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"This disc commemorates, enshrines (though that is too mortal-sounding a word) a unique and extraordinary occasion: as Walter Legge points out in his shrewd notes, the Salzburg Festival had no regular tradition of Lieder recitals when this one was planned. Wolf was perhaps closer to his and Schwarzkopf's hearts than any other Lieder composer, so they decided on the recital without having chosen an accompanist. At dinner in Turin in December 1952 (Legge wrongly places it early in 1953) Furtwangler asked Schwarzkopf if he could accompany her, and she incredulously accepted. They rehearsed prodigiously, and the Furtwangler-determined results are plain for all to hear. He accompanied her with the lid of his Steinway open (to Gerald Moore's rage), and the piano is at least on an equal footing throughout the recital. That, it seems to me, is as it should be, above all in Wolf. And this is the only Wolf-playing we have from Furtwangler, indeed the only piano playing apart from the keyboard role in the Fifth Brandenburg Concerto, also from Salzburg (but in far less good sound) which EMI released last year (reviewed on page 38 of the October 2000 issue)." - International Record Review (Michael Tanner)