Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Eloquence
Catalogue: ELQ4840156
Release: 2019
Size: 729 MB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: cover
Strauss II: Der Zigeunerbaron / Act 2
01. Duet: Wer uns getraut
Strauss II: Eine Nacht in Venedig – Operetta in 3 Acts – 1923 Version by Erich Korngold and Ernst Marischka / Act 2
02. Treu sein
Millöcker: Der Bettelstudent – Operetta in 3 Acts / Act 2
03. Soll ich reden (Arr. Rudolf Bibl)
Strauss II: Eine Nacht in Venedig – Operetta in 3 Acts – 1923 Version by Erich Korngold and Ernst Marischka
04. Lagunen-Waltzer
Suppe: Boccaccio
05. Hab’ ich nur deine Liebe
06. Mia bella fiorentina
Lehár: The Merry Widow (Die lustige Witwe) / Act 3
07. Duett: Lippen schweigen
Lehár: Schön ist die Welt / Act 1
08. Frei und jung dabei
09. Schön ist die Welt
Lehár: Schön ist die Welt / Act 3
10. Ich bin verliebt
Lehár: Das Land des Lächelns / Act 1
11. Bei einem Tee à deux
Lehár: Das Land des Lächelns / Act 2
12. Dein ist mein ganzes Herz!
13. Wer hat die Liebe uns ins Herz geschenkt
Lehár: Paganini / Act 2
14. Gern hab’ ich die Frau’n geküsst
15. Niemand liebt Dich
16. Liebe, du Himmel auf Erden
Lehár: Der Zarewitsch, Operetta in 3 Acts / Act 1
17. Allein! Wieder allein! (Wolgalied)
Lehár: Der Zarewitsch, Operetta in 3 Acts / Act 3
18. Kosende Wellen
Lehár: Friederike – A play with music in 3 Acts / Act 2
19. Warum hast du mich wachgeküsst?
Lehár: Der Graf von Luxemburg – Operetta in 3 Acts / Act 2
20. Lieber Freund, man greift nicht nach den Sternen
Kalman: Die Zirkusprinzessin – Operetta in 3 Acts / Act 1
21. Zwei Märchenaugen
Dostal: Clivia / Act 2
22. Ich bin verliebt
Künneke: Der Vetter aus Dingsda – Sung in German / Act 1
23. Ich bin nur ein armer Wandergesell’
Kattnig: Bel Ami – Operetta
24. Bel ami, schöner Freund
Dostal: Die Ungarische Hochzeit / Act 2
25. Spiel’ mir das Lied von Glück und Treu
Kattnig: Mädels vom Rhein
26. Ich weiss mir ein Mädel am sonningen Rhein
27. Czernik: Chi sa?
Kalman: Gräfin Maritza / Act 1
28. Komm mit nach Varasdin
29. Gluck ist ein schöner Traum (Song of the Gypsy)
30. Wir singen dir, wir bringen dir ein Liedchen dar (Song of the Children)
31. Grüß mir mein Wien
32. Spiel, Zigeuner!
33. Höre ich Zigeunergeigen? (Entry of Countess Maritza)
34. Komm, Zigány
35. Bravo, Herr Verwalter
Kalman: Gräfin Maritza / Act 2
36. Intermezzo
37. Wenn ich abends schlafen geh’… Ich möchte träumen von dir, mein Pucikám
38. Herrgott, was ist denn heut’ los… Einmal möcht’ ich wieder tanzen (Waltz Duet)
39. Mein lieber Schatz… Sag’ ja, mein Lieb, sag’ ja… Komm mit nach Varasdin!
40. Sonnenschein, hüll’ dich ein… O schöne Kinderzeit
41. Grüß mir mein Wien
42. Junger Mann ein Mädchen liebt
43. Hei Mariza, hei! Mariza heute mach dein Meisterstück
A feast of Viennese operetta on two Decca albums, newly remastered and reissued complete.
Born in Bratislava – Pressburg, as it was in 1901 – Anton Paulik became a reassuring presence for decades in the pit at the ‘lighter’ Viennese lyric theatres, who could make the music of the ‘Waltz King’ and his successors sparkle and swirl like few others. In charge at the Volksoper one night in summer 1969, Paulik was ‘flawless and apparently ageless’ according to the critic for Opera, who got to the heart of the conductor’s gifts: he ‘knows how to play operettas so that they were whistled in the streets from the premiere onwards, and he knows how to make them sound respectable at the same time. In this respect he is comparable only with the Clemens Krauss of the famous Fledermaus recording’ (also reissued by Eloquence, 4827379).
In 1958 Paulik and the Volksoper had recorded an album of excerpts from Emmerich Kálmán’s best-known operetta, Grafin Märitza. This was done under studio conditions at the city’s Sofiensaal, but thoroughly ‘run in’ after performances of a new production at the Volksoper. Paulik’s presence on the podium was a guarantor of authenticity: he had led the premiere back in 1926 at the Theater an der Wien. Marcel Prawy, who was close to Kálmán during the composer’s last years, produced the recording for RCA (it first appeared on Decca in 1973). To get them in the proper mood, Prawy took the entire cast to the nearby Hungarian border at Lake Neusiedel. While searching for a genuine gypsy band, Prawy and Paulik went to Vienna’s Pataky Restaurant where a new group had recently made its début. They signed the band on the spot, loaded the gypsies into two taxis, went to the Sofiensaal and began to rehearse.
In December 1970, Paulik and the Volksoper returned to the Sofiensaal, this time for Decca, to record a double-LP of Viennese operetta, which was duly released the following year as ‘Vienna, Women and Song’.
The set amounts to a history of the genre, as historically valuable as it is effortlessly enjoyable, opening with a duet from Der Zigeunerbaron and closing with a standalone song by Willy Czernik (1901-99, Chi sa? Between them feature hit numbers from perennial favourites such as Millocker’s Das Bettelstudent, Suppe’s Boccaccio, gems of Lehar from Die lustige Witwe, Das Land des Lächelns, Paganini and several others, before bringing the operatta story up to date with Kálmán, Künneke and names now less familiar to us such as Rudolf Kattnig (Mädels vom Rhein) and Nico Dostal (Die ungarische Hochzeit). With the soprano Renate Holm and tenor Werner Krenn at hand, both stalwarts of the operetta scene in the city, authenticity was once again guaranteed.