Tannhäuser
Richard Wagner
Gran Teatre del Liceu 2008

Director: Sebastian Weigle
Orchestra: Simfonica del Gran Teatre del Liceu
Tannhäuser: Peter Seiffert
Elizabeth: Petra Maria Schnitzer
Wolfram: Markus Eiche
Venus: Béatrice Uria-Monzon
Hermann: Günther Groissböck
Walther : Vicente Ombuena
Biterolf: Lauri Vasar
Heinrich: FranciscoVas
Reinmar: Johann Tilli

Aspect Ratio: 16:9, 1080i
Format: PCM Stereo, DTS HD 5.1
Running time: 201 mins
No. of Discs: 1

“This set is essential” concluded Gramophone of the Ring cycle when this 2008 production was issued complete. Christian Thielemann leads a performance of masterful pacing and burning conviction that features detailed interpretations from many of today’s most experienced interpreters of their complex and glorious roles.

The composer's great-granddaughter was keen to stage Cord Garben's abridged version of the cycle at the Teatro Colin in Buenos Aires, but in the event things turned out rather differently. The present documentary provides a thrilling and visually memorable account of the long journey taken by this version from it's inception to the first night.

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With it's plot derived from Arthurian legend, Tristan und Isolde is considered by many to be the most harmonically daring and overtly sensual of the composer's operas. From the famous opening 'Tristan chord' of the Prelude, repeated at key points in the drama, to it's over-powering harmonic resolution at the end of the Liebestod (Love-Death), the opera is remarkable for the hypnotic power, physical longing and intense human emotion sustained over more than three years.

Comprising four separate operas, Wagner' visionary Der Ring des Nibelungen took 25 years to complete. Centered around a ring of power and the attempts of various people to acquire it, the Ring cycle explores the relationship bet.

Comprising four separate operas, Wagner's visionary Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung) took 25 years to complete. Centred around a ring of power and the attempts of various people to acquire it, the Ring cycle explores the relationship between love and earthly power and the themes of yearning and loss, all within a setting of medieval legend. The prologue Das Rheingold deals with the theft and subsequent surrender of the ring forged from the Rhinegold by the Nibelung dwarf Alberich.

Wagner: Lohengrin (Sung in Italian)

Wagner: Götterdämmerung, Act III (Live)

Wagner: The Flying Dutchman, WWV 63

The Zurich Opera Orchestra recently re-branded itself as the Zurich Philharmonia. Along with its relaunch it launched its own CD label. With an energized, undistracted Fabio Luisi at the helm, this is paying big dividends in this CD of popular Wagner overtures. The sensual, calm flow of the Rienzi Overture is exemplary for his Wagner: Luisi unfolds the music with a resting, slow magnificence before rolling out the full brunt of this powerful overture. The whole two-CD album continues in this vein. Indeed, this is now my favorite disc of orchestral Wagner!

– Forbes (Jens F. Laurson)

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Also available on CD

Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung) is one of the most remarkable achievements in all music, and Siegfried, the third in the cycle, contains some of the greatest moments in Wagner’s entire output. Wagner conceived Siegfried as a heroic ‘man of the future,’ and his fantastical tale is one in which the human dramas of treachery and violent struggles for power become magnified in a world of gods, dragons and magic. The previous opera in this cycle, Die Walkure, was acclaimed in The Guardian as “thrillingly vivid… easily maintains the high standard and promise of Das Rheingold.” (Naxos NBD0049).

This year marks the 200th anniversary of Richard Wagner’s birth. This CD clearly shows Wagner’s ambition to vie with Beethoven, manifesting the inclination towards big and boundless writing. Tobias Koch, one of the most versatile keyboard instrumentalists of his generation, reproduces Wagner’s original sound in brilliant fashion.

Hans Rosbaud was the chief conductor of the Southwest Radio Symphony Orchestra from 1948 until his death in 1962. He transformed the orchestra, later renamed as the SWR Symphony Orchestra Baden-Baden and Freiburg, into a leading European ensemble. His interests lay in both contemporary music and the classical and romantic symphonic repertoire. This new series from the SWR Classic label presents largely unpublished recordings by Rosbaud of classical and romantic repertoire, starting with overtures by Richard Wagner.

