Sunday, August 22, 2021

Wagner: Asahina vs. Fischer

 Somebody posted an Asahina Ring Cycle. After the first hour of Götterdämerung, it is as to be expected. It's slow, but the orchestra seems exemplary if perhaps a little small, and even the singing - however small-voiced is wonderful by the cow-mooed standards already in place by the 1980s. You will never hear chording, blending, and balance this skillfully applied. Every moment is full of overtones.

Asahina's Ring Cycle is a miracle in its way, but it's not 'my' Wagner. It glows as few if any versions ever have, but Wagner flows more than he glows, and there is something a little bit creepy about such a loving approach that makes every detail of Wagner glow with affection.
I've always had a particular interest in what Jewish conductors make of Wagner and if one can detect any difference in approach to our forbidden fruit (objectively unlikely I know).
Purely as conducting, Adam Fischer's Bayreuth run in 2002 has become my favorite (the Brünnhilde and Siegfried are just plain not good, the Wotan is not much better...). I can't explain the difference to any other version except to say that the drama is all there without the bombast, the beauty is all there without over-refinement, the paragraphs are long and winding with plenty of rubato but never excessive. It flows as no other conductor has ever made it in a river of apposite darkness. For all the beautiful orchestration, Wagner's glow is entirely superficial... at the level of the soul Wagner is as dark as pitch. Not even Keilberth understands it this well. Fischer makes Wagner sound like a composer without pretension - Wagner suddenly sounds inclusive and all-embracing like Brahms and Mahler.

Asahina: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUGp0gxLLh4

Fischer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1RkhxxY56o&list=PLoasmABcHZdHuVcV0NnAQ6UB1JxPqOAzJ&index=7

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