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Hector Berlioz
BENVENUTO CELLINI

Benvenuto Cellini – Burkhard Fritz
Teresa – Maija Kovalevska
Fieramosca – Laurent Naouri
Giacomo Balducci – Brindley Sherratt
Pope Clemens VII – Mikhail Petrenko
Ascanio – Kate Aldrich
Francesco – Xavier Mas
Bernardino – Roberto Tagliavini
Pompeo – Adam Plachetka
Innkeeper – Sung-Keun Park

Vienna State Opera Chorus
Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra
Valery Gergiev, conductor

Philipp Stölzl, stage director and stage designer
Kathi Maurer, costume design
Duane Schuler, lighting design
Mara Kurotschka, choreographer

Filmed at the Großes Festspielhaus, Salzburg, 5, 10 and 15 August 2007.

Picture format: NTSC 19:9
Sound format: Dolby Digital 2.0 / Dolby Surround 5.0 / DTS 5.0
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: English, French
Running time: 164 mins
No. of DVDs: 1 (DVD 9)

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BERLIOZ Benvenuto Cellini • Valery Gergiev, cond; Burkhard Fritz ( Cellini ); Maija Kovaleska ( Teresa ); Laurent Naouri ( Fieramosca ); Kate Aldrich ( Ascanio ); Brindley Sherratt ( Balducci ); Mikhail Petrenko ( Pope Clement VII ); Vienna State Op Ch; Vienna PO • NAXOS 2.110271 (DVD: 163:35) Live: Salzburg 8/5-10-15/2007


This is an eye-popping extravaganza in which stage business keeps pace with, and too often trumps, Berlioz’s most coruscatingly vibrant and scintillantly compelling score. Cellini appears in a helicopter at the rooftop porch of Balducci’s penthouse, framed against the New York skyline; robots help Teresa with her toilet (including shaving her armpits) as Maija Kovaleska delivers herself of her big aria with virtuosic aplomb; Ascanio, too, is a robot—Kate Aldrich deliciously does her “Tra-la-la” aria with head removed (at stage level); Pompeo is a pimp, and hookers are a significant portion of the Mardi Gras crowd; the wheedling Asian innkeeper brandishes an assault rifle; and so on. The animation of static moments—in terms of staging—is clever, entertaining, and often riveting. The Mardi Gras itself is a credibly incredible triumph of garish color, comic incident, choreographically turned hurlyburly, and drama. Even those who care little for Berlioz’s music will find themselves entranced by the spectacle, while those with some regard for the composer may be alternately delighted and appalled. Berlioz’s conception of the artist as a romantic hero is a major casualty. As Cellini, Burkhard Fritz is in heroic voice and magnificent swagger but portrays his man as a gangster; while, between Mardi Gras and his appearance at his atelier, the director has foisted upon him a gratuitous wound, allowing the camera to make much of his pained expressions and bloodied clothes. Why? Pompeo’s blustering aria, boasting his fencing prowess, has been transferred to Fieramosca, which makes no sense whatever as the latter is—and is played throughout to great comic effect by Laurent Naouri—a sneaking pantywaist. English subtitles render maîtres ciseleurs as “master engravers,” a literal translation that ignores Berlioz’s usage to mean master goldsmiths while making nonsense of the Dionysian hymn he lavished upon Cellini’s foundrymen. We never see the Perseus , the statue Cellini’s been commissioned to cast, instead, the mold he threatens to destroy as Pope Clement rebukes him is a picayune Winged Victory of Samothrace —another disturbing dissonance between Berlioz’s straightforward dramatic narrative and director Philipp Stölzl’s pointless, would-be-clever dinking. Within the often silly parameters just outlined, vocally and histrionically this production is beyond all praise. Valery Gergiev’s direction is surefire, though others—Sir Colin Davis, Sir Roger Norrington—have found deeper resonance through significant portions of the score, while the never less than virtuosic Vienna Philharmonic is massive where Berlioz is lean and sinewy. Nevertheless, one comes to the end stunned, thrilled, and viscerally moved. As the cast took richly deserved bows, I, alone in my hovel, stood and cheered! Naxos’s surround sound lets no detail of this teeming, overfull, overrich score escape, delivering all with overwhelming punch. Despite all caveats, highest recommendation.


