Wagner – Der Ring des Nibelungen (Sir Georg Solti, Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra)

No longer sharing. Sorry.

I have the Herbert Von Karajan set of Der Ring des Nibelungen from Deutsche Grammophon.

That is a 14CD set as well, I never felt the need to post here, there was never too much interest in Classical music with folks here.

Though I did post these sets.

Thread 94585 (55 Discs!!!)

Thread 108951 (87 Discs!!!)

As well as many others..lol

No longer sharing. Sorry.

You must have the patience of a saint. I’m dreading the next twelve discs. 🙂

Lighting fast Internet and I had converted my CD’s to .rar files a few years ago so it wasn’t too bad.

I had a set from EMI, by Sawallisch if I remember correctly, a live recording. But I never managed to finish it. Probably it’s time to dig it out. Thanks to TazerMonkey for the listenning guide.

I’ve heard the live performances have "a greater sense of drama" but I was never sure if there was any truth to such a claim or if it was just pure snobbery. I don’t know that I’ve heard of that particular set, koala. I’ve heard good things about Bohm’s set and about Berenboim’s recent recording.

I’ve never made it all the way through this Solti set, either, although I’ve sampled at least a bit from each. It’s such a large commitment timewise, and reading simultaneously in German and English while also trying to appreciate the music isn’t the most relaxing way to spend your time, but what I have heard "properly" has convinced me that Wagner, bitter anti-Semite bastard that he was, was also a Friggin’ Genius in the absolute sense of the term.

No longer sharing. Sorry.

Firstly, thank you for this undertaking. I was lucky enough to find this set for a reasonable price second-hand a few years ago and have thought about uploading it many times since.

Bohm’s Bayreuth recording is great for the singers – a fantastic cast, projected brilliantly – but less so for the orchestra. I think capturing the sound of Wagner’s custom-designed theatre might not be so easy on record. Sawallisch’s set, from what I remember hearing from a friend’s copy, is good too and interpretively rather different to Solti. Barenboim and Karajan are well recorded and lush. Solti’s VPO studio recording wins out overall for me for the great sense of theatre and every effect realised; he conveys the ‘magic’, both musical and extra-musical.

I would strongly recommend anyone with more than a passing interest in this work listen to Deryck Cooke’s wonderful audio essay. He looks at some of the score’s main motifs and shows how they interconnect and develop, with each other, and with the characters, themes and symbols of Wagner’s enormous tapestry. Musical examples are heard every step of the way and it manages to be both erudite and accessible. I guarantee it will deepen your appreciation of the music 🙂

An Introduction to Der Ring des Nibelungen
by Deryck Cooke

MP3-V0
RingIntro.part1.rar (http://www.mediafire.com/?x9uak4daofnkytm)
RingIntro.part2.rar (http://www.mediafire.com/?0058tm60cccj786)

Thank you, Lens, for the Cooke analysis. I actually got it from the library on accident several years ago before I heard any of the operas and have regretted not ripping it. Can’t wait to give it a listen!

i’ve got a few recording by sir solti…he’s awesome!

anyway to download these files from a mac? the mirror creator appears to only work with windows.

No longer sharing. Sorry.

Thanks to Lens for the Cooke’s introduction. This will be a great help too. It’s your Herrmann thread brought me to this forum.

No longer sharing. Sorry.

TazerChimp…you have been busy my compadre..thanks so much for your effort.

Hugs.

WON-DER-FUL stuff!

I wish I had the time to plunge into these, but heaps of kudos HAVE to be handed out to you!

Apart from Stokowsky’s Symphonic Syntheses, does anyone know some other "abridged" versions, or selected pieces albums?

Thank you very much for this post 🙂

Apart from Stokowsky’s Symphonic Syntheses, does anyone know some other "abridged" versions, or selected pieces albums?

Arthierr, i found some of these selections of the ring posted on the shrine:

Thread 102046

Thread 94702

http://forums.ffshrine.org/f92/classical-request-58159/24.html#post1295375

http://forums.ffshrine.org/f92/classical-request-58159/17.html#post1256733

Last link (The ring without words), was posted long long time ago. It’s dead now but i can re-up if you want.

EDIT: Googled a version of the ring without words online and found it in lossless: FileFactory Folder view – Wagner – The Ring Without Words – Lorin Maazel BPO (http://www.filefactory.com/f/d63ce50f4a91a1a3/)

Good finds, Sanico. There’s also this two disc compilation, Der Symphonische Ring (The Symphonic Ring), available in 24-bit FLAC. It’s been a while since I’ve heard it, but I found this link through Google (http://goo.gl/8LHaL).

