Pfitzner - Palestrina (Vienna, 2024)

Hans Pfitzner - Palestrina

Wiener Staatsoper, 2024

Christian Thielemann, Herbert Wernicke, Michael Spyres, Wolfgang Koch, Wolfgang Bankl, Günther Groissböck, Kathrin Zukowski, Patricia Nolz, Michael Nagy, Michael Laurenz, Michael Kraus, Hiroshi Amako, Jusung Gabriel Park, Clemens Unterreiner, Devin Eatmon, Andrew Turner, Ilja Kazakov, Teresa Sales Rebordão, Marcus Pelz 

Staatsoper Live Streaming - 12th December 2024

It isn't often you get the opportunity to hear Hans Pfitzner's music or operas, which is a shame as Palestrina is a beautifully scored and arranged opera, but there are some valid reasons for this omission. Some composers fall out of fashion, their works no longer attractive to a modern audience and certainly the subject of Palestrina - an opera set around the Pope giving his approval at the Synod of the Council of Trent in 1563 for polyphonic music to be used in the composition of a mass - is not one that sounds like it will draw in big audiences. There are also are considerable challenges for orchestral and choral elements to consider, but perhaps the main reason why Pfitzner is rarely programmed are nothing to do with the quality of his music, but with the legacy of his association with the Nazis and antisemitism.

Whatever the reasons, Palestrina is rarely performed and it's true that the subject is a hard one to sell to a modern opera audience. Although it forms a considerable part of Act II, the opera is not really concerned with discussions between archbishops and cardinals disputing obscure esoteric religious dogma and heresies, but rather there is a clear underlying intent. Make that overt intent, since the opera is called Palestrina, after all, named after the choir master of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, Pierluigi Palestrina, who is tasked with the formidable and momentous task of writing music that will make polyphonic music an acceptable part of the celebration of the Catholic mass. It's then really about celebrating the magnificence of music, about celebrating composers for their art, for how they suffer to create. Through Palestrina, Pfitzner gives due recognition to "the art of masters of many centuries", to those who have contributed significantly to their art. And that includes Richard Wagner, whose Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg is a clear reference point for Palestrina.

Still, a word-heavy, long-winded opera about an ancient former papal composer giving thanks to God through music isn't going to appeal to the masses either (not to be confused with appealing to masses in the religious sense) and Palestrina is indeed heavy going but, as with any great opera, you would expect there to be some correspondence with a deeper human experience, or perhaps a more common one, since you don't get much more elevated than striving to reach into the spiritual realm of human experience. Pierluigi Palestrina’s suffering that perhaps inspires such creativity is indeed a human one; sorrow for the loss of his wife. At the beginning of the opera however, still in the depths of grief, all inspiration has deserted him and he is unreachable. Such is the depth of his loss that he has no confidence that he can accept the commission from Cardinal Borromeo to write a new work, an eternal mass, and indeed he no longer even sees the point of value of his metier. He has reached Faustian levels of despair, abandoning himself to the 'Rien'. Evidently though in this case Palestrina doesn't submit to Mephistopheles but to a higher power; music. 

Somewhat appropriately then, Palestrina is far from a 'one-note' opera, but has many levels in its progression through its three acts. Just as Palestrina is the missing a note in the chord, so too pouring all the human contradictions and complexes that arise over the doubts, fears and all other kinds of human experiences - greed and pride come into play between the religious orders in Act II - all feed into the score that Pfitzner uses to construct a foundation and embellish it with beauty and spirituality. Voices, the outward manifestation of human expression is fully involved in this, from the individual grappling with their fears, weaknesses and limitations to the choral togetherness that elevates it and joins it with the rest of the world.

Bringing in the Council of Trent and its aims, its religious and political powerplays is another complication. Can polyphonic church music wrung from a reluctant choir master unite all the reform of ecumenical matters that are subject to discussion, dispute, heresy and schism, fraying tempers, the assertion of dominance of Pope or Emperor, carving up their domains of power and influence? Well, at long as you don't bring the Protestants into it! Despite the apparently elevated subject matter, the opera is not without a sense of humour at the pomposity and entitlement of it all, but there is a sense that power is respected and, where is the will, distinguished leaders can reach agreement and bring about important change. Not sure anyone who was following the outcome of COP29 will agree that this is a valid argument, but Pfitzner makes a compelling case for it here.

Directed by Herbert Wernicke, the production in Vienna matches intent of both sides of the work well, bringing music and majesty, order and elegance to the stage. The effects and sets are basic but effective. For Palestina's grappling with his muse and his human condition, there is an array of tiers for an orchestra with a large church organ, the back of the stage opening to reveal a chorus, heavenly choirs and angelic voices bringing light from darkness. It's almost overwhelming, which is the effect it should be aiming to achieve. Likewise for the Synod, the music stands are removed and the seats rearranged for the chamber, the assembled cardinals and archbishops all arranged in order of importance, stretching back and upwards into the choir gallery. There is none of the elaborate day-glo colour schemes of the Bayerische Staatsoper production from 2009, the only recorded stage production of this opera.

All credit to the Wiener Staatsoper for giving this work another opportunity to confirm that this is truly a magnificent opera. Whatever you think about what history has to say about the human weaknesses and failings of Hans Pfitzner, like Luigi Palestrina he manages to compose music that lives on beyond its creator. If the conservative nature of his writing has proved not to be the work of a master who went on to inspire other masters on a musical level, it nonetheless has an important message to impart - and a challenge to incorporate it - about the transcendental qualities of music, of how an artist can rise above human earthly constraints to aspire to a higher spiritual level.

That's still a challenge to get across in an epic work of this length, and it's clear that it needs the highest level of performance and interpretation here to lift it up to its fullness. With Christian Thielemann at the helm, attention to detail and considered personal interpretation is assured. The casting is also superb with excellent performances throughout. Familiar with Michael Spyres mainly as a lyric tenor who can sing baritone with a sweetness of voice that is ideal for Rossini and Mozart, I was thoroughly impressed with his performance as Pierluigi Palestrina. Considering that he has to embody the spiritual, the artist, the human, there is a lot to take on and a lot of singing for intense though well-dispersed periods of a long opera. Wolfgang Koch is also excellent in the role of Cardinal Borromeo.

External links: Wiener Staatsoper, Wiener Staatsoper Live Streaming

Wagner - Tristan und Isolde (Bayreuth, 2024)

Richard Wagner - Tristan und Isolde

Bayreuther Festspiele, 2024

Semyon Bychkov,Thorleifur Örn Arnarsson, Andreas Schager, Günther Groissböck, Camilla Nylund, Olafur Sigurdarson, Birger Radde, Christa Mayer, Daniel Jenz, Lawson Anderson, Matthew Newlin

BR-Klassik - 25th July 2024

It's not often I am at a loss of words to describe or give an impression of a production of Tristan und Isolde, particularly one at the Bayreuth Festival which usually gives plenty to think about and unusual directorial touches to describe, but in the case of the new production that opens the 2024 festival I think this Isolde has taken all the words for herself. At the start of the opera we see her wearing a jewel encrusted fencing mask, dressed in a robe filled with words that spreads out around and covers the ground she lies upon, still scribbling more words onto the costume. For the remainder of the first Act however we see little more on the stage than an abstract impression of a ship with rigging sailing through misty waters. Already I'm beginning to suspect that director Thorleifur Örn Arnarsson is going to expect each person who views it to do much of the work for him on this one.

