The Grail – the cup which Jesus Christ used at the Last Supper, and which subsequently collected His blood as He bled on the Cross – is one of the most powerful symbols in the last two thousand years of Western culture.
Parsifal, Wagner’ three-act opera, is the most famous work to celebrate the Search for the Grail. First performed in 1882, and written especially for the composer’s revolutionary theatre in Bayreuth, Parsifal has towered above twentieth-century culture, in so far as it became a principal source of inspiration for Hitler.
Tony Palmer’s film centres round a performance of Parsifal, with the unmistakable Placido Domingo in the title role, and conducted by the distinguished Valery Gergiev. The striking documentary, narrated by Domingo himself, offers a description of the plot and explores theories about Parsifal’s origins and considerable sphere of influence.
The music was recorded at the Mariinsky Theatre in St Petersburg and in the gardens of the Villa Rufolo in Ravello, Italy, which had been a principal source of inspiration for Wagner.
This powerful and controversial film provides an invaluable oppurtanity to explore Wagner and his most intense opera.
There can be no half-measures with Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde: every performance demands supreme commitment, and that’s what it receives in this 1998 production from the Bavarian State Opera. No city has a longer Tristan pedigree than Munich, but Peter Konwitschny’s inventive updated staging is liberated rather than inhibited by that tradition. It’s a bold setting for a truly magnificent cast, and Gramophone described Waltraud Meier’s Isolde as “riveting”. Jon Frederic West, Kurt Moll and Marjana Lipvosek match her for intensity. With Zubin Mehta conducting and the Bavarian State Orchestra on radiant form, this is some of the finest Wagner singing – and playing – of its era.
Dmitri Shostakovich’s Eighth Symphony, which was written in the pivotal months after the Battle of Stalingrad, follows the principle of triumph through adversity – ‘per aspera ad astra’ – not just musically, but also conceptually: Everything that is dark and shameful will perish; everything that is beautiful will triumph.’ This ‘triumph,’ though, is restrained. The Eighth is a large-scale work that ends in something like a pastoral mood, played pianissimo; poses of jubilation were not in Shostakovich’s nature. The concert opens with the delightful, lively Overture to ‘Rienzi.’ And the ‘Dance of the Seven Veils’ from ‘Salome’ shows the fin-de-siècle’s enigmatic penchant for decadence.
“This production quite possibly shows us the path that musical theater will be taking in the future” (Die Zeit). Indeed, the Catalan city of Valencia is setting new accents in 21st-century opera not only with its spectacular, futuristic opera house, the Palau de les Arts “Reina Sofía” designed by Santiago Calatrava, but also with the visually transfixing production of Wagner’s “Ring” staged there by Carlus Padrissa and his theater group La Fura dels Baus. The Barcelona-based Fura became known internationally when it designed and carried out the opening ceremonies of the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, and made its breakthrough in the classical world with its production of Berlioz’s “La damnation de Faust” at the 1999 Salzburg Festival. The Fura’s trademark is its spellbinding fusion of movement, sound, music, dance, acrobatics and technology into unforgettable stage events of sometimes raw but always captivating power. In the world of opera, the ensemble has defined its personal style through its exploitation of large-screen projections, the extraordinary mobility of the performers, and the magical use of human beings to create organic structures that evoke objects such as Valhalla (in this “Ring” production). Indeed, La Fura was predestined for Wagner’s visionary world: his dream of a Gesamtkunstwerk becomes reality as a shape-shifting sequence of tableaux unfolds before our eyes with all the elements that constitute the “lenguaje furero” or “Fura idiom”. Eminent conductor Zubin Mehta leads world-class Wagner singers such as Matti Salminen, Peter Seiffert, Juha Uusitalo, Jennifer Wilson and Lance Ryan. Most prominent among the younger cast members are Jennifer Wilson, a “singer we’ll be hearing more of” (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung) and Juha Uusitalo, whom the F.A.Z. hailed as a new “Number One among the opera gods”. Equally outstanding is the Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana, one of the “youngest and best opera orchestras in Europe” (Opernglas), playing “with rapturous beauty under Zubin Mehta. […] The suppleness, rhythmic presence and singer-friendly dynamic that Mehta achieves with this orchestra are nothing less than miraculous” (F.A.Z.). UNITEL CLASSICA is delighted to continue its proven collaboration with the Palau de les Arts of Valencia, which now features productions of “Fidelio”, “Cyrano” and “Turandot” in addition to the Ring. UNITEL also offers a “Making of” to each of the four Ring operas, as well as documentaries on set designer Roland Olbeter, video designer Franc Aleu and director Carlus Padrissa. With this Ring from Valencia UNITEL continues its cycles of Ring productions begun with the “Centennial Ring” of Patrice Chéreau and Pierre Boulez of the late 70s/early 80s, and followed by the Harry Kupfer/Daniel Barenboim production of the early 90s, both in Bayreuth.
