Berg: Wozzeck. - Claudio Abbado, Vienna Philharmonic - sound recording reviews

National Review, July 14, 1989 by Ralph de Toledano

Wozzeck, Alban Berg's "revolutionary" opera, has been given a brilliant performance by Claudio Abbado and issued, in CD version, boxed with a 172-page booklet that includes the full libretto (Deutsche Grammophon 423 587-2). In separate promotional material, Abbado hails the work as the greatest opera of the twentieth century.

Critics respected by me -have expressed similar opinions. I have listened three times to Wozzeck, and the enthusiasm it has generated escapes me. It is not its atonality -atonality can be very appealingor its dissonances -dissonance can be very beautiful-or even its addiction to the 12-tone cluster that turns me off. I find the opera strident, harsh, and cold, calling for declamation rather than singing, and never approaching the undoubted drama of its libretto. This is not the fault of Abbado, the Vienna Philharmonic, or the soloists, who give it all they have. Undoubtedly the fault is mine and I can only confess my inadequacy.