Benjamin Britten: Death in Venice
Death in Venice
2
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- Künstler:
- Philip Langridge, Alan Opie, Michael Chance, BBC Singers, City of London Sinfonia, Richard Hickox
- Label:
- Chandos, DDD, 2004
- UPC/EAN:
- 0095115128022
- Erscheinungstermin:
- 21.3.2005
Product Information
»It’s either the best or the worst music I’ve ever written«, wrote Benjamin Britten in a letter shortly after completing the first draft in December 1972 of what would prove to be his last opera. The work, which took a little over two and a half years to write, and came at serious personal cost: »I wanted passionately to finish the piece before anything happened«, he said, postponing vital heart surgery. The eventual operation, thus delayed, was not wholly successful, and considerably shortened the composer’s life.
The opera is based on Thomas Mann’s Der Tod in Venedig, published in 1912. Britten had known about the novella for some time (he had a reputation for gestating projects over many decades) but the themes could hardly have been more topical for the late twentieth-century, a time when traditional attitudes towards homosexuality were becoming increasingly under scrutiny. Mann once wrote about the subject of his novella:
»What I originally wanted to deal with was not anything homoerotic at all. It was the story – seen grotesquely – of the aged Goethe and that little girl in Marienbad whom he was absolutely determined to marry. Passion as confusion and as a stripping of dignity was really the subject of my tale.«
Mann’s story concerns Aschenbach, a famous writer suffering from writer’s block, who falls passionately in love with a beautiful young Polish boy during a holiday in Venice. Britten’s opera – although it certainly portrays Aschenbach’s passion moving through stages of ›confusion‹ and ›the stripping of dignity‹ – is more about the right of the individual to express himself, both in art and in love without fear of social and legal censure. The novella takes the form of a stream of consciousness monologue and the librettist, Myfanwy Piper, gave shape to the work by turning the musings of Aschenbach into elements of a kind of psychological thriller.
Rezensionen
»Here the emphasis is on tonal beauty. Beautiful singing, beautiful playing, even a slight lingering over – a slight stretching out – of particularly beautiful passages. Yet there is full measure of drama expressed though exquisite diction. Langridge is regarded as the leading interpreter of Britten’s tenor music, and here he certainly lets us hear why… The orchestra plays magnificently; they sound rich, warm, smooth as silk. Tempos are a bit slower than Britten’s, without the composer’s drive – gentler and just a shade under Britten’s fullness and emotional grandeur. Recorded sound is broad and clear.« American Record Guide
»It is superbly recorded in Chandos’s most dazzlingly ‘present’ and realistic sound and quite wonderfully conducted by Hickox, the most convinced and convincing of the second-generation Britten conductors, who gets world-class playing from the City of London Sinfonia (and especially its virtuoso wind and tuned-percussion soloists)…. A triumph for Langridge, Opie, Hickox and Chandos, without a doubt, and one of the truly memorable records of the year, I think.« International Record Review
»Conductor Richard Hickox and the City of London Sinfonia last night gave an important, overwhelmingly powerful reading of Benjamin Brittens final opera… Philip Langridge… proved a subtler, more deeply involved and flexible interpreter than Peter Peers… on this evidence theres still no finer singer-actor in the world.« London Evening Standard
Although most of Britten’s major operas are established on the international circuit, ‘Death in Venice’ has yet to claim its rightful place. Hopefully this new recording in Richard Hickox’s Britten series…will help advance its cause. The performance is beautifully played and recorded, and in its all-important central role reunites Richard Hickox with Philip Langridge, so compelling in their earlier set of ‘Peter Grimes’. Gramophone (Editor’s Choice)
Rezensionen
FonoForum 08/05: »Erst diese Einspielung räumt mit dem Vorurteil auf, ›Death in Venice‹ sei Benjamin Brittens eher ermüdendes Alterswerk.«- Tracklisting
- Details
- Mitwirkende
Disk 1 von 2 (CD)
Death in Venice op. 88 (Oper in 2 Akten) (Gesamtaufnahme)
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1 My mind beats on (1. Akt)
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2 Who's that
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3 I have always kept a close watch over my development
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4 Hey there, hey there, you!
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5 Ouvertüre
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6 Ah Serenissima
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7 Mysterious gondola
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8 We are delighted to greet the Signore
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9 So I am led to Venice once again
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10 The Lido is so charming, is it not?
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11 How does such beauty come about?
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12 The wind is from the West
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13 Le bele fragole
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14 Ah, how peaceful to contemplate the sea
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15 Chor: Adziù, Adziù!
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16 As one who strives to create beauty
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17 Aou! Staganod, aou
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18 Naturally, Signore, I understand
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19 There you are, Signore, just in time
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20 I am become like one of my early heroes
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21 A thousand apologies to the Signore
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22 Chor: Beneath a dazzling sky the sea
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23 Chor: No boy, but Phoebus of the golden hair
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24 Chor: See where Hyacinthus plays
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25 Chor: Phaedrus learned what beauty is
Disk 2 von 2 (CD)
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1 Chor: First, the race!
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2 Chor: Try your skill
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3 Chor: Young discobolus
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4 Chor: Up and over
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5 Chor: Measure to fight
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6 The boy, Tadzio, shall inspire me
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7 Orchestervorspiel (2. Akt)
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8 So, it has come to this
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9 Guardate, Signore
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10 Do I detect a scent?
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11 And now I cannot let them out of sight
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12 Chor: Kyrie eleison
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13 Gustav von Aschenbach, what is this path you have taken?
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14 This way for the players, Signori
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15 La mia nonna always used to tell me
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16 Fiorir rose in mezo al giasso
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17 One moment, if you please
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18 So it is true, true, more fearful than I thought
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19 So - I didn't speak
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20 Receive the stranger god
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21 Do what you will with me
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22 Yes! A very wise decision, if I may say so
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23 Hurrah for the Piazza
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24 Does beauty lead to wisdom, Phaedrus?
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25 The wind still blows from the land
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26 Ah, no!
