Zandonai - Francesca da Rimini (Berlin, 2021)

Riccardo Zandonai - Francesca da Rimini

Deutsche Oper, Berlin - 2021

Carlo Rizzi, Christof Loy, Sara Jakubiak, Alexandra Hutton, Samuel Dale Johnson, Ivan Inverardi, Jonathan Tetelman, Charles Workman, Meechot Marrero, Mané Galoyan, Arianna Manganello, Karis Tucker, Amira Elmadfa, Andrew Dickinson, Dean Murphy, Patrick Cook, Thomas Lehman

takt1.com streaming

Other than being associated with a group of post-Verdi Italian composers at the beginning of the twentieth century, opera verismo is hard to define in musical or thematic terms. There's an element of social realism in works like Puccini’s La Bohème and Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana, but it’s more in considering how the real people deal with personal hardships and difficulties than in any social commentary or criticism. Other works, like Alfano’s Cyrano de Bergerac, Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur or Giordano's Fedora that hardly fit the common idea of verismo. In any case with the enhanced emotional range and the artificial construct of singing one’s troubles, opera hardly seems the ideal way to approach any kind of social realism.

On the other hand, the hard-hitting musical style of verismo, pushing and even perhaps over-extending the emotional content even further than Verdi, perhaps hits on a deeper emotional reality for the troubles of its subject, or perhaps more accurately, it communicates the depth of feeling to an audience. For all the (unjustified) criticism of emotional manipulation and accusations of sentimentality that could be levelled against Puccini, there is no question that he does masterfully express the deep personal dilemmas suffered by his protagonists and communicate it through the medium of music in a way that touches the listener.

It might not have the common people touch of Cavalleria Rusticana, dealing instead with two noble families where an arranged marriage has left a woman in a loveless relationship and unable to be with the person she loves, but Riccardo Zandonai's Francesca da Rimini does nonetheless enter into that realm of enhanced emotional turmoil. Musically, it elaborates and elevates to an extraordinary level (aspiring to Wagner's Tristan und Isolde obviously) the romantic aspect, but sets this against and within the bloodthirsty violence and brutality of the family wars. Whether Zandonai’s opera is successful is debatable, but it has potential that could be realised in a strong theatrical setting. Christoph Loy can usually be relied upon for that, but while he certainly makes Francesca da Rimini 'work', I’m not convinced he finds anything deeper in it.

What is indisputable is that Act I of Francesca da Rimini has one of the greatest build-ups in all opera. Perhaps not quite as prolonged and ultimately sublime as Tristan und Isolde, the origin story of which this opera acknowledges as a model, but it's a good one nonetheless. The arrival of the mysterious Giovanni Malatesta is surrounded in gossip and speculation and, on the part of Francesca at least, some amount of trepidation, as she is to be married to this unknown man. When he finally approaches from the wings, she is told that he's slim, tall, handsome and walks like a king. "You're going to be the happiest woman in the world". And bam! just as described her future husband walks onto the stage and Zandonai accompanies this with the most seductive and romantic of music and heavenly choruses. Albeit with a hint of something awry behind it? Menace? Disappointment? For a trick of bait and switch has been played and it's not Giovanni, but his much better looking brother Paolo il Bello who she sees and immediately falls in love with.

Loy isn't going to let that be a premature climax and ensures that Act II of the opera closes on another dramatic finale that has you gripped to your seats and almost blown away. That effect is of course not achieved in isolation and as usual Loy pays close attention to what the music is telling us and looking for the best way of presenting that. Without swords and doublets, he shows the household of Francesca's Polenta family as thugs in suits, conspiring to trick Francesca into a marriage of convenience. With scattered flowers and a Gothic backdrop in the earlier scenes, there's an air of decadence about it as well, and Loy emphasises the almost ecstatic musical explosion at the violent wars of the conclusion of Act II with the intoxicated Francesca almost revelling in the spilled blood of the Malatesta.

That moment of madness turns into confusion and fear that is extended and developed as she becomes torn between all three Malatesta brothers. The music, and particularly the vocal range, is correspondingly pushed further into heightened expression, which Sara Jakubiak sings superbly in Francesca's confrontation with Smaragdi. If she can appear a little detached and not always have the fullness of voice elsewhere, she does bring a sultry character to Francesca, much as she did previously - in parts fully naked - as the queen in Loy's production of Korngold' s Das Wunder der Heliane. She really shows her ability in the varied tones of the opera's third Act.

Although linking thematically and visually with that previous work at the Deutsche Oper, Christoph Loy here adopts more of the style of the similarly themed feuding family wars of his 2015 production of Bellini's I Capuleti e i Montecchi for Zurich or, taking place confined in a wealthy mansion with a window view, it's more simplified like his production of Carl Maria von Weber's Euryanthe at the Theater an der Wien in 2018. If it doesn't measure up to provide any deeper or broader thematic approach, the little details and correspondences with the music do manage to highlight the dramatic qualities of the work, even if it still doesn't seem to hold together as a whole.

Still, Act IV ramps up the drama and the decadence deliciously as Loy insists on showing Francesca flirting dangerously with the third brother, the psychotic Malatestino, fabulously sung and performed with casual menace by the always impressive Charles Workman. The music continues to be filled with ominous motifs building tension and anger that is going to end in tragedy, and it plays out wonderfully under Carlo Rizzi's musical direction. The role of Paolo has a challenging dramatic range to meet and Jonathan Tetelman does it well, all of which adds to a very successful interpretation of Zandonai's opera. The casting is great, the performances convincing, the music compelling, but it's still hard to feel involved in the circumstances or character of D'Annunzio's drama.

Links: Deutsche Oper

Korngold - Das Wunder der Heliane (Berlin, 2018)

Erich Wolfgang Korngold - Das Wunder der Heliane

Deutsche Oper Berlin, 2018

Marc Albrecht, Christof Loy, Brian Jagde, Sara Jakubiak, Josef Wagner, Okka von der Damerau, Derek Wetton, Burkhard Ulrich

Naxos - Blu-ray

Like many other German and Austrian works that were categorised as 'degenerate' Entartete music by the Nazis in the 1930s, Korngold's early operas have as a consequence been consigned largely to obscurity. That is undoubtedly unfair, as the banning of such works had little to do with any kind of musical discrimination or value judgement and everything to do with whether a composer was of Jewish origin or had Jewish family connections. The neglect and loss of such works and any legacy they might have had could however also have as much to do with them being out of touch with changing musical tastes and the reality of people's lives on the ground.

