"Actor: Matti Salminen"

• Wagner - Die Walkure (Boulez, Bayreuther Festspiele) | DVD | (11/07/2005) from £26.33   |  Saving you £-1.34 (N/A%)   |  RRP £24.99

  Opera in Three ActsThe Second part of Patrice Chereau's epoch-making Bayreuth Ring is a radical re-imagining of Die Walkure unprecedented in its psychological penetration.

• Wagner - Tristan Und Isolde (Barenboim) | DVD | (10/11/2008) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £13.99

  Wagner: Tristan And Isolde / Daniel Barenboim (3 Discs)

• Wagner - Das Rheingold (Boulez, Mcintyre, Schwarz) | DVD | (11/07/2005) from £15.04   |  Saving you £1.95 (11.50%)   |  RRP £16.99

  In Patrice Chereau's illuminating violent Bayreuth production of Das Rheingold Wotan wears the brocade coat of feudal times while the Rhine seems to be a reservoir with modern-day power station. Yet as Chereau says it could also be many other things ... perhaps a mythological presence the mythology of our time ... The gods' ascent to Valhalla (is) a defiant flight into the future.

• Opera Night 2007 - Deutsche Oper Berline - For The German Aids Foundation | DVD | (03/03/2008) from £21.58   |  Saving you £-1.59 (N/A%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Chorus Of The Deutsche Oper Berlin Orchestra Of The Deutsche Oper Berlin Conducted By Lawrence Foster Live from the Deutsche Oper Berlin

• The Flying Dutchman - Wagner | DVD | (09/05/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £16.99

  One of the most acclaimed Wagner productions of the postwar period this electrifying revolutionary Bayreuth staging of The Flying Dutchman catapulted the German director Harry Kupfer to international fame. Kupfer's psychologically acute production presents the entire story as a hallucination in which Senta's yearning for the eternally wandering Dutchman sends her into a trance-like state. Senta is sung by Danish soprano Lisbeth Balslev the American bass-baritone Simon Estes portrays the Dutchman while the Finnish bass Matti Salminen is Daland.

• Der Ring Des Nibelungen: Highlights (La Fura Dels Baus) | Blu Ray | (22/11/2010) from £8.20   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £N/A

• Wagner: Das Rheingold -- Metropolitan/Levine | DVD | (14/10/2002) from £19.99   |  Saving you £-3.00 (N/A%)   |  RRP £16.99

  It takes a certain amount of forethought if Das Rheingold is to be more than a series of special effects scenes, though moments like the appearance of the giants through the mist or Alberich's transformations need to be as thrilling as they are here. As always in his Wagner, and perhaps especially in this very traditional 1990 Metropolitan Opera production of the Ring cycle, James Levine keeps to the forefront the underlying humanity of Wagner's gods and monsters. In the first scene, for example, he brings out the thoughtless, callous frivolity of the Rhine maidens as they precipitate the events of the four operas by taunting the gnome Alberich: it helps that they swirl around, green and gold, in a convincing representation of the bottom of the Rhine, but the emotions are the point. Ekkehaard Wlaschiha is a convincingly menacing Alberich partly because Levine brings out his vulnerability as well as his evil temper. James Morris is splendid as the younger less care-worn Wotan and Siegfried Jerusalem as Loge enjoys the sarcasm of his cynical commentary on Wotan's aspirations. The smaller parts have luxury casting: Matti Salminen as Fafner and Christa Ludwig as Fricka, for example. On the DVD: Das Rheingold comes with a photo gallery of the Metropolitan Opera production and with menus and subtitles in German, French, English, Spanish and Chinese. Disappointingly though it is presented in American NTSC format with standard TV 4:3 visual ratio. But it does have an excellent clear acoustic in all three of its audio options: PCM stereo, Dolby Digital 5.1 and DTS 5.1. --Roz Kaveney

• Wagner: Siegfried -- Metropolitan/Levine | DVD | (14/10/2002) from £19.19   |  Saving you £2.80 (14.59%)   |  RRP £21.99