Inspired by his impressive descriptions, ensemble feuervogel follows Coryat on his voyage of discovery through the alleyways, squares, and canals of the Serenissima: from the magnificent St Mark's Basilica to the noble palazzi of the Venetian aristocracy and the elegant courts where music, dance, and courtly art played a central role. The concert programme Observations of Venice brings ornate diminutions and madrigals into dialogue with dance music, ricercars, and canzonas. In this way, ensemble feuervogel receives the music of the Venetian cinquecento, which Coryat wrote was "so beautiful that I would willingly walk a hundred miles at any time to hear the like of it."

Wagner’s visionary Ring of the Nibelung was first performed as a cycle of four operas in 1876. Its mythic plot examines the relationship between love and earthly power through the agency of a ring which confers ultimate power on its bearer.

One of the most sustained and remarkable achievements in all of music, the tetralogy is performed by an all-star cast, conducted by the new music director of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, Jaap van Zweden, in performances that have been critically acclaimed worldwide for their “thrilling sense of drama.” (The Sunday Times, London)

Past praise of previously released volumes included in this set:

Das Rheingold

Van Zweden’s approach is closest in memory to Herbert von Karajan’s–intimate and chamber-like. The back and forth between the fine, unexaggerated Fricka of Michelle De Young and the remarkable, surprising Wotan of Matthias Goerne is natural and familiar, and Goerne is the surprise of the performance. His experience and expertise as a Lieder singer comes in very handy in this opera.

– ClassicsToday.com

Die Walküre

This is a Walküre that reveals its treasures slowly; it’s a warm, intimate reading. The Wälsungs are stunning. Stuart Skelton's tone is big and clean, wobble-free. And his cries of “Wälse” in Act 1 have to be heard to be believed. Heidi Melton as Sieglinde is wonderfully expressive. The listener hangs on every perfectly pronounced, clear word she and Skelton sing, and thanks to Zweden, who leads their interactions as if the opera were bel canto, we feel for them. Interrupting their budding love is Falk Struckmann, surprisingly (he’s a baritone, not a bass). He is a grand, scary Hunding.

– ClassicsToday.com

Wagner: Siegfried

Van Zweden's marvelously-rehearsed orchestra play with accuracy, brilliance, and color. I commented on the beauty and sadness of the Walküre performance, and here, added to those two qualities is, by the third act, passion.

Simon O’Neill may not be the most intuitive Siegfried on disc, but he’s among the brightest-toned and most solid, showing no flatting even at the end of his bout with Brünnhilde. Heidi Melton is an excellent Brünnhilde and a marvelous singer/actress, using her half hour to transform with clarity. Everyone proves their mettle, taste, and polish here, and I suspect there will be few who are disappointed.

– ClassicsToday.com

Wagner: Götterdämmerung

This is a grand finale to the Hong Kong Philharmonic’s Ring Cycle. Both Walküre and Siegfried were marvelously conceived, excellent concert performances, each with a minor flaw or two: recording balances out of whack and unfocused mid-voice for Brünnhilde in Walküre; recording too recessed in Siegfried; lack of character delineation in the Wanderer/Mime scene in Act 1 of Siegfried. I was quite taken by the storytelling in both, finding beauty, sadness, and in the Siegfried finale, passion. This set, recorded at two concert performances (and, I suspect, a patch-up session or two—there is NO applause or audience reaction anywhere), is, in one word, majestic, which is a fitting end to the Cycle.

– ClassicsToday.com

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The Walhall Eternity label is for the first time releasing in it's entirety the legendary 1959 Covent Garden Ring cycle of Richard Wagner conducted by Franz Konwitschny, performances that feature the finest Wagnerian voices of the 1950's, including Wolfgang Windgassen, Hans Hotter, Astrid Varnay, Ramon Vinay, Amy Shuard (student of Eva Turner and Covent Garden regular), Gottlob Frick and more. Franz Konwitschny's gripping interpretations lie comfortably between those of F�rtw�ngler's commanding heights supremacy and Solti's fire and spontaneity. Re-mastered 24bit/96kHz.

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Import Hybrid-SACD pressing.

The Walhall Eternity label is for the first time releasing in it's entirety the legendary 1959 Covent Garden Ring cycle of Richard Wagner conducted by Franz Konwitschny, performances that feature the finest Wagnerian voices of the 1950's, including Wolfgang Windgassen, Hans Hotter, Astrid Varnay, Ramon Vinay, Amy Shuard (student of Eva Turner and Covent Garden regular), Gottlob Frick and more. Franz Konwitschny's gripping interpretations lie comfortably between those of F�rtw�ngler's commanding heights supremacy and Solti's fire and spontaneity. Re-mastered 24bit/96kHz.

Classical Music