The Brahms interpretations of Paavo J�rvi, the Grammy Award-winning Estonian-American conductor, and his Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen have been receiving the highest public and critical acclaim. "A Brahms revelation" was the headline in the New Yorker, for the Zeit it's "a reference recording" and the Hamburger Abendblatt wrote "the greatest experts of Brahms come from Bremen (die besten Brahms Versteher kommen aus Bremen)". The Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen perform Brahms nowadays exactly to the size that the composer himself was accustomed to at the time. This interpretation puts Brahms� symphonies in a new light, which is explored in the additional documentary through the eyes of the musicians and their artistic director Paavo J�rvi.

Freedom, fraternity and humanity – this is what Beethoven’s 9th Symphony stands for. It opens the 10th Grafenegg Festival, performed by the Tonkunstler Orchestra, joined by 24 alumni of the European Union Youth Orchestra (EUYO) and “a soloist quartet which no one could possibly imagine to be more prestigious” (Die Presse). “Vogt’s tenor and the Wiener Singverein were especially moving” (Wiener Zeitung) and “the vocal performance by excellent bass René Pape, the fabulous soprano Camilla Nylund and the brilliant mezzosoprano Elena Zhidkova … in Beethoven’s Ninth was just sensational. Bravo!” (Kurier) Composer in Residence Christian Jost’s new work also centres around Beethoven, featuring the song “An die Hoffnung” (“To Hope”), and “convincingly used an impressive orchestra” (Der Standard), with “tenor Klaus Florian Vogt as a well-cast soloist” (Salzburger Nachrichten).

Also available on Blu-ray

At Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, maestro Fabio Luisi gives “a superb performance” (Operawire) of Der Fliegende Hollander (The Flying Dutchman), the forerunner of grand Wagnerian dramas. His Italian Richard Wagner debut is infused with energy and drive, under his direction the orchestra and chorus of Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, together with Coro Ars Lyrica, sparkle “in what was a five star performance” (Operawire). Thomas Gazheli stars as the Dutchman, who has been condemned to endlessly wander the seas until the day of Judgement. Marjorie Owens shines as his savior Senta.

Also available on Blu-ray

This is one of the most beautiful and brilliant recordings of Wagner´s Tristan und Isolde and it´s first time available on video. Leonard Bernstein’s way of conducting this opera is unique and he makes orchestra and singers perform at their very best. The Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks was the only German orchestra with which Leonard Bernstein regularly collaborated for many years and it has numbered among the top ten orchestras in the world. A star cast of singers with Peter Hofmann and Hildegard Behrens in the title roles completes this exceptional semi-staged production. Bernstein’s 1981 recording of Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde is still considered an outstanding interpretation and has set the bar until this day. When he heard this performance Karl Bohm said, “Bernstein has conducted Tristan und Isolde the way that Wagner intended it to be conducted”.

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REVIEW:

Bernstein prefers a very personal, emotionally spontaneous approach, and the orchestral playing is, as to be expected, sensational. in all Peter Hoffmann and Hildegard Behrens sound fresh, youthful, and intense, if not highly dramatic or heroic in the more traditional Wagnerian sense.

The resolution of the film falls short of the technical possibilities inherent the Blu-ray format. Away from the grandiose soundtrack, the DVD / Blu-ray is of more historical interest, lacking the modern degree of visual splendor.

– Merker Online
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DETAILS:

Subtitles: G, E, F, Sp, It, Kr, Jp
Booklet: English, German, French
No. of Discs: 3
Run time: 291 minutes
Disc Format: DVD 9
Picture: NTSC 4:3
Audio: PCM Stereo
Region Code: 0 (worldwide)

Also available on Blu-ray

On the occasion of the 200th birthday of Giuseppe Verdi, Teatro Regio di Parma and Unitel Classica have joined forces to create a truly unique project – for the first time ever, and just in time for the composer’s 200th brithday, Verdi’s Operatic oeuvre, which comprises the labour of more than 50 years, will be available in High Definition and Surround Sound. All of the composer’s 26 Operas, as well as the Requiem – which is closely related to the Operas – will be performed and audio-visually recorded in and around Parma, and released on DVD and Blu-ray. Verdi’s Nabucco is presented here staged by Daniele Abbado. Bonus features include a 10 minute introduction of the opera.

