Händel: Giulio Cesare in Egitto HWV 17 (in German)

• Cast: Fritz Wunderlich (Sesto), Walter Berry (Giulio Cesare), Lucia Popp (Cleopatra), Christa Ludwig (Cornelia), Hans Günter Nöcker (Achillas), Karl Christian Kohn (Ptolemeo), Hans Bruno Ernst (Curio), Max Proebstl (Nizenus), BR Choir, Münchener Philharmoniker, cond. Ferdinand Leitner

• From the Orfeo C 351 943 D booklet text: "Thanks to an experienced artistic personality at the conductor's desk, there came into being not only a musically and stylistically harmonios production, but also a document of a generation of singers that is seen today as unique."
• John B Steane about Orfeo C 351 943 D in "Gramophone", 3/1995: "It is usually the big nineteenth-century opera sets that are bought for their singers; but with a line-up of principals such as we have here Handel too is swept into the golden net. Lucia Popp, two years into her career after her Vienna debut, Christa Ludwig, Fritz Wunderlich, Walter Berry: that is a quartet which in its time may have seemed no more than standard stuff, but at this date looks starry indeed. [...] The Orfeo, for one thing, is sung in German instead of Italian; it has cuts, though many fewer than the Mackerras recording in English with Dame Janet Baker; it has the solo voices recorded very close indeed (those that are supposedly off-stage are just about where many modern recordings would have them except when off-stage); and the orchestra sounds, to our re-trained ears, big and thick, with the heavy bass-line that used to seem as proper to Handel as gravy from the roast was to Yorkshire pudding. The roles of Caesar and Sextus, moreover, are taken by men, and there is not a countertenor in sight.
  The origin of the recording is a broadcast on Bavarian Radio, part of an ambitious series in which Handel's principal operas and oratorios would be presented to a public far less accustomed to such things than we are today. The preparation was clearly very thorough, the text being a good one by the lights of those times, the orchestral playing of a high standard, Ferdinand Leitner's direction steady and judicious. Popp is perhaps an ideal Cleopatra, most beautiful and fresh in tone with something appropriately charismatic about the voice-character, and sensitive to the developments of this woman whom Handel has invested with such fascinating life. Ludwig, sumptuous of voice, gives a moving account of Cornelia's lament in Act 1. Wunderlich's every appearance is welcome, and he probably is best of all the soloists in securing variety and making the words tell. A bass-baritone Caesar has to deal with runs not meant for such a voice, and Walter Berry is most successful in the quieter, less florid numbers, particularly in the expression of reverence for the dead Pompey. There is much to enjoy. And there might have been still more had the 'English text enclosed' turned out to be a libretto. All I could find by way of 'text' was a plot summary. An additional help would have been the provision of aria titles in Italian in the track-listing."
• "The Rough Guide to Opera", 1997: "Those more interested in singing than authenticity might want to sample Orfeo's live 1965 recording, for the cast includes Lucia Popp, Walter Berry, Christa Ludwig and Fritz Wunderlich."

If you know this recording, feel free to add your own comment!

	Orfeo d'Or C351943D (3 CD)
	Melodram MEL 37059 (3 CD)
	Opera d'Oro OPD-1192 (3 CD; the final chorus is faded out 1 min too early!)
	Verona 27035/37 (3 CD)
	Verona 30010/18 (9 CD, = 27011/13 + 27032/34 + 27035/37)

Excerpts on

	DG 435 145-2 ("Erwacht in meinem Herzen", "Nur weinen lernte ich", "Keine Schlange läßt sich töten" on "FW - 5 CD Set")
	DG 794 731-1 (4745182) ("Erwacht in meinem Herzen", "Nur weinen lernte ich", "Keine Schlange läßt sich töten" on "FW - Arien und Duette")

Fritz Wunderlich Discography