Word: fricsay
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Mozart: The Magic Flute (RIAS Symphony Orchestra, chorus and soloists conducted by Ferenc Fricsay; Decca, 3 LPs). Despite its slightly studied style and rather tubby sound, this is the finest recording yet to appear of the 165-year-old masterpiece. Soprano Maria Stader makes Pamina a joy to the ear; Rita Streich is awesomely secure in the Queen of the Night's sky-high aerobatics, while the two leading men, Tenor Ernst Häfliger and Baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, use their handsome voices with distinction...
Bartok: Piano Concerto No. 3 (Monique Haas; Berlin's RIAS Symphony Orchestra conducted by Ferenc Fricsay; Decca). Bartok was racing death when he composed this strongly appealing work, because he wanted to leave his pianist-wife something to play for her living. (He died in 1945 with the last few bars uncompleted.) French Pianist Haas is up against some stiff competition from other recorded versions, but, perhaps because the concerto was written for a woman, her delicately imaginative performance is hard to beat...
Rossini: Stabat Mater (Maria Stader, Marianna Radev, Ernst Häfliger, Kim Borg; RIAS Symphony conducted by Ferenc Fricsay; Decca, 2 LPs). The composer who was once advised by Beethoven to stick to comic opera, here turns up in a churchly (if not always churchlike) mood. The chorus sings some lofty and properly devotional counter point, but the lovely solo voices have arias that bounce and flow with the joyfulness of the Barber of Seville. Performance: elegant...
Blacher: Orchestral Variations on a Theme of Paganini (RIAS Symphony Orchestra conducted by Ferenc Fricsay; Decca). The same theme (for solo violin) used by Brahms for his famed Variations gets some plain and fancy going-over by one of Germany's most successful living composers. Boris Blacher uses a big orchestra in opulent style, with emphasis on suave clarinet murmurings, massed brasses in swing-band style and ingratiating melodies. The disk is Vol. I of Decca's New Directions in Music and Sound. Debussy: Pelleas and Mélisande (Janine Micheau, Camille Maurane; chorus and Lamoureux Orchestra conducted...
Esthetic Dustbin. None of her symphonic sisters across the country would have panicked in such a fix, and Miss Ima rose to the occasion. After some quick transatlantic negotiation last week, she announced a major coup: to take over for Fricsay during the spring season. Miss Ima landed one of the world's most famous conductors. His name: Sir Thomas Beecham. Said Miss Ima: "He was very gracious. We feel elated...