"As last year, the musical direction was entrusted to Michele Mariotti, whose immersion in the score has deepened further allowing him to provide a very remarkable reading. Simply seeing the warmth that all the singers offered him from the stage was enough realize that this young maestro has managed to develop genuine team work producing very good results. His interpretation of “Va pensiero” was unique: a very personal reading, slow, solemn and moving from which the Teatro Regio Chorus rewarded him with spectacular and truly unusual performance. I had never heard a chorus singing this passage at such a pianissimo complete with real diminuendos. This only can be done by an exceptional choir... Similarly, the music from of the Teatro Regio Orchestra was everything to be expected from this excellent group. The protagonist Nabucco was Leo Nucci, the Verdi Festival’s true star... Abigaille was the Greek soprano Dimitra Theodossiou... The cheers she received were not even true cheers, but spectacular screams, so loud that it seemed as if her life might be at risk. At her final bow she was almost completely covered by flowers, thrown from the upper floors, with none left at all for any other artist... As might be expected there was a completely full house for this almost gala performance. 'Va pensiero' was encored at popular request and at the final bows, there were triumphs for Leo Nucci, Dimitra Theodossiou and Michele Mariotti." -- José M. Irurzun, MusicWeb International reviewing a live performance of this production

Nabucco – Leo Nucci
Ismaele – Bruno Ribeiro
Zaccaria – Riccardo Zanellato
Abigaille – Dimitra Theodossiou
Fenena – Annamaria Chiuri
Il Gran Sacerdote di Belo – Alessandro Spina
Abdallo – Mauro Buffoli
Anna – Cristina Giannelli

Teatro Regio di Parma Chorus and Orchestra
(chorus master: Martino Faggiani)
Michele Mariotti, conductor

Daniele Abbado, staging
Caroline Lang, stage director
Luigi Perego, set and costume designer
Valero Alfier, lighting designer

Recorded live from the Teatro Regio di Parma, 2009

Bonus:
- Introduction to Nabucco

Picture format: NTSC 16:9
Sound format: PCM Stereo / DTS 5.1
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: Italian, English, German, French, Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Japanese
Running time: 137 mins (opera) + 10 mins (bonus)
No. of DVDs: 1

On Saturday October 6, 2018 at the Philharmonie de Paris, Nicolas Horvath sat down to perform Erik Satie's complete works for piano without a break. The event was captured in this fascinating film by acclaimed director Thierry Villeneuve and features selections from Horvath's marathon eight-hour performance, filmed in black and white. This immersive visual experience sees Satie's mysterious and timeless music brought to life in a dreamlike conflation of past and present in front of a captivated audience. Horvath wrote of the evening: "This concert was remarkable, the press coverage was incredible (all of the main media previewed it as a 'must see concert'). Curiously, and unlike everything I had prepared, or even in my very own recordings - performing all of a composer's music with no break at the very same concert takes you to unexpected territories. I was very surprised at the risks I took from time to time, both musically and technically. But listening to the whole eight hours of musical evolution makes clear that each decision was a logical part of a larger unity, as it was mirrored in other later pieces..."

Umberto Giordano’s opera Siberia with its libretto by Puccini’s successful librettist Luigi Illica (La bohème, Tosca) premiered in 1903 at La Scala as a replacement of Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, which was not finished at the time. Madama Butterfly came out in Milan shortly after Siberia and flopped completely. Umberto Giordano, however, briefly became a public favorite.

