CD1 Schubert Song Recital • Fischer

CD2 Mozart Operatic Arias • Pritchard

CD3 R. Strauss Capriccio – closing scene • Vier letzte Lieder • Ackermann

CD4 R. Strauss Scenes from Arabella • Matacic

CD5 A Lieder Recital • Moore

CD6 A Mozart Song Recital • Gieseking

CD7 A Recital of Duets • Seefried • Moore

CD8 Walton Scenes from Troilus and Cressida • Walton

CD9 Elisabeth Schwarzkopf in Songs You Love • Moore

CD10 More Songs You Love aka The Christmas Album • Mackerras

CD11 Elisabeth Schwarzkopf sings Operetta • Ackermann

CD12 Wolf Goethe Lieder • Moore

CD13 Wolf From the Italian Song Book • Moore

CD14 Wolf Songs from the Romantic Poets • Moore

CD15 Schwarzkopf portrays Romantic Heroines • Susskind • Wallberg

CD16 Favourite Scenes and Arias • Rescigno • Schmidt • Galliera

CD17 R. Strauss Vier letzte Lieder • Five Songs with Orchestra • Szell

CD18 Mozart • R. Strauss Concert Arias and Lieder • Brendel • Szell

CD19 Mahler Des Knaben Wunderhorn • Fischer-Dieskau • Szell

CD20 Wolf Italienisches Liederbuch • Fischer-Dieskau • Moore

CD21–22 Brahms Deutsche Volkslieder • Fischer-Dieskau • Moore

CD23–26 The Elisabeth Schwarzkopf Songbook Vols. 1–4 • Moore • Parsons

CD27 Songs I Love • Parsons

CD28 Schumann Frauenliebe und -leben • Liederkreis • Parsons

CD29 A Hugo Wolf Recital • Furtwängler

CD30–31 Homage to Gerald Moore • Fischer-Dieskau • Los Angeles

CD31 Beethoven Fidelio – excerpts • Ah! perfido • Karajan

The 100th birthday of Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, one of the reigning sopranos of the second half of the 20th century, falls on 9 December 2015. She died in 2006, but her recordings are timeless treasures of the Warner Classics catalogue. Like her close contemporary and friend, Maria Callas, Schwarzkopf is a representative of a golden era of recording; but while Callas is closely identified with Italian composers and specifically with opera, Schwarzkopf is admired above all in music of the Austro-German tradition, both opera and song.
The 31-CD deluxe box set, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf: The Complete Recitals 1952-1974, to be released on 6 November, gathers together all the recital programmes of song, opera and operetta that Schwarzkopf recorded for EMI between 1952 and 1974 with Walter Legge – who became the soprano’s husband in 1953 – as producer. Schwarzkopf and Legge conceived each programme with the greatest of care, and this collection respects and retains the integrity of every recital, with no recoupling or reorganisation of the tracks. In addition, the recordings have been remastered to the highest standards in 24-bit/96kHz: Schwarzkopf’s art emerges in all its beauty, refinement and detail.
The collection comprises programmes of song, with both piano and orchestra, and programmes of operatic, operetta and concert arias. The emphasis is on Austro-German composers such as: Mozart; Richard Strauss – notably with two different versions of his sublime Vier letzte Lieder – conducted by Otto Ackermann (1953) and George Szell (the 1965 studio recording, often regarded as the greatest in the catalogue); Schubert; Schumann; Brahms; Wolf; Mahler; Wagner; Johann Strauss and Lehár. The recitals also showcase Schwarzkopf in arias and songs by Italian, Russian, Czech, British and Nordic composers.
Encouraged by Walter Legge, Schwarzkopf developed into the leading female lieder-singer of her time, perhaps famed above all for her interpretations of the sophisticated songs of Hugo Wolf, and this box contains a programme of Wolf recorded in Salzburg in 1953 with none other than the great conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler at the piano. She remains unrivalled for her attention to the meaning of the words and to expressing it through subtleties of phrasing and tonal coloration. Such was her fame as a recitalist that she could sell out large venues such as New York’s Carnegie Hall and London’s Royal Festival Hall for a programme of lieder with piano. Her final appearance as a recitalist came in Zurich in 1979, but she continued to be active as a (sometimes redoubtable) teacher and her students included Thomas Hampson and Renée Fleming.
Elisabeth Schwarzkopf: The Complete Recitals 1952-1974 presents the soprano in collaborations with some of the other greatest artists of her time, such as: sopranos Irmgard Seefried and Victoria de los Angeles; baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau; pianists Walter Gieseking, Edwin Fischer, Gerald Moore (Schwarzkopf’s favoured accompanist), Geoffrey Parsons and Alfred Brendel, and conductors Herbert von Karajan, George Szell, Charles Mackerras, Otto Ackermann and William Walton – who originally composed the role of Cressida in his opera Troilus and Cressida for Schwarzkopf, though she never sang it in the theatre. The recording of scenes from the opera constitutes one of the more unexpected CD in this landmark collection.
Each individual recital in the box is presented in a sleeve with its original artwork. The comprehensive illustrated booklet features essays by three distinguished writers, all acknowledged experts on Elisabeth Schwarzkopf: Alan Sanders (English); André Tubeuf (French) and Thomas Voigt (German).