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Puccini & Weiya: Turandot / Oren, China NCPA Orchestra [DVD]
Turandot, the late gem of Italian opera, is a celebration of the sounds and the mythical figures intimately associated with Chinese culture. The dramatic punch of the libretto inspired Giacomo Puccini to imagine a sound world of unusual splendor. The score is entrancing and unique, featuring original Chinese melodies, Asian pentatonic scales, and colorful orchestration with percussion writing that is strongly reminiscent of traditional Asian music. The NCPA’s production of this popular opera is a compelling feast for the senses. Chinese composer Hao Weiya gave this Turandot a new finale, performed for the first time in Beijing. In this captivating staging by director Chen Xinyi and under the musical direction of Daniel Oren an excellent cast offers a unique musical experience.
Mahler: Symphony No. 8 / Chailly, Lucerne Festival Orchestra
Gustav Mahler’s 8th Symphony breaks the boundaries of the symphonic form in a world-embracing gesture. Riccardo Chailly is one of the staunchest performers of this work, and therefore it seemed appropriate in many ways that he chose this work for his inaugural concert as Claudio Abbado’s successor and new music director of the Lucerne Festival Orchestra. The artistic statement was combined with a deeply personal conviction: it should be a “tribute to Claudio,” the highly esteemed friend and colleague to whom Chailly, as he emphasizes, owes very much. On 12 August 2016, Claudio Abbado’s unfinished Mahler cycle with the Lucerne Festival Orchestra was completed in a breathtaking performance of the Mahler 8th, simultaneously heralding in a new era in Lucerne.
Das Land Des Lachelns
Beethoven: Triple Concerto & Symphony No. 5 / Blomstedt, Gewandhausorchester [Blu-ray]
More than 200 years after its premiere at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig, Isabelle Faust, Jean-Guihen Queyras and Martin Helmchen have congenially mastered the artistic challenge of Beethoven’s gemstone. Under Herbert Blomstedt's sensitive direction, the soloists unite chamber musical intimacy together with virtuoso sophistication – and prove once again that the Triple Concerto is an unduly underestimated, much too rarely programmed masterpiece. With the composer's 5th Symphony, Blomstedt succeeds in achieving an entirely new perspective of this work. In the culmination of his three-year, intensive reenactment of Beethoven’s cosmos, the impressive sound that characterizes the Swedish grand seigneur's conducting is heralded by transparency rather than showmanship, relevance instead of pathos, and tenderness in place of sentimentality.
Beethoven: Triple Concerto - Symphony No. 5
Bach: Mass In B Minor / Biller, Krumbiegel, Lattke, Langner
BACH Mass in b • Georg Christoph Biller, cond; Reglint Bühler (sop); Susanne Krumbiegel (mez); Susanne Langner (alt); Martin Lattke (ten); Markus Flaig (bs); Thomanerchor Leipzig; Freiburg Baroque O • ACCENTUS 20281 (DVD: 114:07) Live: Leipzig 6/23/2013
Quite apart from the fact that it was probably never performed in Bach’s lifetime, it is hard for us in our day to see just how strange Bach’s Mass was in its own time. In is structured in four parts instead of the traditional five, it is highly demanding of both voices and instruments—itself not automatically a negative characteristic—and it is so massive as to be liturgically impractical. Strictly speaking, the “Mass” applies only to the Kyrie and the Gloria, required elements in any Lutheran main service, but also similarly used in some Roman Catholic services of the time. Though there are other, earlier large liturgical pieces—Monteverdi’s Vespers, for example—I cannot think of another concert Mass before it (but there likely is one somewhere). In hopes of getting a title, Bach sent the Missa, the first two sections, to the Roman Catholic Elector of Saxony on July 27, 1733, but its final, expanded, form comes from 1748–49. It was probably performed in Berlin in 1811 or 1812, but the first recorded performance was not before 1835, also in Berlin.
Little can be said of this piece that has not already been said hundreds of times. It is a monument that, like all great monuments, does not yield all its secrets at once. It is also one for which no recording, however sophisticated, can ever replace the experience of being there when it is sung, and I can further attest that nothing at all can surpass the experience of actually singing it. This said, it must also be noted that there is no lack of fine recordings: ArkivMusic currently lists 114, of which there seem to be about 8 DVD performances, with the present one also available in Blu-ray.