On the other hand, there is something to be said for reining in the traditional excesses seen at Bayreuth for something a little more low key than some of the wilder over-the-top productions seen there over the last few decades under the artistic direction of Katarina Wagner. You can take your pick at which is the most extravagant, whether Herheim's Parsifal, the Castorf Ring, the Baumgarten's industrial Tannhäuser… there are too many to choose from. Perhaps it's time to tone down on the distractions a little and let the music and the singing express everything that needs to be said, or at least everything that is important. In the case of Tristan und Isolde, it doesn't need a great deal of imagined action, elaborate stage sets or re-interpretation to bring out what it is about, but it should leave some openness that allows some of its mysteries to remain. There is at least a suggestion of something mystical and ambiguous in this production around the feelings that truly lie between Tristan and Isolde, even before the magic potion kicks in.

As for the magic potion, well even that is not deemed essential in this production for those feelings to well up and spill over. There is a phial, but neither seem to drink from from it, both already seemingly aware on some level of the feelings they have for each other, the simmering passions that they know are wrong, one a betrayal of Morold, the other a betrayal of King Mark. And yet despite Tristan studiously trying to avoid meeting Isolde on the journey from Ireland until she is delivered to the King in Cornwall, it just can't be avoided. When he does agree to take the drink, he appears to be well aware of Isolde's magical powers since they helped heal him while in Ireland (a source of guilt for both), and as such, knowing what is ahead, he seems willing to accept or unable to deny the fate she offers him, which is death. Isolde for her part, realises this at the last moment and casts the potion away, assuming her own share not so much of the poison as her share of guilt.

If there is not much in the way of pointers as far as the direction goes at this stage, at least there is much to enjoy in the singing. Andreas Schager and Camilla Nylund might not be the first choice singers for these roles, but there is no denying their experience in almost all the key Wagnerian roles for tenor and soprano. Schager is perhaps a bit too earnest, a little steely and overly forceful in delivery - and this becomes more of an issue in the second and third acts. Camilla Nylund is again excellent, following her recent performances as Brünnhilde in the impressive Zurich Ring Cycle. Both are well supported here by Olafur Sigurdarson's Kurwenal and Christa Mayer's Brangäne

Ok, so maybe I'm not left at a complete loss of words, but few of them point to any original observations about the work at this stage. The subsequent Acts don't add a great deal more, lack rigour and focus, but perhaps hint at the framework of an idea, with Semyon Bychkov bringing more to the musical interpretation to spur it along. The orchestral build up to the arrival of Tristan in Act II is furiously played, overwhelming, as you imagine it ought to be. The darkness enveloping Isolde and Brangäne is dimly illuminated at his arrival to show them in a rather more cluttered area in what appears to be the hull of the ship with pipes, gauges, wheels and dials, but also random luggage and objects: a globe, clocks, an urn, stuffed animals, statues and busts, pictures, Isolde's mask, all of it bathed in reddish golden glow.

All the rapturous sentiments are there in Act II, but there s little sense of it meaning anything or any sense of it being connected to the world outside - which is a valid view of two lovers for whom nothing else exists. In what becomes a running theme in this production - and hence where you suspect some intent of commentary or interpretation lies - is that the two lovers seem determined to consummate their love again though the imbibing of the death potion but are inevitably interrupted. Another attempt is made after King Mark’s speech, as Tristan holds the flask and invites Isolde to join him in his wondrous realm of night. Rather than Merlot striking him with sword, Tristan succeeds in drinking from the flask and Isolde is frustrated in her attempt to follow him by an intervention from Melot. King Marke's arrival however reveals that in the light of day, the hull of the ship is nothing more a rusted hulk. These are slim points of difference that don't seem to offer anything significant or new.

Andreas Schager is already feeling the strain a little in Act II through the sheer force of his delivery, pushing much too hard at the expense of a more nuanced interpretation of the dynamic. Camilla Nylund's lovely richness of voice is evident but she doesn't always have the necessary power and lacks any real direction from Arnarsson to help her wade through the text that spills onto her dress. It's probably about time that someone other than Georg Zeppenfeld was given the role of King Mark at Bayreuth (and every other important house in Europe performing this work), but it's only when you hear someone else sing it that you appreciate Zeppenfeld more. It's not an enviable role to enter at this stage in Act II and have to deliver a long monologue wallowing in disappointment and betrayal, but grimacing Günther Groissböck isn't able to make much of it and a section of the audience show their displeasure at the end of act curtain call.

The skeletal hulk of the decaying, rusting ship remains in Act III as Kareol, now even more disordered, with all the junk heaped together in a pile and the dying Tristan slumped against it. Again, it's a slim offering for this work and the failure to make anything significant of the circumstances that drive Tristan and Isolde to consummate their love-death, in as far as that can be done (and in Wagner's world, in his music at least it makes sense) means that it's hard to feel that the right tone has been established for this final scene. Schager gives his usual committed performance but it feels desperate rather than express desperation. His delivery then of Tristan's delirious monologue wavers, impressive in some respects, inaccurate in others as he flails around pushing his voice to its limits. Nylund at least brings a more delicate yet appropriate touch to what the director has been heading towards in the conclusion where she drains what remains in the flask and joins Tristan in death.

It's true that every director has their own interpretation of Tristan und Isolde and there should be no limits placed on that, but I can't help feel that from the small twists on the libretto that are applied here, it shows a fundamental misreading of the work or perhaps a very limited view of it. There is a suggestion that both Isolde and Tristan have deep emotional baggage or physical human limitations - one in Isolde's obsessiveness over trying to put her feelings into words, the other in the objects that almost smother Tristan in Act III - that holds them back from achieving the true transcendence they aspire towards together, both trapped within an imperfect decaying body of the ship. It's not a lot to go on, but with Wagner's remarkable score conducted by Semyon Bychkov and some good singing it's almost enough. Unfortunately with this work almost enough just isn't good enough.

