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List Price: $34.95Price: $31.49You Save: $3.46 (10%)Great Stars of Opera - Telecasts from the Bell Telephone Hour 1959-1966
ASIN : B000055XTE
Sales Rank : 39189
Studio : Video Artists Int'l
Region Code : 0
Format : Classical, Color, DVD-Video, NTSC
Binding : DVD
EAN : 0089948420194
UPC : 089948420194
Number Of Discs : 1
Release Date : December 28, 2000
Publisher : Video Artists Int'l
Manufacturer : Video Artists Int'l
Availability : Usually ships in 24 hours
Label : Video Artists Int'l
Running Time : 120
Amazon.comThe most spectacular of the 21 operatic excerpts on this two-hour collection of Bell Telephone Hour telecasts is the last and longest--Joan Sutherland singing the Mad Scene from Lucia di Lammermoor--more than 13 minutes of incredible vocalizing, still as fresh and technically dazzling as it was when it was televised in 1962, shortly after her Metropolitan Opera debut in that role. In a sense, video recording was not Sutherland's best medium. She was not a great actress or a conventionally beautiful woman, but the video representation of her slightly awkward stage presence makes her vocal grace and agility sound all the more impressive. Equally historic is a scene from Boris Godunov melodramatically sung by George London shortly after his triumphant Bolshoi debut in that role (though one wishes he had been allowed to sing it in Russian for his American audience). A discovery of sorts is Risë Stevens's performance of a long monologue from Natoma, a long-forgotten opera by Victor Herbert. Leontyne Price looks very young and extraordinarily talented in selections from Il trovatore and Aida; Birgit Nilsson produces great sounds in music from Turandot and Götterdämmerung. The list could go on much longer. The names on the cover of this disc are (except for the unfortunate absence of Maria Callas) virtually a who's who of the leading Metropolitan Opera singers of the late 1950s and early '60s. It would be pleasant to have Galina Vishnevkaya, Christa Ludwig, Cesare Siepi, and Walter Berry as well, but their careers blossomed elsewhere and we must be thankful for what is here--thankful, in particular, that there were once programs on commercial network television that presented material of deep and permanent value. --Joe McLellan
Reviews for the Great Stars of Opera - Telecasts from the Bell Telephone Hour 1959-1966
List Price: $29.99Price: $26.99You Save: $3 (10%)Lehar - The Merry Widow / Bonynge, Sutherland, Stevens, Opera Australia
ASIN : B00005RIXJ
Sales Rank : 26448
Director : Virginia Lumsden
Studio : Kultur Video
Region Code : 1
Format : Classical, Color, DVD-Video, NTSC
Binding : DVD
EAN : 9780769700052
ISBN : 0769700055
UPC : 032031000599
Release Date : December 20, 2001
Publisher : Kultur Video
Manufacturer : Kultur Video
Availability : Usually ships in 24 hours
Label : Kultur Video
Running Time : 155
Actors: Joan Sutherland, Ron Stevens, Anne Maree McDonald, Anson Austin, Gordon Wilcock
Amazon.comThis production of Lehar's The Merry Widow is a mixed bag, appropriate, perhaps, for a work of art that is both sublime and ridiculous. Its weakest element is the presence of Joan Sutherland, which will undoubtedly attract the most buyers. Still, viewers will replay it often (perhaps bypassing some of Sutherland's numbers) for the sake of its lavish production, particularly for the abundant, polished, and colorful dance numbers. The 1988 performance, by the Australian Opera in the elegant Sydney Opera House, dates from the end of Sutherland's career, and it leaves one wondering whether she should have retired a bit sooner, while at the same time treasuring every moment in the presence of one of the unique voices of the 20th century. There are moments of beauty in her singing, but intonation and support are both variable. The supporting cast, including Ronald Stevens, Anne-Maree McDonald, and Anson Austin, is generally adept, though some gags (especially the Pontevedran accents) may seem overworked. --Joe McLellan