  James Levine makes Siegfried, sometimes the problem child among the four operas of Wagner's Ring cycle, attractive and interesting. He is aware of the darker side of some of the comic scenes--the seemingly benevolent dwarf Mime carries the weight of Wagner's many prejudices--but manages to keep them uneasy rather than positively sinister thanks to the finally judged performance of Heinz Zednik. Siegfried Jerusalem is admirable as Siegfried, full of boyish enthusiasm during the reforging of the sword, and of authority in his confrontations with the dragon and with Wotan. (The dragon itself is, as so often, an unfortunate compromise between realism and stylisation.) James Morris is extraordinary in Wotan's scenes here, his combination of injured pride and relieved joy when Siegfried demonstrates, by shattering his spear, that Wotan has entirely lost control of events is exemplary. This is an opera whose many and various scenes are all preludes to its emotional core: the love duet which comes when Siegfried awakens Brunnhilde. Jerusalem and Hildegard Behrens convey both the innocence and the ardor of this duet; while Levine gets extraordinary playing from the Metropolitan Opera orchestra throughout, but especially here, where a chamber-like delicacy applies to much of the music. On the DVD Siegfried on this disc is a recording of the 1990 Metropolitan Opera production and comes with both menus and subtitles in German, French, English, Spanish and Chinese as well as a picture gallery. Awkwardly it is presented in (American) NTSC format not PAL, and the visual ratio is standard TV 4:3. Better is the choice of sound formats--PCM Stereo, Dolby Digital and DTS digital--which provide a spacious acoustic that gives proper weight to the climaxes, and an appropriate delicacy to Wagner's subtler passages. --Roz Kaveney

• Wagner: Gotterdammerung -- Metropolitan/Levine | DVD | (14/10/2002) from £12.24   |  Saving you £11.01 (100.27%)   |  RRP £21.99

  Under the baton of James Levine, Gotterdammerung ("The Twilight of the Gods") has a narrative drive that reminds us that, of all the individual operas in Wagner's Ring cycle, this is the one most about human emotions and the one in which its heroes are pulled into a world where they are most vulnerable to them. Siegfried Jerusalem as Siegfried and Hildegard Behrens as Brunnhilde never, in a sense, stand a chance: they are innocents who allow themselves to be manipulated not merely by the villainous Hagen, but by the ordinary venality of Gunther and his sister Gutrune, who goes along with a dirty little scheme to get what she wants, and is destroyed by it. As the tempter figure Hagen, Matti Salminen dominates the stage whenever he is on it; he is one of those basses whose voice and scowl seem to come from somewhere deeper than his large boots: rarely have the summoning of the vassals, or the oath of vengeance he, Gunther and Brunnhilde swear against Siegfried seemed so utterly his triumph. Jerusalem is almost perfect as Siegfried in spite of the gravelly quality of his heroic tenor: he has a glorious innocence even when the character is tricked into desecrating his true love; Hildegard Behrens is magnificent as Brunnhilde, both in her anger at Siegfried's apparent betrayal of her and in her redemptive understanding of how she has to atone for his death. Other Gotterdammerungs may be more monumental, but few make you care so passionately. On the DVD: Gotterdammerung comes with menus and subtitles in German, French, English, Spanish and Chinese and with a picture gallery of the production. Awkwardly it is presented in (American) NTSC format, not PAL, and with a visual aspect of standard TV 4:3. More impressive is the choice of PCM stereo, Dolby Digital 5.1 or DTS 5.1; the sound is admirably clear and well-balanced. --Roz Kaveney

• Mozart: Don Giovanni -- Zurich/Harnoncourt | DVD | (12/03/2002) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £29.99

  In this Zurich Opera House staging of Mozart’s darkly comic cautionary fable Don Giovanni the lighting and stage design keep the characters shaded in half-shadow: even Zerlina’s wedding feels like a subdued affair here, and the Don’s banqueting room is a suitably gloomy venue for the Stone Guest’s climactic visit for a spot of dinner and damnation. Both this staging and video director Brian Large’s filming play no tricks with the audience’s expectations, opting for a largely traditional presentation of this tragedy of swaggering bravado, cuckolded lovers and revenge from beyond the grave. Nikolaus Harnoncourt brings all the sensitivity of his historically informed approach to the orchestra pit. Heading a very strong cast are Rodney Gilfry, defiantly strong-voiced but also haughtily handsome as the seducing Don, and Cecilia Bartoli, a mercurial presence as Donna Elvira. Their scenes together crackle and fizz, even when Bartoli’s extremely ripe vibrato contrasts a little uncomfortably with Harnoncourt’s authenticity. Liliana Nikiteanu makes for a pretty, naïve Zerlina, convincingly torn between her Masetto (Oliver Widmer) and the animalistic attraction of the Don. Laszlo Polgar’s Leporello is wheedling and base, but still the inheritor of his master’s charisma; Isabel Rey and Roberto Sacca are solid as the colourless moralists Anna and Ottavio; while Matti Salminen’s powerful Commendatore isn’t expected to do anything more than stand still and declaim. Overall this is an excellent musical performance, unexceptionally staged. On the DVD: Don Giovanni on disc has a good 24-minute "Behind the Scenes" feature, including interviews with Cecilia Bartoli, Harnoncourt, Gilfry and Isabel Rey. There’s also a trailer for other ArtHaus releases. The 16:9 picture sometimes struggles to bring definition to the dimly lit sets; sound though is crisp and clean PCM stereo or Dolby 5.1. There are subtitles in five languages. --Mark Walker