I must confess… Wagner has never quite clicked for me – much to my shame! I find him rather self-indulgent – and my personal opinion is that any story which requires fifteen hours to tell is trying just a little bit too hard. I’m quite fond of some of the music – but as a whole I find myself growing fidgety – particularly during the numerous and lengthy "exposition" segments. (In my mind, most Wagner seems to consist of 10% showpieces – the rest being a sinuey mess of over-cooked, over-complicated posturing.)

Perhaps in the future, I will suddenly understand – this thread is a goldmine. Thank you so much for these posts. 🙂

Wagner has never quite clicked for me – much to my shame! I find him rather self-indulgent

Nothing really to argue with there. I personally have a hard time with this music as well, but when it’s brilliant, it’s so brilliant that I feel I need to explore further to see what I’m missing. A large part of why I decided to upload the Solti set and create this thread was to start a discussion and motivate me to explore the Ring more completely; maybe I’ll finally finish the damn thing!

Wagner and the Ring epitomize self-indulgence, but in an odd way I think that’s also the charm of it. Here’s a man who spends a significant portion of his life devoted to this work that he believes will realize his conception of the apotheosis of art. He takes a Germanic myth and elects to write not one, not two, not even three, but four operas at lengths that strain the most attentive and patient of audiences to be performed only in an opera house of his own design, complete with stage directions that only a god could accomplish and forging new tonalities and commissioning new musical instruments that the music will require. It sounds insane. The sheer audacity of such an attempt is mindboggling… and yet he not only actually completed the Ring Cycle, but his efforts are generally considered a resounding success!

Perhaps now would be a good time to go into more detail on my experiences with the Ring. Apologies in advance for the long read:

I have never been a great fan of opera but I knew Wagner of course from The Ride of the Valkyries and Siegfried’s Funeral March and my favorite score at the time (still up there) was Danny Elfman’s Batman, which I had read described as "Wagnerian." Same with Herrmann’s Vertigo. So I did a modicum of research and found a recording of Das Rheingold at the LA Public Library and gave it a listen. I immediately loved the Prelude, but when the singing started I checked out. I just didn’t get it, and I was sorely disappointed. Luckily I decided to do a little more research and read a synopsis of the first scene in Rheingold while giving the disc another spin, and this time something clicked. "Oh," I thought. "That’s what it’s supposed to be like."

Now, at the time, the thought of listening to 14 discs of opera still seemed like a torture worse than death, so I looked into orchestral compilations. I found that a lot of these purely orchestral versions that I stumbled across felt like they were missing something; whether that was context or the passion that accompanies a full performance, I don’t know, but they just didn’t seem to have the same power as the "proper" version (as experienced through the first quarter of Rheingold, of course). I read about the Solti set and how highly regarded it was, and decided to try out a two-disc "great scenes" album distilled from the entire set. I really dug it, loving and adding the Magic Fire Music, the Forging Scene, the Sunrise Duet, and the Immolation Scene to my list of favorites. While I knew I was missing a lot of the connective tissue, I thought that set would more than satisfy me.

And so it did, until one night on a whim I checked out Gotterdammerung from USC’s music library. I popped the first disc into my computer, unsure of what to expect… and my jaw dropped during the haunting opening, particularly after the second sustained chord comes in. The beauty, the sense of foreboding in the moment… I instantly thought it bettered almost everything in my "greatest scenes" set, and then I couldn’t help but wonder just what else I had been missing. Unfortunately, USC didn’t have the rest of Solti’s recordings in their entirety, and I ended up biting the bullet and purchasing the set for myself.

I’ve owned the set for several years now, and I still haven’t listened to it all the way through. In bits and pieces, I have probably listened to most of it, with Siegfried getting the least attention for some reason. But, listening "properly" with libretto and in rapt attention, I must confess that I’ve really only managed that with Rheingold. I find the simultaneous listening to the music while following the German text and attempting to understand in English to be a very daunting and draining effort… but with every attempt I’ve made to listen, be it with or without libretto, I have discovered a new facet or moment in the work that sends a tingle down my spine. It’s so wonderfully dense and rich. It can definitely get tedious, but when it connects it does so on such a high level that I feel that I owe it to myself to work to be able to truly appreciate what the Ring has to offer, and I’m hoping that this thread will not only help myself in this regard but anyone who is interested in this music.