FANFARE: Adrian Corleonis

The Places ò the tour of France takes US to Burgundy to the Pays de la Loire to Franche-Comté and elsewhere and includes glimpses of the 17th century Château de Cheverny with it's hunting museum and souvenirs of the chase and the Château d'Arlay with it's site for falconry. The Château de Bussy-Rabutain was rebuilt in the middle of the 17th century by Count Roger of Bussy-Rabutain exiled from the French court after his scandalous Histoire amoureuse des Gaules a literary preoccupation reflected in his collection of pictures. The restored gardens of the Château de Villandry are seen in their formal lay-out. The Music ò the music chosen to accompany the tour of the fertile and varied landscapes of France is by Beethoven and consists principally of his Pastoral Symphony a work that reflects his feelings as he recollects a visit to the countryside.

RUSSIA / UKRAINE / UZBEKISTAN

The Places
Peter the Great founded St Petersburg in 1703 on Swedish territory, a provocation to Sweden, then the most powerful state in the region. Over a few years, he created a new city with an outlet to the Baltic, a city to challenge Moscow and force Russia to face Western Europe. Victory over the Swedes at Poltava in 1709 secured the city’s future. The tour takes in Odessa, in the Ukraine, an important naval base for Russia on the Black Sea, and concludes with a visit to Uzbekistan.

The Music
Mussorgsky was originally an army officer, ending his life in intermittent government service, as addiction to alcohol took its toll. At his death in 1881, at the age of 42, he left much unfinished. His Pictures at an Exhibition was written in 1874 as a set of piano pieces, a translation into music of paintings, designs, models and drawings by his friend Victor Hartmann, who had died the year before, heard here in the colourful orchestration by Ravel. Borodin had a successful career as an analytical chemist, a professor at the Medico-Surgical Academy. His activities as a scientist limited the attention he could give to music, so that a number of his compositions remained incomplete at his relatively early death at the age of 53 in 1887.

Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: PCM Stereo / Dolby Digital 5.1 / DTS 5.1
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Running time: 60 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

• Against the backdrop of St Petersburg’s beautiful Court Capella, Eldar Nebolsin performs the piano concertos of Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov with a passion and sincerity as palpable onscreen as live in the hall. With such evident pleasure and seemingly with ease, he transformsthe familiar into something fresh and wonderful. He is seen live with Vladimir Lande and theSt Petersburg State Symphony Orchestra. Bonus material shows Nebolsin as soloist in anintimate and equally engaging performance of Beethoven’s Fourth Piano Sonata.In 2005, Eldar Nebolsin was unanimously awarded the Sviatoslav Richter Prize in the FirstInternational Piano Competition in Moscow, where he was also honoured with the specialaward for The Best Classical Concerto Performance. He enjoys a busy international careeras a soloist, recitalist and chamber-music player, appearing with conductors, orchestras andcolleagues of international distinction.

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Adapted from Thomas Mann’s 1912 novella, Death in Venice was Benjamin Britten’s last opera, the composer insisting on its completion while delaying badly needed heart surgery. The starkly simple narrative of a famous but failing novelist travelling to Venice to seek inspiration only to find unhealthy infatuation and deadly cholera, is given a chamber-like precision and clarity through Britten’s score, becoming a haunting drama filled with musical symbols, disquieting mystery and richly evocative atmospheres of Venice and its strange characters. Willy Decker’s Teatro Real production was described as ‘one of his most brilliant stage works… a remarkable technical feat.’

