;i1r,,*-==::xr - Chandos

Editor's note:
Something should be added to the subject'Aksel
Schigtz and Opera". There ile the Tchaikovsky and
Gounod items to consider. They were recorded in
1944, the last session during the war. They had
been forgotten, it seems, because the 78 rpm record
was not issued till the late 50s.
Both items were in Aksel Schiptz's repertoire.
They were programmed for a recital on April 13th
19,+0. Hitler had occupied Denmmk on the 9th.
Aksel Schiotz refused to cancel the recital, because
in his view that would be submission.
Faust's "Salut demeure" has a high C near the
end. But it is hrdly the high C of an operatic tenor
we heu. This recording illustrates limits. Aksel
Schiotz had studied the paft of Faust with John
Forsell at Stockholm and did sing it at the Royal
Opera of Copenhagen. There he had also appeared
in Wagner. No, I am not pulling your leg! I hasten
to add that it was the pan ofWalther von der
Vogelweide in Tannhduser, a part which consists in
ensemble-singing.
The Lenski aria is much more succesful. It is
not the sound of a Russian tenor, of course. But
sung as here, almost like a Lied, or as the inner
monologue it is ("in deep thought", is the
direction), the soft pain, those innermost feelings in
the music, come out beautifully.
Don Ottavio, that most ridiculed of operatic
chilacters, has some likeness to Lenski. Soren
Kierkegaud did not find him interesting, writing
about "Don Giovanni" and making the point that
Don Juan is the ideal theme for an opera, as
sensual seduction is the nature of music, as it is
Don Juan's ("Either-Or", part 1).
Having found and recognized her seducer,
Donna Anna describes to Don Ottavio, in much
and unbelievable detail, her experience as an
unsuccesful attempt of rape. (Which is not
consistent with, at the start of the opera, her
clinging to Don Juan and calling him "deceiver". It
is really Donna Anna whose tragic fault it is that
her father is killed. Edward J. Dent mentions that a
British audience will usually give out a dirty
laughter at the rape story, Don Ottavio being the
laughing-stock for his nalve acceptance of the
story.) In music of furious passion Donna Anna
now orders Don Ottavio to be her revenger. Then
she leaves. Don Ottavio, left alone, sings "Dalla
sua pace". What other singer has put that kind of
loving rapture and tendemess in this music? The
inexperienced boy is a tragic fi.gure, as sung by
Schigtz. IIis feelings are betrayed by the knot tied
by Don Giovanni, the erotomaniac, and a Donna
Anna whose passion has been moused,
dangerously.
If the reader cannot agree to all this. it still
remains that Schiotz as he sings Don Ottavio's
rias, found inner true feelings which musically
and psychologically show up Don Giovanni, for
inner true feelings are not in the seducer's
repertoire. So we can understand Egisto Tango's
behaviour on the podium.
On the opera stage Aksel Schiotz had his
finest successes in "Liden Kirsten" ("Fair Kirsten",
a rommtic opera by Hans Christian Andersen and
J.PE. Hartmann which Liszt had performed at
Weimar) and in Britten's "The Rape of Lucretia".
More about this in other volumes of the collection.
A short dialogue between Mogens Wdldike
and Aksel SchiOtz is included after the recorded
rehearsal excer?ts:
MW: Thank you! - we'll have a look on it during
the interval before we go on.