Reviews for the Lehar - The Merry Widow / Bonynge, Sutherland, Stevens, Opera Australia
New Price: $349.95Gilbert & Sullivan - The Mikado, The Pirates of Penzance, Iolanthe (Stratford Festival, Canada)
ASIN : 1569383456
Sales Rank : 95626
Studio : Acorn Media
Region Code : 1
Format : Box set, Classical, Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, NTSC
Binding : DVD
EAN : 9781569383452
ISBN : 1569383456
UPC : 054961345694
Release Date : December 08, 2000
Publisher : Acorn Media
Manufacturer : Acorn Media
Label : Acorn Media
Running Time : 412
Actors: Gilbert & Sullivan, Maureen Forrester, Brent Carver
Amazon.comA set of three stage performances taped in the theater by Canada's Stratford Festival in the 1980s, these productions of the Gilbert & Sullivan favorites The Mikado,The Pirates of Penzance, and Iolanthe (each is also available separately) offer the virtues and pitfalls of live-performance video. The staging is on the modest side; visual and sound quality are not flawless. But the high spirits shared by actors and audience are a delight. Unfortunately, ambitious editing undercuts that sense of immediacy. Many of the singing voices have been dubbed, and applause is unnaturally deleted at some key moments. Now and then the actors turn and address the camera. The result isn't really convincing as either a stage production or a film. The Mikado alone avoids that sort of identity crisis and is by far the most satisfying of the three. Purists will flinch at the many updated lines, but modernizing isn't a bad way to approximate Gilbert's very topical humor. For U.S. viewers, though, the Canadian jokes (about Pierre Trudeau, Wayne Gretzky, or Canadian TV) won't entirely hit home. One advantage to the collection is the fun of seeing members of Stratford's company in multiple roles. There's also the occasional Canadian star: Maureen Forrester, Brent Carver. Despite mixed results, this set is a useful introduction to the pleasures of G&S and proof of how well these pieces still play before an audience--and sustain having their jokes brought into another era. --David Olivenbaum
Reviews for the Gilbert & Sullivan - The Mikado, The Pirates of Penzance, Iolanthe (Stratford Festival, Canada)
List Price: $24.99Price: $10.99You Save: $14 (56%)Massenet - Werther
ASIN : B00000JMP9
Sales Rank : 50611
Director : Petr Weigl
Studio : Image Entertainment
Region Code : 1
Format : Classical, Color, DVD-Video, NTSC
Binding : DVD
EAN : 0014381565720
UPC : 014381565720
Number Of Discs : 1
Release Date : December 24, 1999
Publisher : Image Entertainment
Manufacturer : Image Entertainment
Availability : Usually ships in 24 hours
Label : Image Entertainment
Running Time : 101
Actors: Brigitte Fassbinder, Peter Dvorsky
DescriptionJules Massanet's lyrical opera is transformed into a superb film production by Petr Weigl, shot on location in Prague, with music conducted by Libor Pesek. First produced by the Vienna Opera in February 1892, "Werther" rapidly confirmed Massanet's position on the French opera scene and achieved enormous popularity outside France, notably in Italy, America and England. The tragic story tells of Werther's intense passion for Charlotte, who has married his best friend, Albert, fulfilling a pledge to her now deceased mother. But Werther's letters of love bring Charlotte to his side when he promises to take his own life. Amazon.comOpera is almost always about the great love one cannot have. Very few--such as Poulenc's Dialogues of the Carmelites--transcend the intimacy of love and move into a larger, even epic vision. In a sense, forbidden lust and longing is the thing that fuels opera, and it's a perfect metaphor for the fact that very few "can have" and survive being filmed. Zeffirelli's La Traviata may be one of the few that vibrantly--and exquisitely--breathed to life in the midst of death on the big screen. Czech director Petr Weigl has attempted to do the same for Jules Massenet's music for Goethe's novel, Die Leiden Des Jungen Werthers, and the results are decidedly