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Valery Gergiev, fresh from his appointment as chief conductor of the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra in 2015, takes his new ensemble to the BBC Proms for a concert of the utmost in drama and vivid musicianship. The brilliant young Uzbek pianist Behzod Abduraimov performs Rachmaninov’s thrillingly virtuosic Piano Concerto No. 3, while the Russian stage and film actor Alexei Petrenko recites the text in Galina Ustvolskaya’s resonant and profound Symphony No.3 ‘Jesus Messiah, Save Us!’. The programme also features a hypnotic Ravel Boléro, an alternately tender, florid and witty Rosenkavalier Suite, and the rousing Hungarian March by Berlioz.

SPAIN

The Places
The tour starts in the countryside near Sancti Petri, and shows other aspects of the fertile landscape of Andalusia, leading to the historic hillside town of Medina-Sidonia, seat of the Guzman family whose Duke led the Spanish Armada in 1588. The resort of Sitges in Catalonia is followed by the great Cathedral of Seville, reputedly the largest Gothic church in the world, and towns that reflect the Moorish past of this region of Spain.

The Music
The French composer Maurice Ravel inherited from his mother, of Basque origin, a strong interest in Spain. Spanish elements influence much of his music including the Rapsodie espagnole, completed in 1908, Ravel’s first major orchestral work and a demonstration of his originality and of his gifts as an orchestrator. The music moves from the stillness of night to two characteristic Spanish dances and a final Spanish fiesta. Isaac Albéniz enjoyed a double career, winning an international reputation as a virtuoso pianist and doing much to establish Spanish music in a form acceptable at home and abroad. He divided the later years of his life, a period of deteriorating health, between Paris, Barcelona and Nice, years which saw the composition of his Iberia.

Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: PCM Stereo / Dolby Digital 5.1 / DTS 5.1
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Running time: 55 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

The tour takes US first to the carnival celebrations in Basel, with it's elaborate displays. There follows a visit to Vigeland Park in Oslo, with it's characteristic figures, the work of Gustav Vigeland. The music chosen for this tour is by Schumann. His Carnaval accompanies the carnival in Basel, flowers in the countryside are depicted in Blumenstuck and the granite figures in Vigeland Park, in Oslo, are matched with Scenes of Childhood.

SICILY

The Places
Sicily has enjoyed a remarkably varied history, held by Phoenicians and Carthaginians, it became part of Roman territory, later to be occupied by Ostrogoths, recaptured by the Byzantines, ruled by Saracens, and occupied by the Normans, followed by German, French, and Spanish overlords. It was only in the mid-nineteenth century that the island was drawn into the unified country of Italy. The historical changes that Sicily has undergone are reflected in its culture.

The Music
The music chosen for this tour of Sicily is by Beethoven and consists of three of his best known piano sonatas, the Pathétique, the Moonlight and the Appassionata.

Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: PCM Stereo 2.0
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Running time: 57 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

Our journey takes US to places in Austria, Germany, Italy, Switzerland and Scotland, largely following the order of the seasons, from the hope of spring to the snows of winter. Violinist, priest and highly prolific composer, Antonio Vivaldi was born in Venice in 1678 and spent most of his life there. The most popular of his 500 or more concertos, then and now, has been the Four Seasons, eventually published in 1725, each concerto accompanied by an explanatory sonnet.

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Giuseppe Saverio Mercadante was a contemporary of Donizetti and Rossini, and his prolific output of operas proved influential in founding dramatic techniques that were taken on by Verdi. Set in the ancient and besieged city of Carthage, Didone abbandonata is the dramatic and tragic tale of ill-starred lovers whose decisions ultimately place an entire populace in peril. A genuine rarity in the theatre, Didone has strong ties to the 18th century but also points towards the bel canto innovations that were to come. This carefully researched and critically acclaimed production presents the work in the sound and playing style of Mercadante’s time.

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Based on real events and drawing on Georg Büchner’s revolutionary play, Alban Berg’s Wozzeck turns a grimly tragic narrative of violence and murder into one of the most powerful and original operas of the 20th century. Berg’s uncompromising portrayal of brutality and madness generated much controversy, but the significance of Wozzeck was soon recognised; its compelling lyrical expansiveness, large-scale dramatic gestures and remarkable musical structures producing music of overwhelming emotional intensity. The Financial Times declared this to be "a beautiful, moving, engrossing production… this is a consummate Wozzeck, blending clarity, lyricism, compassion and crushing force."

