Camilla Nylund – Wagner at Wahnfried (2020)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/48 kHz | Time – 38:46 minutes | 377 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Deutsche Grammophon (DG)
In cooperation with the Bayreuth Festival and BR-Klassik, we announce the release of Bayreuth 2020: Wagner at Wahnfried. This album features Siegfried Idyll, performed by the Festival’s Music Director Christian Thielemann and members of the Bayreuth Festival Orchestra, and the Wesendonck Lieder, with Finnish soprano Camilla Nylund as soloist.
Dr Clemens Trautmann, President Deutsche Grammophon, expressed DG’s pleasure at working closely with the Festival once again, both online and in staging and recording a unique live event: “The Bayreuth Festival has shaped the reception history of Wagner’s music, and for us at Deutsche Grammophon, building a relationship with its team has been a truly enriching experience. (…) The challenges of summer 2020 have proved just how pro-active our partnership can be: working together, we succeeded in making the entire Festival programme available to a global audience online via DG Stage in no time at all. On top of that, and in keeping with Wagner’s own feelings about rethinking and creatively breaking with tradition, we made the joint decision to document for posterity the novelty of an opening concert held at Haus Wahnfried under the direction of Maestro Thielemann.”
The global spread of the Covid-19 pandemic has had disastrous consequences across many domains, particularly culture and music. Concerts and festivals have been cancelled worldwide and it has required a great deal of ingenuity for artists and organisers to find a way to spread their message.
The Bayreuth Festival was no exception to the crisis’ wrath, but Christian Thielemann decided to hold a virtual festival (in which operas are filmed and shown online) with a real-life concert in Villa Wahnfried, built by Wagner to house his entire family within close proximity to the Festival Theatre (thanks to the generosity of King Louis II of Bavaria). The audience, masked and installed in the garden, respect social distancing and follow the concert on large video screens.
The anecdote is well-known, Siegrief-Idyll was composed as a birthday present for Cosima Wagner-Liszt and was played on Christmas morning 1870 by thirteen musicians in Tribschen, where the soon-to-be wedded couple were staying next to Lake Lucerne. This original and intimate interpretation by Christian Thielemann is played with a collection of musicians that were set to play the 2020 Festival. For the occasion, German composer and arranger, Andreas N. Tarkmann, has realised a deft instrumentation of Wesendonck-Lieder which is played by the same musicians. The works are sung by the great Wagner soprano Camilla Nylund, who was also unable to perform at the 2020 festival like the rest of her colleagues. – François Hudry
Tracklist
1. Camilla Nylund – Richard Wagner: Siegfried Idyll, WWV 103: a. Ruhig bewegt
2. Camilla Nylund – Richard Wagner: Siegfried Idyll, WWV 103: b. Leicht bewegt
3. Camilla Nylund – Richard Wagner: Siegfried Idyll, WWV 103: c. Lebhaft
4. Camilla Nylund – Richard Wagner: Wesendonck Lieder, WWV 91: I. Der Engel (Arr. Tarkmann for High Voice and Chamber Orchestra)
5. Camilla Nylund – Richard Wagner: Wesendonck Lieder, WWV 91: II. Stehe still! (Arr. Tarkmann for High Voice and Chamber Orchestra)
6. Camilla Nylund – Richard Wagner: Wesendonck Lieder, WWV 91: III. Im Treibhaus (Arr. Tarkmann for High Voice and Chamber Orchestra)
7. Camilla Nylund – Richard Wagner: Wesendonck Lieder, WWV 91: IV. Schmerzen (Arr. Tarkmann for High Voice and Chamber Orchestra)
8. Camilla Nylund – Richard Wagner: Wesendonck Lieder, WWV 91: V. Träume (Arr. Tarkmann for High Voice and Chamber Orchestra)
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