Richard Strauss

Based on Oscar Wilde's lurid play, it is an intense exploration of the Salome story. Its sumptuous vocal and orchestral writing seethes and pulsates as Strauss conjures up the brutality of Herod's corrupt court. Richard Strausss opera at the Salzburg Festival, staged by Romeo Castellucci at the Felsenreitschule, was nothing short of a sensation. Debuting in the title role, Asmik Grigorian propelled herself to international stardom with her mesmerizing singing and acting abilities. The exceptional soprano recently won the International Opera Award as best singer.

In this documentary, award-winning filmmaker Susan Froemke explores the creation of the Metropolitan Opera’s storied home of the last five decades. Drawing on rarely seen archival footage, stills, and recent interviews, The Opera House looks at an important period of the Met’s history and delves into some of the untold stories of the artists, architects, and politicians who shaped the cultural life of New York City in the ’50s and ’60s. Among the notable figures in the film are famed soprano Leontyne Price, who opened the new Met in 1966 in Samuel Barber’s Antony and Cleopatra; Rudolf Bing, the Met’s imperious General Manager who engineered the move from the old house to the new one; Robert Moses, the unstoppable city planner who bulldozed an entire neighborhood to make room for Lincoln Center; and Wallace Harrison, whose quest for architectural glory was never fully realized.

In his new production, Robert Carsen places the action at the end of the Habsburg Empire, underscoring the opera’s subtext of class and conflict against a rich backdrop of gilt and red damask

Comic romance with a philosophical twist? This popular opera combines it all to tell the story of a revoltingly greedy man who tries to get his hands on a young woman's fortune.

With their “comedy for music” in the spirit of Mozart, Richard Strauss and his inspired librettist Hugo von Hofmannsthal created the most popular of all their works and one of the most frequently performed operas of all time. In the guise of a gossamer-light and supremely entertaining high-class comedy, Der Rosenkavalier touches on universal themes such as love, sex, marital fidelity and the changes that human relations undergo over time – and all of it set to music of the most glorious kind imaginable. With its stellar cast under the inspired direction of Harry Kupfer, the 2014 Salzburg Festival’s production of Der Rosenkavalier was one of the most internationally acclaimed interpretations of the work since the start of the new millennium. “A musical feast from beginning to end“ (Wiener Zeitung).

2014 marks a year of celebration recognizing the 150th birthday year of the German late-Romantic orchestral, operatic and lied master composer, Richard Strauss (1864-1949). Arabella (premiered 1933, Dresden) was the last of the half dozen Strauss works to feature a libretto by the great Austrian writer Hugo von Hofmannsthal. This production, from the most recent Salzburg Easter Festival is, after Capriccio, the second of three Richard Strauss operas C Major is releasing in honor of the composers birth, life and work. The star-laden cast includes soprano Renèe Fleming, baritone Thomas Hampson, Albert Dohmen (Covent Garden, Wiener Staatsoper, MET) and Gabriela Beaková (Wiener Staatsoper, Covent Garden). With Christian Thielemann and the Staatskapelle Dresden, the music of Richard Strauss is in the best of hands. (ORF) Thielemann gets the best out of the cast...especially Renée Fleming with her luxurious soprano FAZ

Richard Strauss' last stage work is an opera about opera as an art form, depicting the creation of a music drama in a wise and witty way. Which came first the words or the music? That is the question Strauss and his librettist Clemens Krauss address through the story of a Countess torn between a composer and a poet.

A gay Brit living in New York is deprived of his immigration status, and risks losing his family and life in the U.S. He marries his lesbian best friend to remain in the country and stay with his family, but things get complicated when he meets the love of his life and is forced to make an impossible choice.

Starring Jonas Kaufmann as Bacchus and featuring Emily Magee with Daniel Harding conducting the Vienna Philharmonic, Ariadne auf Naxos was filmed at the acclaimed Salzburg Festival in 2012. This release also includes "Le Bourgeois gentilhomme."

Flemings voice might have been made for Ariadne and she achieved a great personal triumph in this production: The chief glory of the evening was hearing Renee Fleming, the Straussian soprano par excellence, making her role debut as Ariadne… As the possessor of what is, possibly, the most beautiful soprano voice in the world, she put her vocal treasures in the service of an empathic, nuanced interpretation of the role. From the creamy top, through a rich, warm middle, to the bewitching, darker colours of her lower register, Fleming poured her magnificent sound into Strausss enchanting melodic arcs, animating the sadness, vulnerability, and desire of the bereft princess...

