ and ‘Heimliche Aufforderung’. ‘Morgen’ is a marvel of calm contemplation, showing (as does a melting ‘Wiegenlied’) how beautifully Davidsen can pare her voice down when necessary. She seems a little less sure, though, how to deal with Strauss’s actual last song, the slight ‘Malven’ – not helped by being heard in its orchestral guise.

And the Four Last Songs themselves? Davidsen’s vocal riches and interpretative honesty are deeply rewarding, her majestic soprano harking perhaps most to the work’s first performer (and her compatriot) Kirsten Flagstad, rather than to any of the more lyrical sopranos that have dominated over the last decades. There are many wonderful moments, such as the final hushed phrase of ‘September’, leading to that heartbreaking horn solo, beautifully done here.

But I miss the sense of these songs having been lived in, and Davidsen inevitably takes a little longer to get airborne in her phrases than lighter voices do, needing a bit more space to negotiate the bends of Strauss’s melismas. And she’s not helped by Esa Pekka Salonen, whose conducting sometimes here feels strangely listless. The grand opening of ‘Im Abendrot’ (a distinctly broad nine minutes in this recording), for example, soon starts to sag and lose warmth – compare how Karajan fills out and sustains these phrases in his famous account with Gundula Janowitz.

Arguably Davidsen could have waited until she had more to say about these remarkable works before going into the studio with them. But there’s still enormous pleasure to be had from hearing her in them, and this album only reinforces the fact that she is one of the greatest vocal talents to have emerged in recent years, if not decades.

-- Hugo Shirley, Gramophone

More reviews:
ClassicsToday  ARTISTIC QUALITY: 9 / SOUND QUALITY: 9
http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2019/Jun/Strauss_Davidsen_4834883.htm
https://theclassicreview.com/album-reviews/review-lise-davidsen-sings-strauss-and-wagner/
https://www.limelightmagazine.com.au/reviews/wagner-%E2%80%A2-strauss-lise-davidsen-philharmonia-orchestra-esa-pekka-salonen/
https://www.amazon.com/Lise-Davidsen-Salonen-Philharmonia-Orchestra/dp/B07Q363D8M

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Richard Strauss (11 June 1864 – 8 September 1949) was a leading German composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras. He is known for his operas, lieder, tone poems and other orchestral works. Strauss was also a prominent conductor throughout Germany and Austria, enjoying quasi-celebrity status as his compositions became standards of orchestral and operatic repertoire. Strauss made a large number of recordings, both of his own music as well as music by German and Austrian composers. Along with Gustav Mahler, Strauss represents the late flowering of German Romanticism after Richard Wagner.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Strauss

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Richard Wagner (22 May 1813 – 13 February 1883) was a German composer, theater director, polemicist, and conductor who is primarily known for his operas. He revolutionized opera through his concept of the Gesamtkunstwerk ("total work of art"), by which he sought to synthesize the poetic, visual, musical and dramatic arts, with music subsidiary to drama. His composition are noted for their complex textures, rich harmonies and orchestration, and the elaborate use of leitmotifs. Wagner's influence spread beyond musical composition into conducting, philosophy, literature, the visual arts and theatre.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Wagner

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Lise Davidsen (born February 8, 1987 in Stokke) is a Norwegian opera singer. She studied at the Grieg Academy in Bergen and the Royal Opera Academy in Copenhagen. Davidsen made her first appearances with the Royal Danish Opera during the 2012-13 season and came to prominence after winning first prize and audience prize at the Operalia competition in London in 2015. In 2018, she was named the Gramophone Magazine Young Artist of the Year. Davidsen has performed in many festivals and opera houses, and has recorded two albums before signing an exclusive recording contract with Decca.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lise_Davidsen
https://lisedavidsen.com/

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