External links: Bayreuther Festspiele, BR-Klassik

Smetana - The Bartered Bride (Munich, 2019)

Bedřich Smetana - The Bartered Bride

Bayerische Staatsoper, 2019

Tomáš Hanus, David Bösch, Selene Zanetti, Pavol Breslik, Günther Groissböck, Wolfgang Ablinger-Sperrhacke, Oliver Zwarg, Helena Zubanovich, Kristof Klorek, Irmgard Vilsmaier, Ulrich Reß, Anna El-Khashem, Ogulcan Yilmaz

Staatsoper.TV - 6 January 2019

Like the few great comic operas that endure across the years, the principal strength of The Bartered Bride is not sophisticated satire or even its comic content, since few opera comedies 'translate' well over time. Like Mozart for example, the comic potential of Smetana's most successful opera lies in its recognition of essential human qualities and in the ability of new performers to continually renew and breathe life into the work. Of course there's another essential element that contributes to the work's success and longevity and that's Smetana's glorious music. Musical and singing performances are well catered for in the new Munich production and under David Bösch's direction it succeeds to a large degree in keeping the whole thing lively and entertaining, and you can't ask for more from a light comic opera than that.

I was unsure however that there would be anything to gain or any subtle commentary to be made from Bösch's decision to switch The Bartered Bride's setting of a bucolic idyll of a Czech country village for a dung heap. That said, there's not much idealisation of life in the countryside in the opera, the villagers resigned from the opening song to the fact that there's no room for sentiments of love when the realities of money are far more important. Wedding and woe go hand in hand unless it's properly managed and love makes fools of those who enter into it without proper consideration for such necessities.

That doesn't leave much hope for the romance between Marie and Hans. Marie's parents Kruschina and Kathinka have called upon the marriage-broker Kezal to formalise the arrangements that have been agreed long ago to advantageously marry Marie to one of the sons of Tobias Micha. Since one of them has disappeared and is believed to be dead (hmmm, I wonder where he might have gone...), that means that Marie is going to be married to Wenzel. It's going to take some quick thinking and scheming on the part of Marie not just to outwit Kezal but also manufacture a circumstance where her marriage to Hans might be acceptable. To Marie's surprise however, Hans seems to have allowed himself to be bought off, signing a contract that makes Marie the bartered bride of "one of the sons of Tobias Micha" (hmmm...).

The Bartered Bride is a simple enough story with a fairly obvious plot twist, but it's the strength of the sentiments of Hans and Marie (and Smetana's scoring of such) that give the work its irrepressible human character. The two lovers are under no illusions or romantic ideals about their situation; they just know that they were meant for each other and are confident enough to believe that they won't be separated by any circumstance arranged by their parents and that they will work something out. It's not so much a case of love conquers all as a battle of cleverness and wit.

Of course the obstacles that have to be overcome have to be serious enough as to make it seem insurmountable, and money is always a familiar reality, even if arranged marriage isn't as much a universal problem. What is of course most important and most successful about how Smetana deals with the subject in The Bartered Bride is that the forces of ideal and reality, or love and opposition are embodied in the characters and in the musical character of the piece. The situation itself is not inherently funny, and how it plays out is merely amusing, but it comes alive in the playing, in its characters, in how they are interpreted and in how the music brings vibrancy and life to it all.

Marie and Hans are the romantic characters, so the majority of the comic potential lies with the marriage facilitator Kezal and in how the lovers seek to outwit him. David Bösch emphasises the disparity between Kezal's flamboyantly over-dressed, bare-chested, arm-wrestling activities and the dung heap village that he has visited, and Günther Groissböck plays it up terrifically, his looming overbearing presence dominating the stage whenever he is on it. For their part, Selene Zanetti and Pavol Breslik have to play the part not just of simple country people with romantic ideas, but show the sincerity of their feeling in the lovely arias that Smetana writes for them, showing the underlying human qualities that are essential to the character of the work. Both are simply outstanding for technical delivery, sweetness of timbre (with a steely determination underpinning it) and for the deftness of the comic playfulness in the delivery elsewhere.

Patrick Bannwart's dung-heap set proves versatile enough to introduce other elements of visual comedy and extravagance such as a tractor that Marie drives over a wedding dress, some live pigs, a beer festival and the requirement to set up a site for the travelling circus in Act III. Another little running visual joke where the prompter - the box buried in a smaller dung pile - is invited to take part in the entertainment provides another light amusing touch that works well. Aside from the circus, where Bösch does his own thing but still provides spectacle and amusement, all of this fits well with the rich folk-influenced dances, choruses played with verve and dynamism under the musical direction of Tomáš Hanus. Plenty of spectacle and light humour, with wonderful music and lovely singing, you really can't ask for more from The Bartered Bride.

Links: Bayerische Staatsoper, Staatsoper.TV

Wagner - Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (Bayreuth, 2017)

Richard Wagner - Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg

Bayreuther Festspiele, 2017

Philippe Jordan, Barrie Kosky, Michael Volle, Klaus Florian Vogt, Johannes Martin Kränzle, Daniel Behle, Anne Schwanewilms, Wiebke Lehmkuhl, Georg Zeppenfeld, Günther Groissböck, Tansel Akzeybek, Armin Kolarczyk, Daniel Schmutzhard, Paul Kaufmann, Christopher Kaplan, Stefan Heibach, Raimund Nolte, Andreas Hörl, Timo Riihonen

BR-Klassik - 25th July 2017

Barrie Kosky tones down his usual visual extravagances for his Bayreuth debut, but there's no shortage of spectacle, imagination and controversy in his production of Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg premiered at the 2017 festival. The reason for the taking a little more of a low-key approach is that Kosky, as a Jewish director, has decided to tackle a rather difficult subject, and that's the longstanding question of Wagner's antisemitism and the alleged expression of it in this opera. You can hardly accuse Kosky then of reigning in his excesses out of reverence for the composer on his home turf, so to speak.

There's a case for challenging Wagner's beliefs around the questions of art, race and nationalism in his works, and certainly over the last decade Bayreuth has been at the forefront in addressing the difficult and troubling nationalistic elements in his works, particularly in Lohengrin and Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. Effectively putting the composer's great late masterpiece on trial for alleged antisemitism, there are initially some doubts about whether such an emphasis should be allowed to dominate over the whole of a work that has considerably more warmth, humanity and humour to it.

It certainly looks like Kosky is about to over-complicate and muddy the waters by inserting Wagner directly into the production, creating a tangled web around the work's composition, history, tradition and legacy. Act I recreates Wagner's Bayreuth mansion Haus Wahnfried, where the composer is showing off his latest creation to his family and friends. Franz Lizst, who evolves into Pogner, is there with his daughter Cosima, Wagner's wife, who in turn will transform into Eva in the opera. Wagner himself will of course transform into the wise Hans Sachs, but he also models a youthful version of himself as the spirit of Walther von Stolzing.

Perhaps most controversially, Hermann Levi, the Jewish conductor of the first performance of Parsifal, transforms into Beckmesser, who it has been said (but hardly definitively) is a Jewish caricature in the opera. In the traditional German craft of the Meistersingers, Beckmesser is the one who might aspire to compose great art, but he can never be truly German, and in the end is shown to imitate and steal the ideas of others to little authentic effect from one who is in closer contact with the nature of the land and has noble pure German blood running through his veins. And, of course, the people rise up and reject Beckmesser's poor and inauthentic efforts at German art, giving him a good kicking for his troubles in Act II.

