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Debussy - Pelleas et Melisande

Label: LSO Live

Cat No: LSO0790

Barcode: 0822231179023

Format: Hybrid SACD

Number of Discs: 3

Genre: Opera

Release Date: 6th October 2017

This product has now been deleted. Information is for reference only.

Works

Debussy, Claude

Pelleas et Melisande

Artists

Magdalena Kozena
Christian Gerhaher
Gerald Finley
Bernarda Fink
Elias Madler
Franz-Josef Selig
Joshua Bloom
London Symphony Chorus
London Symphony Orchestra

Conductor

Simon Rattle

Works

Debussy, Claude

Pelleas et Melisande

Artists

Magdalena Kozena
Christian Gerhaher
Gerald Finley
Bernarda Fink
Elias Madler
Franz-Josef Selig
Joshua Bloom
London Symphony Chorus
London Symphony Orchestra

Conductor

Simon Rattle

About

Sir Simon Rattle leads an all-star cast in this highly-anticipated new recording of Debussy’s evocative opera Pelléas et Mélisande. It was captured in January 2016 during performances of an innovative collaboration between Rattle and Peter Sellars, two of the boldest creative minds in music and theatre today. Supported by the London Symphony Chorus, prepared by renowned choral director Simon Halsey, it is a moving statement of intent for Rattle’s tenure as LSO Music Director.

The plot, a love triangle between Prince Golaud, his wife Mélisande and his brother Pelléas, is shrouded in mystery and full of gripping twists and emotion-filled turns, ultimately ending in Pelléas’s untimely death. The sensuous score contains some of Debussy’s most exquisite music and perfectly crystalises the atmosphere of Maeterlinck’s original play.

"Irresistible...the performance was being recorded for LSO Live. I shall be first in the queue to buy it" – Rupert Christiansen, The Telegraph ****

"Simon Rattle and Peter Sellars go headstrong into a bright future with the London Symphony Orchestra... It is a work that brings the best out of Rattle as an opera conductor too...The stature of Pelléas et Mélisande as one of the greatest of all operas was never in doubt, and the performance was dedicated to the memory of Pierre Boulez, who worked regularly with the LSO over almost half a century, and was a mentor to the young Rattle; Pelléas was also the only staged opera that he ever conducted in Britain." – The Guardian ****

"Rattle’s conducting was immaculate... the performance has made me think about the work again" – The Spectator

Cast:
- Mélisande: Magdalena Kožená
- Pelléas: Christian Gerhaher
- Golaud: Gerald Finley
- Yniold: Elias Mädler
- Arkel: Franz-Josef Selig
- Geneviève: Bernarda Fink
- Shepherd, A Doctor: Joshua Bloom

Sound/Video

Paused

1

Acte 1 Scene 1 'Une Foret': 'Je Ne Pourrais Plus Sortir'
2

Acte 1 Scene 1 'Une Foret': 'Pourquoi Pleures-Toi?'
3

Acte 1 Scene 1 'Une Foret': Interlude
4

Acte 1 Scene 2 'Un Appartement Dans Le Chateau': 'Voici ce Qu'il Ecrit a Son Frere'
5

Acte 1 Scene 2 'Un Appartement Dans Le Chateau': 'Qu'en Dites-Vous?'
6

Acte 1 Scene 2 'Un Appartement Dans Le Chateau': Interlude
7

Acte 1 Scene 3 'Devant Le Chateau': 'Il Fait Sombre Dans Les Jardins'
8

Acte 1 Scene 3 'Devant Le Chateau': 'Hoe Hisse Hoe!'
9

Acte 2 Scene 1 'Une Fontaine Dans Le Parc': 'Vous Ne Savez Pas Ou Je Vous Ai Menee?'
10

Acte 2 Scene 1 'Une Fontaine Dans Le Parc': C'est Au Bord D'une Fontaine'
11

Acte 2 Scene 1 'Une Fontaine Dans Le Parc': Interlude
12

Acte 2 Scene 2 'Un Appartement Dans Le Chateau': 'Ah! Ah! Tout Va Bien'
13

Acte 2 Scene 2 'Un Appartement Dans Le Chateau': 'Tiens, Ou Est L'anneau Que Je T'avais Donne'
14