Shortly after successful re-runs on important theatres, including Buenos Aires, New York and São Paulo, Siberia could not maintain its position in repertoire although Gabriel Fauré designated the second act as “one of the most remarkable and captivating that modern dramatic music can offer.“ This opera rarity performed at Bregenz Festival “is musical narrative theatre in perfection“ (Süddeutsche Zeitung) in which “Uryupin leads the agile Wiener Symphoniker through the score with a sense for delicately tinted colours. Ambur Braid sings the challenging part of Stephanas with bravour“ (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung).

Winner of the 2021 Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition!

“A vivid Orlando makes history in Vienna” (New York Times International): Olga Neuwirth’s opera Orlando, based on Virginia Woolf’s novel of the same name, is the first full-length opera by a woman celebrating its premiere at the Vienna State Opera. Olga Neuwirth, for a long time one of the great composers of the present, succeeds with this opera in creating a captivating arc across many musical genres. It’s an exciting, socially critical production by Polly Graham who puts a fantastically singing and playing Kate Lindsey in the center of the action. For Orlando, Neuwirth won the prestigious Grawemeyer Award; it became “world premiere of the year” by Opernwelt magazine, and for Die Zeit, the Hamburg-based national German newspaper, it was “the premiere of the season.”

Acclaim:

"Neuwirth’s score, fusing orchestral, electronic and sampled sounds, is often bewitching...while the use of musical quotations, from Elizabethan polyphony to Lady Gaga, is certainly entertaining.

"The Vienna production...clearly didn’t stint on anything. Some of the sense of grandeur may be lost on a small screen, but the use of video, with texts projected on to the set, as well as the sumptuous costumes by Comme des Garçons, is certainly lavish...

"As Orlando, the mezzo Kate Lindsey is outstanding in what is a hugely demanding role...Constance Hauman provides a telling cameo as the Queen. Matthias Pintscher is the conductor, efficiently coordinating everything[.]"

--The Guardian (Andrew Clements)

Nearly twenty years on from his first staging of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker ballet in 1967, the great ballet star and choreographer Rudolf Nureyev (1938-93) staged this, his final choreography of, and radically re-imagined revision of, this greatest of all ballets – the Paris version – in 1985 as director of the Paris ballet, a position he had ascended to two years earlier. Mr. Nureyev’s version enjoys a particular standing in the history of this ballet in that it was the first to incorporate the psychology of E. T. A Hoffman’s fairy tale on which Tchaikovsky’s ballet is based. In this production, the characters of Drosselmeyer and his nephew the Prince are one and the same person, representing the ideal man dreamt up by the Clara, the heroine, ready to leave her childhood and become a teenager. This presentation features dancers Liudmila Konovalova and Vladimir Shishov, the Wiener Staatsballett company, one of the world’s finest and the Wiener Staatsoper, conducted by Paul Connelly. “Elegant, romantic, delightful…great soloists, endearing pupils, fantasy-inspiring costumes, a harmonious and sure-footed ensemble” - Die Presse

Booklet: English, German, French
No. of Discs: 2
Run time: 102 Minutes
Disc Format: DVD 9
Picture: NTSC, 16:9
Audio: PCM Stereo, PCM 5.1
Region Code: 0 (worldwide)

Jean-Joseph Cassanéa de Mondonville was greatly admired in his day. His opera Titon et l’Aurore was one of his most popular works, being held up as a triumph over the rival Italian style during the Parisian Querelle des Bouffons in the 1750s. The narrative of this spectacular opéra-ballet follows the tumultuous and seemingly unbreakable liaison between the goddess L’Aurore and her lover the shepherd Titon. Jealous gods and goddesses try to interfere through murderous intent and dramatic abduction, but true love ultimately conquers all in stage director Basil Twist’s acclaimed feast for the senses.

REVIEWS:

This is a remarkably interesting production on several fronts. The music is a rarity, the composer almost unknown, the staging as close to the original as can be achieved, the period performance very fine and the history of the piece of unusual cultural significance.

