Tristan und Isolde Metropolitan Opera 1934

Here are about 50 minutes of extracts from a broadcast of Tristan und Isolde from the Metropolitan Opera. This was the cast (from the Met database)
Metropolitan Opera House
January 6, 1934 Matinee Broadcast

Wagner - TRISTAN UND ISOLDE

Tristan.................Lauritz Melchior
Isolde..................Gertrude Kappel
Kurwenal................Friedrich Schorr
Brangäne................Doris Doe
King Marke..............Ludwig Hofmann
Melot...................Arnold Gabor
Sailor's Voice..........Hans Clemens
Shepherd................Hans Clemens
Steersman...............James Wolfe

Conductor...............Artur Bodanzky

 
Gertrude Kappel as Isolde

There are about 20 mins each from Act 1 and Act 3, but only about 7 mins from Act 2. It gives us a unique chance to hear the Isolde of Gertrude Kappel, a leading German dramatic soprano. Melchior would be heard complete and in better sound in later broadcasts but this was Kappel's only Met broadcast as Isolde. For such an important singer Kappel's recorded legacy is slim, a few commercial recordings relatively early in her career, then a few poor quality broadcast recordings. In addition to these extracts from Tristan we have portions of her as Sieglinde as well as her in the Met premiere of Elektra. From Vienna we have portions of her Brunnhilde in all three Ring operas. The sound is not great in these extracts of Tristan. They were airchecks recorded from the radio on fairly primitive equipment, so you should expect a lot of surface noise. However, personally I think them worth persevering with especially if you are interested in hearing how Wagner was regularly being sung before the war.

http://rapidshare.com/files/445494460/1934Tristan.zip