Wagner: Tristan und Isolde

For a supposedly 'difficult' opera, there's a fair choice of DVD Tristans… But this 1983 Bayreuth version, reappearing at last here on DVD, remains the finest. Jean-Pierre Ponnelle's staging... — BBC Music Magazine, December 2007, More…

Release Date: 16th Jul 2007
Catalogue No: 0734321
Label: DG
Series: Unitel

BBC Music Magazine

December 2007

DVD Choice
Gramophone Magazine

November 2007

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Wagner: Tristan und Isolde

René Kollo, Johanna Meier, Matti Salminen, Hermann Becht & Hanna Schwarz
Bayreuth Festival Orchestra
Daniel Barenboim, Jean-Pierre Ponnelle (director)

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Subtitles: German, English, French, Spanish and Chinese

Staged and Directed by: Jean-Pierre Ponnelle

Reviews

December 2007

For a supposedly 'difficult' opera, there's a fair choice of DVD Tristans… But this 1983 Bayreuth version, reappearing at last here on DVD, remains the finest. Jean-Pierre Ponnelle's staging steers impressively between the Romantically naturalistic and the poetic: a gnarled tree trunk doubles as ship and castle, and Isolde is symbolically isolated by her encircling robes. René Kollo and Johanna Meier don't have huge voices, but sing and act with unusual expression, and even look good. Matti Salminen as King Mark and Hanna Schwarz as Brangäne are heartbreakingly intense...

November 2007

This Bayreuth Tristan (first seen in 1981) is an almost perfect marriage of fairy-tale beauty (legendary Arthurian settings, "period" costumes) and interventionist Regie. Meier, of all princess, spell-casting witch and consumed lover, is a risk-taking Isolde, slamming the sword with the missing fragment into the wide swaying ship deck. Kollo's hero has Hotter-like detail, intensity and pain. ...the younger Daniel Barenboim secures thrilling drama-enhancing playing from the Festival Orchestra. But the ultimate triumph is Ponnelle's - he staged the show, designed the set and the costumes, and directed this film of it.

Barenboim's DVD, with evocatively beautiful sets by Jean-Pierre Ponnelle, presents an essentially poetic vision of Tristan...The video production is very well managed, using six cameras imaginatively, often in close-up, bringing out the beauty of the sets. Meier rises superbly to the challenge of the final Liebestod, rounding off an impressive performance

Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung

With Johanna Meier’s unusually powerful Isolde and René Kollo’s resplendent, expressive Tristan, a better cast is hardly imaginable today

Wagner: Tristan und Isolde

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