The superb orchestra and chorus of Les Arts Florissants play and sing as if unaware of the lack of any audience and the presence of COVID masks in the pit—not the stage! This was all done in the middle of our pandemic. What a treat this would have been for an audience…

…This disc has to be given a strong recommendation. The picture is appropriately bright and sparkling, the sound is absolutely clear and clean with enough ambience to give it the feeling of being there.

-- MusicWeb International (Dave Billinge)

Highly rewarding for both the staging and the musical accomplishments – it should be at the very top of one’s shopping list.

The cast that was selected for this first production in modern times is a knockout one in every respect. William Christie and Les Arts Florissants are in crisp energetic form. Whenever the camera focuses on Christie it is obvious that he is enjoying himself every bit as much as his singers. Perfect picture and sound engineering guarantee that every fleecy moment is preserved with distinction.

-- MusicWeb International (Mike Parr)

Recorded at the Opéra-Comique last year, although without an audience, this recording of Mondonville’s Titon et l’Aurore is another triumph from William Christie.

-- Gramophone

Treading a tightrope between death, life and intense romance in the opulent world of 19th-century Habsburg royalty, Elisabeth tells the story of the beautiful Empress of Austria, from her wedding, to her tragic assassination by the hand of the Italian anarchist Luigi Lucheni. Ongoing dark obsessions and inner turmoil are undercurrents as family schisms flare up amidst a crumbling empire. These powerful themes and a potent score brimming with fabulous music have combined to establish Elisabeth as the most successful German-language musical of all time. This spectacular open-air event presents Elisabeth at the fabled empress’s real-life home – Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna.

These special concerts with the award-winning SWR Vokalensemble represent two Christmas gifts from the Gaisburg Church, considered to be one of the most beautiful churches in Stuttgart. Michael Praetorius’ In dulci Jubilo exemplifies an ancient European tradition for Advent music that has inspired composers to express seasonal beauty and joy from medieval times to the present. English conductor Marcus Creed brings an authentic depth of experience with these works and in the fine selection of popular Christmas Carols from the British Isles.

Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo was premiered in 1607 and is the oldest opera still performed today. The narrative is based on the Greek legend of Orpheus who, armed only with the weapons of music and love, descends into Hades in an attempt to bring his lost bride Eurydice back to the living world. The opera’s dramatic power is brought to life in this acclaimed production conducted by the great Monteverdi expert and interpreter Jordi Savall. Filmed at the Opéra Comique in Paris, L’Orfeo features a virtuoso cast with the service of text and music always at its core.

Il trittico was premiered in New York on 14 December 1918, composed while the First World War was still raging in Europe. At first glance, the three one-act operas Gianni Schicchi, Il tabarro and Suor Angelica seem to have no connection with each other; their common denominator is solely the entanglement of man in a fateful destiny that only exceptionally, for a moment, seems to promise a happy outcome to the “adventure of life” - a set of themes that in its complexity seems to be in such good hands with few directors as with Christof Loy. The main female roles in the three opera acts are performed by the Lithuanian soprano Asmik Grigorian, a very rare and tremendous feat, but once again connects the works to each other.

Springtime in Amsterdam is a joyful feature film created by director Christof Loy, world renowned for his work in international opera houses. Meeting accidentally in Amsterdam, a group of four people experience a series of confusions that must be resolved in 48 hours. A richly varied musical score that includes Viennese operetta, Dutch and French chansons, and songs from the American song book, is performed by a renowned cast of singers and conducted by Marko Letonja, well versed in popular music. In a magical dream world, dilemmas are resolved in this enchanting fable.

REVIEWS:

It is enjoyable enough to watch, being well directed and slickly performed… All four are excellent: Annette Dasch, Theresa Kronthaler, Thomas Oliemans and Norman Reinhardt, plus Henk Poort for good luck as a series of characters. They emote as well as they warble.