The near-eradication of such works from music history may not be so much to do with the labelling of such music as degenerate as much as the operas and their themes being rather too 'decadent' in subject matter at a particular juncture in history when the world was about to plunge once again into war. Korngold's operas would certainly fit in with the decadent fantasies that seemed to flourish around this period. With fairy-tale worlds peopled by ambiguous figures and wrapped in lush chromatic orchestration, Richard Strauss, Franz Schreker and Erich Wolfgang Korngold relished delving freely into a dark core of madness and forbidden lusts that had been unleashed post-war in the new century.

If they don't reveal any great psychological insights, works like Die Frau ohne Schatten, Die Gezeichneten and of course Korngold's Die tote Stadt are nonetheless fascinating and exquisitely beautiful works that are very much the product of their (short-lived) time. So too it transpires is Das Wunder der Heliane (Heliane's Miracle), another Korngold masterpiece that has been largely neglected or deemed irrelevant to the development and progress of 20th century opera. Composed in 1927 with a trial at its centre, there's a sense even that Das Wunder der Heliane challenges itself in response to such conflicts, if only within the world of opera. Are you willing, it seems to ask, to sacrifice the beauty of Romance for a harsh, unyielding, joyless life without magic and love in it?

That seems to be the choice open to the Stranger, imprisoned for bringing a message of joy and light to a land where love and laughter are forbidden. The King, a stern and embittered figure who has never even known the love of the Queen, visits the Stranger in his cell to tell him that he will stand trial and face execution for his frivolity. The Queen, Heliane however proves to be more yielding to the Stranger's outlook, offering him her hair, her feet, her mouth and then her nakedness, but not her body. The King, going back to plead with the man to ask him how to win the love of the Queen, is outraged when he discovers her naked with the Stranger.

That's the first highly charged Act of Das Wunder der Heliane, the subsequent two Acts setting these forces against one another, leading to the death of the Stranger in Act II and his 'resurrection' at the miraculous intervention of Heliane, whose goodness and purity allows them to consummate their love in death in the finale of Act III. There doesn't appear to be much Wagner or Schopenhauer influenced philosophical underpinning to this pseudo-mystical Liebestod, just throwing out the idea of beauty, purity, love and light as the true enduring force in the world, even stronger than death.

If there's any way of making a credible case for this idea, it's in how Korngold smothers any philosophical shortcomings with persuasive swathes of strings, harps, 'seraphic voices' and all manner of celestial instrumentation. Who could resist or deny that there is indeed something miraculous and otherworldly in the music at least? If anyone can convince you of the argument of Das Wunder der Heliane, it's Korngold's orchestration at his most extravagant. It's rather like Strauss in this register - full-on, rich and complex, underscoring high emotion with soaring crescendos.

Like Strauss it also places exceptional demands on the singers, who not only have to be capable of the stamina to handle its technical complexities, keeping up with the continuous augmentation of musical emotions, but also rising above it and making it feel like it comes heroically from the heart. I haven't come across American tenor Brian Jagde before, but he is supremely capable of bringing all that to the role of the Stranger, in thrall to love and beauty. The rush of 'pure' lusts inspire him to soar to incredible heights in his Act I scene with Sara Jakubiak's Heliane that culminates in her revealing herself fully to him. The singing with the orchestration and the charge of the chaste eroticism reaches everything that Korngold could wish to achieve in a scene like this.

Christof Loy's direction doesn't try to compete with the charge that is already there, but his directions certainly help bring it about. It's almost impossible to sustain that kind of charge and tie it into further miraculous associations between love and death (although Tristan und Isolde - clearly the major influence on this work - of course proves otherwise), so Loy aims for a more sober set design, setting the drama in a courtroom inspired by Billy Wilder's Witness for the Prosecution, with dark classical wooden panelled walls and no unnecessary adornment or effects. As is often the case with Loy, he seems to give a problematic work the best possible presentation that highlights its strengths and mitigates against any weaknesses, and he does it with some style too.

Korngold's score also demands a certain flair and Marc Albrecht is an experienced conductor in this field. To judge purely on impact, the whole character of Korngold is there, distinct from Wagner, Strauss or Schreker, using unconventional instruments in an idiosyncratic way to achieve similar effects. The demands are not just on the principals then but the whole cast and there are consequently impressive performances from Josef Wagner as the distraught and furious King, Okka von der Damerau as the king's Messenger, Burkhard Ulrich as the Blind Judge and Derek Wetton suitably otherworldly as the Gatekeeper. This is a hugely impressive and revelatory production in every respect of a neglected Korngold rarity.

Recorded live at the Deutsche Oper in Berlin in 2018, Das Wunder der Heliane is given a superb presentation on Blu-ray disc by Naxos. The HD image is good, but evidently the real benefit of the format is in how it gets across the power, complexity and detail of Korngold's majestic score in the high resolution DTS HD-Master Audio 5.1 and LPCM 2.0 soundtracks. The spread of the surround track gives a more immersive experience, while the 2.0 track is more direct and powerful, particularly on headphones. Korngold specialist Brendan G. Carroll provides an introductory essay in the booklet, and also some items from his own archive on the disc, including an 8-minute recording from 1928 of the Act III Zwischenspiel and a picture gallery of rare photographs, posters and images. The BD is all-region compatible and there are subtitles in German, English, French, Japanese and Korean.

Glanert - Oceane (Berlin, 2019)

Detlev Glanert - Oceane

Deutsche Oper Berlin, 2019

Donald Runnicles, Robert Carsen, Maria Bengtsson, Nikolai Schukoff, Nicole Haslett, Christoph Pohl, Albert Pesendorfer, Stephen Brook, Doris Soffel

Deutsche Oper Berlin - 3rd May 2019

Composed for the bicentenary of the birth of celebrated German poet Theodor Fontane, the intention of composer Detlev Glanert for Oceane would seem to be principally to do justice to the original author's work. That in itself is a challenge however because the opera is based on only a fragment of a novella left by Fontane, Oceane von Parceval written in the 1880s, that was left unfinished. With a sympathetic production by Robert Carsen it has to be said that Glanert largely succeeds in meeting those intentions, but whether the opera seeks to find any wider application or breaks any new ground as far as contemporary opera is concerned, that's not immediately evident.