Is this all that Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg is about? It is really an antisemitic work? The question is one worth addressing, particularly by the time you come to Act III of the work with its problematic concluding speech. Barrie Kosky fortunately proves to be more than capable of tackling some of those more troubling questions without neglecting all the other essential elements of the work. It might appear to be somewhat provocatively over-emphasising the matter, not to mention making a lazy reference to Nuremberg by placing the medieval citizens in a courtroom during war crime trials that took place in the city in 1945, but the validity of exploring the legacy of Meistersinger far beyond its own time is borne out by the almost prophetic words of Wagner's libretto.

"How peacefully with its staunch customs, contented in deed and work, lies in the middle of Germany my dear Nuremberg", sings Hans Sachs about a place that embodies the spiritual heartland of Germany. And yet Wagner recognises that the same essential German qualities also contain within them an element of old madness that could come under the thrall of "a goblin" who could unravel the thread of madness that lies within it, and it's the role of a Hans Sachs "to guide the madness so as to perform a nobler work"; towards art. The Nuremberg trials setting is not arbitrary or gratuitous then, but it gives real meaning and force to Wagner's words and to the sentiments at the heart of Meistersinger.

Whether you agree with the premise and its execution, Kosky at least makes a meaningful connection between life and art by looking at the work through the prism of Wagner's own life and composition, a much more meaningful exploration than Stefan Herheim's half-hearted placement of Wagner into the opera in his 2013 Salzburg production of the same work. At the very least, Kosky keeps the stage interesting, full of movement, ideas and occasional eccentric little touches (the little phials of colour representing the chemistry of composition), but never going in the direction of campness or irreverence which this director is capable of but clearly finds inappropriate for this major work.

Thanks to Philippe Jordan's conducting and supporting the idea from the orchestra pit - the performance filled with warmth and a complementary blending of the complex moods and colours of Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg - it's possible to enjoy the production without having to grasp all the historical references and controversies that have dogged the work throughout its lifetime. The singing, from an absolute A-list of Wagnerian singers, also truly brings out all the musical qualities of the work. It's a sheer delight to see them all combining to such remarkable effect on this great work.

The singing is exemplary, but it's more than just technical prowess being exhibited here. There's evidently a strong directorial hand in the characterisation which brings in full individual engagement and collaborative interaction between the performers. I don't think I've ever seen Klaus Florian Vogt perform better anywhere than he does with this Walther von Stolzing. His distinctive light youthfully lyrical tone is perfectly suited to the role, but in performance too he seems totally involved with the character, the drama and in reaction to the figures around him. Judging by the mixed reception at the curtain call, the casting of Anne Schwanewilms as Eva was a little more divisive, but personally I thought her performance was exceptionally good, her voice as distinctive as Vogt's, full of character and with extraordinary swoops and expressive detail.

Michael Volle and Johannes Martin Kränzle of course have a well-honed double act as Sachs and Beckmesser, but they adapt that well to the requirements of the production bringing even more depth to the interpretation and the characterisation. There is never a moment when they don't have you entirely in their spell, bringing nuance and complexity to the soul-searching explorations. Volle in particular gives a mighty performance, again the best I've ever seen from him or indeed from anyone in this role. When his Wagner/Sachs addresses the charges laid against him and fervently pleads his case from the Nuremberg witness stand asking "how can the art be unworthy which embraces such prizes?", there's not a jury in the land that would convict him.

Links: Bayreuther Festspiele, BR-Klassik

Wagner - Parsifal (DNO, 2016)

Richard Wagner - Parsifal

Dutch National Opera, 2016

Marc Albrecht, Pierre Audi, Anish Kapoor, Ryan McKinny, Bjarni Thor Kristinsson, Günther Groissböck, Christopher Ventris, Bastiaan Everink, Alexandra Petersamer, Elena Pankratova, Marcel Reijans, Roger Smeets, Lisette Bolle, Rosanne van Sandwijk, Erik Slik, Jeroen de Vaal, Maartje Rammeloo, Lisette Bolle, Inez Hafkamp, Tomoko Makuuchi, Caroline Cartens, Rosanne van Sandwijk, Eva Kroon

Amsterdam - 9th December 2016

Parsifal is such a unique piece of music drama that it permits many ways of presenting it; there's no right way and there's no wrong way. It has little of the dramatic action that you would more commonly find in opera and is limited in the stage directions it needs to put its message across, so it's surprising how versatile and open to exploration Parsifal remains. The conceptual, symbolic or abstract approach however seems more like its natural medium, rather than say a production that explores character or one that attempts to provide an interpretation of the meaning of the work. Other approaches are valid however, which of course is a measure of its greatness as a supreme work of art, which seems to me to be something that is indisputable.

That was my impression anyway coming out of the Pierre Audi's production of the work at the Dutch National Opera in Amsterdam, which suggests that they must have got something right. Just quite how they did it is, as is often the case with this opera, somewhat more difficult to define, but surely it is at least by remaining true to the spirit of Wagner's intentions for his final masterpiece. That doesn't mean that you have to be slavishly literal however, and Pierre Audi's direction and Anish Kapoor's sets are firmly in the conceptual mode. By which I mean that they attempt to create a visual representation of the deeper meaning of the work rather than holding to its surface representation. And by which I mean there is scarcely any overt religious iconography, but plenty to allude to the work's spiritual and transcendent content.

That very much depends on how much you want to read into it, but obviously when it comes to such an approach, the onus must be placed on the individual member of the audience. For me, the representation of Montsalvat as a solid mass of jagged rocks bathed in blood-red light gave it the appearance of a raw open wound. That is evidently a key image in relation to this opera, and in fact it's also the image of a bleeding wound that is projected onto the screen during the overture. The pain and suffering endured by Amfortas, an eternal wound from the spear that that pierced Christ on the cross, is so great that it can't simply be confined to a single body; it engulfs the whole of Montsalvat. Everyone there feels the pain, and if you can't hear that in the music, you aren't listening closely enough.

Arguably that is what the staging should be striving to represent by whatever means necessary. It's more important to sense that than it is to see medieval knights and the Holy Grail on the stage. The second scene of Act I, the transubstantiation scene, literally builds on the first scene. The configuration is slightly altered and wooden scaffolding around it bears the faithful. There's a sense here of the need to build the world anew, build upon the pain, putting it to use. The wooden beams picked up by the reinvigorated knights are not crosses then, but crossbeams that symbolise or serve as building blocks.

