Richard Strauss Capriccio opera to a libretto by Clemens Krauss and Richard Strauss. Directed 2021 by Jens-Daniel Herzog at the Semperoper Dresden. Stars Camilla Nylund (The Countess), Christoph Pohl (Flamand), Daniel Behle (Olivier), Nikolay Borchev (La Roche), Morten Frank Larsen (The Count), George Zeppenfeld (Director of a Theatre), Christa Mayer (Clairon), Tuuli Takala and Beomjen Kim (Italian Singers), Frank Blümel, Friedrich Darge, Alexander Födisch, Torsten Schäpan, Norbert Klesse, Thomas Müller, Juan Carlos Navarro, and Jörg Reißmann (Servants), Torben Jürgens (Majordomo), and Wolfgang Ablinger-Sperrhacke (Monsieur Taupe). Christian Thielemann conducts the Sächsische Staatskaapelle Dresden and the Sächsischer Staatsopernchor (Chorus Master André Kellinghaus). Set design by Mathis Neidhardt; costume design by Sibylle Gädeke; lighting design by Fabio Antoci; choreography by Michael Schmieder and Ramses Sigl; dramaturgy by Johann Casimir Eule. Directed for TV by Tiziano Mancini. Sung in German. Released 2022, disc has 5.1 dts-HD Master Audio sound. Grade: NA
The artwork on the front of the Blu-ray keepcase is strangely ugly and uninformative. But here’s a image from this production I found somewhere:
Hugo Shirley, full of praise, states in the February 2023 Gramophone (page 84) that this Semperoper show is probably the “best modern recording” of this opera. That’s saying a lot as I really have trouble believing anything can upstage my beloved disc of the 2011 Met production of Capriccio with Renée Fleming. So next consider the official trailer:
All this seems a bit drab and unappealing to me compared to Fleming singing at the Met. But I also found several favorable reviews online about the Semperoper live performance, including a brilliant, glowing accolade by Jim Pritchard on seenandheard-international.com dated May 25, 2021. Pritchard considers Thielemann unsurpassed in Richard Strauss. So maybe you go to the Semperoper for the orchestra and to the Met for wonderful storytelling.
OR