-- Opera Now

Francesco Cilea’s Adriana Lecouvreur was inspired by the real-life story of a celebrated actress at the Comédie-Française who was much admired by Voltaire. Hailed as a masterpiece, the opera was triumphantly staged in cities around the world after its premiere in 1902. The dramatically effective narrative is a passionate love triangle filled with intrigue and complicated plot twists set in the gallant 18th century. Its subtle ironies and gorgeous cantabile style of music provide a perfect vehicle for the star cast in this stunning production from the Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino.

REVIEWS:

The playing is admirably sensuous: Cilea knew his Wagner and Debussy, and Harding pointedly emphasizes the debts, while also giving us plenty of Italianate passion and lyricism.

-- Gramophone (DVD/Blu-ray of the Month, January 2023)

This Maggio Musicale production from Florence boasts a genuine star at its heart...María José Siri marks out her own territory, thanks to her lustrous voice and honestly theatrical characterization...The remaining star turn here is the conductor Daniel Harding in full-on verismo mode, notably sensitive to his singers’ needs, and inspiring the Maggio Musicale orchestra to project Cilea’s score with refined virtuosity.

-- Opera

Catalani’s masterpiece, first performed in 1892 at La Scala in Milan, is best known for its aria “Ebben? Ne andrò lontana”. With nuanced harmonies and colourful instrumentation, he pays great attention to the orchestra sound. He chose highly unusual material for his opera: the successful novel Die Geier-Wally by Wilhelmine von Hillern tells the story of a young woman who does not fit any of the gender clichés of the time. Unlike many earlier operatic heroines commanded to marry against their will, Wally does not look for a solution in society, but instead runs away to the mountains. Her husband must be her equal, someone unafraid to face both a bear and her father. “Izabela Matula - A Wagnerian hell of a woman with a great soprano.” (Kronenzeitung) / “Catalani’s highly dramatic music finds an intense advocate in Andrés Orozco-Estrada on the podium of the excellently disposed Wiener Symphoniker.” (Wiener Zeitung)

REVIEW

The career of the short-lived Catalani only really produced one opera of substance in the shape of his proto-verismo treatment of La Wally, based on a German play by Wilhelmine von Hillern...hailed by Toscanini as a work of genius[.] Competition with the slightly younger Puccini, no less than his early death, effectively condemned Catalani to near-eclipse outside his native Italy.

In the second Act, following the death of her father, Wally is able to let her real feelings show, only to find that she is treated as a figure of mockery not only by her supposed friends but also by the man she really loves, who only kisses her in order to win a bet with his mates. Her sudden transformation from suppressed romance to incandescent jealousy is superbly handled here, and the characterisation suddenly begins to assume a realism that one might have never expected from the more forthright interpretations featured on those old sound recordings. The working out of the jealousies over the next two Acts is sympathetically handled, until in the final scene the hero is overwhelmed and swept away by an avalanche (one of those operatic endings that will always assure La Wally a place in the more comic annals of theatrical history). The music here rises to real heights, with the extensive prelude to Act Four a magnificent evocation of the high peaks of the Alps and its cavernously wide-spaced woodwind octaves clearly providing a model for Prokofiev in the opening of his Alexander Nevsky over sixty years later.

As may be gathered from the foregoing, much of the responsibility for the impact of the opera lies with the singers; an insensitive performance can effectively reduce the music to simple ranting. And the cast here is very impressive indeed. In the title role Izabela Matula has the full Valkyrie metal for her big moments, but at the same time is able to fine down her voice to delicate half-tones which encompass much of the heroine’s more vulnerable emotions. Her singing of her big aria is steady as a rock, and she holds the audience in the palm of her hand to the extent that they do not ruin the transition into the closing scene of Act One by bursting in with unwanted applause. As her feckless lover (who cannot even be bothered to tell her that the woman of whom she is so jealous is actually his sister), Leonardo Capalbo looks every inch the charming playboy, and one can well believe both in his callous disregard for her feelings and then in his sudden realisation of love even when he is told that she planned to have him murdered. His singing is pretty special too, heartfelt and charming by turns.

