Word: tristan
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...comparisons with "the irrecoverable magic" of Swedish-born Soprano Olive Fremstad.* Last week another Swedish Wagnerian soprano strode the Met's stage, and this time the comparison was to the "incomparable" Flagstad herself. The debutante: 41-year-old Birgit Nilsson, whose appearance in a new production of Tristan und Isolde touched off the kind of debut furor the Met's Wagnerians have not witnessed in a quarter-century...
...solid (5 ft. 8 in., 150 lbs.) and imposing woman, Dramatic Soprano Nilsson was discovered, as the curtain rose, pacing the deck of the ship bearing Isolde to King Mark of Cornwall; for all the world she looked like a handsome Viking figurehead. In the long, angry denunciation of Tristan that followed, she displayed a big, flashing, vibrant voice that galvanized her audience and conveyed an immediate sense of the turbulent passions that animate the role. As the opera unfolded, Soprano Nilsson continued to dominate the stage with such ringing power that she cut without difficulty through the opulent textures...
...production as a whole was less exciting. German Tenor Karl Liebl, substituting as Tristan for the ailing Ramon Vinay, had neither stage presence nor the power to match the Nilsson salvos. Baritone Walter Cassel as Kurvenal and Bass Jerome Hines as King Mark both turned in workmanlike performances, and Soprano Irene Dalis was impressive as Brangaene. Conductor Karl Boehm led his orchestra through a methodical reading. As for the decor, with the world's best to choose from, the Met had again picked the second-rate. The sets by German Designer Teo Otto were pedestrian and confusing: starkly realistic...
Marriage Revealed. Nora Kaye (real name: Nora Koreff), 38, American Ballet Theater's dramatic ballerina, who has made modern ballet's earthy heroines her own, brought grace and precision to classical roles as well; and Herbert Ross, 33, choreographer of sex-swept ballets (Tristan, Metamorphoses) and nightclub acts; she for the third time (No. 2: Violinist Isaac Stern), he for the first; in Majorca, Spain...
David Amram's incidental music is of uneven quality. Highly apt is the background for Romeo's Mantuan soliloquy: an unaccompanied English horn, suggested perhaps by the third act opening of Wagner's Tristan. At the opening performance the balance of the instruments in ensemble playing was awry, but this is easily remedied. George Balanchine's choreography is proper if not exceptional...