5/5 What do you mean you don't own this already?
  by Angus W. Grant (Melbourne, Australia)
This is a corker. I don't have trouble with modern stagings, I have trouble with bad stagings. If the concept behind this setting troubles you ( I don't know why, it makes perfect sense to me), surely you can enjoy the dozens of magical moments where the sublime music is only enhanced by the stage directions.
The romantic interlude up to and including "ein augenblick ist wenig" in the prologue is intensely beautiful, with the Composer and Zerbinetta breifly allowing themselves to be touchingly human. So clever. Having the composer return to accompany Zerbinetta for her grand aria is a wonderful touch. You will never have seen this rambling coloratura spectacular make so much dramatic sense. Why is Martinez not more famous? There are so many deft directional touches ranging from the profound to the twee, but all convincingly part of the overall concept.

None of this would matter if the singing was ordinary, but it is very good and often excellent. Sophie Koch in particular is outstanding. Davis here is at his most compelling. This is a very driven and passionate reading of the score which is not afraid to enjoy the sensual moments or make the most of climaxes. the recorded sound is excellent as is the camera work and quality of the lighting.
I love the great singers on the Levine DG set (Norman and Troyanos) but find that I can only watch small sections as the production is like something out of your great Aunt's doily collection. Aridane is a flawed dramatic work which contains Strauss' most sublime music. This production makes it thrilling to watch and allows you to hear things in the music you didn't realise were there. For that reason it is an essential purchase.

5/5 Look What They've Done To My Song!
  by Miz Ellen (Bovine Universe)
A wealthy but boorish patron of the arts commissions a tragic opera from an up and coming young composer (sung by Sophie Koch as a trouser role). He also and somewhat absentmindedly hires a troop of burlesque clowns to entertain his guests. The opera seria singers are decidedly miffed at this but all heck breaks loose when the Major-Domo informs everybody that, to save time, both productions will go on simultaneously.

What can I say? (It is very hard to talk with one's tongue in cheek.) This opera literally has everything: the grand prima donna singing the tragic role of the abandoned heroine Ariadne, longing for death because her lover has left her...and a bunch of clowns.

I loved this spoof. It makes fun of the exaggerated emotions and stuffy conventions of tragic opera. This production has a fresh, modern feel although I'm guessing it was done years ago. The actual period is left vague -- the characters wear vaguely period costumes while the guests (who wander around the stage on the fringes of the performance) seem to be generic. As for the singers, the one that sticks in the brain afterward is Sophie Koch who strikes all the right notes in the role of the outraged composer.

5/5 Different does not mean wrong
  by Mr John Haueisen (WORTHINGTON, OHIO United States)
So what if the three Muses look like multi-colored Smurfs?

Yes, the costuming, scenery, and number of people onstage may be different from what we are accustomed to, but IT WORKS!

First, Sophie Koch, as the Composer, not only sings excellently, but, acting-wise, she seems more involved in the entire production, as she drifts on and off the stage, pondering what is to become of her composition--this work. She really makes Strauss's point about writing music for the stage.

Colin Davis and the orchestra of the Sachsische Staatsoper Dresden provide the appropriate sublimely Strauss "terrible chords" (in the good sense) which support the great artist performances here.

Susan Anthony brings passion and masterly singing, with acting to match it. At the end, as the credits start to roll, we can see that she is exhilarated by this magnificent performance.

Jon Villars, though a bit bizarrely attired (how does one dress as Bacchus?) is the most powerful, vocally and stage-presence-wise that I've seen in this (Hermes/Bacchus) role.

Iride Martinez, despite the other two strong leads, manages to steal the show. Her singing is superb. Her joie d'vivre and-- Oh, her facial expressions!-- give new depth to the role. This is why opera should be seen on DVD!

It's like leaving the theater thinking, "Oh boy, I sure am glad I came to see this tonight."