Christian Thielemann conducts this Staatskapelle Dresden production of Richard Strauss' chamber opera. The opera follows events at the home of the wealthiest man in Vienna, who has booked both a comedy burlesque act and a serious opera group for entertainment. When the dinner runs long he declares that both forms of entertainment must take place at the same time - much to the chagrin of the opera's proud young composer. Filmed live in Baden-Baden on Feb. 25 by the veteran director Brian Large, Renée Fleming makes her debut in the role of Ariadne together with fellow key Strauss interpreters Sophie Koch and Christian Thielemann, following on from their Rosenkavalier triumph. Thielemann conducts the Staatskapelle Dresden, the orchestra to whom Strauss dedicated his Alpine Symphony and which premiered Feuersnot, Salome, Elektra, Der Rosenkavalier and Daphne.

This performance of the Richard Strauss opera Frau ohne Schatten, recorded live and in high definition, features vocalists like Stephen Gould, Anne Schwanewilms, Michaela Schuster, and Wolfgang Koch in the leading roles.

Renée Fleming is Countess Madeleine, the beautiful, enigmatic woman at the center of Strauss’s sophisticated “Conversation Piece for Music.” She is being courted by two men: Joseph Kaiser sings the composer, Flamand, and Russell Braun is Olivier, the poet. The stellar cast also includes Peter Rose as the theater director La Roche, Sarah Connolly as the actress Clairon, and Morten Frank Larsen as the Countess’s brother. John Cox’s elegant production places the action in the 1920s. Andrew Davis conducts.

The Nikolaus Lehnhoff production of Richard Strauss's "Elektra", recorded live at the Salzburger Festspiele in 2010. Iréne Theorin stars as Elektra, with Eva-Maria Westbroek as Chrysothemis, Waltraud Meier as Klytämnestra, Robert Gambill as Aegisth, and René Pape as Orest. Daniele Gatti conducts the Wiener Philharmoniker.

The richness and intensity of Richard Strauss's masterful one-act opera, in Herbert Wernicke's compelling production, vividly portrays the relentless pursuit and ecstatic realization of vengeance. Featuring Linda Watson, Jane Henschel, Manuela Uhl, Rene Kollo, and Albert Dohmen. The Philharmonia Chor Wien and Münchner Philharmoniker are conducted by Christian Thielemann

This production of Strauss’s most sumptuous work by director Nathaniel Merrill and designer Robert O’Hearn is almost as beloved as the opera itself. It perfectly captures the glittering never-land of rococco Vienna the way the Viennese—and the rest of the world—wish it had been, and it’s the ideal setting for an adult comedy of love and errors. Susan Graham is the aristocratic young Octavian, torn between two women: Renée Fleming as the Marschallin, the mature woman who understands that one day Octavian must leave her; and Christine Schäfer as Sophie, the young girl who unexpectedly captures his heart. Kristinn Sigmundsson is the lecherous Baron Ochs who sets the whirling plot in motion, and Edo de Waart conducts.

Herbert Wernicke's production of Richard Strauss's "Der Rosenkavalier", filmed live at the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden on 31 January 2009. Renée Fleming is the Marschallin, Diana Damrau is Sophie, Sophie Koch is Octavian, Franz Hawlata is Baron Ochs, Franz Grundheber is Faninal, Jane Henschel is Annina, and Jonas Kaufmann is the Italian singer. Christian Thielemann conducts the Münchner Philharmoniker.

It is no wonder that Met audiences have gone wild over Karita Mattila’s sizzling Salome. Indisputably one of the greatest Salomes of our time, Mattila utterly incarnates Oscar Wilde’s petulant, willful, and lust-driven heroine. With Strauss’s groundbreaking music magnifying the degenerate atmosphere and building the erotic tension, this is one opera that is as shocking today as it was at its premiere in 1905.

Live from the Royal Opera 2008. David McVicar’s powerful 2008 production of Strauss's opera – based on a play by Oscar Wilde – takes the controversial and disturbing film 120 Days of Sodom as its visual reference. The action is set in a debauched palace, which has suggestions of Nazi Germany. Strauss’s ravishing and voluptuous score adds to the sexual alchemy that is conjured by an international cast led by Nadja Michael in the title role. Salome is filmed for the big screen with High Definition cameras and recorded in true surround sound.

The Semperoper caused a sensation in November 2007 when it visited Japan for the first time in twenty-six years. The demand for tickets and the audience's enthusiasm were unprecedented, not least because the company was staging a piece that is performed more authentically in Dresden than anywhere else in the world: Richard Strauss' Der Rosenkavalier, which received its first performance in Dresden in 1911. Leading the ensemble was the radiant-voiced and profoundly thoughtful Marschallin of Anne Schwanewilms.