Whether the fragment is unfinished or only a sketch, the basic underlying plot of Oceane van Parceval is a familiar one and not greatly substantial. It's another telling of the Melusine legend that can be seen in various incarnations in Rusalka, Undine and even the movies Splash and The Little Mermaid. For Fontane the consideration of a child of nature out of step with the ways of the modern world, or indeed the modern world's detachment from its true essential nature, could have been related to political events in the imperfect foundations of the German Empire at the time of its writing (something Wagner might also have had in mind during the writing of the Der Ring des Nibelungen, a feature of the Leipzig Ring Cycle seen around this performance), but the subject is still something that we can surely still relate to today.

With only a fragment to work with, Glanert has little else to go on. As far the story goes, it's set in a seaside town hotel that has seen better days. Madame Louise welcomes her guests for the new summer season with some optimism that a wealthy benefactor might help restore the hotel's fortunes. She's counting on the landowner Martin von Dircksen, but she also has set some hopes on Oceane von Parceval, who is something of an unknown factor.

Oceane's mysterious manner and behaviour also intrigue Martin von Dircksen, the young man so bewitched by this magical creature that he is blind to the scandal she is causing among the guests. It's not just that she dances lasciviously and with no inhibitions, to the horror of the pastor staying at the hotel, but her outbursts and silences are also enigmatic. Most strangely of all, she doesn't seem to react to the discovery of a dead fisherman found on the beach. Martin however is oblivious to her failings to fit in with the expectations of the rest of the world.

It's all very straightforward and there's nothing complicated or surprising about the developments in Oceane when Martin determines that he will marry this strange creature only to find that they are not at all compatible. Glanert makes this incompatibility apparent through conventional musical means, using only high and low notes to express the wild character dynamic of Oceane, while Martin is all middle-register, safe and comfortable, unimaginative and unexciting, with no depth of character. Glanert also looks back at his previous opera Solaris for the otherworldly choruses that open the opera, communicating in a language that is beyond human understanding.

Glanert complicates matters for the listener however by mixing these character details with traditional musical forms, the little band at the hotel playing a series of dances, a polka, a waltz, a galop, which the characters sing over. Mostly however this is confined to Martin's friend, Dr Albert Felgentrau a tutor in science, and Oceane's chaperone Kristina as the two of them also pair up as a couple on the holiday. With a priest, a landowner, a businesswoman and a scientist, all of them contrary to the nature of Oceane, there's a lot of character detail and conflict to take in in the first three scenes.

In the second half of the work however, the opera takes shape and establishes its own character. The flow of the sea and the stirring up of waves in a storm becomes an important musical as well as visual reference for the power of nature and the danger of any attempts to master it, control it, or deny it. Martin's declaration to Oceane on the beach is beautiful, making it all the more tragic that he doesn't understand what he is dealing with and is completely blind to the reality of who Oceane is.

Glanert succeeds very much in fleshing out the characters with this kind of musical detail, and Robert Carsen's simple but elegant black-and-white designs with projections of the sea catch the mood of the piece well, but the period costumes and moral outlook remain confined very much to a specific time and place. If the conclusion builds up forcefully to a dramatic conclusion where society cruelly denounces Oceane, who would seem to have done little to offend anyone by today's standards, it is nonetheless a reflection of a deeper truth, and - even if it's not made explicit - we can recognise how much greater a distance we are from respecting nature today.

The world premiere performances of Oceane at the Deutsche Oper Berlin were conducted by Donald Runnicles, capturing the mood and dynamic arc of the work from conflicting tones of the first half, though the flowing romanticism of the second half to the thundering conclusion. Soprano Maria Bengtsson impressively handled the difficult challenge of expressing the inhuman or uncivilised side of Oceane, but all the roles were exceptionally well taken. Nikolai Schukoff was so good he was surely too sympathetic to be Martin, but there is actually nothing wrong with the landowner other than his shallowness and incompatibility for Oceane.

There were notable performances also from Nicole Haslett as the bubbly Kristina and Christoph Pohl as the serious Albert. Again there was perhaps more character detail than was strictly necessary for the other representatives of society that react against Oceane, but they were well sung by Albert Pesendorfer as the Pastor and Stephen Brook as George, the maitre d'. I'm not sure that Doris Soffel is still up to the demands of Wagner and Strauss, but is still a force to be reckoned with in a role like Madame Louise, and was warmly received by the Berlin audience at the curtain call.

Links: Deutsche Oper Berlin

Verdi - Rigoletto (Berlin, 2019)

Giuseppe Verdi - Rigoletto

Deutsche Oper Berlin, 2019

Michele Gamba, Jan Bosse, Yijie Shi, Stefano Meo, Siobhan Stagg, Samuel Dale Johnson, Byung Gil Kim, Cornelia Kim, Bryan Murray, James Kryshak, Gianluca Buratto, Maiju Vaahtoluoto, Paull-Anthony Keightley, Amber Fasquelle

Deutsche Oper Berlin - 30th April 2019

First performed at the Deutsche Oper in Berlin in 2013, theatre director Jan Bosse's first venture into opera has a similar look, feel and approach to Verdi's Rigoletto as other productions of this period. There's the all the variety of life as a circus theme of Robert Carsen's 2013 Aix-en-Provence production, there's something of the 60s' Las Vegas glamour of the Met's 2013 production, but perhaps more evidently with the seating of the Deutsche Oper house looking back at you from the stage, it at first looks close to the Bayerische Staastoper's 2012 meta-theatrical production of the opera as staged drama.

One thing that all these diverse productions have in common is the way they use each of these situations to look a little more deeply behind what at times appears to be an improbable melodrama and find the underlying themes of the work. Of course, as is often the case with Verdi, if you get the musical performance and the singing right the hard work is done for you, and happily that was the case at the Deutsche Oper's final performance of Rigoletto in its 2018/19 season. That doesn't mean that the stage production and direction only have to provide an attractive show for the narrative, but it should work with the music to bring out those more universal themes and morals.

The main moral of Rigoletto isn't hard to identify and it doesn't need an elaborate analysis; actions have consequences, sometimes unintended and unexpected consequences when they are the result of an act of bad faith, whether that is mocking someone less fortunate than you, plotting revenge, or simply hiding the truth. To the unfortunate Rigoletto, the hunchbacked court jester who thinks he has regal protection to do as he likes and wants to strike back at a world because of his affliction, the resulting comeback from his acts of bad faith feels like a curse; la maledizione.

Jan Bosse's production design initially seems appropriate then but limiting, the wooden panelled walls and banks of yellow seating that fill the stage reflecting the amphitheatre and balcony of the Deutsche Oper house back at the audience. The good-time partying of the court of the Duke of Mantua is like a stage, where whatever actions that take place are merely play-acting, viewed as if they have no consequences in the real world. All manner of license is permitted, and if someone doesn't like it, they are ejected from the theatre.