Georg Christoph Biller is in the no-longer curious position of competing with himself in the same place and in the same context, the Bach Festival in Leipzig, then in 2000 (DVD, Euroarts, rev. 30: 5), now in 2013. Though his sense of the timing of each section has not much changed over those years, there is a considerable difference in his overall approach.
First, while he is certainly up-to-date on all the current issues of historically-informed performance practice, he has properly felt free to adapt them to the forces at his command. Though the Thomanerchor as a whole counts just under 100 boys, aged 10 to 19, the choir on both recordings consists of something over 50. However fine the soloists are, this piece lives or dies by the quality of the choral singing. The Thomanerchor is not an amateur choir of cute children but, rather, a serious musical organization which makes a spectacular noise. Their sheer joy and complete technical proficiency leave no doubt that they know everything they need to know in order to project the ultimately exuberant spirit of this piece.
The first and most obvious difference between the two performances is the sound of the choir itself. Partly due to the bright recording and partly due to their articulation, the sound in 2000 was rather aggressive and deliberately heavily aspirated (E-le-he-he-he-he-he-he-he-i-son), which certainly makes each note in the run easier to sing but is choppy and not particularly graceful. The great pleasure of the new recording is that the choir has discovered that it can make a legato line that still articulates each note, and the result is a clarity of line that allows Biller to make each line go somewhere itself and not just be a sequence of notes. Then, too, here Biller uses a smaller group for certain quiet sections, such as Et incarnatus est/Crucifixus (And he was born/Crucified), in the Creed, for instance, to gain greater contrast with the following section, Et resurrexit (And he arose). In the Sanctus, he physically rearranges the choir, to set it up for the double-choir conclusion from the Osanna to the end.
The second difference is the orchestra. In 2000, Biller had the services of players from the Gewandhaus Orchestra in Leipzig, whose modern instruments added brightness to the whole sound. In 2013, he used the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra. Now, in addition to playing at the lower, so-called “Baroque,” pitch of around A=415 instead of at modern pitch of around A=440, the fewer overtones and resultant milder quality of these older instruments actually support rather than overwhelm the choir and soloists. For their solos, the instrumentalists stand.
Third, the five vocal soloists in the later recording sing from amidst the choir rather than, as earlier, at the front of the church balcony on which everything is performed. While we certainly hear them clearly, they are, as a group, inherently less powerful and less characterful than the quartet used in 2000. This may partly be a recording strategy, but they are well balanced with respect to the orchestra.
The production work in this DVD is exemplary. The concentration is all on the performers: There are no side trips to interesting corners of the church and only occasionally to the audience. The only timing glitch is in that given for the Dona nobis pacem (Grant us peace) at the very end: The music actually takes 3:02 and the rest of the 6:11 claimed is given over to applause and bows. It is a real mistake that none of the members of the orchestra nor the fine instrumental soloists is named anywhere in the material or on the DVD, and the web site of the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra is no help in trying to identify who they are. And who are the two boys also given a separate bow at the end?
The smiles on the faces of the boys afterwards tells us that they had a good time. I had a good time too, and wanted nothing so much as to get up there and sing with them. This is a fine performance: Bach is well-served by everyone, and it goes on my next Want List. Much recommended.
FANFARE: Alan Swanson
Verdi: Messa da Requiem / Luisi, Philharmonia Zurich
With the "Messa da Requiem“, Christian Spuck brought one of Verdi’s key works to the stage. In a large-scale co-production by the Ballett and Oper Zurich, the German choreographer and director ventured to portray an unusual interpretation of Verdi’s funeral mass in his scenic choreographic production. 36 dancers, the choir and supplementary choir of the Opernhaus Zurich as well as four highly acclaimed soloists joined together under the direction of Fabio Luisi for 13 wide ranging scenes dedicated to one of the most fundamental themes of humanity. Christian Spuck does not seek a mere religious interpretation of the liturgical text. Instead, he is interested in focusing on people who, in their vulnerability and helplessness, are in the search for comfort. In poetic tableaux he deals with basic human emotions and focuses on the feelings of fear, rage, pain, sadness and the search for redemption.
