# Round 2: Der Manner Sippe. Flagstad, Norman, Traubel



## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)




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## Seattleoperafan (Mar 24, 2013)

I think they are all fabulous and I have listened to all many times. All a tad mature sounding but glorious nevertheless. Norman is too mezzo in timbre for the role, but her low notes are so incredible. The other two are neck and neck but Flagstad wins by a hair with me. They all are marvelous on the low passages which for me is essential, with Flagstad and Traubel making them powerful but very integrated with the rest of the voice. The Flagstad was recorded in 56.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Flagstad loved the role of Sieglinde and it was her debut role at the Met in 1935, when she was already forty years old. I don't know whether she ever got to sing it again once she became the world's most in-demand Brunnhilde, but here she is at age 61, no doubt happy to be recording some of the music. It doesn't take her too high, as some of her late recordings do, and she sounds very much at home with words and music, if a bit mature and without the urgency and subtlety of a Lotte Lehmann ("a" Lotte Lehmann, as if there were more than one!). 

Helen Traubel, for my taste, has a timbre too mature-sounding for the role. Not only mature, but invulnerable; it's hard to imagine Hunding carrying this six-foot Amazon off and marrying her against her will! She gives quite an alert and urgent performance, though. I really can't fault her on musical grounds.

Listening to Jessye Norman in this company, I'm struck by the less incisive quality of her voice, which sounds very dark, a bit hooty, and contraltoish. I've never been able to imagine her as Sieglinde, either vocally or physically, despite the intelligence and urgency she brings to the music. Imagine Siegmund's surprise at discovering that his little twin sister had grown up into a majestically zaftig black woman with the voice of an Erda!

Despite her relative placidity, I'll take Flagstad in this round.


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## MAS (Apr 15, 2015)

I hear three great voices, all of which are over-qualified for Sieglinde, only one of which I’d ever heard in the role and that is Norman. Flagstad and Traubel are, for me, naturally Brunhildes. I didn’t know Flagstad loved singing Sieglinde. 


Strictly voice-wise, the endowments are Flagstad, Traubel and Norman in that order, though all three are fabulous, though I don’t strictly associate Norman with Wagnerian roles. Would I want to hear any of them sing Sieglinde? Certainly I do!

I’ve heard more of Flagstad on recordings than Traubel in my lifetime, so I have a marked preference for her for no other reason than her incomparable voice. She gets my vote.


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## Tsaraslondon (Nov 7, 2013)

Nothing much to add. All of them great voices. None of them born to sing Sieglinde, which means it really just comes down to whose voice I liked the most, and that was Flagstad.

None of them would win over Lehmann though.


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

I was pleasantly surprised with Flagstad as there is a warmth and focus in the voice that I don't associate with her. Her delivery of the text shows that she is as interested in expressing the words as she is in making a beautiful sound. The role generally sits in the right place for her and I don't feel that this is Brunhilde slumming it as I do from the version by Traubel. Her voice is too dark to be a Sieglinde, despite it being sung well. Her interpretation is also a bit flat in general. Norman (I still am hearing a mezzo when she sings) is even less suited to the role.

I'm surprised Schwarzkopf or Grummer never recorded this aria (although I understand that it may have sat too low or requires a bigger sound).

N.


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## damianjb1 (Jan 1, 2016)

Once again - Traubel gets my vote.
Flagstad is glorious but the sound (for me) is too grand for Sieglinde at this stage in her career. It's glorious singing and wonderful to listen - just not my first choice out of these 3 recordings.
Norman lacks the rock solid vocal security the other two ladies have.


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