The set however proves to be surprisingly adaptive to the progression of where those actions ultimately lead. A raised platform and some veils create rooms and staircases to represent Gilda hidden away in her father's home, while at the same time maintaining the idea - for the moment anyway from Rigoletto's viewpoint - that they remain spectators to what goes on in the Duke's world, in the audience applauding his performance, immune to any real-world consequences.

One of the other main themes of Rigoletto that Bosse's production successfully highlights is that the idea of there being two worlds is not so much an illusion as naivety for not realising that there are different laws in the world for the rich and the poor, for those in power and those who follow them. Actions have consequences, but they have a different impact depending on where you stand in the social order. All men are not treated as equals in the eyes of the world. It's the realisation of this that Rigoletto recognises as the real curse at the conclusion of the opera.

Bosse's production then becomes a gradual process of stripping Rigoletto of his illusion that the world will work in his favour and not in favour of the Duke. And, quite literally, that is achieved in Stéphane Laimé's impressive set designs by a breaking down and stripping away of the stage props and backdrops. The on-stage seating turns around as the behind-the-scenes machinations of the Duke and the court are revealed to Rigoletto and Gilda, the stage finally stripped bare revealing the backstage area by the final heart-rending scene.

Viewed as pure melodrama the actions of Gilda leading up to the final scene have their own romantic logic, but here in Bosse's production they could be seen as having a different meaning without lessening the dramatic impact of the scene. Rigoletto is left with nothing but anger for the revelation of the injustice of the world - raging against la maladizione - but Gilda's sacrifice in this context is that of someone who still believes in truth and love, and cannot live in a world where that no longer exists; a human rather than a heroic response.

That still comes across effectively in the Deutsche Oper's production, but it has to work with the musical performances and requires strong consistent singing across the challenging principal roles. It's hard to fault the performances here. The musical direction under Michele Gamba seemed initially a little too smooth, but in reality it was simply matching the glamour of the Rigoletto's illusion, becoming rather more sinister around the storm as the mood changes and thundering home with the hard-hitting conclusion. Rigoletto's particular structural arrangements are all about mood and pacing and this was just perfect.

The singing was also exceptionally good. Yijie Shi is making the transition from lighter Rossini bel canto to the heavier Verdi repertoire quite successfully in such roles as the Duke of Mantua, carrying the dramatic weight and romantic lyricism superbly. Siobhan Stagg can carry heavier repertoire like Reimann's Lear, but is apparently also capable of singing the sweetly romantic side of Gilda. She is of course dramatically capable then of making this character a little more than just an innocent fool. Her 'Caro nome' was impressive, and she fared well in Gilda's duets/duels with her father. Stefano Meo was a strong Rigoletto, the ideal kind of Verdi baritone for this role, taking us through those variety of moods of bluster and incomprehension to devastation. There were notable performances also from Gianluca Buratto as Sparafucile and Maiju Vaahtoluoto as Maddalena and Giovanna.

Links: Deutsche Oper Berlin

Reimann - Die Gespenstersonate (Deutsche Oper, 1984 - DVD)

Aribert Reimann - Die Gespenstersonate

Deutsche Oper Berlin, 1984

Friedemann Layer, Heinz Lukas-Kindermann, Hans Günter Nöcker, Martha Mödl, Horst Hiestermann, David Knitson, Gudrun Sieber, Donald Grobe, William Dooley, Barbara Scherler, Kaja Borris

Arthaus Musik - DVD

Aribert Reimann's chamber opera Die Gespenstersonate (The Ghost Sonata) is an adaptation of the play by the same name by August Strindberg and it's a fairly faithful one too, in tone as much as in its translation of Strindberg's text. It's a typically bleak outlook from the Swedish dramatist on human relations, cynical of family structures, marriage and the social values that extend through them out into society.  It's a familiar subject also for Reimann, who has explored similar themes in adaptations of various other classical and literary works, in Lear and most recently in Medea. Those are both large scale works that make use of huge orchestral forces and jarring cacophonous music for effect, but Die Gespenstersonate achieves much the same impact through Reimann's powerful use of a chamber orchestra, the arrangement putting one in mind of the sinister undercurrents created in Britten's The Turn of the Screw.

As the title indicates ghosts also play a part in Die Gespenstersonate, but they are likewise scarcely any more unsettling or disturbed than the 'living' characters in the play. At the centre of the work is the Director Jakob Hummel, a tyrannical force who has bought up the debts of the Colonel and aims to assert his authority over his estate in the same way he does with his own household. He introduces the student, the son of the Colonel to the various figures in the house, berating them for old crimes they have committed, intent on "pulling up the weeds to reveal the crime", although we find that the Director is far from guiltless himself.

The bizarre household includes a living Mummy and even some ghosts that only the student is able to see, all of them silently going through the motions of living together in mutual hatred and suspicion, but unable to escape from the crimes that bind them together. "We've parted ways countless times", the Mummy confesses, "but then we're always drawn back together again". The Director wants to destroy it all, but the Mummy believes that there is a way of erasing the past, through repentance for the sins that have been committed.

Reimann's version of the work would appear to put this idea into a German post-war context, where the sins of the past still hang over the people, binding them together in silent guilt, casting an influence over the present day that prevents them moving forward. Despite being separated from that time and free of guilt, even the student is affected by those actions in the past, repaying what he is led to believe are his father's, principally in the ghost that arises in the shape of a lost woman who falls into a pit whenever he tries to reach for her. The split level stage of the Deutsche Oper's 1984 production, emphasises the division between past and present, the upper level inhabited by the grotesque characters of the household seen through the transparent floor.

Reimann's score is moody and unsettling with deep low tones, creating and edginess between the characters in the way that the instruments weave between one another and clash in dissonance. The scoring for the voices creates a similar effect, some of the roles very wide in tessitura in a way that is typical for Reimann, with sharp rises followed by deep plunges. Much of the text of the play is largely spoken-singing, but when Reimann uses the full range of expression for the content, breaking into sung phrases when required for extra emphasis. The young student, who perhaps is led through a greater emotional journey than the rest of the fossilised inhabitants, seems to have the biggest emotional journey in this regard.