Anish Kapoor's designs for Klingsor's castle and gardens in Act II are even more abstract, consisting only of a large circular mirror of uneven distorted clarity hanging above the stage, the background of the set merely a curved black wall. Again, it's a representation of the tone of this Act, the world seen through a glass darkly (a Biblical reference without the religious iconography). Reflected in this mirror the flower maidens are indeed a dazzling kaleidoscopic display that holds Parsifal back from what it is he must do. Kundry attempts to bring some light to Parsifal's quest for enlightenment, but it still represents a distortion of the truth. It is only when Parsifal recalls the suffering of Amfortas that his eyes are opened and he is able to recognise the truth for himself.

Act III is the exact opposite of how this Act is usually represented. Instead of a post-apocalyptic Montsalvat, with Titurel dead, Amfortas surely unable to endure further pain, and the faith of Gurnemanz and the knights in tatters, Kapoor depicts a clean, open, ordered scene. It's all pale blue, with geometric shapes on a bare minimal stage, the figures all wearing futuristic robes like a scene from a Robert Wilson opera production (incidentally, I haven't seen his Parsifal, but Robert Wilson doing any Wagner and preferably a Ring Cycle would be my ultimate dream production - could someone ask him, please?). The third act however is about redemption, and that is followed through with the associated Christian rituals of feet-washing and baptism, as well as consideration of death and the afterlife.

If it was difficult to pin the production down to a definitive statement, concept or interpretation, there was no mistaking what the music was telling you, and it's there that the 'truth' of Parsifal is there to be revealed. Marc Albrecht conducted with a measured pace, never allowing the work to float or drift, keeping instead a consistent drive - although I might have liked a slower more contemplative Good Friday scene. It was the 'shaping' of the orchestra that counted for more here, lifting the sweeps of strings, emphasising the plaintive tone of the cellos and the spiritual uplift of the brass, with the percussion hammering home the truth. It was an utterly exhilarating performance that demonstrated the beauty and the brilliance of Wagner's orchestration for Parsifal, as well as its ability to reach deeper places.

The performance of the 9th December was slightly delayed while the DNO flew in a replacement for an indisposed Petra Lang. The disappointment of not seeing Lang sing and perform the role of Kundry was however alleviated by the promise of the replacement being Elena Pankratova, who most recently sang the role (impressively) at Bayreuth this year. Delays however prevented Pankratove from getting to the house in time so the first Act was sung very capably by Alexandra Petersamer from the side of the stage while the role was mimed out by the assistant director Astrid van den Akker. The circumstances were not ideal, but in practice it didn't have an adverse impact on the quality of the performance, with Pankratova at the side of the stage for Act II and III demonstrating every ounce of the power that marked her performance at Bayreuth. If anything, a mimed Kundry just gave her and the work an additional sense of otherworldliness.

Also seen at Bayreuth 2016, Ryan McKinny likewise gave another intense, agonised performance as Amfortas. There might not have been as much blood-letting as at Bayreuth, the 'Grail' here being a flow of blood onto a strip of cloth held in front of him for the followers, but the sacrificial nature of gesture counted. I was initially uncertain that Günther Groissböck would have the necessary gravitas for Gurnemanz, but he was more than capable for the role, his voice carrying even over the full force of the orchestra, and he had good stage presence.

Christopher Ventris didn't make the same kind of impression, but it's undoubtedly a challenge for singer and director to give Parsifal any real depth of character. He is a cipher, a symbol, a saviour who will lead the way through pain to redemption in compassion. There was no faulting his singing performance, which was nothing less than lyrical and beautifully articulated. Bastiaan Everink's Klingsor was similarly a cipher, but again well sung. The brilliance of the DNO chorus was truly astounding and deeply moving - reducing the lady beside me to tears at the end of Act I - and the flower maidens here were also exceptionally lyrical and beguiling.

Links: De Nationale Opera

Busoni - Doktor Faust (Zurich, 2006)

Ferruccio Busoni - Doktor Faust

Opernhaus Zürich, 2006

Philippe Jordan, Klaus Michael Gruber, Thomas Hampson, Günther Groissböck, Gregory Kunde, Reinaldo Macias, Sandra Trattnigg, Martin Zysset, Andreas Winkler, Thilo Dahlmann, Matthew Leigh

Arthaus Musik - Blu-ray

The fact that it isn't performed very often might lead one to believe that Busoni's Doktor Faust is not quite as dramatically suited to the stage as other adaptations of Goethe's famous work. In truth, few of those other versions ever amount to either a complete or a coherent account of the Faust legend, more often picking and choosing scenes to musically illustrate it, reducing it down to a series of episodic numbers. That's true for Berlioz's La damnation de Faust, as much as it is for Bioto's Mefistofele and even Gounod's Faust, which may nonetheless be the most successful account of the work for the opera stage.  

Grappling with the dramatic construction of the work is probably the greatest challenge and Busoni's opera appears to be much more complete and better structured as an opera than any of the other above named examples. And this is despite the fact the Prologue where Faust enters into his deal with Mephistopheles takes up a full third of the work. At this stage Faust is already considered a heretic and a libertine in his quest to understand men's behaviour and extend the boundaries of human knowledge. Three mystical figures appear however, three students from Cracow who drift unseen past his assistant Wagner, offering him a book and a key that will open the door to the knowledge he seeks, allowing him to call on the assistance of Lucifer and his servants.

This opening scene is an important one to establish the context for what follows and Busoni gives it due attention for its potential for stage spectacle, for the richness of the music that can be applied to it, and for the part it plays in determining how the audience regard Faust's considering a pact with the devil. He doesn't enter into the arrangement lightly (it's nothing something to dabble in, after all), dismissing all the demons who he believes will not be able to help him fulfil his ambitions. He may only be left with Mephistopheles in the end, but he recognises that this servant of Hell who can read the thoughts of men and knows the secret desires in their hearts, offers the best opportunity for the learning the forbidden knowledge he seeks.

Rather than dominating and dictating the whole tone of the work and potentially distorting the message of the legend of Faust, the doctor's misdeeds and misuse of his powers take up only the middle section of the work, but it is so well used. Like the first section, Busoni's orchestration is rich and dynamic, with recitative and declamation mixed with Romantic sensibilities, symphonic interludes and occasional forays to the edges of tonality. Even within these more episodic scenes, Busoni finds a full range of expression that covers the important aspects of Faust's actions.

His seduction of the maiden Gretchen is not as important - debatably - as him being held to account for it by her brother the soldier. His response, leaving the act of disposing of this man to Mephistopheles, in a church and blasphemously disguised as a monk, all add to the accounts in Satan's books, for which Faust will have to settle up later. Likewise, Faust's display of power for the Duke and Duchess of Parma is not just an opportunity to display arcane powers, but a way to probe relevant questions on the nature of beauty, and how to use them to bend the Duchess to his bidding. The consequences of this are even debated by students of Catholic and Protestant doctrine in a scene that further explores the pull of emotions, love and human mortality.