Even better is Jacques Imbrailo as his rival, far from the cardboard villain that one finds in other performances, and singing in a manner that well suits his move into Italian repertory. He too finds plenty of dramatic meat in his part, and evokes pity as he degenerates into a shabby muddy wreck while still craving the affection that he understands he can never receive. Alastair Miles makes something sympathetic even of the blustering and bullying father, and Ilona Revolskaya is thoroughly believable as the scruffy boy who becomes the heroine’s only genuine friend. Sofia Vinnik makes much of little as Hagenbach’s misunderstood sister, and even Zoltán Nagy as the anonymous peasant creates a real character with sympathetic eyes staring out even through his alcoholic haze. The Arnold Schoenberg chorus assume their operatic roles with full-bodied and enthusiastic commitment, and they mix well and unobtrusively with the extras. And one must not overlook the contribution of Tiziano Mancini, who as always seems to appreciate when we need to see the singers in close-up and when it is best to draw back.

[The] direction of the singers themselves is superbly well handled by Barbora Horáková Joly, who gets the best results from her performers. The reputation of La Wally as a precursor of the later verismo style is well deserved, and the fact that the action here is updated to the present day disturbs me not one whit. Indeed the costumes serve to emphasise the very real nature of the characters in terms of modern psychology, and the singers are not afraid to get themselves believably grubby, dirty and blood-stained. Even the only slightly incongruous element, that of the stern father dictating precisely who his daughter shall marry, is unfortunately still with us today, although one might hope that the heroine’s reaction would be more rebellious nowadays.

I can earnestly recommend this video as – finally – a substitute for the Decca audio set that has perforce served us for half a century, and the best available performance of an opera that really does not deserve its almost total neglect outside Italy.

--MusicWeb International (Paul Corfield Godfrey)

 

Triumphantly premiered in 1724 at the King’s Theatre in London, George Frideric Handel’s Giulio Cesare in Egitto masterfully combines human emotions: Triumph with sorrow, despair with happiness and love with profound melancholy in the face of the transience of all earthly life. Star director Keith Warner creates a production that imaginatively blends silent film and baroque opera, delightfully echoing Mankiewicz’s legendary Cleopatra with Elizabeth Taylor, Rex Harrison and Richard Burton. An excellent cast of singers is led by two of the world’s leading countertenors: Bejun Mehta and Christophe Dumaux. Louise Alder shines as the seductive Cleopatra. Patricia Bardon, Simon Bailey and Jake Arditti are further highlights in this extraordinary group of singers, while Ivor Bolton provides the appropriate soundtrack on the podium of the Concentus Musicus Wien. “Many of the excellent singing actors present themselves in top form.” (Kurier) “A triumph! A must for baroque opera fans.” (Kronenzeitung) “A finely balanced mixture of poetry and comedy, of cinematic action and touching contemplation.” (Der Standard)

An exile from his native land following the failed revolution of 1848, the impoverished Richard Wagner is in Zürich working on his opera Tristan und Isolde. There he meets Otto and Mathilde Wesendonck, ardent admirers of his music. Wagner’s passionate and scandalous affair with Mathilde, whose poems he set to music, is explored in this feature film by director Jens Neubert. After their relationship ended, Wagner left Zurich for Italy, forever remembering Mathilde as ‘my first and only love’.

Since the death of Herbert von Karajan in 1989, the prestigious Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra’s concerts around Ascension Day (15 August) have firmly been in the hands of Riccardo Muti. Always sold out, they are among the highlights of every festival summer. For this year’s concert and on occasion of his 80th birthday, the maestro was acclaimed for his interpretation of Beethoven’s Missa solemnis, a piece he has never conducted before. “Muti is a master in conveying extremes: monumentality, where it is compositionally intended, and highest internalization alternate with each other in a dense interplay.” (FAZ) “Muti mastered the work and presented it as stringently as perhaps no one else can do it today.” (Die Presse)