FULL KING ARTHUR Stuttgart 2024 Linda Bennett, Katinka Bohse, Sanghee Han, Lara Rieken
Information on the Performance
- Work Title: King Arthur
- Composer: Purcell Henry
- Libretto: John Dryden
- Venue & Opera Company: Staatliche Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst HMDK, Stuttgart, Germany
- Recorded: July 14. 2024
- Type: Concert Live
- Singers: Linda Bennett, Katinka Bohse, Sanghee Han, Lara Rieken, Giorgia Cappello, Leandra Nietzsche, Gregor Jenne, Theo Rohde, Hannes Nedele, Matthias Lika, Jonathan Paulsen
- Conductor: Thilo Dahlmann
- Orchestra: Studierende der Instrumentalklassen der HMDK
- Stage Director:
- Costume Designer:
Information about the Recording
- Published by: Staatliche Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst Stuttgart
- Date Published: 2024
- Format: Streaming
- Quality Video: 4 Audio:4
- Subtitles: nosubs
- Video Recording from: YouTube FULL VIDEO
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON THIS PERFORMANCE
King Arthur, or The British Worthy (Z. 628), is a semi-opera in five acts with music by Henry Purcell and a libretto by John Dryden. It was first performed at the Queen’s Theatre, Dorset Garden, London, in late May or early June 1691.
The plot is based on the battles between King Arthur’s Britons and the Saxons, rather than the legends of Camelot (although Merlin does make an appearance). It is a Restoration spectacular, including such supernatural characters as Cupid and Venus plus references to the Germanic gods of the Saxons, Woden, Thor, and Freya. The tale centres on Arthur’s endeavours to recover his fiancée, the blind Cornish Princess Emmeline, who has been abducted by his arch-enemy, the Saxon King Oswald of Kent.
King Arthur is a “dramatick opera” or semi-opera: the principal characters do not sing, except if they are supernatural, pastoral or, in the case of Comus and the popular Your hay it is mow’d, drunk. Secondary characters sing to them, usually as diegetic entertainment, but in Act 4 and parts of Act 2, as supernatural beckonings. The singing in Act 1 is religious observance by the Saxons, ending with their heroic afterlife in Valhalla. The protagonists are actors, as a great deal of King Arthur consists of spoken text. This was normal practice in 17th century English opera. King Arthur contains some of Purcell’s most lyrical music, using adventurous harmonies for the day.
Quoted from Wikipedia