It is the concertante performance of Elektra in which the Staatskapelle Dresden under the baton of its principal conductor Christian Thielemann does justice once again to its reputation as Richard Strauss’s favourite orchestra and leaves us in no doubt: this is where the Strauss sound is at home! Evelyn Herlitzius leads a brilliant cast including Waltraud Meier, René Pape and Anne Schwanewilms.
Elektra
Swedish soprano Iréne Theorin gives an impressive role debut as Elektra, just as Wagner singer Waltraud Meier as Klytämnestra. They are complemented by Eva-Maria Westbroek’s Chrysothemis and René Pape’s Orest. In his interpretation of Strauss’ one-act masterpiece, conductor Daniele Gatti explores the radical side of the Expressionist score, while not neglecting the late 19th-century lyricism either. His musical vision harmonizes perfectly with the forbidding atmosphere conveyed by director Nikolaus Lehnhoff and his set designer.
Thielemann conducts Strauss
Following the complete recordings of the symphonies of Brahms and Schumann, the Staatskapelle Dresden and Christian Thielemann are turning their attention to the work of Richard Strauss. While the Sächsische Zeitung wrote about Morley that she “indulged the songs with great delight and the finest feeling”, Der Standard wrote about Thielemann: “Great clarity, great class. The inner charge of the instrumental, this intensity palpable in every note, with which the Staatskapelle Dresden immediately stormed into Strauss’s Heldenleben, revealed Thielemann’s well-known strengths: he succeeds in uniting impulsivity and balance in the sound as well as expressive melodic surging and structural clarity.” PROGRAM: Strauss “An die Nacht“, “Ich wollt ein Sträußlein binden“, “Säusle, liebe Myrthe!“, “Als mir dein Lied erklang“, “Amor“ from Op. 68 “Muttertändelei“, “Ein Heldenleben“; Hennig: “Nacht“
Capriccio
Capriccio by Richard Strauss is an opera about opera as an art form: it describes the creation of a musical drama with wise cheerfulness and full knowledge of this genre of theatre. The “conversation piece with music” is Strauss’s last complete stage work, his farewell as an opera composer, the cultivated conclusion of a well-considered life’s work. The composer worked closely with the Semperoper Dresden for six decades, and nine of his operas were premiered on the Elbe. To this day, the house and its orchestra, the Staatskapelle Dresden, celebrated worldwide as the “Strauss Orchestra”, cultivate his work with a unique intensity and quality. The celebrated Strauss interpreter and principal conductor of the Staatskapelle Dresden, Christian Thielemann, leads a top-class ensemble with star soprano Camilla Nylund as the Countess, Georg Zeppenfeld as La Roche, Daniel Behle as Flamand, Nikolay Borchev as Olivier, Christa Mayer as Clairon and Christoph Pohl as the Count. In Jens-Daniel Herzog’s new production, the plot unfolds in full poetic power and impressive imagery.
Der Rosenkavalier
Multimedia artist André Heller makes his highly anticipated debut as stage director at the Berlin State Opera with Richard Strauss’ tragicomic Rosenkavalier and the critics are full of praise: “With his staging of Rosenkavalier André Heller sets a monument to flawlessness” (Die Zeit). Master conductor Zubin Mehta leads the fantastic orchestra of the Staatskapelle Berlin and a “cast of singers, above all with Camilla Nylund and Günther Groissböck, which is unsurpassable – a Rosenkavalier with a dream cast” (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung). “One has hardly ever seen a more splendid, elegant and opulent Rosenkavalier” (Süddeutsche Zeitung)
Der Rosenkavalier
Herbert von Karajan began conducting operas at the age of 21, and continued doing so throughout the rest of his long and prestigious career. A great admirer of Richard Strauss’s music, Karajan’s interpretation of Rosenkavalier demonstrates reveals his great familiarity with the work as well as hinting at the pleasure he took in conducting the work. His creative team, including Anna Tomowa-Sintow, Kurt Moll, Agnes Baltsa, Gottfried Hornik, Janet Perry, and Heinz Zednik, remains to this day one of the most spectacular solo distributions the work has ever enjoyed. Legendary for his rigorous approach to rehearsing and performing, the maestro took on the roles of artistic director, music director, and even became involved in certain aspects of filming.
Die Frau ohne Schatten
Under Christian Thielemann’s baton, the new production of Richard Strauss’ Frau ohne Schatten at the Vienna State Opera becomes a much acclaimed musical highlight “with a top-class protagonist quintet” (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung) and a sensationally playing Orchester der Wiener Staatsoper. French director Vincent Huguet gives his debut in Vienna and tells the story as a complex fairy tale, rich in images. Christian Thielemann “presents the most powerful and poetic Strauss conducting in decades” hails the Neue Zürcher Zeitung.
Salome
In Petr Weigl’s production of Richard Strauss’s powerful and erotic one-act opera, Catherine Malfitano produces a spellbinding performance as Salome, a role which demands the utmost physical and emotional commitment throughout the complex vocal passages and choreographed scenes. During a banquet, Jochanaan (John the Baptist) proclaims, from his prison cell, the coming of the Messiah. He is brought for Salome to see and she, fascinated by him, makes an advance which he shuns, urging her not to follow the ways of her mother, Herodias. When Jochanaan is taken back to his cell, Herod asks Salome to dance, and she agrees on condition that she will be granted a wish. After her Dance of the Seven Veils, she demands the head of Jochanaan, which Herod is forced to have brought to her. She fondles and kisses it until the revolted Herod orders his soldiers to crush her with their shields.
Elektra
The NorrlandsOperan’s Symphony Orchestra is lead by conductor and grammy award nominee Rumon Gamba, gives the music its powerful and expressive note. Strauss’ courage inspired Carlus Padrissa of La Fura Dels Baus in his staging of Elektra’s wrath and vindictiveness and for giving the atmosphere for that, West Bothnian twilight is the perfect background for the burning forest and the river of blood. Elektra is sung by Ingela Brimberg who’s “powerful voice filled soul, earth and sky” (Kulturkorren).
Salome
Her ‘voice and acting are utterly overwhelming’ wrote the FAZ in its glowing review of Angela Denoke’s performance in Baden-Baden as the enigmatic young woman with a morbid interest in a captured prophet. The stellar cast also includes Alan Held as the doomed prophet; Kim Begley as the lustful Herodes; and Doris Soffel as the imperious Herodias. In a monumental set dominated by the panther-like Salome, director Nikolaus Lehnhoff depicts the inner tragedy of this young woman, who is both strong and weak, victim and perpetrator.