Category Archives: DVD review

Il Trittico with Asmik Grigorian

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It’s quite rare nowadays to stage all three Il Trittico operas in one evening and it will probably get rarer as financial pressures force shorter shows.  Nonetheless it was done in Salzburg in 2022 in productions by Christof Loy.  The USP was having Asmik Grigorian sing all three principal soprano roles so, not unreasonably, the usual order was switched up with Gianni Schicchi coming first and Suor Angelica closing things out.  Unsurprisingly, and as intended, the evening increasingly became the Grigorian show as each opera succeeded the previous one.

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Boris in the Garden

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No, not a pandemic piss-up at No.10 but a newly released recording of Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov recorded at Covent Garden in 2016.  Funnily enough I remember Bryn Terfel, who plays the Tsar, alluding to learning the role during his Koerner Hall recital in April of that year.

1.murder

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Oedipus Rex

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A video recording of Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex is a bit of an oddball really.  It’s quite short (55 minutes) and it’s an oratorio rather than an opera.  I guess it could be staged but the version recorded at the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in 2022 isn’t.  It’s a concert setting, in concert dress, with music stands.  There’s not even minimal blocking.

1.setup

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L’amico Fritz

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Mascagni’s L’amico Fritz might be the perfect antidote to an unsuccessful reimagining of Götterdämmerung.  It’s short, uncomplicated, tuneful and nobody dies.  It’s a simple love story in which an Alsatian landowner, who is a confirmed bachelor, makes a bet with the local rabbi that he can’t find him a bride.  Then he falls hopelessly in love with the daughter of his tenant and they all live happily ever after.

1.violets

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To begin at the end

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It’s probably not ideal to begin the review of a new Ring cycle with Götterdämmerung but in the case of the cycle directed by Valentin Schwarz that premiered at Bayreuth in 2022 Götterdämmerung is the first to be released on video.  Fortunately the generous two Blu-ray disk package includes a narrated summary (in English and German) of the whole cycle as seen by the director so it’s possible to put Götterdämmerung in context

1.norns

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Siberia in Bregenz

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Giordano’s Siberia is less well known than some of his other works such as Andrea Chenier and Feodora but it has been getting something of a revival recently with a production at the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in 2021 (released on Blu-ray and DVD by Dynamic) and at the Bregenz Festival in 2022 which has also now been released on Blu-ray and DVD.

1.petersburg

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Acis et Galatée

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Acis et Galatée was Lully’s last completed opera.  Like pretty much all of his work it displays in abundance the qualities that Voltaire claimed made Racine and Corneille superior to Shakespeare.  How you feel about that will probably affect how you feel about Acis et Galatée, which is an elegant and classically correct retelling of Ovid’s tale of a nymph who loves a shepherd and the Cyclops who spoils the fun.  It has an allegorical prologue too, which celebrates the glories of Louis XIV (natch).  It also has lots of dance numbers.

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Il Turco in Pesaro

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Rossini’s Il Turco in Italia isn’t performed (or recorded) all that often despite being well constructed and amusing in a thoroughly silly way.  Perhaps it’s just too difficult/expensive to cast?  It requires a bass or bass-baritone of great flexibility plus a top notch Rossini soprano and two tenors with genuine high notes plus several other soloists.  Who knows?  Anyway it was given at the Rossini Festival at Pesaro in 2016 and recorded for video.

1.gypsies

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3D Turandot

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I’ve been following developments in use of technology in the theatre for a few years now and, to be honest, I’ve seen lots of theory and not a lot of practice though Tapestry’s RUR: A Torrent of Light did use motion capture.  The Turandot recorded at the Liceu in Barcelona in 2019 takes it to a whole new level though.

1.liutimurcalaf

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Beware of llamas

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Offenbach’s La Périchole is one of his less often performed works and I think I can see why.  It really isn’t as good as La Belle Hélène or Orphée aux Enfers but it has its moment and in the completely mad, over the top, utterly French treatment it got at the Opéra Comique in 2022 it’s really quite enjoyable.

1.viceroy

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