Legge’s Operetta Series on CD: A Delicious Froth

Walter Legge, the producing genius behind the operatic treasures of the early years of the Angel/EMI label, deserves no less credit for overseeing the operetta series dating from the same years, 1952-58. The nominal star of those performances was Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Mrs. Legge--but no one dared suggest nepotism with a talent of that magnitude.

Schwarzkopf was part of an ensemble that, in the operettas, included the young and virtually unknown Nicolai Gedda; a pair of echt -Viennese singing comedians, Erich Kunz and Karl Donch, and soubrettes Erika Koth and Emmy Loose, all under the lithe baton of Otto Ackermann, presiding over a London Philharmonia Orchestra transformed into the world’s most stylish waltz band.

The series is at last with us again, sounding better than ever in digital sound on Angel compact discs.

For one listener the cream of this frothy crop is “Wiener Blut,” top non-vocal tunes (waltzes, polkas, gallops) from the pen of Johann Strauss Jr., posthumously joined by the book and lyrics of Victor Leon and Leo Stein, who would later create the “Die Lustige Witwe” libretto for Franz Lehar. Their efforts on behalf of “Wiener Blut” resulted in a musical delight coupled to a loopy farce of which Feydeau might not have been ashamed.

The Legge troupe, headed by Schwarzkopf--the teasing, cooing, vocal affectations that can make listening to her a trial in more serious repertory are made to order for this material--Gedda and Kunz is pure joy, and Angel accommodates the 70-minute score on a single CD.

Another arrangement, this time involving surgery by Erich Wolfgang Korngold on an existing, unsuccessful Strauss operetta, is “Eine Nacht in Venedig.” While the work is musically cohesive in Korngold’s refashioning, the confused-identities plot has little of the wit of the “Wiener Blut” libretto. The tunes, however, are irresistible and the performance is consistently on the mark, with the additional plum of some ravishing singing by the Philharmonia Chorus. The single CD (69530) is nearly 80 minutes long.

Strauss’ other great operetta, which, like “Fledermaus,” can be found on the major operatic stages alongside Mozart and Verdi (although with less frequency), is “Der Zigeunerbaron” (69526, 2 CDs). It is given what must be the performance of its lifetime by the repertory company, augmented by the 25-year-old Hermann Prey, belting out the great last-act recruiting song with spectacular brio.

The best known work of Lehar, ruler of the second generation of Viennese operettists, is, of course, “The Merry Widow” (69520--another single-disc bargain). Schwarzkopf is both merry and in most alluring vocal form, while Gedda and Loose exude optimum charm as the young lovers. Casting Kunz as Danilo may cheat us of some notes--Kunz’s range was restricted, to say the least--but he does give us some memorable clowning.

A more serious Lehar operetta is “Das Land des Lachelns” (The Land of Smiles). Ackermann and his cast made a powerful case for it with their 1953 recording (69523, 2 CDs). Hearing its greatest tune (and Richard Tauber’s signature), “Dein ist mein ganzes Herz” (Yours is my heart alone), in chilling context is a revelation: The Chinese prince sings it to his young Viennese wife to indicate that of all his wives she is the one who has his heart, which ultimately proves insufficient for the lady.

There is more to this operetta than that single tune--ravishingly sung by Gedda, with no attempt at imitating Tauber--and, again, all of it handsomely done by the Legge troupe. But there is something uncomfortable-making about the libretto, by Fritz Lohner and Ludwig Herzer, in which the intelligent Asians are perhaps unintentionally caricatured as being shifty and barbaric while the frivolous, even dimwitted, Europeans are to be loved at pretty-face value.

It should be noted that the two “Smiles” CDs (69523) total only 87 minutes playing time--eight minutes longer than the single-disc “Eine Nacht in Venedig.” Surely Angel could have included some of the operetta arias recorded by Schwarzkopf and Ackermann around the time of these sessions.

“Die Fledermaus” (69531, 2 CDs) is the single fatally flawed production in the lot, done in by two pieces of miscasting: a self-effacing Bach tenor, Helmut Krebs, chosen to impersonate Alfred, the preening Italian tenor, and Kunz, who is is all wrong for Falke, trying to make it on charm alone where a strong, secure operatic voice is demanded.

Then again, charm is precisely what is lacking in the conducting of Herbert von Karajan, who muscles and hacks his way through the score where Ackermann danced.

A final cavil, which applies to the entire series: While trilingual notes (and synopses) of minimal worth are provided, the crucial librettos and their translations are not. Hardly fair play when one considers that these are full-priced CDs.