Elektra, Op. 58 : Tragedy in one act; Libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal, after Sophocles
The wretched Elektras under way at the Metropolitan Opera (final performance was 23 March, FWIW, which wasn’t much) prompted me to upload this, as antidote. In any case, I miss here a more sonorous and more viscerally interpreted Klytämnestra in the mold of Jean Madeira or Brigitte Fassbaender. But one can’t have it all. But WOW, the Chrysothemis! Further along, compare the experienced, genial, tightly integrated direction from Sawallisch and his Munich orchestra’s in-kind response, germane to the Straussian idiom, against Nézet-Séguin’s no-man’s-land. No comparison.
Elektra : Eva Marton
Chrysothemis : Cheryl Studer
Klytämnestra : Marjana Lipovšek
Orest : Bernd Weikl
Aegisth : Hermann Winkler
Der Pfleger des Orest : Kurt Moll
Die Vertraute : Victoria Wheeler
Die Schleppträgerin : Dorothea Geipel
Ein junger Diener : Ulrich Ress
Ein alter Diener : Alfred Kuhn
Die Aufseherin : Carmen Anhorn
Erste Magd : Daphne Evangelatos
Zweite Magd : Shirley Close
Dritte Magd : Birgit Calm
Vierte Magd : Julia Faulkner
Fünfte Magd : Caroline Maria Petrig
Recorded January 1990, Herkulessaal, Munich, Chor und Symphonie-Orchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks; Chorleitung: Gustaf Fjökvist; Dirigent: Wolfgang Sawallisch
Meanwhile, the world waits and waits and waits for Deutsche Grammophon (or Philips Classics?) to release their studio recording of ELEKTRA with Jessye Norman, Cheryl Studer, Helga Dernesch, Victor Braun, et.al., and the late Claudio Abbado conducting the Vienna Philharmonic.
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