Recorded at its world premiere in Berlin in 1984, the performances are everything they ought to be, with a striking cast taking on the challenging roles well. Released on DVD as part of Arthaus Musik's series of archive Deutsche Oper releases, the image quality is inevitably Standard Definition only, but the 4:3 image is bright and clear, capturing well the whole tone and mood of the piece as it was performed at the Hebbel Theatre in Berlin. The PCM Stereo audio track is excellent. There are no extra features other than the information and synopsis provided in the enclosed booklet. The DVD-9 disc is all-region compatible, with subtitles in German, English, French, Spanish and Italian.

Janáček - Jenůfa (Deutsche Oper Berlin, 2014 - Blu-ray)

Leoš Janáček - Jenůfa

Deutsche Oper Berlin, 2014

Donald Runnicles, Christof Loy, Michaela Kaune, Jennifer Larmore, Hanna Schwarz, Will Hartmann, Ladislav Elgr, Simon Pauly, Stephen Bronk, Nadine Secunde, Martina Welschenbach, Fionnuala McCarthy, Jana Kurucová, Alexandra Hutton

Arthaus Musik - Blu-ray

Christof Loy's strength as a director, as he demonstrates here to remarkable effect in the Deutsche Oper's production of Janáček's Jenůfa, is the depth of characterisation he brings to the drama. It's never an imposed reading, but one that can be found in the music itself - no more so than in Janáček's extraordinary score for this work. The setting in Loy's productions might not always conform to the letter of the libretto, but he nonetheless invariably creates a strong environment for the characters to work in and reveal their inner lives. He has a lot to work with in Jenůfa, and with some equally strong musical and singing performances, the full power of Janáček's work is there for all to hear and see.

Jenůfa is a simple story, but it shows how terrible things can happen to anyone, accidentally, through no fault of their own. The consequences of these events and the responsibilities it confers on people can be an unendurable burden, causing great suffering and misery. As a humanist however, Janáček recognises the truth that beauty can flourish even in the worst of situations, and that happiness is always a possibility. This note of hope that he introduces in the almost impossibly beautiful epilogue to Jenůfa is one of the greatest moments in all of opera. Christof Loy shows the truth of this in the Deutsche Oper production, but in order to reach that moment of near-transcendence, he also has to show the full horror of what leads up to it.

What Loy achieves so well in Act I is the sense of urgency and anticipation, the rush of emotions, the implied threats of violence and the conflict of sentiments that are going to set off a tragic series of events. It's a perfect match for the complex, urgent rhythms of Janáček's weaving, rolling and menacing score. There's Jenůfa's fear of her cousin Števa being conscripted into the army, her concern heightened by the fear that she will have to face the anger of the community alone, since she knows she is unmarried and pregnant by him. Her stepmother, Kostelnicka, unaware of her condition, dislikes Števa, her own experience leading her to conclude that he is a drunken good-for-nothing who is unsuitable for marriage. Laca is in love with Jenůfa and, jealous of the concern she shows for Števa, glowers and roars, ready to explode in a fit of jealous rage. Add Števa, stupid, drunk and celebrating, a misplaced knife and a crowd and there will inevitably be trouble, but this is only the beginning of a series of terrible events.

The fact that those actions are going to have grave consequences has however already been indicated right from the outset in a silent scene that shows Kostelnicka brought into an interrogation room. As well as setting her up as a key figure in what is to follow, Loy also shows his ability to look beyond the surface drama into the real heart of what makes Janáček's Jenůfa beat. Understanding Kostelnicka's motivations is important, but it has to be seen in the context, attitudes and morals of the Moravian village community in which the opera is set. That means much more than just using regionally appropriate costumes and backdrops, and for Loy all is needed is plain costumes and an austere white box with sliding panels that open up and close Jenůfa off from the community outside.

That fully creates the occasion for Jenůfa to be a victim of circumstance, her nature and instincts bent to conform to the pressures of society and the community. In terms of laying out the tragedy and the part that Kostelnicka and Laca play in it, Loy not only sets down strong characterisation, but he has two fine singers who are capable of drawing every ounce of character that is inherently there in the drama and the music. Jennifer Larmore in particular is one of the best Kostelnicka's I've ever come across. The scene where she resolves to remove the baby from the picture is chilling and credible, as is how she remains affected and weighted down later as a consequence of her actions. As a singing performance, Larmore's performance is simply outstanding and everything it ought to be, but there's real personality and meaning given to the words and how they manifest in her actions.

Laca's role is a dual one that is rather more complex than the character's simplicity of expression would suggest, but all the contradictions and their implications are fully brought out in Loy's staging and in the performance by Will Hartmann. From one perspective, Laca's accidental scarring of Jenůfa is the single most significant episode that sets off a chain of tragic events, but it is also significant that he also brings about the resolution to them. Loy ensures not only that the actions of the others are fully weighed for the impact they have in what occurs - the villagers, Števa, Kostelnicka and even Jenůfa herself - but that the sense of love, repentance, forgiveness and reconciliation that comes about arises out of the tragedy is even greater. Laca is an important part of this, and Hartmann not only captures that stupid blind, jealous rage of the character, but also his sensitivity and the depths of his feelings for Jenůfa, unconditionally defending her from the community outrage.

There's a danger that Jenůfa could remain a passive figure in the opera with no ability to direct her own fortune, her own passions subject to the actions, whims and projections of others. Her beauty and the purity of her feelings is important however and that comes through intact, if scarred. Michaela Kaune isn't as strong an actor as Larman, but the expression of the essence of Jenůfa is all there in her singing and performance and she clearly puts everything into the role. The same sense of commitment is applied to the characterisation and the performances elsewhere. Even Števa has real personality. He's not just a drunken good-for-nothing or cowardly, but just a boy. He's passionate and clearly loves Jenůfa but he's not grown-up enough to take on the responsibilities of a disfigured wife, a child and making a home, but he is just too weak to stand up to the more forceful female personalities around him.

Similar attention is applied even to secondary roles, but none of Loy's ideas or interpretations exist in isolation or are created out of nothing. All of this is there in the libretto and in the score itself and Donald Runnicles ensures that the precision of the rhythms and their emotional undercurrents all perfectly match the composer's intentions as well as what is happening on the stage. On BD/DVD, Brian Large elects to cut out the audience applause between acts, allowing the force of the drama to playing the drama straight through, and it does make a significant impact, Loy's direction and the acting performances drawing you right in. There are no extra features on the BD50 disc, and the image and audio are reasonably good, but not exceptional. Subtitles (which can only be selected from remote or pop-up while playing) are in English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Korean and Japanese.

