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Opera Recordings

MIECZYSŁAW WEINBERG: DIE PASSAGIERIN

(Opera Complete Recording) · DSHAMILJA KAISER · NADJA STEFANOFF
Chor der Oper Graz · Grazer Philharmoniker · Roland Kluttig

2CD · C5455 PC: 22 UPC: 845221054551

Opera in two acts, eight scenes and one epilogue Op. 97 (1968)
Libretto: Alexander Medvedev after the novel by Zofia Posmysz
Lisa: DSHAMILJA KAISER
Marta: NADJA STEFANOFF
Walter: WILL HARTMANN
Tadeusz: MARKUS BUTTER
CHOR DER OPER GRAZ 
(Einstudierung / Chorus Master: Bernhard Schneider)
GRAZER PHILHARMONIKER  · ROLAND KLUTTIG Dirigent/conductor
‘I simply cannot stop enthusing about Weinberg’s The Passenger. I’ve heard it three times now, studied the score, and every time I understand more of the beauty and greatness of this music. It is a work of consummate form and style and its subject extremely relevant.’ – Dmitri Shostakovich
In 1960, Lisa – formerly a guard at Auschwitz and now the wife of a West German diplomat – is on an ocean liner bound to Brazil. She thinks she recognises in another passenger a woman named Martha, a Polish prisoner under her direct jurisdiction. Through a series of flashbacks across two acts, eight scenes and one epilogue, the audience witnesses the final reckoning between two women as they attempt to escape their pasts. The Passenger premiered in 2010 at the Bregenz Festival. With this new production by Oper Graz composer Mieczysław Weinberg’s powerful Holocaust drama continues to gain international recognition.  

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HENZE: DAS VERRATENE MEER

Opera Complete Recording
Bo Skovhus · Vera-Lotte Boecker · Josh Lovell · Orchester der Wiener Staatsoper · Simone Young

2CD · C5460 PC: 22 UPC: 845221054605

‘I find myself increasingly occupied with matters of the human soul, its sublimation and spiritual abyss. Certainly my opera The Ocean Betrayed betrays this preoccupation. This music has been to Hades and back, with Monteverdi and myself.’ Hans-Werner Henze based the story for Das verratene Meer (‘The Sea Betrayed’) on Japanese writer Yuko Mishima’s 1963 novel, Gogo no Eiko (‘The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea’). The book offers an unsettling scenario ‘in which the struggle for normality is doomed to failure’. A young widow, Fusako, falls for a merchant navy officer, Ryuji, creating tension with her son, Noboru, who belongs to a violent gang that will exact revenge on the widow’s lover. Through symphonic interludes, the ‘angry, betrayed sea’ becomes the drama’s witness and its narrative voice in Henze’s painfully dark and brutal opera. 

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HENZE: DER PRINZ VON HOMBURG

MARGITA · SCHNEIDERMAN BÖCKER · ADAMS · EBBECKE
STAATSORCHESTER STUTTGART · CORNELIUS MEISTER

C5405 PC: 22 UPC: 845221054056

‚But tell me, who could have written a better libretto than my friend Heinrich von Kleist. When I was searching for a language in combination with which my music could produce something new, a diction targeted by my music, I hit on the Prince. . […] The tension between the life of the individual and raison d’état, issues as to the disregard of law and order, man’s quivering before the might of ruling authorities and the courage to resist it, all of that might happen today or might have occurred one or two thousand years ago. […]Many of my endeavours in works of recent years appear through this drama to have reached a new point, i.e. a new polyphony and ist concomitant, freely chosen rigour.’ Hans-Werner Henze

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HINDEMITH: MATHIS DER MALER

Wolfgang Koch · Kurt Streit · Charles Reid · Manuela Uhl · Franz Grundheber
Slowakischer Philharmonischer Chor · Wiener Symphoniker · Bertrand de Billy

3CD-Set · C5450 PC: 22 UPC: 845221054506

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Gottfried von Einem DER PROZESS THE TRIAL

