Opera on DVD

Started by uffeviking, April 08, 2007, 12:54:48 AM

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uffeviking

I realise Tristan and Isolde are not passionate, hotblooded figures in a dramatic Verdi opera, but just a tad more riled up testosterone and hormone wouldn't hurt!  ;)

johnshade

#281
Quote from: marvinbrown on October 04, 2007, 05:52:18 AM
  Just curious if anybody has seen this DVD, I am thinking of buying it and am looking for feedback. So far on amazon.co.uk this has received one great review and one horrible review....does the truth lie in the middle somewhere? 

...
I love this video of perhaps my favorite opera. I have recordings and, when available videos, of all operas of R Strauss. I have had the CD of Solti's studio version for several years and became very familiar with this wonderful music. The Solti video is a live performanace from Salzburg. I am very attached to this performance. Fr-oh-sch is a truly great opera.
The sun's a thief, and with her great attraction robs the vast sea, the moon's an arrant thief, and her pale fire she snatches from the sun  (Shakespeare)

bhodges

Quote from: johnshade on October 16, 2007, 10:59:49 AM
...
I love this video of perhaps my favorite opera. I have recordings and, when available videos, of all operas of R Strauss. I have had the CD of Solti's studio version for several years and became very familiar with this wonderful music. The Solti video is a live performanace from Salzburg. I am very attached to this performance. Fr-oh-sch is a truly great opera.


I really need to see this, since I love the opera, too.  I saw the recent Met production several times, which was marvelous. 

Interestingly, on one visit I brought two friends--a married couple--who are opera "newbies" and had never seen any R. Strauss at all.  Conventional wisdom might say that Die Frau is too long, too strange (plot-wise), or whatever for those starting out with Strauss, or with opera in general. 

Well, my friends absolutely loved it!

--Bruce

Lethevich

#283
It's sometimes difficult to find enough time to watch a long opera, and I hate splitting them over two nights, so I was wondering whether anyone could recommend any particularly short ones (say, not much over 100 mins in length) that are available on DVD?

At the moment I have the obvious candidates covered: Salome, Ill Tritico, Cav/Pag, as well as Penderecki's Die Teufel von Loudon and Janacek's Makropulos Case, and can't think of many others. Purcell and Stravinsky probably have something appropriate, but I don't own any DVD by either of them.
Peanut butter, flour and sugar do not make cookies. They make FIRE.

Anne

Quote from: Lethe on October 17, 2007, 02:33:13 AM
It's sometimes difficult to find enough time to watch a long opera, and I hate splitting them over two nights, so I was wondering whether anyone could recommend any particularly short ones (say, not much over 100 mins in length) that are available on DVD?

At the moment I have the obvious candidates covered: Salome, Ill Tritico, Cav/Pag, as well as Penderecki's Die Teufel von Loudon and Janacek's Makropulos Case, and can't think of many others. Purcell and Stravinsky probably have something appropriate, but I don't own any DVD by either of them.

I can't remember the title at the moment but there is a short opera with a woman talking on the telephone.  Is it La Voix Humaine?  Composer Poulenc?

bhodges

Quote from: Anne on October 17, 2007, 07:12:05 AM
I can't remember the title at the moment but there is a short opera with a woman talking on the telephone.  Is it La Voix Humaine?  Composer Poulenc?

That's right.  I'm not sure if there's a DVD of it available, but there are a number of CD versions. 

--Bruce

Anne

Quote from: bhodges on October 17, 2007, 07:23:52 AM
That's right.  I'm not sure if there's a DVD of it available, but there are a number of CD versions. 

--Bruce

Thanks.  There is a DVD available for La Voix Humaine.  I rented it from Netflix.

Drasko

Yes, there is a DVD of La Voix Humaine



Poulenc opera that would probably be lots of fun on DVD (and it's around 70 mins) would be Les Mamelles de Tiresias but don't think there is one.

Also, Monteverdi's L'Orfeo fits length requirement (100-110 minutes). 

head-case

Quote from: uffeviking on October 11, 2007, 09:11:07 AM
Here is the cover of the LVD from the 1983 performance. It is adequate in the traditional sense for directing and singing and conducting. Kollo and Meier are not the most ardent lovers, all is rather boring.