The final third of the work is devoted to Faust's downfall, the knight, the Duchess and a dead baby she has delivered come back to haunt him, but they also present him with a chance at some kind of redemption. Dividing the work almost equally up into Thought-Action-Reflection, the overall impression of Busoni's Faust then is of a work that focuses on the human drives and the price to be paid for them rather than the Romantic centre of Marguerite in Gounod's Faust or the huge battle between the forces of Heaven and Hell that is scaled up in Boito's Mefistofele.

So why then is Busoni's Doktor Faust not better known and given greater credit? Well, like many worthy works from the same period, history hasn't been kind to Busoni's great work. The opera remained incomplete when the composer died in 1924, the work finished by a pupil, Philipp Jarnach, for a first performance in 1925, but it was only in 1982 that the opera was completed from original sketches that the composer left for the remainder of the work. Like many 'lost' or neglected works from the 1920s however, musical fashions changed greatly around this time, and those that fell in-between the two world wars particularly have suffered the most, seeming to become irrelevant and never finding an audience as music went in another direction entirely. Even though Busoni paved the way for this kind of new music and even though Doktor Faust still sounds quite modern, it has never had the opportunity to find the place it deserves in the opera repertoire.

The Zurich production from 2006 goes a long way towards highlighting the musical qualities of the work if it doesn't quite manage to make Doktor Faust come fully to life on the stage. The staging is stylised, semi-modern and part abstract (the 'book' Faust gains forbidden knowledge from not actually a book but a small statue here, for example), but dealing with concepts, ideas and the supernatural, there's no reason why it should be 'realistic'. If anything, there isn't a sufficient sense of the human confrontation with huge concepts like eternity and the damnation of the soul, but this weakness could lie with Busoni as much as with Klaus Michael Gruber's stage production.

The singing at least is strong and impressive in its efforts to bring out and convey this deeper element within the work. Thomas Hampson gives a terrific performance of a conflicted character, the nobility of his aims undermined by ego and human failings. Alternately authoritative of purpose and thoughtful of his actions, Hampson shows Doctor Faust capable of mastery of everything but himself. Gregory Kunde gives us a Mephistopheles that is full of character and mischievousness. It's a wonderfully sung and well characterised performance. Philippe Jordan and the Zurich orchestra manage to bring all the majesty and wonder out of Busoni's score.

Links: Opernhaus Zürich

Strauss - Der Rosenkavalier (Salzburg 2014 - Webcast)

Richard Strauss - Der Rosenkavalier

Salzburg 2014

Franz Welser-Möst, Harry Kupfer, Krassimira Stoyanova, Sophie Koch, Günther Groissböck, Mojca Erdmann, Adrian Eröd, Silvana Dussmann, Wiebke Lehmkuhl, Rudolf Schasching, Stefan Pop, Tobias Kehrer, Martin Piskorski, Franz Supper, Dirk Aleschus, Roman Sadnik, Rupert Grössinger

Medici.tv - August 2014

It's probably a self-evident truth and practically a definition of opera, but perhaps more so than any other work, there needs to be a perfect coming together of all the various elements in Der Rosenkavalier. Each of its elements - not just the music, the singing and the staging, but all the other areas that are considered less important - all have their part to play in making this difficult opera work. Truly work as it's meant to. As Salzburg productions go, their 2014 Der Rosenkavalier isn't one of their most adventurous, but in almost every area it serves the intentions of the work, showing in the process just how perfect Der Rosenkavalier can be, and consequently just how miraculous the nature of opera itself can be.

Strauss and Hofmannsthal's first fully-fledged collaboration (after adapting Hofmannsthals' dramatic version of Elektra), Der Rosenkavalier is an immense but delicately poised work that presents considerable challenges in its huge orchestration, the intricacy of interplay and interaction and the demands that it places on the singing voices. Attention to these demands is necessary to achieve a very specific tone and mood, and a production can't really stray too far away from these intentions without undermining the entire purpose of the work. As it says itself, it's a Viennese farce and nothing more, but like the Mozart comedies that it is styled on, Der Rosenkavalier opens up deeper meditations on life, love, time, on the necessary but beautiful pain that comes with the passing of the old and the birth of the new. Der Rosenkavalier in itself, reverential and referential of older opera works, indulges this nostalgia for the past at the same time as it points a way towards the future.

The person best placed to draw out those qualities in a production of Der Rosenkavalier and bring the necessary balance of warm nostalgia and reflective meditation on the meaning of it all, is traditionally the conductor. It's always the conductor who is in charge of Der Rosenkavalier. Leading the ever impressive Vienna Philharmonic, Franz Welser-Möst's control and management of the score is absolutely stunning, weaving Strauss' complex lines through the singing voices, matching the melodies, the tempo and the sheer majesty of a score whose lyricism and evocation of resonances belies any notion of the work being merely "a Viennese farce and nothing more". More than anything else, it's Strauss's writing that fleshes out the broad strokes of the stock characters, imbuing them with considerably more personality and humanity and making their concerns and behaviour universally recognisable.

It's immediately apparent that the Salzburg production has a handle on all these essential ingredients. From the overture to the impression that is created by the elegant set for the Marschallin's bedroom in Act I, everything feels right and sounds right. All the more so on account of the singers we have in the roles of Marschallin and Octavian. Sophie Koch is maybe not so sure of voice on the top notes as she once was singing Octavian, but her experience counts. She knows the role well and is better fitted than most to handle the intricacies of this difficult trouser role (ahem, Glyndebourne!). Krassimira Stoyanova is a glorious Marschallin and gives a great performance here. She has an amazing voice that is perfect for big roles like this, and she is simply just one of the best Marschallins in the world at the moment. I don't think there's any particular chemistry between Stoyanova and Koch, but they work together well and bring their own character successfully to the roles.

I was disappointed however by Günther Groissböck's Ochs von Lerchenau. Not with his singing, which I thought might have been challenged by such a role. True, he doesn't have the commanding boom that is required and is probably a little too young and handsome for the role, but he navigates his way perfectly through the long and challenging sing-speech rhythms of the part. His timbre is lovely and his delivery is perfectly good, but I just couldn't take to him as the baron. He never looked terribly comfortable with the part either, his gestures limited to an arrogant sneer and swagger, adopting a teapot stance and flicking his hand dismissively now and again. His concentration on the delivery means that he sings the role almost entirely without looking at any of the other characters he is interacting with. It's possible I suppose that this is how the role has been directed, Ochs always dominating, the other characters always behind him, subservient to his sense of self-importance.

Whether it was an issue with casting or direction, Baron Ochs consequently failed to come to life for me or really make the necessary stamp on the significance of his role in Der Rosenkavalier. Other than that however, Harry Kupfer's direction is hard to fault. The stage design is classy and elegant, the silver-grey colour scheme giving a sense of a cool nostalgic detachment for an idealised past. Hans Schavernoch's set is made up of large panels and props that glide into position, while large projected photographs of classical Vienna scenes, rooftops and parks place the work perfectly into the essential context of the wider world that the opera is set in.

