As Sean Coxen makes clear below it's not clear which performances we're listening to here. Certainly Varnay is Brunnhilde throughout and Windgassen is definitely the Siegfried in Act Three. That sounds like Nienstedt in Act Three, but who the other singers are in the First Act is anyone's guess. Andy suggests Hopf for Siegfried, but to my ears the singer's voice is a bit steadier and lighter in timbre than Hopf's. The Waltraute has a strong mezzo voice with good low notes.A possibility is that these excerpts (why nothing from Act Two?) are drawn from two performances in the same run, if not the same evening. Varnay is in good form, singing with her usual passion and finesse and without the scooping that plagued her on occasion. Some of her top notes, while always on pitch, are edgier than they would've been ten years earlier. Windgassen sings splendidly, enjoying his tricky high C in Act Three. Gerd Nienstedt's beautiful bass serves Hagen well. Isabel Strauss is a very good Gutrune in Act Three (her scream on learning of Siegfried's death is piercing) Unfortunately, Sawallisch (or whoever the conductor is) cuts her atmospheric monologue as Bayreuth did about this time. The sound is good, but should've been transferred at a higher level; I had to turn up the volume quite a lot.Fans of Varnay will want this.

I was on the fence whether to give this three or four stars - four because these discs are worthwhile, three because they aren't what they're said to be. Andy mentioned in his blurb that it definitely is not Windgassen singing the role of Siegfried in Act 1. Not only that, it is not Gerd Nienstsedt singing Hagen, or Carlos Alexander singing Gunther, or Elisabeth Schaertel singing Waltraute. I know the voice of Nienstedt inside and out. It IS Varnay singing Brunhilde, and she does so magnificently. Her anonymous colleagues are also good. It makes for pleasurable listening unless one specifically wanted to hear the singers quoted on the cast list.Act 3 indeed features the singers quoted, though the Gutrune is Isobel Strauss, not Liselotte Hammes, who very likely is singing the part of Woglinde. It must be said that Windgassen is fabulous here: conventional wisdom often asserts he was all washed up after 1960 or so. Not true! The high C right after the Rhinemaidens scene is hair-raising. His voice is ringing, secure, the delivery eloquent as ever. Varnay again thrills.I think what we have here is an amalgam of two separate performances, both with Varnay. Prologue is shorn of the Norns but Varnay's ecstatic singing opposite Siegfried is happily there; first pages of Act 3 missing, picks up with Siegfried's line "Was leid ich doch..." The Hagen/Gunther/Gutrune of Act 1 are superior to their Act 3 counterparts. Students of Wagner singing will find these discs valuable.