Tristan und Isolde (2009)

Director: Michael Beyer

Since the 1990s, Christoph Marthaler and his congenial stage and costume designer Anna Viebrock have caused a sensation with highly musical and atmospheric productions of plays and operas. It was only a matter of time, then, before this directing team was also invited to the Bayreuth Festival. Marthaler's style of radical deceleration proved ideally suited to Wagner's Tristan und Isolde in this production – with Viebrock's sober yet poetic sets – unveiled in 2005. In the 2009 revival documented here, Robert Dean Smith and Iréne Theorin were joined in the title roles by Robert Holl, one of the great basses of his generation, who sang the role of King Marke.

Cast

Robert Dean Smith

Tristan

Iréne Theorin

Isolde

Michelle Breedt

Brangäne

Robert Holl

King Marke

Jukka Rasilainen

Kurwenal

Ralf Lukas

Melot

Clemens Bieber

A young sailor

Arnold Bezuyen

A shepherd

Martin Snell

A steersman

Peter Schneider

Himself - Musikalische Leitung