Richard Strauss - Elektra / Abbado, Marton, Fassbaender, Vienna State Opera

Starring:Eva Marton, Cheryl Studer, Brigitte Fassbaender, James King (IV), Franz Grundheber, Goran Simic, Waltraud Winsauer, Noriko Sasaki, Wilfried Gahmlich, Claudio Otelli, Gabriele Lechner, Margarita Lilova, Gabriele Sima, Margareta Hintermeier, Brigitte Poschner-Klebel, Joanna Borowska
Director: Brian Large
Studio: Image Entertainment
Product Type: DVD

Editorial Review:
Amazon.com
There is a special category of German opera--we might call it the repellent masterpiece--in which some works of Richard Strauss are prominent, and Elektra is perhaps the pinnacle, certainly a unique experience. This production fulfills all the opera's requirements for mastery and repulsion.

Amazon.com

There is a special category of German opera--we might call it the repellent masterpiece--in which some works of Richard Strauss are prominent, and Elektra is perhaps the pinnacle, certainly a unique experience. This production fulfills all the opera's requirements for mastery and repulsion.

Description

World famous conductor Claudio Abbado extracts a harrowing performance from the peerless Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra during this production of Strauss's opera of revenge, torment and horror. The music is infused with an eeriness that heightens the emotions on stage and adds to director Harry Kupfer's bold tale of tyranny and bloodshed. The Vienna State Opera is flawless with Eva Marton giving an uninhibited and exultant performance in the title role.

Customer Reviews:

The best ELEKTRA so far!!!.......2007-04-21

Great, amazing production.
Kupfer rules with this intense and inspired stage directing.
This is the first Elektra of Eva Marton and it is the best interprentation I have ever seen so far.
Her Elektra is passionate, human, full of pain, insanity, fear and fury. Multimensional portrayal and great conducting from Abbado, as well.
A MUST for every opera fan!!! A MUST SEE!!!

Beautifully sung, but..................2006-11-26

This production of Elektra is exceptionally well sung by all involved--no weak links.

The Vienna State Opera under Claudio Abbado provides a richer orchestral sound than I have heard in other productions.

I should warn you about the staging, costumes, and subtitles:

The staging and scenery are uworldly--a huge bust (of Agamemnon?), a giant, planet-like sphere, and many ropes hanging from the ceiling. The ropes provide something for the singers to hang onto and struggle against, but some may find this distracting.

The costuming is dark and of no identifiable nationality or time period--and that's OK--it fits in with the intended dark and gloomy prisonlike world of Elektra. But the headgear seems too bizarre to me. Chrisothemis seems to be wearing a conehead hat, and the rest wear hats resembling leather football helmets of the 1920s.

The optional subtitles are in something like King James English, with lots of "thou" and "thee." Perhaps that's intended to help set a long-in-the-past atmosphere.

Although Marton and Studer sing very well, I found Brigitte Fassbaender to be the one who steals the show. Kitschly-bejewelled, she hobbles along, decrepit, deranged, and hideous--EXACTLY what most expect of Elektra's evil mother. Much as a really nasty Scarpia makes the opera, Tosca work, Elektra works best played off a totally repulsive Klytemnestra.

If the mentioned issues about subtitles, hats, and staging would not bother you, the rest of it is a delightful dark operatic work. By the way, Elektra is NOT a pseudo-psycho-sexual story about a girl obsessed with her father. As you mythology folks know, Elektra's obsession is about getting JUSTICE for her father's murder.

Abbado - Yes.......2006-03-16

Abbado is the best conductor of this generation in my opinion. The vitality and sensitivity of his performances can't be surpassed. He does Strauss as well as Beethoven and Verdi.

Elektra shows everyone the ropes.......2006-03-02

The pacing by the Vienna Staatsoper (Conducted by Claudio Abbado) was well done in one act. It was a tad fast at first. Then you get into the story which follows the classic telling with a little more emphases on Klytemnästra.

Basic tale based on a play by Sophocles is that the mother-queen Klytemnästra (Brigitte Fassbaender) and her mother's lover Aegisth (James King) dispatches the father-king Agamemnon. Turns out he was a favorite of Elektra (Eva Marton) was quit fond of her father and swears revenge. Her sister tries to talk her out of it. But the eventual outcome will rely on all the siblings and Klytemnästra's bad dreams. And Elektra is too ecstatic about the outcome.

I understand a little German so I watched this the first time through with the English Subtitles. I am not sure that is an advantage over just gleaning the few words and knowing the story as the subtitles we so archaic that they were almost unfathomable and distracting. At one point Klytemnästra even says "ye gods".

Get a different view of this story by watching "Electra" (1962) with Irene Papas as Electra. This time rendered in Greek.

So Intense!!!!!!!!!!!!!.......2005-09-30

This production was incredible!! I felt dragging tension throughout the entire DVD. Eva Marton's voice is huge and incredibly affective. She acted so well as Elektra!!! Mezzo-Soprano Brigitte Fassbaender is a genius. Her potrayal of Queen Clytemnestra was amazingly done. I can't imagine anyone else doing a better job. This was an incredibly dark opera...very different from Strauss's other masterpieces, with the exception of Salome. You won't find darkness and intensity like this in Der Rosenkavalier or Capriccio.

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