Acte 2 Scene 2 'Un Appartement Dans Le Chateau': Interlude
15

Acte 2 Scene 3 'Devant Une Grotte': 'Oui; C'est Ici Nous Y Sommes'
16

Acte 3 Scene 1 'Une des tours du chateau': 'Mes longs cheveux descendent'
17

Acte 3 Scene 1 'Une des tours du chateau': 'Je les tiens dans le mains'
18

Acte 3 Scene 1 'Une des tours du chateau': 'Que faites-vous ici?'
19

Acte 3 Scene 2 'Les souterrains du chateau': 'Prenez garde, par ici'
20

Acte 3 Scene 3 'Une terrasse au sortir des souterrains': 'Ah, je respire en fin!'
21

Acte 3 Scene 3 'Une terrasse au sortir des souterrains': Interlude
22

Acte 3 Scene 4 'Devant le chateau': 'Viens, nous allons nous asseoir ici'
23

Acte 3 Scene 4 'Devant le chateau': 'Qu'ils s'embrassent, petit pere?'
24

Acte 4 Scene 1 'Un appartement dans le chateau': 'Ou vas-tu?'
25

Acte 4 Scene 2: 'Maintenant que le pere de Pelleas'
26

Acte 4 Scene 2: 'Pelleas part ce soir'
27

Acte 4 Scene 2: 'Ne mettez pas ainsi votre main a la gorge'
28

Acte 4 Scene 2: Interlude
29

Acte 4 Scene 3 'Une fontaine dans le parc': 'Oh! Cette pierre est lourde'
30

Acte 4 Scene 4: 'C'est le dernier soir'
31

Acte 4 Scene 4: 'Nous sommes venus ici il y a bien longtemps'
32

Acte 4 Scene 4: 'On dirait que ta voix'
33

Acte 4 Scene 4: 'Quel est ce bruit?'
34

Acte 5 Scene 1 'Une Chambre Dans Le Chateau': 'Ce N'est Pas De Cette Petite Blessure'
35

Acte 5 Scene 1 'Une Chambre Dans Le Chateau': 'Attention, Je Crois Qu'elle S'eveille'
36

Acte 5 Scene 1 'Une Chambre Dans Le Chateau': 'Melisande, As-Tu Pitie De Moi?'
37

Acte 5 Scene 1 'Une Chambre Dans Le Chateau': 'Non, Non Nous N'avons Pas Ete Coupables'
38

Acte 5 Scene 1 'Une Chambre Dans Le Chateau': 'Qu'avez-vous Fait?'
39

Acte 5 Scene 1 'Une Chambre Dans Le Chateau': 'Qu'y A-T-Il?'
40

Acte 5 Scene 1 'Une Chambre Dans Le Chateau': 'Attention... Attention!'

Europadisc Review

Recently ranked by BBC Music Magazine as no.11 in their list of all-time greatest operas, Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande is – together with Berg’s Wozzeck and Duke Bluebeard’s Castle by Bartók – one of the miracles of 20th-century opera. Debussy’s almost verbatim setting of Maurice Maeterlinck’s claustrophobic and mutedly mysterious Symbolist drama is a masterpiece of suggestion, vocal restraint, suppressed emotion and contained yet colourful scoring. It is a work that has been fortunate on disc, above all with the great Francophone performances of yesteryear (Desormière, Cluytens, Inghelbrecht, Ansermet) but also well into the stereo and digital eras (notably Boulez, Abbado and Haitink). And the truth is that so much of the work’s quiet power is ‘composed into’ the allusive score (by both Maeterlinck’s words and Debussy’s music) that any performance, given a reasonably strong line-up of soloists, sensitive orchestra and textually aware conductor, is likely to make its mark.

That this new recording from the LSO Live label, taken from semi-staged performances at the Barbican in January 2016, amounts to so much more is a tribute both to the sure musical hand of Simon Rattle (whose experience with Pelléas goes back decades) and to his enviable ensemble, from soloists down to the very last member of the orchestra. One of the first things that strikes the listener is not just the beauty of the sound, but also its all-enveloping nature: for these performances, with the orchestra onstage immediately behind the singers, the instruments doubled in function as the forest setting, with flutes and clarinets ranged either side of the stage, and the first violins in the centre. The effectiveness of this will undoubtedly be more apparent to those who have Surround Sound equipment, but even on standard stereo conventional the results are remarkable. And for once the powerless tragic heroine Mélisande really does die ‘among the violins’, as Debussy wished.