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REVIEW:

Marc Albrecht embeds Wozzeck within a lineage of lyrically sprung, dance-driven operas from Weber’s Oberon to Der Rosenkavalier, taking in Lortzing and Die Fledermaus along the way. The singing is accomplished with style, especially the astonishingly secure Captain of Marcel Beekman and the engagingly sinister comic turn of Willard White as the Doctor. Even were it not among the most beautifully played and sung accounts on record and film, this Wozzeck would command attention for Krzysztof Warlikowski’s staging.

– Gramophone

Pixel is a stunning contemporary dance performance for 11 dancers in a virtual and living visual environment. A work on illusion combining energy and poetry, fiction and technical achievement, minimal music and hip-hop. It opens a dialogue between the synthetic world of digital projection and the real bodies of dancers. Pixel appeals to fans of contemporary dance, urban and hip-hop moves, with elements of circus too. Artistic Director and choreograper Mourad Merzouki, together with his Compagnle Kafig has elevated hip-hop to the world stage. In doing so he has created a multicultural contemporary dance form which takes equal place with modern dance and other idioms of the genre. He has incorporated circus elements, martial arts, contemporary dance and puppetry, and brought in performers from Algeria, Brazil and Taiwan in order to develop his ideas. The music was composed by French composer Armand Amar won a Cesar award for his original soundtrack.

Based on stories by Henri Merger but also infused with the composer’s own experiences as a penniless graduate, Puccini’s powerful opera La Boheme portrays its youthful characters’ romantic outlook on life and the brutally tragic end to their innocence. The story is set around 1930 but director Orpha Phelan sees Puccini’s characters as equally at home in our times: “their story is universal, all that is needed is to understand what it is like to be young and in love!” This Malmo production was acclaimed in the Svenska Dagbladet as “one of the most moving renditions of Puccini’s opera I have ever seen.” In this production, we are in Paris. The wonderfully romantic city, made for falling in love. “Anyone who has been in Paris in a slushy winter knows there is nothing especially romantic about it!” Orpha Phelan states. She does not want to idealize bohemian life. “Nor is there anything particularly romantic about choking to death… in a poor, ugly, cold neighborhood… In the opera this misery is enacted against such oh-so-beautiful music. It’s that contrast that makes the opera great.”

This Blu-ray Disc is only playable on Blu-ray Disc players and not compatible with standard DVD players.

Also available on standard DVD

The collaboration of the poet John Dryden and Henry Purcell marked a conspicuous leap forward for English opera. Their greatest project, King Arthur, is a five-act ‘dramatick opera,’ the text of which had its origins in a patriotic musical play Dryden had written in 1684 but which he radically overhauled. The result was a work that appealed to the audience’s enthusiasm for fine costumes, lavish sets, ingenious stage machinery and a cast of singers, dancers and instrumentalists, containing vocal show-stoppers such as the imperishable ‘Frost Scene’ and ‘Fairest isle.’ This critically acclaimed staging uses a new performing edition by Rene Jacobs, and is sung in English with German dialogue. Bachtrack.com greatly admired the 2017 performance: “The singing cast- all of which played up to six parts each- were strong throughout Soprano Anett Fritsch marveled as Merlin’s trusty spirit Philidel and Cupido, her coloratura agile and light, her singing and speaking impressive both on stage and whilst airborne. Bass Johannes Weisser played a suitably repulsive Grimbald and convinced vocally in the Cold Genius’ staccato aria “What Ho,” Soprano Robin Johannsen and Altus Benno Schachtner delighted particularly during their touching love duet.”

This Blu-ray Disc is only playable on Blu-ray Disc players and not compatible with standard DVD players.

