This release features the world premiere recording of the König Enzio overture from Wagner’s incidental music for a drama by Ernst Raupach. Composed in 1832, before Wagner developed his own distinctive style, the overture bears the heavy influence of Weber and Beethoven. So, while there’s little here that sounds like the Wagner we know and love, the piece’s Beethovenian energy makes it casually interesting if not particularly memorable. Also of casual interest is the remainder of the program. Oleg Caetani can’t seem to make up his mind how these pieces should sound, as he constantly plays with dynamic levels and balances. The Ride of the Valkyries is curiously muted in many passages and The Flying Dutchman sounds less like a sea voyage than a ride on a moving sidewalk.
Caetani’s not helped by the third-rate playing of the Robert Schumann Philharmonie Chemnitz, with its less-than-agile strings (their struggles in the Tannhäuser overture are brutally exposed by the close-miked recording) and not-always-confident brass (Die Meistersinger suffers from occasional lapses in intonation). Then there’s the opaque sounding recording that surprisingly utilizes the new, advanced 24-bit digital technology. (Well, okay, if you say so.) If you must have every composition by Wagner available on disc, then you’ll want this recording. You won’t want it for the performances. As for the 24 bits, that’s about what you’ll get for it at a used CD store.
