Reimann, A: Lear
Bo Skovhus (König Lear), Katja Pieweck (Goneril), Hellen Kwon (Regan), Siobhan Stagg (Cordelia) & Erwin Leder (Narr)
Philharmoniker Hamburg & Chor der Staatsoper Hamburg, Simone Young (conductor) & Karoline Gruber (stage director)
Their Lear's score is based on quick-moving accompanied recitative with underlaying or interposed instrumental mood and atmospheric descriptions...The energy and pace of the Reimann bear witness...
Reimann, A: Lear
Bo Skovhus (König Lear), Katja Pieweck (Goneril), Hellen Kwon (Regan), Siobhan Stagg (Cordelia) & Erwin Leder (Narr)
Philharmoniker Hamburg & Chor der Staatsoper Hamburg, Simone Young (conductor) & Karoline Gruber (stage director)
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Their Lear's score is based on quick-moving accompanied recitative with underlaying or interposed instrumental mood and atmospheric descriptions...The energy and pace of the Reimann bear witness...
About
Live from the Staatsoper Hamburg, 2014
Set Designer Roy Spahn
Costume Designer Mechthild Seipel
Aribert Reimann’s Lear is a milestone in the tragic opera of the 20th century. Ever since its 1978 premiere at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, it has made its triumphal progress around the world in more than thirty productions as the most successful Shakespeare opera of our time. The remorseless logic of the action and plot and the primal force of irresistible sonic fantasies give this work the power to hold the attention of its listeners and viewers from the first moment to the last. The great theme of self-deception is fancifully portrayed in this captivating stage production by Karoline Gruber with a retreat into the interior of a far from frail old man. It is not senility that drives Lear, brilliantly sung by Bo Skovhus, into isolation but his hyperactive ego. The first Hamburg performance of Lear is a musical achievement of the highest order. “The orchestra of the State Opera under its GMD Simone Young is in absolutely top form.” (Handelsblatt)
Sound Formats: PCM Stereo, DD 5.1
Picture Format: 16:9
Subtitles: DE (Original Language), GB
DVD 9 / NTSC
Running Time: 156 mins
FSK: 0
Region Code: 0
Worldwide available
Contents and tracklist
- World Premiere Recording
- Bo Skovhus (König Lear), Katja Pieweck (Goneril), Hellen Kwon (Regan), Siobhan Stagg (Cordelia) & Erwin Leder (Narr)
- Philharmoniker Hamburg & Chor der Staatsoper Hamburg
- Simone Young (conductor) & Karoline Gruber (stage director)
Awards and reviews
July 2015
Their Lear's score is based on quick-moving accompanied recitative with underlaying or interposed instrumental mood and atmospheric descriptions...The energy and pace of the Reimann bear witness to its creators' engagement with their subject. Their version feels less like a setting of another's masterpiece than a subject they're realising themselves.
August 2015
Skovhus’s baritone shows some rust and graininess, but remains quite steady, capable of expressive and dynamic colouration. It’s a powerfully committed performance, less stylized than Fischer-Dieskau’s. Reimann’s over-the-top writing for Goneril and Regan perhaps justifies Gruber’s directing Katja Pieweck and Hellen Kwon as (in Pauline Kael’s indelible phrase) ‘harpies from the soaps’.