5/5 "Wonderful Opera and Performance--Sophie Koch Is Smashing"
  by Paul L. McKaskle (Berkeley, California)


Ariadne auf Naxos is one of my favorite operas and I have seen it on stage numerous times. However, in the past I have found the Prologue only occasionally amusing but not nearly as enjoyable as the opera proper. But with this production, and especially with the singing and acting of Sophie Koch as the Composer, I now truly enjoy the Prologue. Koch is simply magnificent as the young, innocent, idealistic composer who discovers that her masterpiece is to be trashed by the whim of her aristocratic employer. She is horrified when she meets Zerbinetta, whose Commedia dell Arte troop is to perform simultaneously with her opera. But, Zerbinetta works her magic on the Composer and for a few moments the Composer is transfixed by Zerbinetta. But the bustle of getting ready for the performance (performances?) sweeps over the stage and the Prologue comes to an end.

As Ariadne, Susan Anthony, new to me, does an excellent job. Of those I've seen on stage, Elisabeth Schwartzkopf remains the standard for me, and both Leontyne Price and Deborah Voigt are close competitors in the role. Susan Anthony also comes very close. Iride Martinez, also new to me, is superb as Zerbinetta. I haven't yet had the pleasure of seeing Natalie Dessay sing the role (though I have her on CD) and she might even be better, and I've heard several other excellent Zerbinetta's in the past, but Martinez does a wonderful job, especially with the show-stopper Grossmachtige Prinzessen. The rest of the cast is strong. The major-domo is wonderfully imperious.

The production is set in "modern times" and is unconventional in several respects. I'm not a big fan of "updating" operas. I think updating Rosenkavalier, for example, would be a terrible mistake-its whole logic depends on the ethos of the time in which it is set. But I don't think there is any compelling reason to perform Ariadne as an 18th century event. Wealthy boorish "patrons" exist today. I also don't think the production could properly be called "euro-trash" (of which there is too much these days.) It is unconventional, and there are a couple of jarring features in the sets-the "bathroom" at stage right in the Prologue and some sort of TV device in the background during the Opera proper, but mostly the set is pretty realistic given that it is supposed to be set in a large mansion, not in a theater. So, the Prologue takes place in a makeshift backstage and the Opera proper is in a space somewhere in the house. The inclusion of the guests milling around on the periphery of the stage might be jarring to some, but it didn't bother me-it emphasized that the "patron" was a boor who has boorish friends. Finally, during the opera proper, the Composer makes several (silent) appearances, most prominently where "he" "plays" the piano during Grossmachtige Prinzessen while looking as if "he" is in love with Zerbinetta. I thought these were nice touches (though, doubtless, controversial) since it always seemed to me to be a shame that the Composer disappears at the end of the Prologue and we never know how he might have reacted to the final product. I think the Opera proper is simply magnificent music-easily on my "desert-island top ten" list--and I have probably listened to it on LP and then on CD multiple hundreds of times in the past half century. So it is nice to see in this production that the Composer is captivated by the final product.

I recommend this DVD wholeheartedly, first for Sophie Koch's incredible performance, second, for the solid performance of everyone else and, third, for an imaginative production-- though "modern" not jarringly so, at least to me.

4/5 Strange staging, fantastic singing
  by Dryadrianne
Yes, the staging is weird, there are many things that are just make no sense. I did not understand what was happening in the bathroom to the right, and what was that for, but the singing is spectacular. Villars and Susan Anthony are very good, Sophie Koch is incredible, and Iride Martinez as Zerbinetta is sensational! Where did they find her? She is possibly the best Zerbinetta I have ever seen, so spunky and vivacious, and her singing is unbelivable. I can only imagine what it feels to come on stage after she did the Grossmachtige Prinzess, as Ms Voigt once said about Nathalie Dessay, she wipes the stage with that aria! And her scenes with the Composer are wonderfull, too, so ignore the bizarre production ideas, they are a bit annoying, but they will not detract you from enjoying the fantastic singing. Orchestra is very good too. This is one Ariadne DVD to own.