Kurt Moll: Wanger - Tristan und Isolde, 'Tatest du's wirklich?'

Описание: Kurt Moll (born April 11, 1938) is a German operatic bass. He has made innumerable recordings of opera, sacred music, and lieder with many of the great conductors and piano-accompanists. In 1991, he won a Grammy Award for his recording of Das Rheingold. He can be seen in many roles on video, including Sarastro (twice), Osmin, the Commendatore, Dr. Bartolo (Mozart), Hunding, Gurnemanz, and Baron Ochs (several times). His voice was notable for its range, a true infra-bass including full, resonant low and very-low notes with relaxed vibrato; also for its unusual combination of extreme size and purring, contrabassoon-like timbre. Although he was large enough for most of Wagner's noble-bass roles, he was not a thunderer and he never performed as Hagen, Hans Sachs, nor Wotan. His interpretations tended to be restrained and intelligent, even in buffo roles like Baron Ochs and Osmin. His recording of Schubert's philosophical "Lieder für Bass" set a new standard for these songs... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Moll


Lyrics & English Translation

Have you indeed?
Is that what you think?
Look at him there,
the most faithful of the loyal.
Cast your eyes upon him,
the dearest of friends.
His loyalty's
freest deed
pierced my heart
with its hostile treachery!
If Tristan betrayed me,
am I to hope
that what his treachery
has cost me
should by Melot's counsel
honestly be restored to me?

This to me?
This, Tristan, to me?
Whither has loyalty fled
now that Tristan has betrayed me?
What price now honour
and honesty,
now that the champion of all honour,
Tristan, has lost it?
As Tristan appointed himself
its emblem,
where has virtue
flown to,
fleeing from my friend, from
Tristan, who has betrayed me?

Why did you serve me
for so long?
Why the reputation of honour,
the power and greatness
which you won for King Mark?
Did the honour and renown,
greatness and power,
the services
beyond number,
have to be repaid by Mark's dishonour?
Did you value so lightly
his gratitude
which gave you as your very own inheritance
that which you had won for him,
his renown and his Kingdom?
When, childless,
his wife died,
he loved you so much
that never again
did Mark intend to wed.
When all the people
from court and country
thronged to him,
begging and imploring him
to give the country a queen
and to take for himself a wife;
when you yourself
swore to your uncle
that you would carry out
the wishes of the court
and the will of the country, then,
against the wishes of court and country,
in opposition even to you,
with circumspection and kindness
he declined
until you, Tristan, threatened
to exile yourself for ever
from court and country
if you yourself
were not dispatched
to win a bride for the King.
And so he let it be.
This glorious woman
that your courage won for me,
who could behold her,
who could know her,
who could proudly
call her his own
and not think himself blessed?
She, whom I could never
dare approach,
she for whom I
foreswore my desires
in bashful reverence,
so splendid,
so lovely, so sublime,
who could not but
refresh my soul,
despite enemies and dangers
this royal bride
you presented to me.
Now, since by such
a possession you rendered
my heart more open to pain than before,
there, where I was rendered
soft, sensitive and exposed
was I stricken
without hope
that I might ever be healed.
Why so sorely,
wretched man,
did you wound me there now?
There, with the weapon
of tormenting poison,
searing and maiming
my senses and my mind
so that my fidelity
to my friend is stifled,
my open heart
filled with suspicion,
so that now, secretly
and in the dead of night
I creep up on you, my friend, eavesdropping,
and see my honour ended?
No heaven will redeem it for me -
why this hell for me?
No misery will atone for it -
why this disgrace?
The uncharted depths
of its mysterious causes,
who will make them known to the world?


Please enjoy!

I send my kind and warm regards,