Wagner Die Walkure (2008)

In the words of the prestigious German weekly 'Die Zeit,' the stage production of Wagner's 'Rheingold' and 'Walküre' by La Fura dels Baus 'quite possibly shows us the path that musical theater will be taking in the future.' There's no doubt about it: the Catalan city of Valencia is setting new accents in 21st-century opera not only with its spectacular new theater designed by Santiago Calatrava, but also with its visually transfixing production of Wagner's 'Ring' staged by Carlos Padrissa and his theater group La Fura dels Baus. The Barcelona-based Fura blends music, dance, acrobatics and technology into unforgettable stage events of sometimes raw but always captivating power…

Outside Germany, the name Weimar tends to evoke mixed feelings and pictures of German history of the last hundred years. Within Germany, Weimar means a town in the state of Thuringia arguably saturated with the “Deutsche Kultur” of the “Weimarer Klassik”, the legendary Bauhaus, and finally the life and work of Franz Liszt and his son in law Richard Wagner. In Weimar Richard Wagner began composing the first part of his RING-cycle, “Das Rheingold”. In 2008 the Nationaltheater Weimar started a new production of this unique tetralogy. The conductor is Carl St.Clair, a former student of Leonard Bernstein. With Michael Schulz’ fine and highly intelligent staging this new “Ring” production becomes an outstanding document of contemporary opera theatre.

Five CDs of otherworldly beauty and power that revolutionized opera. These 19th-century masterworks include selections and scenes from Der Ring des Nibelungen, Tristan und Isolde, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg and Parsifal. Performances by Birgit Nilsson, Leonie Rysanek, Waltraud Meier, Wolfgang Windgassen, Peter Hofmann, Theo Adam, Matti Salminen with Georg Solti, James Levine and others.

George Szell (1897-1970), one of the greatest conductors of the twentieth century, was born in Budapest, studied piano, conducting, and composing in Vienna and Berlin, and learned his craft as a conductor in the opera houses of Europe. World War II brought him to America, where he conducted at the Metropolitan Opera (1942-1946), and finally led the Cleveland Orchestra from 1946 until his death, "molding the ensemble into one of the world's finest," as the Harvard Biographical Dictionary of Music notes. Szell and the Cleveland became as distinguished a collaboration as Toscanini and the NBC or Karajan and the Berlin Philharmonic. Szell brought the Cleveland Orchestra to such a peak of perfection that many good judges considered the Cleveland under Szell the premier conductor/orchestra team in the world.

Back in the glory days of early digital recordings, Ring cycles were being released fast and furiously. Old Rings were reissued with remastered sound – Solti's on Decca, Böhm's on Philips, and Furtwängler's on EMI – and new Rings were issued with digital sound – Levine's on Deutsche Grammophon, Barenboim's on Teldec, and Haitink's on EMI. Almost 20 years later, EMI re-released Haitink's Ring as a single 14-disc set with full cast lists, notes, and plot summaries, but without librettos.