Mendelssohn: Midsummer Night's Dream - Tchaikovsky: Manfred Symphony [Blu-ray]
In the Overture and Incidental Music to William Shakespeare’s ‘Midsummer Night’s Dream,’ Felix Mendelssohn brings the illustrious company of elves, lovers’ passions and the solitude of the forest or a moonlit night to musical life. It became a model for other literary reflections in music like Peter Tchaikovsky’s ‘Manfred Symphony.’ It’s four movements- or “images,” as the composer himself named them- capture the world-weariness of George Byron’s ‘Manfred: A Dramatic Poem’ in music. Riccardo Chailly and the Lucerne Festival Orchestra awaken the musical imagery of both works in a colorful, fresh, and enchanting performance. This release was recorded live at the Concert Hall of KKL Luzem, Lucerne Festival in August of 2017.
Brahms: Academic Festival Overture - Violin Concerto - Symph
Mahler: Symphony No. 8 / Chailly, Lucerne Festival Orchestra [Blu-ray]
Gustav Mahler’s 8th Symphony breaks the boundaries of the symphonic form in a world-embracing gesture. Riccardo Chailly is one of the staunchest performers of this work, and therefore it seemed appropriate in many ways that he chose this work for his inaugural concert as Claudio Abbado’s successor and new music director of the Lucerne Festival Orchestra. The artistic statement was combined with a deeply personal conviction: it should be a “tribute to Claudio,” the highly esteemed friend and colleague to whom Chailly, as he emphasizes, owes very much. On 12 August 2016, Claudio Abbado’s unfinished Mahler cycle with the Lucerne Festival Orchestra was completed in a breathtaking performance of the Mahler 8th, simultaneously heralding in a new era in Lucerne.
The Cleveland Orchestra Centennial Celebration (1918-2018)
MARIA STUART
KABALE UND LIEBE
Verdi: Aida / Lewis, Noseda, Teatro Regio Torino Orchestra
Originally commissioned to celebrate the completion of the Suez Canal and the opening of Cairo’s new opera house, Verdi’s Egyptian epic Aida is here seen in a spectacular new staging in the Teatro Regio Torino by the Oscar-winning American film director William Friedkin, creator of such famous movies as The Exorcist and The French Connection. The cast features American soprano Kristin Lewis who has been heralded for her “remarkable voice, which she uses with powerful dramatic instinct” (La Stampa), and Georgian mezzo-soprano Anita Rachvelishvili, whose Amneris “dominates the stage with her dark, rounded, irresistible voice and extraordinary stage presence” (La Gazzetta Musicale). Gianandrea Noseda leading the Orchestra and Chorus Teatro Regio Torino received accolaides from all: “he controls everything- orchestra, singers, chorus, dancers, acrobats- with an all-encompassing overview.” (La Stampa) “he knows exactly when it’s time to linger over a timbre, a color, an expressive chord.” (Corriere della Sera)
Gounod: Faust / Castronovo, Noseda, Teatro Regio di Torino
After its premiere in 1859, Gounod’s Faust was an instant hit, and is still one of France’s most popular operas. Based on the play Faust et Marguerite, the work features libretto by Michel Carre. This staging is by director Stefano Poda. “A triumph that will long remain in the annals as one of the most brilliant stagings not only in this theater, but in any of today’s opera houses…” - ResMusica
Picture Format: NTSC, 16:9
Sound Format: PCM Stereo, PCM 5.1
Subtitles: E, G, F, IT, SP, CH, KO, JP
Booklet: E, G, F
Region Code: 0
Weber: Der Freischutz / Chung, Teatro alla Scala
Also available on standard DVD
Weber was at the forefront of the rise of German Romantic opera and sought to dethrone Rossini from his position as the leading operatic composer in Europe. In his breakthrough and most popular opera Der Freischütz (‘The Marksman’) composed in 1821, he succeeded in his aim of establishing a truly German form. Turning to the folklore and folk songs of his native land he took a story of a marksman who makes a pact with the Devil, vesting it with powerful intensity – not least in the famous Wolf’s Glen scene – and an astonishing control of orchestral color and atmosphere.
