Arthaus Musik

Desdemona in Verdi's Otello was a career role for soprano Renata Tebaldi, from her first operatic performance outside of Italy to her final appearance on the opera stage. Between those landmarks she performed the role nearly 100 times all over the world and made studio audio recordings that became reference recordings for the role. This 1962 production with the Deutsche Oper Berlin and Giuseppe Patane was planned as a media event from the outset and blessedly captures a consummate artist in a signature role at the peak of her gifts.

La Scala went all out for its 1986 production of this grandest of grand operas, with a strong cast and, most important for a video recording, a larger-than-life staging. The Triumph Scene in Act II is by no means Aida's only attraction, but it is the part that makes the strongest and most lasting impression and it is the visual and musical climax of this production. Stage director Luca Ronconi brings on a procession to dwarf all processions: looted treasures, heroic statuary, miserable captives struggling under the lash of whip-bearing slave drivers. On par with these visuals is Lorin Maazel's first-class performance of the popular Grand March with the outstanding La Scala chorus and orchestra. In Act III, the contrasting tranquility of the Nile Scene also gets a visual treatment to match the music's qualities.

Götterdämmerung, the final instalment of Wagner’s Ring of the Nibelung, is a story of human passions. Two essentially benevolent creatures, involved with and possibly doomed by their traffic with the gods, find treachery and evil in the world of the humans, and are ruined by the dark side of humanity. Iréne Theorin, acclaimed worldwide for her portrayal of Wagner’s heroines, stars as Brünnhilde opposite Lance Ryan, who continues his radiant portrayal of the tragic hero Siegfried. The strong cast also includes Mikhail Petrenko as the dark antagonist Hagen and Johannes Martin Kränzle, who once again shines as his father Alberich. Waltraud Meier has a memorable appearance as Brünnhilde’s sister Waltraute. With this 2013 recording of Götterdämmerung, the musically and visually compelling Scala Ring Cycle by Daniel Barenboim and Guy Cassiers was completed and proved to be one of the highlights of the Richard Wagner bicentenary.

The Rhine maidens lure and mock the dwarf Alberich. He curses love and steals the Rhinegold.

Alexandre Tarta's production of Berlioz's opera, recorded live at the Salzburg Festival in 2000. Sylvain Cambreling conducts, with performances by Jon Villars, Russell Braun and Tigran Martirossian.

A documentary about the life and career of the conductor Carlos Kleiber. Featuring interviews with Placido Domingo, Brigitte Fassbaender, Manfred Honeck, Michael Gielen, and others. On the 11th July 2004 Carlos Kleiber got into his car and drove from Munich, via the Alps, to his holiday home in the remote Slovenian village of Konjsica. There he wrote a final letter to a friend in which he bid farewell to the world. A short time later the conductor, increasingly plagued by illness and suffering, was found dead.

Nancy Shade is persuasive as the awkward adolescent Marie, whose naiveté leads relentlessly to her downfall. Michael Ebbecke is sympathetic as Stolzius, her jilted lover and avenger, while William Cochran is properly brutish as Desportes, the officer who initiates her spiral of decline. Bernhard Kontarsky gets a dedicated response from his Stuttgart Opera forces, who perform with belief in this often excessive but always engrossing work. Recorded at the Staatsoper Stuttgart, 1989.

Dame Janet Baker, in one of her greatest roles, leads a cast of some of Britain’s finest interpeters of baroque opera and their performance under the baton of Sir Charles Mackerras is one of the highest musical excellence. John Copley’s acclaimed English National Opera production was restaged in studio, skilfully using all the technical advantages offered, to create this top quality recording. The opera was first performed in 1724 at the Haymarket Theatre in London using castrati singers in the heroes’ roles. This production follows modern practice in using women in these parts. Dame Janet’s virtuoso role as Julius Caesar has been heralded as a masterful recreation of the music which Handel wrote for the finest singers of his time.

NORMA tells the tragic story of a supposedly chaste druidic priestess, who is driven to murderous jealousy by her lover's inconstancy. But she forgoes vengeance, protects innocence, and sees to it that the guilty atone for their crimes. Fiorenza Cedolins, Sonia Ganassi, Vincenzo La Scola, and Andrea Papi star in this 2007 Gran Theatre Del Liceu/Grand Theatre de Geneve co-production of the Bellini opera.

Walter Felsenstein's staging of Jacques Offenbach's The Tales of Hoffmann at the Komische Opera Berlin.

For those with any interest in Vivaldi's operas Orlando Furioso is essential viewing, being a 1989 San Francisco Opera revival by Pier Luigi Pizzi of his own 1979 production which was largely responsible for beginning modern interest in Vivaldi's stage work. The composer first premiered Orlando finto pazzo in 1714, but the Orlando Furioso finalised in 1727 was so heavily reworked as to be virtually an entirely new opera, and so successful Handel set the same epic poem by Aristo under the title Alcina in 1735.

In the present stylised production by Lorenzo Mariani the 'violet-perfumed murderess' is taken by mezzo-soprano Marianne Cornetti, one of the most in-demand representatives of her vocal category. Opposite her, in the role of Adriana, is a soprano who as a Verdi and verismo specialist also appears regularly at all the major international opera houses, Micaela Carosi. The 'cock-of-the-walk' role is sung by the world-class tenor Marcelo Álvarez. His timbre, velvety smooth yet robustly virile, is ideally suited to a vocal characterisation of the idolised Maurizio. Conductor Renato Palumbo is very much at home with Cilea's operatic masterpiece, since the Italian Romantic and verismo periods are at the core of his extensive repertoire.

Axel Kohler, the internationally renowned countertenor has brought Admeto into the modern era in timeless style by the skillful application of imaginative theatrical digressions. Köhler's production at the Halle Opernhaus revisits a work that encompasses comedy, tragedy and almost absurd grotesqueness, couching it in the convincing metaphor of a modern hospital.

Ritter Blaubart is a DEFA studio recording, commissioned by East German television, of Walter Felsenstein's production of Jacques Offenbach's operetta Bluebeard in three acts at the Komische Oper Berlin. The operetta was recorded in color at the DEFA Studios for Feature Films in Potsdam-Babelsberg. The film was first shown in theaters on April 27, 1973, in a gala preview at the Kino International in Berlin.

Paris Opera Ballet Master and choreographer Patrice Bart plunges into the Opera's past and brings Degas' famous statuette to life. From the rehearsal rooms to the Cabaret du Chat Noir, the ballet conjures up a colourful era and the lively backstage world of a theatre.

The musical performance of Gustav Mahler's Second Symphony is interactively connected with the visual interpretation of the piece. The arrangement of the visualization concentrates on what the music expresses and the emotions it brings forth. Thus, Gustav Mahler's cultural-historical setting and the sources of his own inspiration do not come into play in this visualization. This work is a matter of blending together two interpretations: one expressed musically and the other visually.

The film accompanies the internationally renowned countertenor Andreas Scholl to recitals in Dresden, Schwetzingen and his home town, Kiedrich. In interviews Andreas Scholl sheds light on his personal and artistic development. In bonus parts of the DVD Andreas Scholl sings John Dowland's "Lute Songs" and Dietrich Buxtehude's "Jubilate Domino." Directly after the recital, Scholl and his co-performers discuss the works and their interpretation of them. "What is the point of a recital, an opera, what is the purpose of music, presented to an audience by performers, communicators? Of course, the purpose of music and art in general, is to enlighten and inspire the human spirit. It is about stimulating – and shaping – both our hearts and our minds." These and other questions Andreas Scholl wants to find out in this portrait.