Live from Salzburg Festival
Laurenz Schmeckenbecher Schneider · Woldt · Eerens · ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra · HK Gruber

C5358 PC: 22 UPC: 845221053585

The Austrian composer Gottfried von Einem got to know the mechanism of this process himself, and it was ultimately thanks to some good fortune that he did not become one of the countless victims of the Nazi system of injustice.
He was one of those great composer personalities that played a major role in rebuilding the waste of the Austrian music scene after 1945, following the devasting cultural policies of Austrofascism, which were above all hostile to modern trends, and even more so those of the Nazis. Catchy thematic and melodic ideas, sharply accentuated rhythm, strong gestural and dance-like vigour and a pronounced feeling for differentiated timbre characterized von Einem’s highly personal musical diction, which can also be discerned in the opera Der Prozess. Einem-pupil, composer and conductor HK Gruber made an amazing, by audience and press enthusiastic celebtrated concertant performance during the Salzburg Festival 2018 which is documented on this recording. 
 

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ASTOR PIAZZOLLA - MARIA DE BUENOS AIRES

LUCIANA MANCINI · DANIEL BONILLA TORRES · JOHANNES MERTES
Lothar Hensel · BEETHOVEN ORCHESTER BONN · CHRISTOPHER SPRENGER

C5305 PC: 22 UPC: 845221053059

‘María de Buenos Aires brought me inner peace, a partial serenity that has changed my way of approaching music. I reached the zenith of my musical life at the time. (Astor Piazzolla)
Piazzolla himself equated María to the tango and its historical ups and downs; and this is probably also the primary aid to understanding the reception of the contents of the piece. Next to that, there is also a musical diction that is entirely unique in the second half of the 20^thcentury, indeed in the New Music scene as a whole. ‘I learnt something: to be patient, to be self-critical, to co-ordinate reflection with passion. Now I am told: ‘That is a different Piazzolla’, but that is not the case. I am the same man, but I have reached a synthesis’. (Astor Piazzolla)
 

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CARL MARIA VON WEBER: Euryanthe

Stefan Cerny · Norman Reinhardt · Jacquelyn Wagner · Andrew Foster-Williams · Theresa Kronthaler
ARNOLD SCHOENBERG CHOR ORF VIENNA RADIO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA · CONSTANTIN TRINKS

C5373 · 2CD-Set PC: 22 UPC: 845221053738

CARL MARIA VON WEBER (1786 – 1826)
EURYANTHE
GROSSE ROMANTISCHE OPER IN 3 AUFZÜGEN J.291
GREAT ROMANTIC OPERA IN 3 ACTS
Libretto von / by Helmina de Chézy
(Opera Complete Recording)
König Ludwig VI – Stefan Cerny
Adolar – Norman Reinhardt
Euryanthe – Jacquelyn Wagner
Lysiart – Andrew Foster-Williams
Eglantine – Theresa Kronthaler
ARNOLD SCHOENBERG CHOR
(Chorus Mater: Erwin Ortner)
ORF VIENNA RADIO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
CONSTANTIN TRINKS, Dirigent / conductor
As good as every music lover is acquainted with Der Freischütz, but the fewest are aware of Euryanthe. In the light of the musical quality of the opera, the disdain for it does not seem fitting. Euryanthewas Weber’s most ambitious project, one that anything but backfired. The composition may certainly be termed ground-breaking and truly deserves more attention. ‘A chain of glittering jewels from the beginning to the end. All witty and ingenious’, Robert Schumann in his critic about Euryanthe. 