• Parsifal - The Search For The Grail | DVD | (11/01/2004) from £7.66   |  Saving you £13.59 (212.34%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Parsifal: The Search for the Grail is a documentary that sets Wagner's last opera in its cultural context, tracing the history of the Grail myth back to the Middle Ages, and arguing that any specifically Christian myth goes back no further than that. It acknowledges that Parsifal is Wagner's most problematic opera, as well as one of his greatest, and gives chapter and verse for its role in creating the culturally respectable anti-Semitism that led to the Holocaust, as well as discussing other issues like its profound, though eloquently expressed, misogyny. At the same time, it makes what case is possible for the non-aesthetic defence--all of the above is true, and yet it is also an opera about learning compassion, at once poisonous and healing. Placido Domingo is the narrator, taking us through chats with talking heads that range from theologian Karen Armstrong to members of the Wagner family and film clips that range from Monty Python and Indiana Jones to Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal. He also performs the role in a variety of extracts conducted by Valery Gergiev at the Kirov Opera, reminding us of just how viscerally impressive and lyrically beautiful late Wagner can be. On the DVD: The Search for the Grail is presented in old TV standard 4:3 ration with only PCM stereo sound. It comes equipped with a useful set of chapter headings and with subtitles in English, French, German and Spanish. --Roz Kaveney

• Wagner - Die Meistersinger Non Nurnberg | DVD | (07/03/2005) from £3.26   |  Saving you £13.99 (699.50%)   |  RRP £15.99

  Richard WagnerDie Meistersinger Von NurnbergOper in drei Akten.

• Parsifal - Wagner | DVD | (29/03/2005) from £41.65   |  Saving you £-5.40 (N/A%)   |  RRP £34.99

  Nikolaus Lehnoff's visionary staging of Wagner's opera for ENO.

• Wagner: Das Rheingold (Das Rheingold - Staged By La Fura Dels Baus) | Blu Ray | (30/11/2009) from £25.79   |  Saving you £4.20 (16.29%)   |  RRP £29.99

  CMJ 700604; CMAJOR ENTERTAINMENT; Classica Lirica

• Wagner: Das Rheingold | DVD | (15/10/2001) from £3.54   |  Saving you £22.71 (996.05%)   |  RRP £24.99

• Wagner: Gotterdammerung (Gotterdammerung Staged By La Fura Dels Baus) | Blu Ray | (18/01/2010) from £25.65   |  Saving you £4.34 (16.92%)   |  RRP £29.99

  Crepuscolo Degli Dei (Il) / Gotterdammerung

• Der Fliegende Hollaender | DVD | (05/07/2004) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £17.99

  Ilkka Backman's acclaimed production takes place outdoors in the huge courtyard of Finland's 500 year old Olavinlinna Castle - a majestic and impressive setting which gives the production an atmosphere and realism almost impossible to create in a conventional theatre.

• Wagner: Die Walkure (Die Walkure - Staged By La Fura Dels Baus) | Blu Ray | (30/11/2009) from £25.50   |  Saving you £4.49 (17.61%)   |  RRP £29.99

  CMJ 700804; CMAJOR ENTERTAINMENT; Classica Lirica

• Wagner: Die Walkure -- Bayreuth | DVD | (15/10/2001) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £29.99

  Die Walkure is the 'first day' of Wagner's great tetra logy of music dramas Der Ring des Nibelungen.Conducted by Pierre Boulez and directed by Patrice Chereau this 1976 production commemorating the centenary of the first Bayreuth Ring has come to be seen as the most illuminating and significant of modern times.

• Wagner: Das Rheingold (Das Rheingold - Staged By La Fura Dels Baus) | DVD | (30/11/2009) from £28.65   |  Saving you £6.34 (22.13%)   |  RRP £34.99

  Oro Del Reno (L') / Das Rheingold (2 Dvd)