Also available on standard DVD

Valery Gergiev, fresh from his appointment as chief conductor of the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra in 2015, takes his new ensemble to the BBC Proms for a concert of the utmost in drama and vivid musicianship. The brilliant young Uzbek pianist Behzod Abduraimov performs Rachmaninov’s thrillingly virtuosic Piano Concerto No. 3, while the Russian stage and film actor Alexei Petrenko recites the text in Galina Ustvolskaya’s resonant and profound Symphony No.3 ‘Jesus Messiah, Save Us!’. The programme also features a hypnotic Ravel Boléro, an alternately tender, florid and witty Rosenkavalier Suite, and the rousing Hungarian March by Berlioz.

This Blu-ray Disc is only playable on Blu-ray Disc players and not compatible with standard DVD players.

Also available on standard DVD

Polychoral music is so synonymous with 16th century Venice that it is easy to forget that the longest flourishing of this style- possibly even its invention- took place in Germany. Whether or not it was in Munich with the works of Orlande de Lassus that the Gabrielis first encountered its effects, polychoral music came to define German textures and techniques for over a century. Both apprentices and rivals to their Italian counterparts, composers such as Hieronymus Praetorius, Schutz, Hassler and Scheidt, as well as Austria’s Biber, fostered a tradition whose influence would extend all the way to the motets of Bach. This performance places a giant of Baroque choral music, Biber’s Missa Salisburgensis, alongside the Venetian choral works of Monteverdi from which it takes its inspiration. The combination is a heady one, a triumphal musical celebration uniquely appropriate to mark the 200th anniversary year of Salzburg’s affiliation with Austria.

This is an audio-only (i.e., with no video content) Blu-ray disc playable only on Blu-ray players.

It is also available on standard CD



PROKOFIEV Symphony No. 4 (revised version); op. 112. The Prodigal Son, op. 46 • Marin Alsop, cond; São Paulo SO • NAXOS 0038 (Blu-ray Audio: 78:18)

Of Prokofiev’s seven symphonies, the Fourth has the most unassuming demeanor. Less sparkling than the First, less violent than the acidic Second and Third, less monumental than the Fifth and Sixth, and less magical than the nostalgic Seventh, its lack of distinctive character has kept it (especially in its baggier revised version) on the edge of the repertoire. Still, despite its relatively anodyne character, it has its fair share of charm, and its virtues are brought to the fore in this graceful performance, the second installment in Alsop’s symphony cycle.

Granted, at first, the performance seems slightly distracted. But within a minute or two, it comes into focus, and from then on, Alsop shows consistent sensitivity to the score’s harmonic flavor (the more mournful harmonies are especially well conveyed), its lyrical pull (especially in the more regretful moments—try the melancholy of the second movement), and its rhythmic stride. Alsop never tries to push the score into a grandeur it doesn’t possess—this is a fairly laid-back performance. But while it’s low in pressure, it’s never inattentive. She has a good sense of balance, so the passages with superimposed ideas (especially in the Finale) have enviable transparency. Details carry well, too (listen, for instance, to the marcato chatter on the bass lines at the beginning of the Finale). And while São Paulo is not quite a super-virtuoso ensemble, its members (especially the busy solo winds) play deftly. If the Symphony still sometimes seems to meander or sag (especially in the second movement and the Finale), the fault is really with the composer, not the performers.

Just as Prokofiev fashioned his Third from his opera The Fiery Angel, so he filched most of the musical material of the Fourth from his ballet The Prodigal Son. Putting the Symphony and its source material together on a single disc will seem either revelatory or redundant, depending on whether you are more interested getting insight into Prokofiev’s compositional methods or getting some musical variety. In any case, the original ballet is as pale as the Symphony (and formally a lot looser): You’ve rarely heard a less violent robbery scene than the seventh movement here, or, for that matter, a more anemic seductress than the one Prokofiev introduces in the third. Still, it too has its beauties (or, most of the time, the same beauties), and the interpretive grace that serves the Symphony so well has the same effect here. The sound is excellent, with plenty of timbral clarity (timpani have exceptional presence); the surround speakers on the 5.1 tracks offer an appropriate warmth to the total aural experience. Recommended.

FANFARE: Peter J. Rabinowitz