The stylised version of this cold idealised Vienna contrasted perfectly with the warm richness of the lives and sentiments of the characters within it. Act I and II contrasted noble elegance with vulgar extravagance of marbled ostentation, while Act III didn't just reveal the darker underside of the comic playing, it practically built the set around the performers in the location of a misty Prater park, making it feel wholly a part of the wider world. Everything slips into place the way it ought to, as elegantly as Strauss's score, and the finale consequently was simply gorgeous. Och ungraciously fades back into the mist, the Marschallin glides off in her Rolls Royce, leaving Koch's Octavian and Mojca Erdmann's delicately sweet-toned Sophie to look ahead to the future.

Rossini - Guillaume Tell (Bayerische Staatsoper 2014 - Webcast)

Gioachino Rossini - Guillaume Tell

Bayerische Staatsoper, Munich - 2014

Dan Ettinger, Antú Romero Nunes, Michael Volle, Bryan Hymel, Marina Rebeka, Evgeniya Sotnikova, Günther Groissböck, Jennifer Johnston, Goran Jurić, Christoph Stephinger, Kevin Conners, Enea Scala, Christian Rieger

Staatsoper.tv Live Web streaming - 28 June 2014

The qualities of Rossini's musical composition and the measure of how advanced his dramatic writing is in comparison to his earlier works, is clearly evident in his prematurely final work for the Paris Opera, Guillaume Tell. In part, that's much to do with the quality of the orchestra that Rossini had at his disposal, but there's clearly ambition on the part of the composer to move away from the standard number opera towards a more dramatic musical expression. In many ways, even though it is largely through-composed, Guillaume Tell points the way towards the grand opéra tradition, even as it looks back and retains a sense of the opera seria.

In both respects, whether it adheres towards one style or other, Rossini's final opera is a virtuoso work that requires performers of an extremely high calibre. It's a long work, almost four hours without cuts, with challenging vocal lines that push one tenor role to deliver fifteen high-Cs, many of them late in the second Act. The challenges extend to the staging of the dramatic action. Other than providing a sense of location for the Swiss Lake Lucerne setting, there aren't any conventionally difficult scenes to stage (other than an archer shooting an apple off a boy's head evidently!), but the real challenge lies rather in finding a way to make the staging visually and dramatically interesting. Without proper direction there can be a lot of opera seria-like standing around singing out one's emotional conflict to the audience.

Consequently, Guillaume Tell is not a work that is performed very often, but if the considerable musical and dramatic challenges can be overcome, there are great rewards to be found in this remarkable opera. Set during the Swiss revolt against the Austrian Hapsburg occupation in the thirteenth century and even managing to tie a doomed love affair into the storyline, there is at least a strong dramatic situation in Guillaume Tell. It's the kind of scenario that Verdi would come to specialise in, and Rossini's writing here sets a high bar for his successor to aspire to and eventually surpass. An oppressed nation under a hated foreign rule, stirrings of revolution and expressions of patriotic fervour, there's even a romantic situation of lovers torn in a conflict of love and duty to one's country.

The sense of the kind of passions that underlie Guillaume Tell are exemplified by the action that opens the opera. Leuthold, angry at an assault committed by Austria troops in his village, brutally attacks and kills the soldier responsible for the abduction of his daughter. This scene is shown silently before the opera starts, but rather than choose to follow this with the traditional overture, Act I of this production launches straight into the action with the village wedding celebrations that are soon to be interrupted by news of the Austrian governor Gessler's reprisals. The dropping the overture (or moving it, as it transpires, since cutting it would be unforgivable), and even the tone of the wedding celebrations indicate that this is going to be a production that emphasises the darker side of Guillaume Tell. And, being Munich, it's an abstract and modernised staging as well, looking like it is set sometime in the 1970s.

Instead of anything like traditional backdrops or even a sense of the setting even being anywhere in Switzerland, the production relies mainly on a layered series of columns on a darkened stage, the long tubular shapes rising and falling, symbolising or at least effectively evoking a sense of crushing oppression. In other scenes, the pillars float, revolve and strike angular positions, always matching the tone of the scene, whether it's a love scene or one of conflict. Or both, as is the case with Arnold Melcthal and his love for Mathilde, a Hapsburg princess whose life he once saved from an avalanche. On hearing that his father has been executed by Gessler, Arnold however has no choice but to join the call to arms that the intrepid archer William Tell is advocating against the oppressors.

Advocating, that is, with a gun rather than a traditional bow and arrow. Following the absence of the overture, this could lead the audience to wonder whether the director hasn't gone too far in taking Guillaume Tell away from the crowd-pleasing elements that contribute to its musical and dramatic greatness. That proves not to actually be the case. The shooting of the apple from Jemmy's head it staged with a crossbow and has full dramatic impact at the end of Act I, while the overture is reinstated after the interval before the start of the second act, a place where - arguably of course - it fits in well. It's not so much delayed gratification as using the melancholy tone of the solo viola to reflect Jemmy's sense of impending death - one that is populated it seems by fantasy figures from 'Where The Wild Things Are' - exploding into the famous march as the success of Tell's shot is seen to be sure and his turning on Gessler provokes the people to rise up in rebellion.

The Bayerische Staatsoper are of course well-known for taking on challenging works as well as for the experimental stylisations they take in their approach to opera stagings. For a work that is rarely staged which and has as many challenges as Guillaume Tell, the obvious approach would be stick with a familiar traditional period production, but playing it safe is never an option for the Munich opera company. Not that they get any thanks for it. The mindless booing that greeted Antú Romero Nunes and his team at the curtain call was inevitable then, but Munich should continue to pursue this kind of approach undaunted. It might infuriate a small section of the audience, but Nunes' approach succeeded in projecting a suitable tone for Rossini's opera, the measure of its success being plainly that the force of the work and the sentiments it expresses were fully achieved. I'm not sure why anyone would think the wearing of lederhosen and a few painted backdrops of the Alps would have improved it greatly.

There could however be little anyone would find lacking in the musical performance or the singing. Dan Ettinger finds a lush romanticism in the score, quite different from the familiar Rossinian romp, that drives the sweep of the drama wonderfully. The structure of the work is likewise tied more to dramatic requirements than to providing tailor-made roles to either showcase the performers' talents or spare their energies. It's a good hour and a half for example before the arch-villain Gessler even makes an appearance. Günther Groissböck doesn't quite have the depth of bass for a commanding governor, but donning a bull's head mask he presents a fearsome enough figure for Tell to defy. It was Marina Rebeka however who won most of the applause at the end of Act I for her Mathilde, and deservedly so.