Arabella, Op. 79, is a lyric comedy or opera in three acts by Richard Strauss to a German libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal, their sixth and last operatic collaboration. Arabella is determined to marry for love, not wealth - against the wishes of her impoverished aristocratic parents. When she gives her heart to the mysterious Mandryka, a series of misunderstandings puts their love to the test.

Released as a memorial for the great Russian cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, who passed away on 27 April 2007, this DVD contains one bonafide cello concerto, the Schumann Cello Concerto in A minor, and two tone poems with prominent cello parts, Ernest Bloch's Schelomo and Richard Strauss' Don Quixote. Rostropovich mastered the Schumann in several famous recordings. Here, conducted by Leonard Bernstein, he provides a splendid performance. Featuring his trademark powerful technique, smooth legato and crisp vibrato, the Romantic roots of the concerto are never hidden for long, despite the relatively cool playing of the Orchestre National de France.

As viewed and filmed in High Definition by astronauts on the space shuttle, this is the Planet Earth as few have seen before. One hour of High Definition visual space scenery, coupled with eight separate one hour soundtracks of the world's most treasured clasical music in Dolby Digital Surround Sound. Choose your favorite classics for this High Definition trip around the world - complete classical music collection on one disc. Classical Masters featuring Wagner, Pachelbel, Ravel, Strauss, Beethoven,Handel, Debussy, Marcello, Satie, Mozart, Vivaldi/Mendelssohn, Bach, Rossini, Dvorak, Brahms, Chopin, Tchaikovsky, and other great composers.

The Martin Kušej production of Richard Strauss's "Elektra", filmed live at the Opernhaus Zurich on 30 November and 4 December 2005. Eva Johansson stars as Elektra, with Marjana Lipovšek as Klytämnestra, Melanie Diener as Chrysothemis, Rudolf Schashing as Aegisth, and Alfred Muff as Orest. Christoph von Dohnányi conducts.

This 2004 production of Richard Strauss's three-act comic opera Der Rosenkavalier (1911) emerged from the efforts of the Grosses Festspielhaus Salzburg. It stars Adrianne Pieczonka as Feldmarschallin, Franz Hawlata as Baron Ochs, Angelika Kirchschlager as Octavian and Franz Grundheber as Faninal. The Konzertvereinigung Wiener Staatsopernchor and the Wiener Philharmoniker lend added musical support, with Rupert Huber serving as chorus master of the former and Semyon Bychkov conducting the latter.

No começo do século 20, Virginia Woolf lida com a depressão e tenta finalizar o romance "Mrs. Dalloway". Seu texto afeta profundamente uma dona de casa dos anos 1950 e uma mulher nos dias atuais, que parece viver os eventos do livro.

Among the greatest operas in Richard Strauss's oeuvre, "Der Rosenkavalier (The Cavalier of the Rose)" spins the tale of the Marschallin (Elizabeth Whitehouse), a dowager struggling with old age. Making the transition more difficult is Octavian (Ildiko Komlosi), a lover many years her junior. This 1997 Palermo production, under the baton of maestro Pier Luigi Pizzi, co-stars Daniel Lewis Williams as Baron Ochs, the Marschallin's obnoxious cousin.

Richard Strauss's opera, from the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden.

Arabella, Op. 79, is a lyric comedy or opera in three acts by Richard Strauss to a German libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal, their sixth and last operatic collaboration.

A production of Die Frau ohne Schatten filmed in Japan.

The Otto Schenk production of Richard Strauss's "Elektra", filmed live at the Metropolitan Opera in January, 1994. Hildegard Behrens stars as Elektra, with Deborah Voigt as Chrysothemis, Brigitte Fassbaender as Klytämnestra, Donald McIntyre as Orest, and James King as Aegisth. James Levine conducts.

Felicity Lott, Anne-Sofie Von Otter, and Kurt Moll star in this production of Richard Strauss' opera, staged in Vienna in 1994. A romantic comedy of errors. Princess von Werdenberg must hide her affair with Octavian from her family; when he disguises himself as a chambermaid to avoid scandalizing the Princess, he is pressed into presenting a gift to Baron Ochs von Lerchenau, who has arrived to propose marriage to Sophie von Faninal. However, Ochs soon finds himself infatuated with the chambermaid, much to Octavian's chagrin, which proves to be only the first of a long series of romantic misunderstandings. This production of Der Rosenkavalier is performed by the Vienna State Orchestra and Chorus, under the direction of Carlos Kleiber.

Documentary about sixteen great conductors of the 20th century.

Recorded live at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London on 2 June 1992.