“This production quite possibly shows us the path that musical theater will be taking in the future” (Die Zeit). Indeed, the Catalan city of Valencia is setting new accents in 21st-century opera not only with its spectacular, futuristic opera house, the Palau de les Arts “Reina Sofía” designed by Santiago Calatrava, but also with the visually transfixing production of Wagner’s “Ring” staged there by Carlus Padrissa and his theater group La Fura dels Baus. The Barcelona-based Fura became known internationally when it designed and carried out the opening ceremonies of the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, and made its breakthrough in the classical world with its production of Berlioz’s “La damnation de Faust” at the 1999 Salzburg Festival. The Fura’s trademark is its spellbinding fusion of movement, sound, music, dance, acrobatics and technology into unforgettable stage events of sometimes raw but always captivating power. In the world of opera, the ensemble has defined its personal style through its exploitation of large-screen projections, the extraordinary mobility of the performers, and the magical use of human beings to create organic structures that evoke objects such as Valhalla (in this “Ring” production). Indeed, La Fura was predestined for Wagner’s visionary world: his dream of a Gesamtkunstwerk becomes reality as a shape-shifting sequence of tableaux unfolds before our eyes with all the elements that constitute the “lenguaje furero” or “Fura idiom”. Eminent conductor Zubin Mehta leads world-class Wagner singers such as Matti Salminen, Peter Seiffert, Juha Uusitalo, Jennifer Wilson and Lance Ryan. Most prominent among the younger cast members are Jennifer Wilson, a “singer we’ll be hearing more of” (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung) and Juha Uusitalo, whom the F.A.Z. hailed as a new “Number One among the opera gods”. Equally outstanding is the Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana, one of the “youngest and best opera orchestras in Europe” (Opernglas), playing “with rapturous beauty under Zubin Mehta. […] The suppleness, rhythmic presence and singer-friendly dynamic that Mehta achieves with this orchestra are nothing less than miraculous” (F.A.Z.). UNITEL CLASSICA is delighted to continue its proven collaboration with the Palau de les Arts of Valencia, which now features productions of “Fidelio”, “Cyrano” and “Turandot” in addition to the Ring. UNITEL also offers a “Making of” to each of the four Ring operas, as well as documentaries on set designer Roland Olbeter, video designer Franc Aleu and director Carlus Padrissa. With this Ring from Valencia UNITEL continues its cycles of Ring productions begun with the “Centennial Ring” of Patrice Chéreau and Pierre Boulez of the late 70s/early 80s, and followed by the Harry Kupfer/Daniel Barenboim production of the early 90s, both in Bayreuth.
“This production quite possibly shows us the path that musical theater will be taking in the future” (Die Zeit). Indeed, the Catalan city of Valencia is setting new accents in 21st-century opera not only with its spectacular, futuristic opera house, the Palau de les Arts “Reina Sofía” designed by Santiago Calatrava, but also with the visually transfixing production of Wagner’s “Ring” staged there by Carlus Padrissa and his theater group La Fura dels Baus. The Barcelona-based Fura became known internationally when it designed and carried out the opening ceremonies of the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, and made its breakthrough in the classical world with its production of Berlioz’s “La damnation de Faust” at the 1999 Salzburg Festival. The Fura’s trademark is its spellbinding fusion of movement, sound, music, dance, acrobatics and technology into unforgettable stage events of sometimes raw but always captivating power. In the world of opera, the ensemble has defined its personal style through its exploitation of large-screen projections, the extraordinary mobility of the performers, and the magical use of human beings to create organic structures that evoke objects such as Valhalla (in this “Ring” production). Indeed, La Fura was predestined for Wagner’s visionary world: his dream of a Gesamtkunstwerk becomes reality as a shape-shifting sequence of tableaux unfolds before our eyes with all the elements that constitute the “lenguaje furero” or “Fura idiom”. Eminent conductor Zubin Mehta leads world-class Wagner singers such as Matti Salminen, Peter Seiffert, Juha Uusitalo, Jennifer Wilson and Lance Ryan.