Live Recording · Theater an der Wien, 11.-12. & 15.12.2018

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GIACOMO PUCCINI: IL TABARRO

Botha · Koch · Brunner · van den Heever
WIENER SINGAKADEMIE · ORF VIENNA RADIO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA · BERTRAND DE BILLY

C5326 PC: 21 UPC: 845221053264

 

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KURT WEILL - Edition Vol. 2

THE RISE AND FALL OF THE CITY OF MAHAGONNY · THE TSAR HAS HIS PHOTOGRAPH TAKEN · DER KUHHANDEL · HAPPY END
Anja Silja · Anny Schlemm · König-Ensemble · WDR Rundfunkorchester · Jan Latham-König

C7184 (5CD) PC: PC04 (Special Price) 845221071848

In the framework of Capriccio’s Kurt Weill edition the present second CD-Box now offers a collection of the prestigious recordings of well known and mostly unknown stage works of the composer. Beside the complete recording of Rise And Fall Of The City Of Mahagonny  we also included some rarities like his first comical opera The Tsar Has His Photograph Taken and in the spirit of Offenbach, witty and with a socio-political background, composed operetta Der Kuhhandel (Sheady Dealing).

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Kurt Weill - Edition Vol.1

DIE DREIGROSCHENOPER · DIE SIEBEN TODSÜNDEN · MAHAGONNY SONGSPIEL · DER LINDBERGHFLUG · DER SILBERSEE
Doris Bierett · Trudeliese Schmidt · Ulrike Steinsky · WDR Rundfunkorchester Köln · Jan-Latham König

5CD-Box: C7178 PC: PC04 (Special Price) UPC: 845221071787

CD 1: DIE DREIGROSCHENOPER / THE THREEPENNY OPERA
(Text: Bertolt Brecht)
CD 2: DIE SIEBEN TODSÜNDEN / THE SEVEN DEADLY SINS
MAHAGONNY SONGSPIEL
(Text: Bertolt Brecht)
CD 3: DER LINDBERGHFLUG / LINDBERGH’S FLIGHT
DER JASAGER / HE WHO SAYS YES (School Opera, 1930)
CD 4 + 5: DER SILBERSEE / THE SILVER LAKE
Ein Wintermärchen / A Winter’s Tale (Text: Georg Kaiser)
 DORIS BIERETT · TRUDELIESE SCHMIDT · ULRIKE STEINSKY
WOLFGANG SCHMIDT · WALTER RAFFEINER
KÖNIG-ENSEMBLE
WDR RUNDFUNKORCHESTER KÖLN · JAN LATHAM-KÖNIG
In the framework of Capriccio’s Kurt Weill edition the present CD-Box now offers a collection of the prestigious recordings of well known and mostly unknown stage works of the composer. Beside the famous “Threepenny Opera” and “The Seven Deadly Sins” we also included some rarities like the radio cantata “Lindbergh’s Flight”, the School Opera “He Who Says Yes” and the romantic Winter Tale “The Silver Lake”. An additional 5CD-Set is in preparation.

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ZEMLINSKY

A FLORENTINE TRAGEDY Opera in one act op. 16 (1916)
Heidi Brunner Wolfgang Koch Charles Reid · ORF VIENNA RADIO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA · BERTRAND DE BILLY

C5325 PC: 21 845221053257

Oscar Wilde’s A Florentine Tragedy was written in 1893, but remained a fragment when the author was arrested for ‘sodomy’. But the material was in the air, so to speak, and Alexander von Zemlinsky, who may have had Richard Strauss’ recourse to Wilde’s Salome in mind and hoped for a similar success with A Florentine Tragedy, finally converted the play into a one-act opera. Puccini had also been interested in the material, but the publisher Tito Ricordi advised him against it. Other potential takers also included Ferruccio Busoni who also found the ending too hackneyed. However, such alleged triviality did not deter his colleague Alexander von Zemlinsky, who celebrated success with his opera. Alban Berg admired the work so much that musical parallels to the Florentine Tragedy can be found in his Wozzeck, premiered eight years later.