Rattle has at his disposal a top-drawer cast, who had already performed Peter Sellars’s semi-staging in Berlin with the conductor’s ‘other’ orchestra, the Berliner Philharmoniker, before bringing it to London with the LSO. As the fated title characters, Magdalena Kožená and Christian Gerhaher have just the right voice types for Debussy’s mezzo-ish Mélisande and baryton-Martin Pelléas. Despite less than perfect French diction, Kožená is hugely engaging as a more than usually forthright heroine, with an alluringly smoky quality to the voice, while Gerhaher captures that strange combination of detachment and passion that makes Pelléas such a problematic hero. Franz-Josef Selig is a sympathetic Arkel, blind in wisdom as well as sight, while Bernarda Fink is luxury casting as Geneviève, mother of Golaud and Pelléas, whose appearances are limited to two scenes in Act 1. As Golaud’s son Yniold, treble Elias Mädler from the Tölzer Knabenchor demonstrates a musical maturity far beyond his years: the climax as, forced by Golaud to spy on the two lovers, he shouts ‘j’ai terriblement peur!’ is every bit as unsettling as it should be.

The outstanding individual, performance, however, comes from Gerald Finley as Golaud, the prince who discovers the lost Mélisande, marries her, but is then consumed by jealousy. Anyone who knows the opera will realise that it is this part, and not so much the title roles, that is the key to a great performance. Alone among a cast of characters fatally bound by Maeterlinck’s all-enveloping passivity, the restless Golaud vainly attempts resistance and action. And even though his actions are doomed at best to failure, at worst catastrophe, it is his resistance and his ultimately futile questioning that provide the work with its subtly shrouded dynamism. This role fits Finley like a glove. Whether glowering menacingly, desperately trying to be sensitive or rational, but above all in his jealous outbursts, Finley has the vocal range, technique and sensitivity to inhabit the part as few others have done, certainly in the post-mono era. Indeed, for all his many successes in the field of Lieder, and in operas from Mozart and Wagner to Adams and Turnage, this could be one of his finest achievements.

Alongside Finely’s Golaud, it is Rattle and the orchestra who raise this performance to greatness. There is a superb sense of slowly-built tension, unbearably powerful climaxes, and beautifully shaped interludes. Some may miss the authentic tang of the French orchestras of old, but the beauty and transparency of tone achieved by the LSO is a thing of wonder, and augurs well for its future under Rattle. Compared with the classic recording by Boulez (to whose memory the performances were dedicated), the textures are consistently more colourful, and Rattle’s tempi more pliant and (at times) volatile. This is a work that Rattle has lived with and conducted more than any other opera, and it shows in the way he and the orchestra shape and tease out every nuance of Debussy’s marvellous textures without ever feeling micro-managed. In particular, the crucial Acts 3 and 4 burn with a rare intensity, providing the fullest possible realisation of Maeterlinck’s dramatic vision. Listening to it all, the listener is left in no doubt that this is the work that unlocked the floodgates of Debussy’s mature style, in works such as La Mer and the great piano cycles.

With excellent sound, full libretto (in French and English) and at a highly competitive price, this is a bargain to be snapped up without hesitation. One laments only that room couldn’t be found in the booklet for a few pictures of Sellars’s striking production.

Reviews

Rattle maintains both a clear pulse in individual scenes and a through line which positively celebrates Debussy’s and Maeterlinck’s radical intercutting of scenes of varied physical and emotional locations in the central acts. ... Aside from the Montreal-born Gerald Finley there are no natural French speakers in the cast – but don’t worry. The language side, an annoying glitch on some rival recordings, has been fully taken care of. The French of the German Pelléas and Arkel is especially well studied. Both Gerhaher and Kožená are good at not over-egging the pudding of their confusions and naiveties, or indeed flirtatiousness, which fixes even more attention on the words. Finley manages to make Golaud’s rages frightening without the ‘evil’ melodrama that bigger, darker voices have brought to the role. ... If we are talking competition, this new version (which, as I have already hinted, sounds exceptionally clean and fine) scores high up the list and is highly recommended – an early jewel in the crown of Simon Rattle’s assumption of the principal conductorship of the LSO. Mike Ashman

Gramophone December 2017

Rattle draws myriad nuances without ever losing sight of either the textural balance or the overall apcing. In his hands, for instance, the bassoons in the first Act II interlude are both prophetic of The Firebird and suggest the start of Golaud’s descent into darkness. Every moment counts. ... a sonically luxurious set at a bargain price. Christopher Dingle

BBC Music Magazine Christmas 2017

Gerald Finley’s composed yet menacing Golaud is superb, and to have Bernarda Fink and Franz-Josef Selig as Geneviève and Arkel is real luxury casting. Under Rattle’s leadership the orchestra is a true protagonist in the drama; the colours of this great score are constantly evolving, intensifying and receding, and the interludes are wonderfully well played. Erica Jeal

The Guardian 5 October 2017