Michael Volle and Bryan Hymel's Act I contributions were also acknowledged, but they really came into their own in Act II. Volle was as solid and reliable as ever as Tell, but it was Hymel who really impressed here. You have to give credit to any tenor who can hit all Arnold's high-Cs, but Hymel took them all effortlessly through a smooth vocal line and timbre that now seems more natural for Rossini than the heavy dramatic requirements of Verdi and Grand Opera. Evgeniya Sotnikova made the role of Jemmy count with a clear and expressive delivery, as did Jennifer Johnston as Hedwige.

Links: Bayerische Staatsoper.tv

Mozart - Die Zauberflöte

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Die Zauberflöte

Teatro alla Scala, Milan 2011

Roland Böer, William Kentridge, Günther Groissböck, Saimir Pirgu, Albina Shagimuratova, Genia Kühmeier, Ailish Tynan, Alex Esposito, Peter Bronder

Opus Arte

I think the mark of Mozart’s genius in the composition of his strange and still enigmatic final opera is pretty much agreed upon by most critics and its popularity as one of the most performed works in the repertory deservedly still endures, but in terms of presentation on the stage, Die Zauberflöte still represents a challenge that has perhaps been neglected in recent times by the major modern revisionist directors in favour of finding new ways to explore the Mozart/Da Ponte trilogy of works – The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni and Così Fan Tutte. This is perhaps surprising, since The Magic Flute itself is such a rich and interesting work, historically and personally in terms of the nature of its composition towards the end of Mozart’s life, but it’s also notable for the tremendous musical variety and innovation with which Mozart approaches the Singspiel format, the music not only illustrating or illuminating Schikaneder’s playful and sometimes nonsensical libretto, but bringing structure and depth to the work, breathing life into it in a way that makes its mysteries endlessly fascinating. What more can any director possibly bring to the table or bring out of this work that could make it any more entertaining or even comprehensible?

The stage director for this production of Die Zauberflöte at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan may not have any new ideas about the opera’s central theme of light versus darkness being that of man seeking to rise above their baser natures and impulses, seeking enlightenment over obscurantism, or rationalism over superstition, but as an artist, illustrator and animator South African director William Kentridge does at least approach these themes with a very distinct style of his own. The period setting chosen appears to be late 19th century, the beginning of the age of technological advancement, the characters dressed to looking like figures from a Jules Verne or a H.G Wells novel. At the centre of these scientific advances in this production is the camera, a box that in itself represents the use of light – the ingenuity of man – to forge something out of the darkness, much as Mozart uses the music of the magic flute for the same purpose. Within the box of the stage, Kentridge uses shadows and light in a variety of ways that fits in well with this theme, as well as often being visually very striking.

Thus, in the opening of Act 1, Tamino battles with a snake that is a projection, but rather than being the kind of CGI spectacle that one might expect with the use of modern technology from a production by someone like La Fura dels Baus (one of the conceptual director’s who actually have tackled Die Zauberflöte, but the less said about their unlikely concept of the Magic Flute being a battle between the opposing hemispheres of the brain the better), it’s more in keeping with the chosen time period and created by the three ladies of the Queen of the Night, who form it out of the shadowplay of their arms. So right from the outset, Tamino literally defeats a shadow of the forces of darkness. It might not be as spectacular as some wirework serpents, but it still works effectively and in keeping with a meaningful overall concept. Elsewhere, through black-and-white reversal charcoal designs, animation and even some silent movie footage Kentridge finds a variety of means to illustrate the journey and trials of the protagonists, their acquisition of wisdom and knowledge, as well as reflect the symbolism, numerology and the Masonic imagery that is associated with the themes of the opera.

At times, one might like to see more familiar traditional props and backdrops, but at least the flute and the bells are physical objects here, which is not always something you can count on. Sometimes, the drawings themselves evoke those traditional references, the classic domed canopy of stars that represents the domain of the Queen of Night given a spin here that fits with the artist’s own sense of concept and design. The ideas don’t particularly illuminate this strange, beguiling work in any new way, but neither does the director attempt to impose any ill-fitting concept onto it. It does at the very least have a distinct sense of personality, freshness and originality, which is more than you can say about the only other version of the opera currently on Blu-ray, the Royal Opera House production directed by David McVicar. At times, the imagery here – enhanced it seems by a little post-production overlays for television – is simply spectacular.

In terms of performance however, that earlier mentioned production conducted by Colin Davis, may have the upper hand. The orchestration here sounds somewhat lifeless, and no-one on the stage – with the exception of Alex Exposito’s Papageno, looks like they are having much fun with what should be a delightfully invigorating work. I’m presuming that the arrangement used here by Ronald Böer is period – or more likely semi-period for La Scala – as it’s not orchestrated as lushly as you would normally hear it. That allows for some interesting touches in places that takes it back to its Singspiel origins and there is even continuo for some of the recitative (courtesy of René Jacobs), but it feels like there is a distinct lack of verve in the playing and the performances. In a good interview in the extra features, Böer recognises that Die Zauberflöte contains all the different facets of Mozart’s work, but the complex personality of Mozart himself is in there too, reflected in each of the characters, and that doesn’t always come across here.

I can’t fault the singing of this production’s Tamino or Pamina. Tamino can be a difficult role to breathe any life into, but you don’t necessarily need to – the character’s (and Mozart’s) purity, youthful idealism and single-minded determination (yet one that is open to new ideas and a sense of betterment) is all there in the music and Saimir Pirgu sings it beautifully. So too does Genia Kühmeier’s Pamina represent the other side of that nature with a similar clear purity of voice – her ‘Ach, ich fühl’s’ is one of the loveliest I’ve heard. Alex Exposito is the only figure who demonstrates any kind of life and personality, and he sings Papageno well with clear diction. Where Die Zauberflöte really needs character however, a sense of grandness and imperiousness to give depth and gravity to the work, is in the opposing forces of Sarastro and the Queen of the Night, and unfortunately, neither Albina Shagimuratova nor Günther Groissböck are entirely up to the task. Groissböck, so powerful as the Water Goblin in the controversial Munich Rusalka, is particularly disappointing, not really having the authority in presence or indeed the depth to the voice required for a strong Sarastro. Shagimuratova hits all those notes ok, if a little breathlessly, but she doesn’t command that essential presence or menace either as Queen of the Night.

All in all however, if it’s a little dryly performed and lacking a little bit of spark, this is nonetheless a strong performance of Die Zauberflöte that manages to take a fresh approach to the score and the themes of the work. It’s certainly worthwhile for William Kentridge’s unique approach to production design that makes this never anything less than a rich and imaginative spectacle. The Blu-ray is of the usual high video and audio standards, with extra features consisting of a Cast Gallery and a very interesting twelve-minute Interview with the director and conductor. Region-free, BD50, 1080i, PCM Stereo and DTS HD-Master Audio 5.1, German language with English, French, German, Spanish and Italian subtitles.