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Alexander Zemlinsky

ES WAR EINMAL (ONCE UPON A TIME) · Opera Complete Recording (Remastered Edition)
EVA JOHANSSON · KURT WESTI · PER ARNE WAHLGREN · THE DANISH RADIO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA · HANS GRAF

2CD-Set · C5440 PC: 21 (Special Price) UPC: 845221054407

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Alexander Zemlinsky

DER KÖNIG KANDAULES (Opera Complete Recording) · Remastered Edition
JAMES O’NEAL · MONTE PEDERSON · NINA WARREN · PHILHARMONISCHES STAATSORCHESTER HAMBURG GERD ALBRECHT

2CD-Set C5443 PC: 21 (Special Price) UPC: 845221054438

König Kandaules: JAMES O’NEAL
Gyges: MONTE PEDERSON
Nyssia: NINA WARREN
Phedros: KLAUS HÄGER
Syphax: PETER GALLIARD
Nicomedes: MARIUSZ KWIECIEN
Pharnaces: KURT GYSEN
Philebos: SIMON YANG
PHILHARMONISCHES STAATSORCHESTER HAMBURG
GERD ALBRECHT, Dirigent / conductor

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ZEMLINSKY: DER TRAUMGÖRGE

JANIS MARTIN · JOSEF PROTSCHKA · PAMELA COBURN
RADIO-SINFONIE-ORCHESTER FRANKFURT · GERD ALBECHT

C5395 PC: 21 UPC: 845221053950

"He was too  modern for the  conservatives,  and he  did not manage to catch up with  the 'New
Music', despite his close personal relationship to Schönberg" – This brief characterization of Zemlinskys compositional style shows that the composer 'feil between two stools' even while he was alive. The opera was written at the  suggestion of Gustav Mahler between 1903  and 1906. In 1907 he was engaged by Mahler as director of music at the Court Opera;  at the same time, his third opera "Der Traumgörge" (Görge the Dreamer) was accepted for its first performance.  Following  Mahler's resignation,  however, the  opera was dropped  by Mahler's  successor, even  though it had  already been  rehearsed, and it stayed untouched till the 1970s when the scores and parts have been found in the archive of Vienna State Opera. It's time that this recording – who was the first complete recordings – as well as Zemlinsky's masterpiece turn back to the awareness of the musical life.

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JOHANN JOSEPH ABERT: EKKEHARD

JONAS KAUFMANN · NYLA VAN INGEN · SUSANNE KELLING · CHRISTIAN GERHAHER
SWR RUNDFUNKORCHESTER KAISERSLAUTERN · PETER FALK

The fate of the lovesick monk Ekkehardunfolds against the historical background of the battle againstheathenismandtheHunnishinvasion -things which the broad and lavish grand-opera framework not only justifies but virtually demands.Abert set this very motley text to music in such a way that each of the various worlds and situations is given its appropriate expression, emulating "just about all the styles represented in opera today". However, his approach is not one of simple eclecticism; the entire work is set in the fully individual tonal language he had developed in his previous operas.The young tenor Jonas Kaufmann with his brilliant tembre had the best requirements to present the main-role in this nearly unknown opera. This production was one of the first recordings in general for him, now re-mastered and new released again. 

C5392 PC: 21 UPC: 845221053929

The fate of the lovesick monk Ekkehardunfolds against the historical background of the battle againstheathenismandtheHunnishinvasion -things which the broad and lavish grand-opera framework not only justifies but virtually demands.Abert set this very motley text to music in such a way that each of the various worlds and situations is given its appropriate expression, emulating "just about all the styles represented in opera today". However, his approach is not one of simple eclecticism; the entire work is set in the fully individual tonal language he had developed in his previous operas.The young tenor Jonas Kaufmann with his brilliant tembre had the best requirements to present the main-role in this nearly unknown opera. This production was one of the first recordings in general for him, now re-mastered and new released again. 

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FERRUCCIO BUSONI: TURANDOT // ARLECCHINO

RENE PAPE · LINDA PLECH · JOSEPH PROTSCHKA · CELINA LINDSLEY
RADIO-SINFONIE-ORCHESTER BERLIN · GERD ALBECHT

C5398 PC: 21 UPC: 845221053981

Busoni never came closer to his dream of Italian music than with that night on May 11 1917 of double performance in Zurich, which he calls himself "La Nuova Commedia dell' Arte" I ("Turandot") and II ("Arlecchino"). In the unusually short time from December 1916 to March 1917 Busoni reworked the already existing material to the Incidental Music of Gozzis "Turandot" into an opera. This happen 4 years before Puccini started to work on the same contend. "Arleccino", though  in immediate neighbourhood to  "Dr.  Faust" looking almost like a secondary work, is perhaps the composer's actual key work. The speaking hero of his "theatralische Capriccio" represents  a role model,  which is at times more important to him than his aesthetic Faust, especially as the the World War increases.