At least we finally have a Tristan in which neither Tristan nor Isolde are morbidly obese.   :-\

yashin

Just bought a bunch of DVDs including:

the new Giulio Cesare with Andreas Scholl.  It is excellent.  I have been enjoying my first experience of a male Cesare. Filmed in Copenhagen it is a modern and very good production.

The L'orfeo with Simon Keenlyside is also very good.


marvinbrown



Just watched the first half of the Solti Die Frau ohne Schatten today.... while the sets are not very lavish the performance of this opera is remarkably enjoyable, will complete it tomorrow.

  I am also looking for a DVD recording of Der Rosenkavalier to complement my Karajan EMI Great Recordings of the Century CD recording and ran into a stumbling block.  Which of these is better (both got GREAT reviews) so I am torn:

  This:

  ?

  or this:

  ?

  Obviously I want a Kleiber conducted performance and from the praise both got I couldn't tell which is best  ??? ??  The second one is older but is that necessarily a negative??

  marvin

Lethevich

1. Thanks everyone for the Poulenc recommendations.

2. Wow, Marvin. I had the EXACT same problem almost a year ago. I eventually went for the second (earlier) one after reading MANY reviews, and some comparative ones, to try to seperate them. I forget exactly what made me choose it though - I think there was a mention, among other small things, of the later one having some curtain calls cut, but one left in, making the symmetry/consistency slightly confusing.

By the way, thanks for the Turandot recommendation - I watched it yesterday and it was a pretty huge spectacle. Completely overblown too, but that is fun, and suits the piece :D
Peanut butter, flour and sugar do not make cookies. They make FIRE.

head-case

Quote from: Lethe on October 21, 2007, 02:57:38 AM
I think there was a mention, among other small things, of the later one having some curtain calls cut, but one left in, making the symmetry/consistency slightly confusing.
I is hard for me to imagine that someone would choose one version over another because it had better curtain calls.

Lethevich

Quote from: head-case on October 21, 2007, 10:09:22 AM
I is hard for me to imagine that someone would choose one version over another because it had better curtain calls.

AMONGST OTHER THINGS... that was the nearest thing I could come to remembering an exact detail. I think I got that wrong too, it was more like the end of one act had applause, but it was cut out at the end of the other ones - which is a kind of strange thing. But it was a combination of several factors in reviews made the earlier performance seem a better prospect when I did pick it, it wasn't just that.
Peanut butter, flour and sugar do not make cookies. They make FIRE.

marvinbrown

Quote from: Lethe on October 21, 2007, 10:20:11 AM
AMONGST OTHER THINGS... that was the nearest thing I could come to remembering an exact detail. I think I got that wrong too, it was more like the end of one act had applause, but it was cut out at the end of the other ones - which is a kind of strange thing. But it was a combination of several factors in reviews made the earlier performance seem a better prospect when I did pick it, it wasn't just that.

  I just finished watching Solti's Die Frau Ohnne Schatten DVD, the live performance from the 1992 Slazburg Summer Festival.  I must admit that I loved the 3rd ACT, I can not imagine why some productions make cuts  >:( in the Nurse's part in ACT3 those scenes are GREAT and an essential integral part of the opera's story and the music is wonderfull-  Thankfully Solti had enough sense to keep them in.  I think this is one of the best purchase decisions I have made in a very long time (thanks Lethe, johnshade) for recommending it. 

  I am still torn between which Kleiber Der Rosenkavalier to get and Lethe recommending the earlier recording has got me leaning towards getting that recording......

  marvin

Lethevich

I checked Amazon US (it has a lot of reviews for both) again, and these may be useful in comparing the two (they make the earlier performance seem more attractive to me, so these Amazon comments were probably how I chose between the two):

"Munich [the earlier] gives us faster, more incisive tempos (indeed, the performance is 7 minutes shorter)."

"Get both. If there are other priorities and one has to choose, I'd go for Munich. The strengths are palpable from the pit to the kinder in the final act. Whatever you do, one can't go wrong with either of Kleiber's performances."

"As artists, von Otter and Fassbaender are more evenly matched than the others mentioned, though their approaches to Octavian are different: both are aristocratic, wilfull, elegant, clearly in love with love, von Otter is funnier, Fassbaender is lustier (the bigger, darker, more colorful voice helps)."

