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.
Joyce DiDonato sings In War and Peace: Harmony through Music
„In the midst of chaos, how do you find peace?“, is one of the pressing topical questions that Joyce DiDonato asks in her powerful work In War & Piece – Harmony through Music. The Grammy Award winning mezzo-soprano fashions an intense semi-theatricalized concert production, including works by George Frideric Handel and Henry Purcell. Organizing a set of Baroque arias along thematic lines, DiDonato contemplates the interwoven worlds of external conflict and serenity, internal war and peace, and the challenges which they provide for every citizen of the world. Together with the period-instrument ensemble Il Pomo d’Oro under Maxim Emelyanychev, the singer creates a dramatic atmosphere on the stage of the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona. In the music of Handel, DiDonato achieves a “purity that enhances the composer’s signature formula” (Washington Post).
The Red Square Concert
Appearing for the first time together on Red Square, two of the biggest names in opera to day, Anna Netrebko and Dmitri Hvorostovsky , performing for one night only in front of audience of 7,500 people. The exciting program includes arias from some of the most recognised operas including Tosca, Eugene Onegin, and Il trovatore. The singers are accompanied by conductor Constantine Orbelian, Russia’s State Academic Symphony Orchestra “Evgeny Svetlanov” and a large chorus. Director Frank Hof, whose work includes the memorable Anna Netrebko, Plácido Domingo, and Rolando Villazón performance at Berlin’s Waldbühne, shoot the Red Square performance with 18 cameras in magnificent HD to best capture the stunning backdrop of Red Square, and create an exclusive theatrical mix in 5.1 digital surround sound.
Orfeo ed Euridice
To celebrate the 25th anniversary of the ambitious “Festival Internacional de Música Castell de Peralada”, the Catalan theater collective La Fura dels Baus and its director Carlus Padrissa have staged Gluck’s “Orfeo ed Euridice” with three splendid soloists in a production that confirms the Fura’s creativity. The most striking aspect of the production is the participation of the orchestral ensemble in the action. Padrissa also makes abundant stage use of the chorus, who depict souls or demons. With its stunning effects, expert lighting and video projections, the production grabs the viewer from the very start.
Le Grand Macabre
Ligeti’s absurd-tragicomical masterpiece of the highest order ‘Le Grand Macabre’ blends popular theatre, comic, pop art, cabaret, apocalypse and caricature with a fascinating imaginativeness. The production by ‘La Fura dels Baus’ under the direction of Àlex Ollé already thrilled press and public alike in Brussels, London and Rome, and is considered as ‘one of the best staging’s’ (La Vanguardia) of the world-famous Catalan theatre group.
Puccini, La Bohème
For the first time in his career, Riccardo Chailly conducts an opera in Spain: “La Bohème” at the magnificent Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía in Valencia. The striking result is a lively, colorful symphonic reading of the opera that turns the orchestra into one of the stars of the performance, on a par with the vocal soloists. Stage director Davide Livermore interprets the work with the help of large video projections of Impressionist paintings that harmonize with the period in which the action takes place. This co-production with the Philadelphia Opera features a cast of up-and-coming young singers (cf. Documentary “Riccardo Chailly – A Portrait” Prog. No. 9858).
Dudamel conducts Mahler No. 2
Charismatic Venezuelan conductor Gustavo Dudamel returns to Palau de la Música Catalana, world heritage site and one of the most beautiful concert halls in the world, conducting Mahler’s existential Second Symphony with the outstanding Münchner Philharmoniker. Mahler was keen to emphasize life and death in all its terrible and stunning splendour in this overwhelming opus, also referred to as “Resurrection Symphony”: “In my two symphonies there is nothing except the complete substance of my whole life” he remarked on his all-embracing oeuvre American mezzo-soprano Tamara Mumford and Israeli soprano Chen Reiss as well as the seemingly weightless choirs of Orfeó Català and
Cor de Cambra del Palau de la Música Catalana perform “a mark-shattering finale with goosebumps” (Münchner Merkur). “The dynamic range is enormous. But most fascinating are the moments of absolute silence, in which you can feel how the dramaturgy of the evening comes together: An audience holds its breath” (Süddeutsche Zeitung).
The Beethoven Marathon
It was the sensation in the run-up to the Beethoven Year 2020: The complete Beethoven Symphony Cycle with the Danish Chamber Orchestra and its chief conductor Ádám Fischer. Renowned awards followed quickly: The CD set was named International Classical Music Award’s Recording of the Year 2020 and won the Opus Klassik as the best Symphonic recording / music 19th century. With their witty and volatile performances, Fischer and the DCO amaze the audience and set new standards for the critics – and are now available, recorded in Jean Nouvel’s stunning Koncerthuset in Copenhagen.
Cyrano de Bergerac
A coproduction of the New York, London and Valencia houses, Franco Alfano’s little-known 1936 opera ‘Cyrano de Bergerac’ has been reawakened to life by the great Spanish tenor Plácido Domingo. Although Alfano (1875-1954) enjoyed a long and prolific career as an opera composer, he is known today above all for having completed Puccini’s ‘Turandot’. His earlier works not surprisingly reflect Puccini’s verismo style, but his later works – including ‘Cyrano de Bergerac’ – are clearly inspired by Debussy, Ravel and Strauss. Opulent scoring and colorful orchestral effects elegantly underscore the tragic story based on Rostand’s famous drama of 1897, which achieved international celebrity in the Oscar-nominated 1990 film adaptation with Gérard Depardieu.
Also available: Making of Alfano’s ‘Cyrano de Bergerac’ (18’ – A93500217)
Der Ring des Nibelungen – Die Walküre
“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.