I’m very glad that Lens provided the Deryck Cooke discs and also that we’ve got some links to the syntheses and samplers, because I remember how daunting the entire work seemed when I first sparked an interest in a it a few years ago and how daunting it continues to seem to me today. I’m looking forward to exploring the Ring more closely and I’m really glad we appear to be getting a discussion going!

Thanks to Tanzer for sharing personal thoughts about this work. Hope more people, including me, get into this magical world sooner or later. It’s been a long time since I watched a full length opera from TV broadcast or DVD. At that time, perhaps ten years ago, my interests was mainly in those melodic ones, i.e. Carmen, Madam Butterfly, Aida, etc. I think the really good way to enjoy an opera is to watch it either on TV or in the theatre (though an expensive way). You’ll see all the charactors and all the subtitle, instead of guessing who is who when listenning to a CD. Only after you gain certain level of familiariztion to the work, you’ll find it easier to listen to the CD.

For Wagner, what attracted me fisrt was the Tannhauser overture. I got the Ring CD set (EMI) because of the work’s fame and its cheap price for that particular set. Before I could spend time to dig into it, family established, children born. I almost forget I still have a boxset of The Ring. Thanks for the forum members bring it back to me.

Sanico: thank you for the links! Funny I missed those!

Can I ask for The ring without words in V0, please?

Only the links to "Das Rheingold" are still up. I’m sorry I missed these, because the box set is way out of my price range. Any chance for a re-up?

I’ll re-up these soon. Just getting back into Wagner myself. 🙂

Sorry for the delay, I’ve been busy. I’ll be re-upping these in FLAC and posting the links as they’re ready. Das Rheingold should be up in the next day or so.

I’m trying for the third time to get into Wagner. I managed to get through Tristan und Isolde twice (one with Kleiber and another with Bohm). The last act of Tristan had me on the edge of my seat the whole time and now I am listening to Karajan’s reading of Parsifal, which comparatively sounds not as exciting IMO. I really try to like Wagner but I find myself just listening to the rich orchestration and some recurring themes. Maybe as I grow older, I’ll be able to appreciate the intricate drama as a whole, even the 14-hour Ring cycle. 🙂

And thanks for posting this, Tazer. I ended up seeking out this set after you posted this over a year ago.

Das Rheingold is now up in FLAC. Also added new links to librettos and analyses. See first post.

EDIT: Also, these rips are from the 1997 edition of the Solti set. I was wondering if anyone has happened to hear the 2012 mastering and if it is a significant improvement. I’m somewhat skeptical that the improvement merits the cost.

No longer sharing. Sorry.

Thank you so much for re-upping this! I feel like my birthday’s come early this year! As far as the 2012 remaster goes, everything I’ve read points to a minimal improvement at best. The original master tapes from the Solti collection are so frail that they can’t be used again, and the new remaster was based on the 1997 24 bit restoration. Of course, I haven’t heard it for myself, so I can only speculate as to the actual quality.

I’ve read mixed things about the new master; some raves, and some "better, but marginally so" that seem much more realistic based on the knowledge that they simply reused and spruced up the 1997 masters. If I wanted all of the other swag, the set might be worth it, but the only reason I’d upgrade is the sound quality and it just seems unlikely to be worth $300.

The reviews of the new set did encourage me to see what the LPs sounded like, so I found 24bit/96kHz rips of those. I have only downloaded Das Rheingold. While I definitely noticed more bass and "bite" to the sound that was initially impressive, a closer comparison revealed that the soundstage lacked the depth of these 1997 discs and there was more audible distortion in the climaxes. Personally, I’ve found the benefits of "high-def audio" to be minimal in almost every case; the real benefits are improvements in audio mastering, which in the case of the Solti Ring is now hampered by the degradation of the master tapes.

TL;DR I’m 99% sure I’m sticking with my 1997 discs.

Oh, and Die Walk�re is re-upped. See first post.

Siegfried re-upped. See first post.

Thank you for the re-up in flac! 🙂

Thanks TazerMonkey
Just waiting for G�TTERD�MMERUNG to be re-upped 🙂

Thanks TazerMonkey!

Gotterdammerung re-upped, see first post. The tetralogy is complete again!

And please feel free to post comments. Discussion is welcome.

You’re a superhero, TazerMonkey. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this. Very soon, I’ll be immersing myself once again in this astounding work of art, so thank you very, very much.

Thank you share!

Thanks TazerMonkey! You’re the best!

Thank you for the complete "Ring".

thanks 1,000,000 !!!!!!!!!!