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HEINRICH AUGUST MARSCHNER: DER VAMPYR

Romantic Opera Complete Recording
Jonas Kaufmann · Regina Klepper · Franz Hawlata · Thomas Dewald · WDR Rundfunkorchester Köln · Helmuth Froschauer

2CD · C5184 PC: 21 (Special Price) UPC: 845221051840

HEINRICH AUGUST MARSCHNER (1795-1861)
DER VAMPYR
Romantische Oper in 2 Aufzügen · Romantic Opera in 2 Acts
Text: Wilhelm August Wohlbrück
- Gesamtaufnahme / Complete Recording - 
JONAS KAUFMANN
FRANZ HAWLATA · REGINA KLEPPER · THOMAS DEWALD
WDR RUNDFUNKORCHESTER KÖLN · HELMUTH FROSCHAUER

Something demonic and ghostly fills the air: we find ourselves in the age of Dark Romanticism, which cast its shadow on the opera. The fateful drama is of Scottish origin, whose essence consists of inherited curses, dark, guilty entanglements and bloody props, in order to wake fatalistic shivers. Among the audience at the premiere performance of the "Vampire" in 1828 at the Sächsisches Hoftheater in Leipzig was 15-year-old Richard Wagner. Marschner's opera crosses the path of the theatre novice many times. In 1833 the fledgling répétiteur Wagner in Würzburg got involved in:
„However, soon the Marschner score interested me sufficiently to make it worth while to have my bitter work published. I contributed a new allegro movement to Aubry's tenor aria in Marschner's  'Vampire', which I also wrote the text to. My resulting work was demonic and effective, registering the acclaim of the audience and encouraging recognition from my brother".
Wagner could still get worked up about the "loathsomeness of the thematic“; even Hans Pfitzner had to placatingly defend and emphasise the 'gruesomeness' of the text, the 'shivering' was the "best part of Marschner's music". Edgar Istel also captured his theatrical impression in creepy gothic words: "Whoever saw how the once-bitten vampire returns to life rises up by moonlight to the sounds of Marschner's ghostly music, they will never forget this impression."

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ALEXANDER ZEMLINSKY: DER KREIDEKREIS · THE CHALK CIRCLE

Opera Complete Recording
Renate Behle · Reiner Goldberg · Roland Hermann · Radio-Symphonie-Orchester Berlin · Stefan Soltesz

2CD · C5190 PC: 21 (Special Price) UPC: 845221051901

ALEXANDER ZEMLINSKY (1871-1942)
DER KREIDEKREIS
THE CHALK CIRCLE
Oper in drei Akten · Opera in three acts
Text: Klabund
- Gesamtaufnahme / Complete Recording - 
RENATE BEHLE · ROLAND HERMANN · REINER GOLDBERG
SIEGFRIED LORENZ · CELINA LINDSLEY
RADIO-SYMPHONIE-ORCHESTER BERLIN
STEFAN SOLTESZ
The old Chinese drama of courtroom and customs was usable only as raw material. In its original version it is a fairly dull, wooden affair, handled extremely clumsily from the dramatic
point of view.  It is in effect inventing a Chinese fairy-tale. No strict Chinoiserie: it had
to be as if in a dream of China. Klabund (1925)
Two years after the death of Klabund, Zemlinsky decided to use his Chalk circle as the basis for an opera. He recast the five-act "play after the Chinese" first into a two-act, later into a three-act version, and composed his Chalk circle in 1931/32. This blend of a fairy-tale Utopia, social criticism and inwardness makes itself felt in Zemlinsky's music, which seeks to combine varied stylistic components: Chinese coloration appears in the orchestral scoring, which is enriched with gongs and other exotic-sounding instruments: the melody often avoids semitonal steps and so takes on a pentatonic character. It was the seventh and also his last completed opera, from which the then 61-year-old Zemlinsky hoped for the definitive breakthrough as an operatic dramatist.

