# Who's your favorite Wagner conductor and why?



## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

As above.
Who is your favorite Wagner conductor
and why?
Thanks


----------



## bagpipers (Jun 29, 2013)

I'd assume Wagner conducted his own stuff ,so there's one!
Toscanini was a great Wagnerian to his own shagrin and prefference for Italian Opera.
James Levine


----------



## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

Solti, Toscanini, Reiner....They all sense the flow, the drama...the tension/release formula which is so essential...it never gets bogged down, ploddy, logy...there's always a good flow to the music.
Barenboim is good, too...


----------



## feierlich (3 mo ago)

I couldn't choose one. Krauss, Furtwängler, Knappertsbusch, Keilberth, Kempe, Konwitschny, Stein, Sawallisch, Böhm, Boulez, Sinopoli, Zagrosek, Maazel, Mackerras, Tennstedt, Gielen, Gerd Albrecht and even Mravinsky who only had orchestral recordings because he never worked with vocalists ... - all artistically highly accomplished Wagnerians!


----------



## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

bagpipers said:


> I'd assume Wagner conducted his own stuff ,so there's one!


Wagner had his preferred conductors for his operas: Hans von Bulow and Hans Richter, among others. He was so involved in other aspects of the productions that conducting was just too much.

When it comes to listening to the bleeding chunks, my favorite recordings are old but still hold my attention and sound just fine: Bruno Walter on Sony and Adrian Boult on EMI. For the full operas, Solti, Karajan, Bohm, Levine...


----------



## CnC Bartok (Jun 5, 2017)

No love for Reggie Goodall, then?


----------



## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

CnC Bartok said:


> No love for Reggie Goodall, then?


I do ... although he could be considered as the operatic Celibidache


----------



## Lisztianwagner (2 mo ago)

My favourite is Karajan; in his recordings, the orchestral timbres and colour stand out perfectly in the texture, especially the brass section, powerfully and vividly, but at the same time clearly, with a splendid, accurate sound; besides, the atmospheres depicted are deeply suggestive and immersive, beautifully managing to evoke in the mind of the listener both what happens on the scenes and what goes beyond the action and the words of the characters.
But about _Tristan und Isolde_, Furtwängler is unbeatable.


----------



## Brahmsianhorn (Feb 17, 2017)

This is how you do it


----------



## HenryPenfold (Apr 29, 2018)

Very hard to choose just one!

I have different favourites for different reasons.

*Karajan* might just edge it. Listening to the DG Ring, he delivers the power, the beauty and the subtleness of this amazing score. No histrionics, just pure aesthetics.

*Reginald* *Goodall* gives me the most utterly transcendental experience in The Ring. Any concept of time disappears and I'm simply in Wagner's cosmos. I had a true 'Wagner Moment' when I first heard Reggie's Ring cycle some years ago - sung in English too!

*Furtwängler*. The 1953 Ring is a favourite and when I get the opportunity to sit down and spend some time absorbing a recording of it, usually the Pristine remaster, something special occurs and it's down to Furtwängler's ability to 'see behind the notes and music'. His Tristan Und Isolde is incomparable.

*Leinsdorf* - there's a surprise! A bit of a personal thing here - I just love that live Met 1961/2 radio broadcast (Pristine). It's like stepping into a time tunnel and experiencing a totally different world and culture - a world and culture I think I prefer. And what about his 1940 Walkure with Flagsted, Melchior, Lawrence &al? I have a fabulous recording on Pristine. My favourite Walkure is also Leinsdorf, the 1961 studio Decca.

Favourite Rheingold, is Karajan, Walkure ibid, Siegfried is Goodall and *Knappertsbusch* for Gotterdammerung (1951 Bayreuth).

Finally, it's between Karajan and Goodall and I can't choose. Put a gun against my head? *Goodall*.


----------



## CnC Bartok (Jun 5, 2017)

Becca said:


> I do ... although he could be considered as the operatic Celibidache


Ok, there's a little bit of hyperbole in your Celi quip, but in slightly more serious mode, he's only a couple of hours longer over The Ring than, say, Solti, who's maybe about average? I do like his ring cycle from what I remember of it, it's a truly loving, moulded, even Romantic, rendition, and it never really felt "that slow".....bloody good singing too.

I never invested in it as a set myself though. I am afraid I do not like opera in the "wrong" language, for me the only great opera composer who sounds fine in English is Janáček, and even then Czech is soooo much better. And Goodall was not exactly the easiest individual to gauge. I have to confess finding his own political beliefs a little bit difficult to swallow, especially when the composer himself can find himself over-tainted by such considerations.....


----------



## Tarneem (Jan 3, 2022)

My favorite is Tennstedt. He add spirtual layer to Wagner's music


----------



## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

I prefer Wagner is small bytes so prefer arranger more than conductor -- Frederick Fennell and Grimethorpe Colliery Band are best, Fried Dobbelstein and Fanfare Band pretty good. Favored conductor probably Stokowski.


----------



## Kjetil Heggelund (Jan 4, 2016)

Sorry for saying, but I am doing just fine without Wagner in my life...I have heard the Tristan prelude with Carlos Kleiber a few times, so it's Carlos man! HAHA!!


----------



## superhorn (Mar 23, 2010)

feierlich said:


> I couldn't choose one. Krauss, Furtwängler, Knappertsbusch, Keilberth, Kempe, Konwitschny, Stein, Sawallisch, Böhm, Boulez, Sinopoli, Zagrosek, Maazel, Mackerras, Tennstedt, Gielen, Gerd Albrecht and even Mravinsky who only had orchestral recordings because he never worked with vocalists ... - all artistically highly accomplished Wagnerians!


 Actually, Mravinsky did work with vocal soloists in orchestral works which use voices , and in his earlier years in Leningrad he did conduct opera. at the famous Mariinsky theater . Unfortunately, there don't seem to be any live recordings of. those operas he conducted .


----------