THANKS !

thanks

UPDATE: I thought I’d announce that I’ve gotten hold of the 2012 Deluxe Boxset. I haven’t spent much time with the CDs, but I have listened to the Blu-ray and there is a noticeable but subtle improvement in the sound quality over the 1997 boxset — a bit more low-end, a bit more life to the soundstage and brass. It’s nice, and pretty cool to have all 14 and a half hours of Solti’s Ring on one disc. Culshaw’s book is an interesting, if somewhat white-washed, read on the behind-the-scenes of the recordings. Decca is preparing to release a smaller set in a few months, this time on three Blus (the reason for this baffles me, as the 48kHz, 24-bit master quality is already on the existing single Blu, unless they’ve added a video component with subtitles?).

I’m not promising anything and am offering no timetables, but I’m trying to rip the Blu-ray. If I share it, I’ll add the links to the existing posts so that people will still have a choice as the new downloads will be quite large.

If you truly, will be able to rip and share 24/48 blu-ray of this masterpiece in flac, it would be highly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Thank you to TazerMonkey for the lossless upload of the entire Ring Cycle 🙂 It’s very much appreciated!!! And a thank you to everyone else who contributed to this great post!! 🙂

Quick update: I have the Blu ripped and tagged and everything appears in order. The bad news is that the upload is almost 9GB. I’m not sure I want to upload that much to MEGA; a torrent seems like a better option, but my experience with seeding torrents is, shall we say, limited. So, until I further explore my options, still no upload as yet. But I’m working on it.

Thanks for the update, great you are in progres. Ofcourse any form of share would be appreciated, but concerning size 9GB, mega seems to be good way to go.

Quick update: I have the Blu ripped and tagged and everything appears in order. The bad news is that the upload is almost 9GB. I’m not sure I want to upload that much to MEGA; a torrent seems like a better option, but my experience with seeding torrents is, shall we say, limited. So, until I further explore my options, still no upload as yet. But I’m working on it.

Don’t know if you’re still working on the new upload, but I really appreciate you taking the time to put up the old one! I’ve been wanting to (perhaps slowly) get into Wagner for a while now. 🙂

Don’t know if you’re still working on the new upload, but I really appreciate you taking the time to put up the old one! I’ve been wanting to (perhaps slowly) get into Wagner for a while now. 🙂

I’ll be honest, I forgot I had planned on uploading the Blu rip. I don’t seem to share much anymore, and I still have plenty of space on my MEGA account, so I’m just going to upload there. It’s still going to take a while, but I am uploading it as I type. I think I’ll just wait until I have it all done to update the posts and post an explanation so that I don’t have to do it more than once.

Sorry about the super-long wait, NefMor… :/

TazerMonkey, not at all. Patience is a virtue and iam sure blu-ray rip 24 48 is worth wating. Thanks for all work you have done i will await your upload.

Uploading done. I’ll begin adding the links to their respective posts in a few minutes and update the original post with some of the proceeding text. I feel the need to offer a short explanation:

The Blu-ray rip is from the 2012 boxset with additional books and extras, but it is also based on the 1997 transfer due to the degradation of the original master tapes. It sounds quite similar, but with a touch more bass presence and overall clarity over the 1997 CDs. The record company has also claimed to have repaired several "bad edits." I haven’t bothered with ripping the 2012 CDs because it seemed redundant after getting the tracks off the Blu-ray. Because I used the ripping process described here (http://www.computeraudiophile.com/content/473-ripping-blu-ray-easy-way/), there are no LOG or CUE files associated with the Blu rip. Also, the very last track of each opera has about an extra 45 seconds or so of silence added compared to the CDs, but as all four instances added roughly a whopping 1 MB to the total size of the rip and it’s true to the Blu-ray presentation, I have decided to leave the silence intact. This is the version to listen to if you have the disc space and can playback 48kHz, 24-bit files. They can also be dithered and downsampled in Foobar to CD quality for playback on other devices with most [all?] of the benefits over the previous master still present.

It’s amazing to realize that these recordings are all over sixty years old and sound as great as they do.

Again, sorry for the delay in posting the Blu rip.

TazerMonkey thanks again for all your work and sharing this amazing masterpiece in Blu-Ray rip form.

EDIT: nevermind, remembered the pass.

thanks TM for the stuff from a LONG while back

just got around to going through it 🙂

Is it possible for this to have a re-upload, please?
I have been looking for the Georg Solti recording of the Gotterdammerung for ages!

Does anyone have the rips from the Blu to 24-bit FLAC for the Solti set?
I’m also trying to locate Deryck Cooke’s 2-CD "Intro" to the Ring’s leitmotifs (preferably also in lossless).