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VICTOR E. NESSLER: The Trumpeter Of Säckingen

Opera Complete Recording
Hermann Prey · Franz Hawlata · Regina Klepper · WDR Rundfunkorchester Köln · Helmuth Froschauer

2CD · C5187 PC: 21 (Special Price) UPC: 845221051871

VICTOR E. NESSLER (1841-1890)
DER TROMPETER VON SÄCKINGEN
THE TRUMPETER OF SÄCKINGEN
Opera in a prologue and three acts
Text: Rudolf Bunge, Joseph Victor von Scheffel
UA: Leipzig, 1884
- Gesamtaufnahme / Complete Recording - 
HERMANN PREY · FRANZ HAWLATA · REGINA KLEPPER
WDR RUNDFUNKORCHESTER KÖLN · HELMUTH FROSCHAUER

The first performance of "The Trumpeter of Säckingen" on May 4, 1884 at the Stadttheater in Leipzig was an unprecedented success. For the hundredth Leipzig performance there was a procession with flaming torches in honour of the composer. "The Trumpeter" then began its triumphant conquest of the entire German theatre scene; within a few years the opera had been performed several thousand times and, by the turn of the century, had established its place in the repertoire of all the major opera houses. That great critical authority Eduard Hanslick showed most restraint, making an attempt to analyze the  „popular force, the winning something" in Nessler's "musical mediocrity", and concluding: "The most remarkable thing in this unprecedentedly successful opera is precisely its success." In 1884 – the year following Wagner's death, the year which saw the premieres of Massenet's "Manon" and Puccini's first work, "Le Villi", the year in which Bruckner's seventh symphony and Mahler's "Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen" were composed, – the tastes of the Biedermeier period and quaint romanticism had made their second conquest of the German opera world.

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Franz Schreker: Der Schatzgräber

Opera Complete Recording
Protschka · Schnaut · Stamm · Haage · Philharmonisches Staatsorchester · Gerd Albrecht

2CD · C5175 PC: 21 UPC: 845221051758

LIVE FROM HAMBURG STATE OPERA
FRANZ SCHREKER (1878-1934)
DER SCHATZGRÄBER
Opera with a Prologue, 4 Acts and an Epilogue
- Gesamtaufnahme / Complete Recording - 
JOSEF PROTSCHKA · GABRIELE SCHNAUT · HARALD STAMM
PETER HAAGE
PHILHARMONISCHES STATTSORCHESTER
GERD ALBRECHT

Franz Schreker's operas were among the most played works of the Weimar Republic.  And, in fact, Der Schatzgräber was to become one of the most performed of all contemporay operas during the years of his time: in all 385 performances of the work are between 1920 – the year of the premiere – and 1932 in 50 different cities and productions. If these figures are compared with the 166 performances given to Alban Berg's Wozzeck between 1925 and 1936 in 29 different productions, then the popularity of schreker's opera is to be clearly recognized. Franz Schreker was almost exclusively a composer of operas – an almost singular case in the history of twentieth-century music – the reasons for which are to be found in his technique of musical composition. Schreker accepted and extended the independence of the individual harmonic (chordal) combination as a sonorous value in its own right as was first realized in Wagner‘s Tristan and Isolde. This is programmatically formulated in the Tristan - quotation occurring in the Interlude of Act III of Der Schatzgräber. As is also the case in the dramatic works of Wagner – certain tonal centres are utilized as "sonorous ciphers" for differing levels of dramatic meaning. Thus, in Der Schatzgräber the tone c sharp denotes the realm of illusion – the world of the treasure – while the tone d implies its opposite, the realm of reality or real life. 