mixed. It's a tragic story about young Werther (Peter Dvorsky) who falls in love at first sight with Charlotte (Brigitte Fassbaender). After Charlotte marries someone else in order to fulfill a promise to her recently deceased mother, Werther refuses to be deterred, and writes copious letters to his heart's desire. She sends him away in order to honor her commitment, and only when he threatens to kill himself does she rush to his side and pour her heart out to her dying beloved. Fassbaender and Dvorsky certainly heave, pose, and yearn but Werther is surprisingly stagnant in its presentation, and the continuous separation and isolation of its lovers makes their plight stillborn and remote and, by ultimately focusing so ardently on interiors and arty shots of trees, fronds, and misty grounds, Werther is deprived of its inherent passion. --Paula Nechak
Reviews for the Massenet - Werther
List Price: $29.99Price: $26.99You Save: $3 (10%)Offenbach - La Vie Parisienne / Ossonce, DeLavault, Opera National de Lyon
ASIN : B00005RIXM
Sales Rank : 61609
Director : Pierre Cavassilas
Studio : Kultur Video
Region Code : 1
Format : Classical, Color, DVD-Video, NTSC
Binding : DVD
EAN : 9780769700571
ISBN : 0769700578
UPC : 032031005792
Release Date : December 20, 2001
Publisher : Kultur Video
Manufacturer : Kultur Video
Availability : Usually ships in 24 hours
Label : Kultur Video
Running Time : 161
Actors: Hélène Delavault, Claire Wauthion, Isabelle Mazin, Jean-Yves Chatelais, Jean-Francois Sivadier
Amazon.comOffenbach's melodious extravaganza is essentially a celebration of Paris as a tourist trap, a background for attempted seductions, and a fertile source of routine flim-flams. This 1991 Opera National de Lyon production, emanating from one of Paris's chief rivals among French cities, focuses gleefully on the sordid aspects of the City of Lights, but its strongest appeal is in the quality of the singing and dancing. The opening scene of La Vie Parisienne takes place in a railroad station around the year 1860; tourists are pouring in from all parts of the world, many in colorful foreign costumes, including a Swedish woman, the Baroness Gondremark, who is chosen as the target for a seduction attempt. An elaborate series of deceptions fills out the plot and--more important--supplies opportunities for a dazzling variety of clever song and dance numbers. --Joe McLellan
Reviews for the Offenbach - La Vie Parisienne / Ossonce, DeLavault, Opera National de Lyon
New Price: $94.99Strauss - Die Fledermaus / Kleiber, Coburn, Perry, Bayerische Staatsoper
ASIN : B000056JSR
Sales Rank : 108151
Director : Brian Large
Studio : Umvd Labels
Region Code : 0
Format : Classical, Color, DVD-Video, Full Screen, NTSC
Binding : DVD
EAN : 0044007300794
UPC : 044007300794
Number Of Discs : 1
Release Date : December 19, 2001
Publisher : Umvd Labels
Manufacturer : Umvd Labels
Label : Umvd Labels
Running Time : 155
Actors: Eberhard Wächter, Pamela Coburn, Josef Hopferwieser, Benno Kusche, Brigitte Fassbaender
Amazon.comDie Fledermaus has some of the greatest comic melodies ever presented on an operatic stage--a festival of light-hearted tunes bound together by a plot and a cast of characters that make a virtue of absurdity. This 1988 production, which is acted as charmingly as it is sung, brings out the show's wit, energy, vitality, and, above all, style--a special gemutlichkeit usually associated with Vienna but also cultivated, on this occasion, in Munich. Nobody in this production's superbly chosen cast has the kind of name recognition enjoyed by the stars of the competing DVD from Covent Garden: Joan Sutherland, Marilyn Horne, and Luciano Pavarotti. But they are all first- class musicians and/or comic actors, adept in the special requirements of Viennese operetta and integrated into a deftly crafted ensemble production, with expert conducting by Carlos Kleiber and finely detailed stage direction by Otto Schenk. At Covent Garden, in Joan Sutherland's farewell appearance, Pavarotti et al. were simply inserted into the Act