"This Munich version has of course much to commend: first of all, in this 1979 Munich evening Kleiber was a dozen years younger and it shows, his conducting mostly livelier and with more abandon than in the later viennese evening ... which in turn is enriched by more insights into the score and treatment of its sentimental facets."

"I was never able to take a liking to Jungwirth's handling of the Ochs character. He became quite famous for his portrayal and is featured in the famous Solti-conducted set, studio-recorded by Decca almost 4 decades ago, but I always found his voice too light for the role, unsteady to an unbearable extent and he shows here a severe deficiency in his low notes (they're inaudible!), something frankly unforgivable and for which certainly you cannot fault Moll in the Viennese remake, who is in far better shape and stage-wise, a superior impersonator of the character. "

"Sets and decors are a definite plus for the Munich staging, especially in the second act, as Faninal's mirrored, magnificent palais Schenk devised inexplicably turned for Vienna into an indifferent hall. The sound produced by both the Bavarian State Orchestra and the Vienna Philharmonic is outstanding, the latter's benefitting no doubt from progress in sound recording techniques."

Sadly, the better reviews which compare them tend to conclude that owning both is mandatory :D

Perhaps you should pick on the basis of which singers you prefer? To me, Fassbaender and Popp are hard to beat, and Fassbaender is especially good at playing boy roles IMO (she also looked great in the Kleiber Fledermaus, also on DG).
Peanut butter, flour and sugar do not make cookies. They make FIRE.

marvinbrown

Quote from: Lethe on October 21, 2007, 01:23:52 PM


"I was never able to take a liking to Jungwirth's handling of the Ochs character. He became quite famous for his portrayal and is featured in the famous Solti-conducted set, studio-recorded by Decca almost 4 decades ago, but I always found his voice too light for the role, unsteady to an unbearable extent and he shows here a severe deficiency in his low notes (they're inaudible!), something frankly unforgivable and for which certainly you cannot fault Moll in the Viennese remake, who is in far better shape and stage-wise, a superior impersonator of the character. "

Perhaps you should pick on the basis of which singers you prefer? To me, Fassbaender and Popp are hard to beat, and Fassbaender is especially good at playing boy roles IMO (she also looked great in the Kleiber Fledermaus, also on DG).

  Lethe just a quick question if I may, is there any truth to the criticism that Jungwirth's low notes (the Munich recording) are inaudible??

 
  marvin

Lethevich

Quote from: marvinbrown on October 21, 2007, 01:35:53 PM
Lethe just a quick question if I may, is there any truth to the criticism that Jungwirth's low notes (the Munich recording) are inaudible??

I can't recall a problem with his singing, although I haven't watched it since I bought it (more or less on release), and at the time I may not have been in a very critical frame of mind, as I was pretty blown away by the opulent staging, and was wallowing in the visuals :D If it is an issue, it must be a minor one.
Peanut butter, flour and sugar do not make cookies. They make FIRE.

knight66

I am still torn between which Kleiber Der Rosenkavalier to get and Lethe recommending the earlier recording has got me leaning towards getting that recording......

Marvin, I also was in a dilemma here, mainly because I do not like either of Jones or Lott. Nigel, who used to post here, persuaded me that on this occasion Jones keeps the incipient wobble in her voice under control. He did not lie, I got the set and have so enjoyed it. Fassbaender could not be bettered, the acting is terrific and while I am suer the later version is as good, I am completely satisfied with the older performance. It has such warmth, yet avoids being cloying.

Mike
DavidW: Yeah Mike doesn't get angry, he gets even.
I wasted time: and time wasted me.

Lethevich

#299
Quote from: knight on October 24, 2007, 10:05:53 PM
I am still torn between which Kleiber Der Rosenkavalier to get and Lethe recommending the earlier recording has got me leaning towards getting that recording......

It's important to point out that I went for the first based soley on reading reviews on sites like Amazon, and so have no insight that anybody else could have after a few mouseclicks - I could be missing out on something great in the 2nd recording - but unlike many of the reviews say (in recommending buying BOTH), I am happy enough with just one, and it's a fun production. :)

Maybe flip a coin :D You don't want to be without a Kleiber DVD for too long, you could be hit by a bus next week :P
Peanut butter, flour and sugar do not make cookies. They make FIRE.