Wagner: Parsifal
Composer: Wagner
Conductor: Valery Gergiev
Orchestra: Mariinsky Orchestra and Chorus
Format: SACD
Price: £29.99
Release Date: 20 September 2010
Released 20th September 2010. Pre-orders posted 13th September.
Mariinsky label recordings are made available by LSO Live. To complete your order you will be transferred to the London Symphony Orchestra website.
The Mariinsky label’s first recording of an opera by Wagner features an exceptional international cast led by René Pape, Gary Lehman and Violeta Urmana.
The Mariinsky Theatre has a long association with Wagner’s music. The composer himself conducted at the Theatre, which in 1863 was the location of the first performance of music from his as yet unstaged Ring Cycle. Over the past decade Valery Gergiev has become a frequent conductor of Wagner’s operas, establishing a formidable reputation in the repertoire, although remarkably this is his first recording of the composer’s operas.
Wagner described his final complete opera as a ‘A Festival Play for the Consecration of the Stage’ and the work has always sparked controversy, mixing moral and religious themes with music of irresistible sumptuousness. The opera was inspired by Wolfram von Eschenbach’s Arthurian poem Parzifal. Yet despite the story’s overt Christian imagery, Wagner also draws on ideas from other beliefs including Buddhism. The ‘harmonic experiments’ that he adopted for his previous opera Tristan und Isolde are further refined to create music of astonishing beauty that still retains and reflects the deep morality of the tale.
Watch a video of Violeta Urmana talking about performing Parsifal
Reviews
1 September 2010
‘Above all, this is Gergiev’s Parsifal and it is the superlatively good playing of the Mariinsky Orchestra that, with Pape’s gloriously sung Gurnemanz, makes this new set essential listening for Wagnerians’
1 September 2010
Disc of the Month
Performance ***** Recording *****
‘What really distinguishes this, though, is Gergiev. His reading is vivid and luminous, generally expansive but with fluidly shifting tempos, unashamedly guilty of theatrical excitement. Gergiev, with the vigorous Mariinsky chorus and orchestra, achieves a glowing translucency in both choral and orchestral textures’
26 August 2010
‘Gergiev presumably wanted to record a Parsifal that measured up to the international competition … and he's certainly succeeded’
Artists
Valery Gergiev, conductor
Orchestra and Chorus of the Mariinsky Theatre
Marina Mishuk, Principal Vocal Coach
Andrei Petrenko, Principal Chorus Master
Dmitri Ralko, Children’s Chorus Direction
This recording was made possible through the generous support of Yoko Ceschina.
Evgeny Nikitin Amfortas
Alexei Tanovitski Titurel
René Pape Gurnemanz
Gary Lehman Parsifal
Nikolai Putilin Klingsor
Violeta Urmana Kundry
Yuri Alexeev and Yuri Vorobiev Two Knights of the Grail
Lia Shevtsova, Olga Legkova, Alexander Timchenko and Andrei Popov Four Squires
Olga Trifonova, Irina Mataeva, Liudmilla Dudinova, Elena Ushkova, Zhanna Dombrovskaya and Anna Kiknadze Six Flowermaidens
Alla Martynenko Voice from Above
Recording Details
Recorded at the Mariinsky Concert Hall, St Petersburg, 5-13 June 2008 Producer: James Mallinson
Recording Engineers: John Newton and Dirk Sobotka
Mastering Engineers: Jonathan Stokes and Neil Hutchinson
Notes in Russian (Cyrillic), English, French and German.
Libretto in Russian (Cyrillic) and English, French and German.
Sung in German
4 x Hybrid SACD. Compatible with all CD players Includes multi-channel 5.0 and stereo mixes