II party scene as "guests"--musically splendid but irrelevant to the story. In contrast, the Bavarian State Opera production presents Die Fledermaus substantially as Johann Strauss II originally imagined it--something the Covent Garden production, performed in English, did not manage (or, really, attempt) to do. The men in the cast provide a lot of the comedy, but the most spectacular music is given to the women: Pamela Coburn as a housewife who masquerades as a Hungarian countess, Janet Perry as a chambermaid who wants to break into show biz, Brigitte Fassbaender in the colorful trouser role of Prince Orlofsky. These performances are carefully poised on the brink of outrageousness but never go too far. Deutsche Grammophon supplies an informative, illustrated booklet with this disc--a rarity in DVD productions and much appreciated. --Joe McLellan
Reviews for the Strauss - Die Fledermaus / Kleiber, Coburn, Perry, Bayerische Staatsoper
New Price: $200.00Johann Strauss - Die Fledermaus / Bonynge, Cox, Ashton, Royal Opera
ASIN : B00004Z4VP
Sales Rank : 97224
Director : Humphrey Burton
Studio : Image Entertainment
Region Code : 0
Format : Classical, Color, DVD-Video, Full Screen, NTSC
Binding : DVD
EAN : 0014381579727
UPC : 014381579727
Release Date : December 19, 2000
Publisher : Image Entertainment
Manufacturer : Image Entertainment
Label : Image Entertainment
Running Time : 197
Actors: Judith Howarth, Louis Otey, Bonaventura Bottone, Nancy Gustafson, Eric Garrett
DescriptionThis most effervescent of all Johann Strauss's operettas is a perennial favorite, with its tide of bright, frothy Viennese dance music and charmingly nonsensical plot. In this glittering John Cox production, designed by Julia Trevelyan Oman, the opulence of the Viennese Belle Epoque and the elegant gaiety of the music combine to provide an evening of sparkling Entertainment musical champagne. Judith Howarth, Louis Otey, Jochen Kowalski, Nancy Gustafson; special guest stars Dame Joan Sutherland, Luciano Pavarotti and Marilyn Horne; conducted by Richard Bonynge. 196 minutes. Amazon.comThis is a capable, mildly eccentric, and thoroughly enjoyable production of Johann Strauss's witty, melodious, and charmingly frivolous comedy about elaborate practical jokes, faked identities, long-deliberated revenge, and the power of champagne. The singing is idiomatic, the spirit infectiously jovial, the acting polished and witty. Hard-core lovers of Die Fledermaus in its traditional form may have a few reservations. It is performed in a clever English translation by an English and American cast with a flavor more evocative of London than of Vienna. And the role of the decadent Prince Orlofsky, usually assigned to a female mezzo-soprano in trousers, is taken by a male countertenor, a meaningless gain in realism at the expense of a time-honored tradition that is one of the show's best perennial jokes. These are small points, but for the treatment of the Fledermaus music, without other considerations, I would pick another Covent Garden video production, the 1984 gala, starring Kiri Te Kanawa, Hermann Prey, and Benjamin Luxon, with Placido Domingo conducting and, in the last act, singing a few notes. That becomes irrelevant, however, because this production preserves a very special occasion: the 1990 New Year's Eve Gala in which Joan Sutherland made a cameo appearance--her Covent Garden farewell performance--during the party scene. She brought with her two of the outstanding partners in her career, Marilyn Horne and Luciano Pavarotti. All were in very good voice, and they rose to the occasion with some extraordinary singing. Highlights of the hors d'oeuvres include Sutherland's simple, eloquent "Home, Sweet Home," Horne's performance of "Mon coeur s'ouvre a ta voix" from Samson et Dalila, and Sutherland and Pavarotti in the heart-breaking duet "Parigi, o cara" from La Traviata. --Joe McLellan
Reviews for the Johann Strauss - Die Fledermaus / Bonynge, Cox, Ashton, Royal Opera
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