Walter Berry
Bass Walter Berry grew, by measured and steady advancement, into one of the leading artists of his time. Beginning at the Vienna Staatsoper at the early age of 21, he progressed through the major Mozart baritone and bass roles to such weightier challenges as Beethoven's Pizarro and Wagner's Kurwenal, Telramund, and even Wotan. He was able to transmute the sunny, rounded, very Viennese sound of his wide-ranging instrument into something more potent, more incisive for his Wagner roles and he became one of the most celebrated Wozzecks of his day. His musicianship and sturdy voice made him a welcome guest at many of the world's leading opera venues and he was regarded as an affecting recitalist as well.
Originally intending to pursue a career in engineering, Berry switched to vocal study and trained with Hermann Gallos at the Vienna Musical Academy. He made his debut as a soloist in Honegger's Jeanne-d'Arc and soon thereafter joined the Staatsoper. As early as 1953, he was singing Masetto at Salzburg, the first of an outstanding gallery of Mozart characterizations. At the festival, he also participated in the premieres of Gottfried von Einem's Prozess (1953), Rolf Leibermann's Penelope (1954), and Werner Egk's Irische Legende (1954).
America heard Berry for the first time when he presented his genial Mozart Figaro at Chicago's Lyric Opera in 1957. Three years later, he returned to Chicago as part of a more stellar cast (Schwarzkopf, Streich, his then-wife Christa Ludwig, and Eberhard Wächter) to offer a Figaro unchallenged by any other than Cesare Siepi's. Berry subsequently sang Leporello, Don Alfonso, Fernando (Fidelio), and Baron Ochs in Chicago.
On October 2, 1966, Berry made his debut at the Metropolitan Opera in a production of Strauss' Die Frau Ohne Schatten conducted by Karl Böhm. Together with James King's Emperor, Leonie Rysanek's Empress and Christa Ludwig's Dyer's Wife, Berry's Barak was hailed as a magnificent accomplishment and an immense popular success. A live recording with that same quartet of principals, captured in Salzburg in 1974, reveals each singer performing at such a pitch of vocal and interpretive splendor as to have made the collaboration legendary. Although his marriage to Ludwig had ended in 1971, Berry was still the partner of choice for the mezzo-soprano's intense and soaring Dyer's Wife. Berry made his Covent Garden debut as Barak in 1976 and sang the role in San Francisco that same year.
Berry's increasingly powerful voice tended toward the lower end of bass-baritone spectrum and his Baron Ochs managed the bottommost notes with authority. His recording with Bernstein is both substantially sung and interpreted with Viennese lightness. Berry had accumulated an extensive discography by the time of his death, remaining in good voice until the very end of his life (he participated in a Renée Fleming Strauss recital shortly before his death). His hearty and endearing Papageno was recorded twice. His Pizarro in the 1961 Klemperer recording of Fidelio, despite the conductor's slow pacing, served notice that his was an art destined for more than Mozart. His singing of the bass arias in Klemperer's recording of Bach's St. Matthew Passion is fluent and deeply felt, notwithstanding, once again, some glacial tempi.
Though never quite viewed as a star personality, Berry crafted his own unique spot among the great singers who reigned in the twentieth century's second half.
© TiVo
Discografia
14 álbum(ns) • Ordenado por Mais vendidos
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Humperdinck: Hansel und Gretel
Lucia Popp, Brigitte Fassbaender, Walter Berry, Wiener Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Georg Solti
Classical - Lançado por Decca Music Group Ltd. em 1 de jan. de 1978
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Schumann : Spanisches Liederspiel - Brahms : 18 Liebeslieder Waltzes (Live)
Edith Mathis, Peter Schreier, Brigitte Fassbaender, Walter Berry, Erik Werba, Paul von Schilhawsky
Lieder (German) - Lançado por Orfeo em 19 de out. de 2018
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Bartók: Duke Bluebeard's Castle
Christa Ludwig, Walter Berry, London Symphony Orchestra, István Kertész
Classical - Lançado por Decca Music Group Ltd. em 1 de jan. de 1966
A discografia ideal da QobuzQualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mozart: Die Zauberflöte
Classical - Lançado por Decca Music Group Ltd. em 1 de jan. de 1956
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Beethoven: Fidelio
Gundula Janowitz, Christa Ludwig, Jon Vickers, Walter Berry, Orchester der Wiener Staatsoper, Herbert von Karajan
Classical - Lançado por Deutsche Grammophon (DG) em 1 de jan. de 2008
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Messe In C-Moll KV 427
Symphonies - Lançado por Preiser Records em 7 de fev. de 1995
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Don Giovanni, Wozzek, Fidelio, Frau ohne Schatten, Lohengrin, Cosi fan tutte, Nozze di Figaro, Rosenkavalier, Parsifal, Falstaff & Capriccio
Opera - Lançado por Orfeo em 17 de mar. de 2009
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mozart: Don Giovanni, Nozze di Figaro & Cosi fan tutte
Wiener Philharmonic Orchestra, Walter Berry, Herbert von Karajan, Leonyte Pice
Opera - Lançado por Forlane em 1 de jan. de 2014
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Ullmann: Der Kaiser von Atlantis; Hölderlin-Lieder
Classical - Lançado por Decca Music Group Ltd. em 4 de out. de 1994
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Beethoven: Fidelio
Gundula Janowitz, Christa Ludwig, Jon Vickers, Walter Berry, Orchester der Wiener Staatsoper, Herbert von Karajan
Classical - Lançado por Deutsche Grammophon (DG) em 1 de jan. de 2008
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Wagner: Rienzi
Opera - Lançado por OperaPrima em 1 de jan. de 2013
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Egk: Irische Legende (Live)
Opera - Lançado por Orfeo em 1 de mar. de 2019
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Puccini: Manon Lescaut (Sung in German) [Recorded 1954]
Classical - Lançado por Walhall Eternity Series em 1 de fev. de 2015
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Beethoven: Fidelio
Christa Ludwig, Walter Berry, Jon Vickers
Opera - Lançado por Past Classics em 4 de fev. de 2013
Qualidade de CD de 16 bits 44.1 kHz - Stereo