The work was however not only Schreker‘s most successful opera but also his last successful opera. Its later sudden loss of popularity coincides with the change in cultural climate of the year of 1924, a change which is documented in the fine arts by the transition from Expressionism to so-called New Objectivitiy (Neue Sachlichkeit) and on the political scene by the initial phase of economic consolidation in the young Republic. 

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Franz Schreker: Der Ferne Klang

Opera Complete Recording
Moser · Schnaut · Von Halem · Nimsgern · RSO Berlin · Gerd Albrecht

2CD · C5178 PC: 21 UPC: 845221051789

 

FRANZ SCHREKER (1878-1934)
DER FERNE KLANG

Opera in 3 Acts · Text: Franz Schreker
- Gesamtaufnahme / Complete Recording - 
THOMAS MOSER · GABRIELE SCHNAUT
VICTOR VON HALEM · SIEGMUND NIMSGERN
RADIO-SYMPHONIE-ORCHESTER BERLIN
GERD ALBRECHT
„Der ferne Klang came into being from a twofold need. As a young man I was in a ferment: youth and longing clamoured for self-expression. Longing – to attain an artistic ideal, fame, joy in life, a woman, love! And I wanted to create, wanted to mould everything into sound pictures […] Then in the nick of time I thought of myself, of the drama of growing up, of the folly of this life with its uncertain issue, of all the tragedies that harshly befall us and now and again – often only fleetingly – involve us in their confusion of scene. And I wrote Der ferne Klang out of myself, out of my own youthful experience. (Franz Schreker)

The sensational reception of Der ferne Klang at its first performance on 18 August 1912 in Frankfurt set on foot Schreker's unusually successful career as an opera composer: his works often achieved a higher number of performances than the music-dramas of Richard Strauss. His appointment as teacher at the Vienna Academy of Music enabled him to concentrate on further operas: Das Spielwerk und die Prinzessin (1909 -1912), Die Gezeichneten (1912 -1915) and Der Schatzgräber (1916 -1919). In 1920 Franz Schreker took over the direction of the Berlin High School for Music. He appointed lecturers there of the rank of Arthur Schnabel and Paul Hindemith. Violent political attacks forced Schreker in 1932 to resign his position as director. His work was suppressed and still remained largely forgotten for decades after the war.
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Franz Schmidt: Notre Dame

Opera Complete Recording
Jones · King · Moll · Laubenthal · RSO Berlin · Christof Perick

2CD · C5181 PC: 21 UPC: 845221051819

 

FRANZ SCHMIDT (1874-1939)
NOTRE DAME
Romantic Opera in 2 Acts
Text: Leopold Wilk, Franz Schmidt
- Gesamtaufnahme / Complete Recording - 
GWYNETH JONES · JAMES KING · KURT MOLL
HORST R. LAUBENTHAL
RADIO-SYMPHONIE-ORCHESTER BERLIN
CHRISTOF PERICK
"Notre Dame" immediately evokes the hunchbacked bellringer, Quasimodo, and the films with C. Laughton and A Quinn; one remembers a gruesome, bloodthirsty tale from the late Middle Ages about deformed people, gypsies, villains, knights and priests. With their percise feel for the psychology of the plot, Franz Schmidt and his librettist Leopold Wilk condensed and modified the story and shifted its emphasis. In his novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Victor Hugo's prime intent was to portray 19th century Paris (with Notre Dame Cathedral as the symbolic main character) and to express his social concern for outcasts and the aesthetic and moral worth of ugliness. The opera is dominated not by Paris, not by Quasiomodo (of the five main characters, he has the smallest part), but by Esmeralda. She is at the centre oft the web of stories which make up the plot. The four principal male characters, Phoebus, Gringoire, the Archdeacon, and Quasimodo, have one thing in common – their love for Esmeralda. Men seem to be irresistibly attracted to her, even "bewitched". The lives of these four men are changed, and later destroyed, by their passion for Esmeralda. Meeting Esmeralda has disastrous consequences for all people involved. In her effect on men and the ensuing events, Esmeralda reminds one of Lulu. She is the innocent sister of child-woman Lulu. – However, Alban Berg was not to write his opera for another thirty years.