Links: Deutsche Oper Berlin

Meyerbeer - Die Hugenotten

Giacomo Meyerbeer - Die Hugenotten

Deutsche Oper Berlin, 1991

Stefan Soltesz, John Dew, Angela Denning, Lucy Peacock, Richard Leech, Harmut Welker, Camille Capasso, Martin Blasius, Marcia Bellamy, Lenus Carlson, David Griffith, Otto Leuer, Friedrich Molsberger, Iván Sárdi, Josef Becker

Arthaus Musik

Poor Giacomo Meyerbeer.  The once highly regarded titan of the 5-Act Grand Opéra is now not only long out of fashion, but on the rare occasion when his work is revived it is scarcely treated with the seriousness and sincerity in which it was undoubtedly composed.  I didn't see the Royal Opera House's recent widely derided production of Robert Le Diable, but judging it on the merits of the performance alone via its broadcast on Radio 3, it at least sounded interesting and probably deserving of a more sympathetic staging than the one devised by Laurent Pelly.  Meyerbeer's follow-up to Robert Le Diable (1831) was another beast of an opera, Les Huguenots (1836) and, unfortunately, it's another work that - even more so now - that most opera houses would consider too expensive to risk putting on and no doubt also difficult to cast.  The only recorded video performance we have of it at present is one dating back to 1991 at the Deutsche Oper Berlin.

Conducted by Stefan Soltesz and directed by John Dew, this is inevitably not a version that will satisfy purists (should such a thing as a Meyerbeer purist exist in this day and age).  As imperfect as it is in some respects, the Deutsche Oper Die Hugenotten is at the moment the only opportunity you have to see one of the big important opera works of yesteryear, and it's worthwhile for that alone.  The first thing you will note about this Blu-ray release however is that the title has been rendered in German (unlike its previous DVD release) to reflect the fact that it is a German-language edition of the original French Les Huguenots performed here.  That's not so much of an issue, since Meyerbeer was actually of German origin and this version dates from an 1837 edition prepared by Ignatz Franz Castelli, so it should be close enough to the original work.

Les Huguenots does actually suit the German tongue surprisingly well, but of more concern is the fact that Castelli's version to a large extent played down the conflict between the Catholics and Protestants that is critical to the work's historical account of the St Bartholomew's Day Massacre in 1572 during the reign of King Charles IX.  That historical content is furthermore all but abandoned in the German version of Castelli's translation prepared by John Dew for the Deutsche Oper, which sets the work in the Berlin of the period that was then divided by the Berlin Wall.  This recording of the production dates from 1991 after the breaking down of the wall, but even then it still dates from a period when the imagery still held real significance to the people of Berlin.

Quite how the situation in divided Berlin corresponds with religious conflict in Les Huguenots is however difficult to establish.  In Meyerbeer's opera - with a libretto from the illustrious team of Eugène Scribe and Émile Deschamps - Marguerite de Valois is to marry the Protestant King Henry of Navarra as a gesture of peace between the two sides.  To further strengthen this union, the Count de Nevers accordingly invites the Huguenot Raoul de Nangis to his castle in Touraine and offers him marriage to Valentine de Saint-Bris, but Raoul has already seen a beautiful vision of loveliness and fallen in love unwittingly with Marguerite de Valois herself.  After some romantic complications Raoul agrees to marry Valentine, but when he gets wind of a plot by the Catholics to massacre the Huguenots it only deepens the conflict between his duty and his heart.

How do we know this?  Because just in case we miss it, Raoul tells us directly - "Duty... my heart... a difficult battle", and Meyerbeer's scoring only emphasises the obvious conflict even further.  When there is something of a lack of subtlety (or taste), you can see why modern directors feel the need to play up the unintentional campness of Meyerbeer's work.  How else, for example, are you meant to stage Marcel's "Piff, paff, poff!" aria nowadays other than having everyone skip around the stage in a half-dance?  I'm not sure, but I think I'd like to see a more serious-minded director try it and not necessarily in a traditional context, since even in this shortened version (only two and a half hours for a 5-Act Grand Opéra?) Meyerbeer's management and control of the number opera is evidently masterful, presenting a broad scope of melodrama, romance and entertainment in its varied situations with an abundance of melody and drive.

Are the Royalist Catholics meant to represent the Communist forces of East Germany and the Protestants the small population of the surrounded West Berliners?  How will a marriage smooth relations in such a situation?  The production might not correspond perfectly to its Berlin setting but neither does it really detract from the strength of the work or indeed from the performances in this production.  The singing is exceptionally good from all the main performers.  Richard Leech has the right kind of strong, resonant lyrical voice for Grand Opéra, reminding me a little of Roberto Alagna in places.  He copes well with all the high-Cs thrown his way, but it's Angela Denning who has the difficult role of Marguerite de Valois.  Her opening Act II aria is fiendishly difficult and it shows her limitations, but she is good elsewhere.  Lucy Peacock's Valentine is marvellous and there's good work also from Harmut Welker as the Comte de Saint-Bris and Camille Capasso as the Page.  Only Martin Blasius' Marcel isn't up to the mark.  To say the least.

Brian Large directs the production for the screen.  I'm not sure what technology was available at the time in 1991, but the widescreen image is certainly HD quality and it looks excellent.  The audio isn't quite so good.  Only a PCM stereo option is available and the lower-frequencies can be a little booming if you are playing this at any volume using a subwoofer.  On headphones, the sound dynamic is better distributed to the L-R channels.  The detail in the orchestration is there, if it's not as clean and precise as we're now used to with HD recordings, and the singing is relatively clear also.  There are no extra features on the Blu-ray.  The disc is all-region with subtitles in English, French and Spanish.