“This production quite possibly shows us the path that musical theater will be taking in the future” (Die Zeit). Indeed, the Catalan city of Valencia is setting new accents in 21st-century opera not only with its spectacular, futuristic opera house, the Palau de les Arts “Reina Sofía” designed by Santiago Calatrava, but also with the visually transfixing production of Wagner’s “Ring” staged there by Carlus Padrissa and his theater group La Fura dels Baus. The Barcelona-based Fura became known internationally when it designed and carried out the opening ceremonies of the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, and made its breakthrough in the classical world with its production of Berlioz’s “La damnation de Faust” at the 1999 Salzburg Festival. The Fura’s trademark is its spellbinding fusion of movement, sound, music, dance, acrobatics and technology into unforgettable stage events of sometimes raw but always captivating power. In the world of opera, the ensemble has defined its personal style through its exploitation of large-screen projections, the extraordinary mobility of the performers, and the magical use of human beings to create organic structures that evoke objects such as Valhalla (in this “Ring” production). Indeed, La Fura was predestined for Wagner’s visionary world: his dream of a Gesamtkunstwerk becomes reality as a shape-shifting sequence of tableaux unfolds before our eyes with all the elements that constitute the “lenguaje furero” or “Fura idiom”. Eminent conductor Zubin Mehta leads world-class Wagner singers such as Matti Salminen, Peter Seiffert, Juha Uusitalo, Jennifer Wilson and Lance Ryan.
“This production quite possibly shows us the path that musical theater will be taking in the future” (Die Zeit). Indeed, the Catalan city of Valencia is setting new accents in 21st-century opera not only with its spectacular, futuristic opera house, the Palau de les Arts “Reina Sofía” designed by Santiago Calatrava, but also with the visually transfixing production of Wagner’s “Ring” staged there by Carlus Padrissa and his theater group La Fura dels Baus. The Barcelona-based Fura became known internationally when it designed and carried out the opening ceremonies of the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, and made its breakthrough in the classical world with its production of Berlioz’s “La damnation de Faust” at the 1999 Salzburg Festival. The Fura’s trademark is its spellbinding fusion of movement, sound, music, dance, acrobatics and technology into unforgettable stage events of sometimes raw but always captivating power. In the world of opera, the ensemble has defined its personal style through its exploitation of large-screen projections, the extraordinary mobility of the performers, and the magical use of human beings to create organic structures that evoke objects such as Valhalla (in this “Ring” production). Indeed, La Fura was predestined for Wagner’s visionary world: his dream of a Gesamtkunstwerk becomes reality as a shape-shifting sequence of tableaux unfolds before our eyes with all the elements that constitute the “lenguaje furero” or “Fura idiom”. Eminent conductor Zubin Mehta leads world-class Wagner singers such as Matti Salminen, Peter Seiffert, Juha Uusitalo, Jennifer Wilson and Lance Ryan.
“This production quite possibly shows us the path that musical theater will be taking in the future” (Die Zeit). Indeed, the Catalan city of Valencia is setting new accents in 21st-century opera not only with its spectacular, futuristic opera house, the Palau de les Arts “Reina Sofía” designed by Santiago Calatrava, but also with the visually transfixing production of Wagner’s “Ring” staged there by Carlus Padrissa and his theater group La Fura dels Baus. The Barcelona-based Fura became known internationally when it designed and carried out the opening ceremonies of the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, and made its breakthrough in the classical world with its production of Berlioz’s “La damnation de Faust” at the 1999 Salzburg Festival. The Fura’s trademark is its spellbinding fusion of movement, sound, music, dance, acrobatics and technology into unforgettable stage events of sometimes raw but always captivating power. In the world of opera, the ensemble has defined its personal style through its exploitation of large-screen projections, the extraordinary mobility of the performers, and the magical use of human beings to create organic structures that evoke objects such as Valhalla (in this “Ring” production). Indeed, La Fura was predestined for Wagner’s visionary world: his dream of a Gesamtkunstwerk becomes reality as a shape-shifting sequence of tableaux unfolds before our eyes with all the elements that constitute the “lenguaje furero” or “Fura idiom”. Eminent conductor Zubin Mehta leads world-class Wagner singers such as Matti Salminen, Peter Seiffert, Juha Uusitalo, Jennifer Wilson and Lance Ryan.
Join us for a concert with two universally admired guest artists – Brazilian pianist Nelson Freire, described by The Guardian as ‘a master of (his) craft’, and Australian heldentenor and Grammy Award nominee, Stuart Skelton. The celebratory program includes: Beethoven’s majestic “Emperor” Piano Concerto; Carl Vine’s Symphony No. 1 “Microsymphony” (a work encompassing the dramatic features of a symphony compressed into just 12 minutes); and highlights from Fidelio, Die Walküre, Otello and Götterdämmerung sung by Stuart Skelton, who was awarded the International Opera Awards Male Singer of the Year.
