Uploaded September 2009 | Updated September 2026, 1 day ago

---

Thirteen heldentenors of the last hundred years sing Siegmund's tortured cry during the first act of Die Walküre:

Wälse! Wälse!
Wo ist dein Schwert?
Das starke Schwert,
das im Sturm ich schwänge,
bricht mir hervor aus der Brust,
was wütend das Herz noch hegt?

Your tenors are in chronological order:

1. Lauritz Melchior - Metropolitan Opera, 1940, c. Erich Leinsdorf
2. Max Lorenz - Berlin, 1941
3. Set Svanholm - Met 1954, c. Fritz Stiedry
4. Ramón Vinay - Covent Garden, 1957, c. Rudolf Kempe
5. Wolfgang Windgassen - Bayreuthe 1960, c. Rudolf Kempe
6. Mario del Monaco - Stuttgart 1966, c. Ferdinand Leitner
7. Jon Vickers - Salzburg Festival 1967, c. Herbert von Karajan
8. James King - Bayreuth 1969, c. Lorin Maazel
9. Jess Thomas - San Francisco Opera 1972, c. Otmar Suitner
10. Peter Hofmann - Bayreuth 1978, c. Pierre Boulez
11. Siegfried Jerusalem - Bayreuth 1983, c. Georg Solti
12. Plácido Domingo - Metropolitan Opera 1997, c. James Levine
13. Robert Dean Smith - Bayreuth 2001, c. Adam Fischer

And some theatrical magic brings us to the end of Act 1!