Wagner - Parsifal

Richard Wagner - Parsifal

Deutsche Oper, Berlin 2012

Donald Runnicles, Philipp Stölzl, Mara Kurotschka, Alejandro Marco-Buhrmester, Albert Pesendorfer, Matti Salminen, Klaus Florian Vogt, Thomas Jesatko, Evelyn Herlitzius, Burkhard Ulrich, Andrew Harris, Kim-Lilian Strebel, Annie Rosen, Paul Kaufmann, Matthew Pena, Hulkar Sabirova, Martina Welschenbach, Rachel Hauge, Hila Fahima, Annie Rosen, Dana Beth Miller

25 October 2012

Director Philipp Stölzl’s approach to the Deutsche Oper’s new 2012/13 production of Parsifal in Berlin is immediately and firmly established by the extraordinary setting for the work’s Overture. On a rocky recreation of Golgotha, Christ hangs from a cross in a meticulously detailed tableau vivant representation of the Crucifixion. Surrounded by onlookers freeze-framed in various states of anguish and despair, with Roman soldiers guarding the area, one significantly (as far as this opera is concerned) with a lance, the figures move in slow motion as Christ dies on the cross during the length of the overture, his side is pierced by the soldier’s spear and the blood that runs from it is caught in the chalice and respectfully coveted by his followers. It’s a powerful way to start a performance of this work, and when you have as beautiful a piece of music as the Overture to Parsifal, why waste it on something less than monumental? Solemn, respectful and dignified, the scene is however also completely relevant to the opera’s Passion play exploration of suffering and redemption through death and rebirth and appropriate in how those concepts are tied up by Wagner into the symbolic images of the Lance and the Holy Grail.

Any performance of Wagner’s remarkable final work should indeed be something of a spiritual experience over the course of its four and a half hour length, but there was a sense that Philipp Stölzl’s production here (co-directed by Mara Kurotschka) was perhaps a little too solemn and reverential - or perhaps somewhat too grandiose - to really touch on the transcendental elements of the work. If there’s a touch of kitsch to the production - something characteristic of this director - it’s appropriate to one where the iconography and glorification of Christ’s passion adheres to a certain Catholic tradition. You don’t need to look too far beyond the condition of Amfortas - the Knight of the Holy Grail in agony from a perpetual wound caused by the lance, his suffering deepened by each display of the Holy Grail that gives sustenance and renewed vigour to its followers - to recognise that it’s the question of suffering that is central to the work in how it can be a redemptive force. There was certainly plenty of pain on display in the Deutsche Oper’s new production - the opera house celebrating its 100th anniversary - but little sense of it leading to any kind of transcendental enlightenment.

Despite the prettification of the visuals, every ounce of the earth-shattering, curtain-tearing pain depicted in Christ’s Crucifixion and the despair in the faces of his followers (most notably in one Mary Magdalene/Kundry figure at the margins) is there in the opening scene and retained to be built upon by the events recounted by Gurnemanz and enacted in Parsifal’s journey to recover the Holy Spear from the hands of Klingsor. Stölzl recognises that all that suffering shown in the opening scene is going to be caught up in the musical themes established by Wagner in the Overture, and it consequently becomes impossible to disassociate the suffering of Christ himself every time those leitmotifs swirl and swell throughout the remainder of the work. And just in case the musical expression isn’t powerful enough (and under the baton of Donald Runnicles it often was, even if lacked any real character or vision), the director also uses every visual element to emphasise and add to the near overwhelming display of agony and despair.

That can be as simple as the Monsalvat set design sharing many of the rocky structures and contours of the opening Golgotha scene, but the subsequent scenes also reflect the opening, being mostly static in arrangement, each scene like a 3-dimensional engraving of one of the Stations of the Cross, a single image frieze set in slow motion movement. The set designs by Conrad Moritz Reinhardt and Stölzl moreover allow every element of the work to be examined in detail and every character to be explored for their own personal suffering that contributes to the collective pain. Even every element of the backstory narrated at length by Gurnemanz is depicted visually in mini scenes, as beautifully arranged and brutal as a Caravaggio painting, that are played out in the background on the tops of rocky outcrops. This production of Parsifal is as visually striking as previous Stölzl productions I’ve seen (Berlioz’s Benvenuto Cellini and most notably his production of Wagner’s Rienzi, also for the Deutsche Oper), beautifully arranged, lit and coloured, more than a little kitsch but - within its own designs - it’s also much more respectfully faithful here to the tone of the work in question.

It’s actually perhaps a little too literal and respectful for a work that should also have a life in a spiritual dimension. (That might sound like a pretentious statement for any other work, but not for this one). There’s no doubt that this production - musically as well as visually and conceptually - is completely faithful to the spirit of the work, but it never seems to get beyond it to illuminate or elevate the underlying meaning. That’s evidently a tall order for a work that is wrapped up in Wagner’s complex and contradictory ideas and philosophies, but while Stölzl’s production is not without its own personal touches in its examination of these concepts, they don’t really amount to much and don’t resolve into any kind of satisfactory conclusion. The confusion is best exemplified within the role of Amfortas - the Christ figure of the work - who is not healed by the lance at the end here, but allowed to escape from his pain through death at its touch. This perhaps relates to the very specific Good Friday notions of death and rebirth in a work that the composer described as a Bühnenweihfestspiel - “A Festival Play for the Consecration of the Stage” - but quite where the necessary rebirth/transcendence is supposed to come from is less than clear. There is a suggestion however that the key to this interpretation could lie within the figure of Kundry.

More so than Parsifal or Amfortas, or even Gurnemanz, the focus in this production is very much on that contradictory element of Kundry, whose role is one of the ambiguities that the work principally revolves around - the saint and the sinner, the serpent and the agent of salvation. In this production she’s there at the crucifixion in the guise of Mary Magdalene, and is therefore the single element of continuity (other than the Grail and the Lance) that runs through the whole work, appearing in Gurnemanz’s backstory, being instrumental in bringing about Parsifal’s self-enlightenment, and in the end recognising her role to serve the new protector of the Grail. Here however, in the very final scene of the production, she seems to become terrified of the prospect of the worship and power that this inspires in Parsifal and the Grail’s followers, and where such Christian fervour might lead - a reference perhaps to future religious conflicts or perhaps, since it now seems almost obligatory to acknowledge in a Wagner opera, a premonitory vision of the rise of Nazism. As depicted by Evelyn Herlitzius in the role, Kundry remains a (female) figure of considerable interest and ambiguity, but quite how it all ties together must - perhaps necessarily considering the nature of the work - remain a mystery.

If the work never comes together musically or conceptually in a way that entirely lives up to the proposal put forward in the audacious opening scene, it’s through no fault of the singing performances. Now 67, Matti Salminen was simply superb, fulfilling everything that is required of a Gurnemanz, his deep, beautifully weighted sonorous tones providing the solid basis and solemn gravity that anchors the work in the real world while simultaneously hinting at timeless mysteries. One would think that Klaus Florian Vogt’s light lyrical tenor voice would not be as well suited to the Heldentenor role of Parsifal as it is to his angelic Lohengrin (even though the two characters are mythologically related), but yet again he brings another vocal dimension to a familiar role, demonstrating a capability of pulling those deeper resonant chest sounds out where necessary - such as in his cry of ‘Amfortas!’ at the recognition scene of the meaning of pain, suffering and love - and filling them with an expressive lightness and sensitivity. Dramatically however and in expression of his character, he was given little to work with by the director. Evelyn Herlitzius on the other hand had a rather more substantial personality as this production’s Kundry and rose to the challenge exceptionally well, emoting and projecting the sentiments of the work through some fine singing. Alejandro Marco-Buhrmester (Amfortas), Albert Pesendorfer (Titurel) and Thomas Jesatko (Klingsor) were more than adequate if they didn’t make quite as much of an impression as the principal roles, but there was also some lovely singing from the three Flowermaidens.