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REVIEW:
Goodness, but Der Freischütz is a problematic opera for today! You can’t ignore it because it’s instrumental in the development of German musical Romanticism; several scholars would even call it its progenitor. Schumann, Mendelssohn, Wagner and Strauss would have been unthinkable without it, and even Beethoven, who was no friend of Weber’s, was impressed. However, it poses an all but insoluble problem in staging it for modern audiences. Its setting is so grounded in the Romantic German Forest that any attempts to remove it from there or to update its setting invariably fall flat or seem reductive (or simply indulgent). However, staging it in its original setting risks seeming like a parody of blood-and-soil National Socialism. This dilemma means that, more often than not, it’s one of those works where you’re far better to retreat into the pictures of your own mind’s eye, and happily we have lots of good CD recordings to help us do that, most notably those from Keilberth, Kleiber, Harnoncourt and Davis.
This 2017 La Scala production is a game-changer, however, and it does the best job I’ve yet seen of putting the opera on stage in a way that is neither daft nor wilfully obstructive. Matthias Hartmann goes for a mixture of the specific and the abstract. There are plenty of trees to put us in the forest, but well-placed strips of lighting suggest the church, the hut and the mountainscape behind. The costumes are a quirky mix of national dresses – ranging from Scotland to the Balkans – but, more importantly, Hartmann also gets into the work’s dark psychological possibilities, wondering whether Max’s obsession with the magic bullets is a mirror for his wider insecurities. He doesn’t shun the supernatural, however: various devils appear to direct Kaspar’s actions, and occasionally we see demonic creatures that might have been lifted out of a painting by Hieronymus Bosch. Importantly, this eclecticism works. It poses many questions and gives every facet of the opera its due without getting trapped in any of them, and that alone makes this the opera’s most successful outing on film to date.
The musical performances are excellent too. Who would have thought that the La Scala orchestra would be so good at this cornerstone of the German repertoire? Their playing of the overture is one of the best you’ll hear, with dark, suggestive strings at the opening, a heart-stopping quartet of horns, and a crackling sense of drama in the main Allegro. Myung-Whun Chung is a natural with the whole score, too, shaping the unfolding drama with an unfailingly right sense of where it is going and how it is going to get there.
The singers are top-notch. Julia Kleiter is radiant, luxuriously beautiful in her two big arias without a hint of simpering, and Eva Liebau’s Ännchen is a delightfully light-hearted contrast. Both are fully comfortable in the tessitura and are a joy to listen to as well as to watch. Michael König has a tiny touch of abrasion in his Heldentenor voice, but I could forgive him for his heroic tone, and Stephen Milling does a wonderful deus ex machina as the Hermit. Best of all, though, is Günther Groissböck, whose Kaspar sets the stage alight, almost literally so in the Wolf’s Glen scene. He’s a powerhouse to watch, and he uses his big bass voice with agility and athleticism to bring the part to life.
I approached this with a good degree of scepticism, but I found it completely compelling and was totally won over. To my great surprise, it solves the problems of staging Der Freischütz for our time. With its compelling production and its brilliant musicianship, it is now a clear first choice for Der Freischütz on film, and it’s by some margin the best opera film I’ve seen in 2019 so far.
– MusicWeb International (Simon Thompson)
V8: LIFE IN MUSIC
Kleiberg: Mass for Modern Man / Jensen, Trondheim Symphony Orchstra
Stale Kleiberg’s Mass for Modern Man is about the loss of existential meaning as an antithesis to faith and belief. The work commutes between these two extremes, and raises the following underlying question: Is belief possible for modern man? In this work, the answer is ‘yes’: not a resounding ‘yes,’ but a ‘yes’ in spite of all. The work is a large-scale concert mass for two soloists, choir and orchestra where Kleiberg’s neo-romantic music commutes between the intimate and the grand. Stale Kleiberg (b. 1958) is a major Norwegian composer with a considerable international reputation. His music is widely performed in Norway and abroad, and is mostly commissioned by well-established orchestras, ensembles, and performers. There are also many published recordings of his music, including seven albums (the present one is number eight), that have received outstanding international reviews. Kleiberg’s music is characterized by a highly distinctive form of extended tonality and by meticulous attention to coloristic details.