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ARIANE ET BARBE-BLEUE

PAUL DUKAS

Opera Complete Recording
Marilyn Schmiege · Roderick Kennedy   Jocelyn Taillon · Mitsuko Shirai   Monique Baudoin · KÖLNER RUNDFUNKCHOR · KÖLNER RUNDFUNK-SINFONIE-ORCHESTER · GARY BERTINI, conductor

2CD-Set · C7112 PC: 22 UPC: 845221071121

OPÉRA EN TROIS ACTES
Oper in 3 Akten · Opera In 3 Acts
Text: Maurice Maeterlinck
Gesamtaufnahme · Complete Recording

Numerous authors have worked with this story in all possible ways – as fairy-tale, narrative, novel, drama, opera. Among the best-known works are the fairy-tale by Ludwig Bechstein, the puppet show by Georg Trakl, the narrative by Max Frisch as well as several pieces of music theatre. These include Jacques Offenbach’s operetta, the opera “Ariane et Barbe-Bleu” by Paul Dukas – as well as the probably most prominent work – the opera “Bluebeard’s Castle” by Béla Bartók.
The opinion on Bluebeard and his last wife – who is the culprit? who is the victim? – has changed over the centuries since Perrault published his fairy-tale in Paris 1697.
However, a very similar analysis of the “battle of the sexes” was already presented by Paul Dukas in 1907, ten years before the premiere of Béla Bartók’s work, in “Ariane et Barbe-Bleue”, his tree-act opera which was first performed at the Opera-comique in Paris. Thereby the composer set a text by the Belgian writer Maurice Maeterlinck to music.
The composer, who was known to be a slow worker, took seven years to set the libretto to music, at the same time altering it to represent his own vision. The result was greeted with great and ungrudging approval, especially by fellow composers and musicians. Vincent d’Indy thought that “Ariane” was the most important piece of music drama since Wagner; Karol Szymanowski, Ferruccio Busoni or Bruno Walter considered “Ariane et Barbe-Bleu” to be the most important French opera besides Debussy’s “Pelleas et Melisande”. Certainly, Dukas’ music for “Bluebeard” has way less exotic flair than Debussy’s “Pelléas”.
 
From the archives of Westdeutsche Rundfunk Köln this Studio Recording, produced in 1986, is now presented for the first time on CD. Former chief conductor Gary Bertini had a very good cast on his hand to do this interesting production.
 

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JOHANN ADOLF HASSE CLEOFIDE

Opera Complete Recording

4CD-Set · C7080 PC: 23 UPC: 845221070803

After many years of absence this famous World Premiere Recording of Hasses 1731 in Dresden performed opera is now back and available for international sale. With a well known cast like EMMA KIRKBY, AGNÈS MELLON, DEREK LEE RAGIN and the conductor WILLIAM CHRISTIE this recording is a „must“ for all Baroque Opera Lovers.

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CARL HEINRICH GRAUN

FRIEDRICH II „DER GROSSE“ MONTEZUMA

Opera Complete Recording

C7085 · 2CD-Set PC: 22 UPC: 845221070858

Together with Johann Adolf Hasse, Carl Heinrich Graun was the chief representative of Italian Opera in Germany in the 18th century. The story of „Montezuma“ accords with the historical fate of the last ruler of the Aztecs. The text is by King Frederick II, Graun had a close friendship to him and became chief of the circle of Berlin composers. „Montezuma“ can be seen as Frederick’s countersignature to his own fate, which made him into a martial war-prince. „Montezuma“ shows him in a field of tension: thus the artistically-minded idealistic prince became the royal practical politician: if justice is to be seen to be done to life’s reality, Montezuma must die. Montezuma is mor than just a Baroque opera. This opera can allude to the history of its own nation. It directs our ear to the destiny of America and the destiny of Prussia, to the German’s view, 200 years ago, of America, and American history as the mirror of its own.

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