Verdi: Otello

This 1965 black and white, German-language television film rises above historic interest with expressive work from the principals — BBC Music Magazine, October 2010, 3 out of 5 stars

Release Date: 1st Jun 2010
Catalogue No: 101505
Label: Arthaus Musik

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Verdi: Otello

Historical Studio Production, 1965
Wolfgang Windgassen (Otello), Sena Jurinac (Desdemona), Norman Mittelmann (Iago), Margarita Lilowa (Emilia), William Blankenship (Cassio), Adolf Dallapozza (Rodrigo), Walter Kreppel (Lodovico), Willy Ferenz (Montano), Leo Heppe (Herald)
Sinfonieorchester Des Süddeutschen Rundfunks, Stuttgart Chor Der Wiener Staatsoper & Wiener Sängerknaben
Argeo Quadri (conductor) & Otto Schenk (director)

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Set Design by Gerhard Hruby

Verdi’s opera Othello in a sympathetic studio recording from the early years of television. The camera’s roving eye lends Otto Schenk’s production an intimacy which inspires a vocal and dramatic tour de force from Wolfgang Windgassen and Sena Jurinac in the roles of the tragic lovers Othello and Desdemona. Musical direction is in the hands of the great Verdi conductor Argeo Quadri. For unlike with other opera films, the producers in Vienna did not use playback but recorded each scene live. A further drawback was the fact that the television studios were too small to accommodate a full-size opera orchestra. The musicians and conductor were situated in an acoustically appropriate but geographically separate hall, linked to the film studio only by cables and monitors. This arrangement called for utmost concentration from all parties. The scenes were recorded live; editing technology as we know it today did not exist, so the work involved filming lengthy passages and repeating them as necessary.

The very particular value of this video, now available to all fans of opera for the first time on DVD, is that it documents in convincing fashion the great German Verdi tradition – a tradition in which Othello has always maintained a leading position.

Sound Format: PCM Mono

Picture Format: 4:3

DVD Format: DVD 9, NTSC

Subtitle Languages: DE, IT, GB, FR, ES, JP

Running Time: 134 mins

FSK: 0

Reviews

October 2010

This 1965 black and white, German-language television film rises above historic interest with expressive work from the principals

Verdi: Otello

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