Graun - Montezuma

Carl Heinrich Graun - Montezuma

Deutsche Oper, Markgräfflichen Opernhaus, Bayreuth 1982

Hans Hilsdorf, Herbert Wernicke, Alexandra Papadjiakou, Sophie Boulin, Gudrun Sieber, Catherine Gayer, Barbara Vogel, Walton Grönroos, Karl-Ernst Mercker

Arthaus Musik

Released as part of the Deutsche Oper Archive series, this 1982 recording of Carl Heinrich Graun’s Montezuma may not be the most authentic representation of a rare work of Baroque opera seria or the best quality in terms of video presentation, but it’s a performance that is well worth preserving for a number of reasons. Although there are have been some revivals and discoveries of the operas of J.A. Hasse and J.C. Bach in recent years, there are very few recordings available of any of Graun’s work, despite the fact that he was an important figure in German opera composition of the period, working as Kapellmeister to King Friedrich II of Prussia, Frederick the Great. It’s his relationship with the latter which is the most notable aspect of this particular work, Montezuma (1755) - aside from the fine musical qualities of the work itself - with the King himself even providing the libretto for the opera, and it’s this aspect that is considered in the actual production, recorded in the suitably regal venue of the Markgräfflichen Opernhaus at Bayreuth.

It’s not difficult to see what would have attracted Frederick the Great to the subject of Montezuma, as not only is the subject that considers the duty of a great ruler towards his people a popular subject for opera seria - they were written for royal courts - particularly compositions written or following the Metastasian model, but it’s one that evidently has political relevance here for the librettist himself. Montezuma accordingly is characterised as a benevolent ruler, who sees his duty to resolve human misery, not to rule over his subjects by force. Mexico under the Aztec ruler therefore is a kind of a Golden Age, the people happy and contented, secure in their love for their ruler and the peace his great reign promises against the threat of weaker neighbours. Convention would insist on a romantic aspect to the opera, and here, happiness eludes Montezuma until he finds someone worthy to share his throne with him. That person is Eupaforice, the Queen of Tlascála, who will also ally him with another empire and strengthen his position and the security of his people.

It’s a fairly conventional opera seria then in this respect. Montezuma sings of length of his devotion to his people and his duty, and of striving for personal happiness. The plot ties both aspects together rather well with the arrival of the Spanish, Montezuma’s general Plipatoè warning him that Cortes poses a serious threat, while Eupaforice intimates that she has premonitions of doom. In his goodness and with faith in human nature, Montezuma however invites Cortes and Narvès to his wedding, only to be betrayed. If the relevance to Friedrich II’s time isn’t obvious - the Seven Years’ War would commence a year later in 1756, plunging Prussia into conflict with Austria and then Sweden the year after that - the relevance of the work when viewed in the light of historical events is made apparent in the staging of this production by Herbert Wernicke. Clearly not set in any exotic location, but rather in a more European palatial setting and gardens, the Aztecs moreover wear the period costume of the courts of the 18th century with powdered wigs, ball gowns and military greatcoats. The production would also seem to end with a reading of Frederick the Great’s actual declaration of war, as if the preceding opera has just been a warning that kindness and wisdom in a ruler is admirable, but sometimes he needs to be wise enough to chose when to fight for those freedoms.

If there are some minor liberties taken with the setting to put the work into context (and considering the writer of the libretto, it’s certainly a valid approach), the approach taken with the actual performance would be less justifiable today than they were perhaps when this production was recorded back in 1982. The first clue is that the work only runs to 2 hours and 20 minutes in length, when you could expect an opera seria of this period to be between three to four hours long. Considerable cuts have been applied therefore, and - considering that most of the expository recitative would appear to have been left intact to carry the plot, much of those cuts would have been applied to the long repetitions of the aria da capo with some perhaps excised altogether. That’s understandable for a performance of a very rare Baroque opera, when the performance of any Baroque opera at all - even Handel - would have been very rare indeed. To make it a little easier on the audience, Montezuma is also sung here in German, rather than the original Italian (it was probably written in French by Friedrich II before being translated to the common Italian for opera seria). Although inauthentic, this however works in favour of the production’s parallel to the historical Prussian Empire.

Thirty years ago, part of the reason why Baroque opera was so rarely performed was that there simply weren’t musicians trained to play the period instruments. Accordingly, other than the use of the harpsichord, the music has been arranged to fit modern orchestra instruments, but the whole pace and rhythm of the performance nonetheless feels absolutely right. Back in 1982, there weren’t any countertenors who could specialise in taking on the castrato roles of the work, so they are taken up here by female sopranos and mezzo-sopranos, which actually has the impact of making all the Aztecs in this production of Montezuma female and the Spanish male. If the work is mostly fairly conventional and not terribly dramatic, with stately marching rhythms and expressions of noble sentiments, there are nonetheless some lovely arias and one particularly fine duet between Montezuma and Eupaforice in Act III (’Ach, nur für Dich’ in German). The singing is also exceptionally good, particularly mezzo-soprano Alexandra Papadjiakou as Montezuma, and the performance of the Deutsche orchestra is also strong, performed with an elegant brio.

Released on DVD only, the video quality isn’t up to the standards you would expect today, but certainly acceptable and even very good despite the limitations of the source material. Clearly shot on video 4:3 for television broadcast, there’s a certain amount of noise and shimmer in the background, a level of graininess, and chroma noise, but it has nonetheless clearly been fully restored, the colours well-defined, strongly contrasted and a surprising level of sharpness and detail evident. The transfer is also very stable, with no flicker or wobble. The audio track is PCM stereo only and it’s also fine, with decent clarity to the orchestration and singing, holding relatively firm on the sustained higher notes. There are no extra features, but there is an informative essay and a synopsis included in the DVD’s booklet. The dual layer DVD is region free, NTSC, with subtitles in German, English, French, Spanish and Italian.