Recorded at the Vienna State Opera house in 1989, this staging of Richard Strauss and Hugo von Hofmannsthal’s Elektra is one of the glories of live opera on film, deserving of eternal availability. The DVD picture has great clarity, despite the darkness of Hans Schavernoch’s set design. Other than the cliché of a huge statue head, toppled on its side, the set manages to be suitably representative of a decaying palace as well as an imposing, theatrical space, dominated by the mammoth body of the statue from which the head apparently dropped, draped with the ropes that seem to have enabled the decapitation. Sooner or later most of the characters cling to and twist around those ropes, an apt stage metaphor for the remorseless repercussions from the murder of Agammenon by his unfaithful wife Klytämnestra and her paramour, Aegisthus. Reinhard Heinrich’s costumes capture a distant era while sustaining a creepily modern look — part Goth, part homeless, part Spa-wear.

Jessye Norman is a regal Ariadne, the mythological Greek heroine in this opera-within-an-opera, opposite the passionate Bacchus of the great James King. Kathleen Battle delivers the coloratura fireworks of Zerbinetta, the leader of a commedia dell’arte troupe that finds itself stranded on Ariadne’s island. Tatiana Troyanos and Franz Ferdinand Nentwig star as the young Composer and the Music Master in the opera’s prologue. James Levine brings out all the color and charm of Strauss’s brilliant chamber-sized score with its equal amounts of pathos and humor. Bodo Igesz’s production features sets by esteemed designer Oliver Messel.

Um jovem de seus 16-17 anos, sexualmente inexperiente, Octavian, recebe uma lição de vida e de sexualidade de um nobre ser - a Marechala, Princesa Werdenberg. Ele só descobre a si mesmo, no entanto, e começa a entender os mistérios do coração feminino, quando ele é encarregado pela Marechala de uma nobre missão: levar uma rosa de prata à jovem Sophie, a noiva do Barão von Lerchenau...

A production of Strauss' opera 'Der Rosenkavalier' performed at the Saltzburg Festival in 1984. Includes the Vienna State Opera Choir, the Philharmonic Orchestra with singers Wilma Lipp, Anna Tomowa-Sintow and Agnes Baltsa. Conducted by Herbert Von Karaja

Richard Strauss' Intermezzo is an autobiographical piece - a domestic comedy of marital strife, told in fourteen scenes. John Cox's stylish production is set in the 1920s and stars Felicity Lott as the volatile Christine Storch. The splended art nouveau settings by Martin Batters by evoke perfectly the luxurious lifestyle of Strauss' Vienna.

Strauss's opera adapted to the screen by Gotz Friedrich.

The Metropolitan Opera live production of Richard Strauss's opera Elektra on February 16, 1980

The Metropolitan Opera live production of Richard Strauss's opera Elektra on February 16, 1980

This performance of Richard Strauss' opera Der Rosenkavalier (1979) features the vocal talents of Gwyneth Jones in the lead role; recorded at the National Theatre Munich.

This filmed version of Strauss' shocker features Teresa Stratas as opera's most depraved teenager, and she's as perfect a Salome as one would ever hope to see or hear. Stratas inhabits the role, exploring the character's sensuousness as she vainly woos Jochanaan, her venomous hatred when she's rejected, the crazed look in her eyes when she demands his head--on a silver platter, no less. Such complete identification with a role, especially of a character so malignant helps make this 1974 Salome stand out among the many fine DVDs of the opera.

A 1970 German language drama film written and directed by Bernd Schwamm, starring Silvia M. Andragora, Michael Ande and Patrick Milton. The film screened at International Film Festival Rotterdam in 1975.

Russell's composer biopics were usually labours of love. This was the opposite: he regarded Strauss's music as "bombastic, sham and hollow", and despised the composer for claiming to be apolitical while cosying up to the Nazi regime. The film depicts Strauss in a variety of grotesquely caricatured situations: attacked by nuns after adopting Nietzsche's philosophy, he fights duels with jealous husbands, literally batters his critics into submission with his music and glorifies the women in his life and fantasies. (BFI Screenonline)

Structured in nine tableaux each a study of a simple action or situation involving a lone, naked figure, the blind Eros, searching for fulfilment, for self. The objects he touches - books, paintings - can be seen as icons of the creative spirit; there is also a motor cycle and film equipment. In succeeding scenes he appears to try on identities offered by institutional doctrines of religion and social traditions of (overt) masculinity. Much of the film was constructed in-camera with a small amount of editing afterwards. An innovation was the use of in-camera fade-outs as phrase markers, not as terminal points, within a single set-up or shot.

Opera by Strauss