Donizetti: Il castello di Kenilworth / Frizza, Donizetti Opera
Recorded during the 2018 Donizetti Festival, Il Castello di Kenilworth was first staged at Naples’ San Carlo in 1829. Drawn from a novel by Sir Walter Scott and adapted by librettist Leone Tottola, this rare opera was unjustly long neglected. This recording features the original version, with the role of Warney entrusted to a tenor (which the composer changed into a baritone in the 1836 revision of the score).Il Castello di Kenilworth is the first of the several successful works to follow that Donizetti based on British history, introducing the character of Queen Elizabeth I, torn by the inner struggle between a monarch’s duty and a woman’s feelings. The fundamental pivot of the drama is the antagonism between the two female characters who both dwell and suffer in their loneliness, in a male-dominated world. The performance received excellent reviews, praising the richness of the costumes, the sobriety of the stage setting, and, mostly, the vocal and acting skills of the whole cast, which features first-rate singers like opera stars Jessica Pratt and Carmela Remigio, who share the stage with talented tenors Stefan Pop and emerging talent Xabier Anduaga “A first-class cast, with an imaginative production team, under the musical direction of Riccardo Frizza, have been assembled, and it is not an exaggeration to say that together they have produced a compelling case for “Il Castello di Kenilworth” to be given further consideration. […] It was musically engaging, full of bel canto charm, with some wonderful melodies, and notwithstanding its formulaic format, was dramatically convincingly. (Alan Neilson – Operawire)
Weber: Der Freischutz / Erod, Sachsischer Staatsopernchor
Carl Maria von Weber’s dark Romantic era tale of love, faith, and temptation is grippingly performed by the Dresden Staatskapelle led by conductor, Christian Thielemann in this live DVD performance from early 2015. With highly acclaimed staging by Axel Köhler, the singers in leading roles add to the luster of the production with the tenor Michael König’s performance of the anti-hero Max displaying a gloriously free upper register bringing heroic weight to his role and Sara Jakubiak sweet toned and melancholic Agathe.
Carl Maria von Weber
DER FREISCHÜTZ
Ottokar - Adrian Eröd
Kuno - Alberto Dohmen
Agathe - Sara Jakubiak
Ännchen - Christina Landshamer
Kaspar - Georg Zeppenfeld
Max - Michael König
Ein Eremit - Andreas Bauer
Kilian - Sebastian Wartig
Saxon State Opera Chorus
(chorus master: Jörn Hinnerk Andresen)
Dresden Staatskapelle
Christian Thielemann, conductor
Axel Köhler, stage director
Arne Walther, set designer
Katharina Weissenborn, costume designer
Fabio Antoci, lighting designer
Recorded at Semperoper Dresden, 2015
Picture format: NTSC 16:9
Sound format: PCM Stereo / DTS 5.0
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: German, English, French, Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Japanese Booklet notes: English, German, French
Running time: 149 mins
No. of DVDs: 2 (1x DVD 9 + 1x DVD 5)
Tchaikovsky: Swan Lake / Kessels, Royal Opera House
Swan Lake is perhaps the best-loved of all the classical ballets and has a special place in The Royal Ballet’s repertory. This new production by Artist in Residence Liam Scarlett features additional choreography while remaining faithful to Petipa and Ivanov’s classic. John Mcfarlane’s opulent designs provide an atmospheric, period setting for this enthralling love story, illuminated by Tchaikovsky’s sublime score. Marianela Nuñez brings both poignancy and glitter to the dual role of Odette / Odile, with Vadim Muntagirov as the yearning Prince Seigfried, while the corps de ballet are showcased at their spellbinding best as the enchanted swans and cygnets. “What a magnificent achievement this is. The young choreographer Liam Scarlett has given Covent Garden its first new Swan Lake in 30 years, and it’s a winner. Big, bold, and beautiful, it’s completely distinctive- Scarlett has put his stamp all over this production- yet it honors the traditions of the Royal Ballet.” (The Times)
THE CELLO & I
SYMPHONY NO. 5 - DOCUMENTARY
