Product Details

• Actors: Shostakovich, Nadine Secunde, Christopher Ventris, Alexander Anissimov, Anatoli Kotcherga
• Format: Classical, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Language: Russian
• Subtitles: English, German, Italian, Spanish, French
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: EMI Classics
• DVD Release Date: October 5, 2004
• Run Time: 187 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B0002TTTJW
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #74,537 in Movies & TV (See Bestsellers in Movies & TV)

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  Movies & TV > Musicals & Performing Arts > Classical > By Composer > Shostakovich, Dmitri

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
Dmitry Shostakovich’s Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk is unquestionably one of the greatest operas of the 20th century. This new production, filmed at the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, is part of the new "EMI Classics Opera on DVD" series, which presents first-class productions from the great opera houses of the world. Featured in this production are Nadine Secude (Katerina Ismailova), Christopher Ventris (Sergey), and Anatoli Kotxerga (Boris Ismailov), conducted by Alexander Anissimov with the Symphony Orchestra and Chorus of the Gran Teatre del Liceu. Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk received its premiere at the Maly Theatre in Leningrad in 1934. The libretto, written by Shostakovich himself and Alexander Preys, is based on Nicolay Leskov’s novella of 1865.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

25 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Thoroughly decadent production; thoroughly decadent opera, November 11, 2004

By	Richard Chilson (Minneapolis, MN United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Keep the children away; this is definitely R rated. I had heard but not seen Lady Macbeth before and was impressed. Here I am overwhelmed. My flesh crawled the last ten minutes and I finished beyond tears. This is definitely one of the five great 20th century operas. That Stalin scared Shostakovich out of opera over this counts as one of his crimes against humanity. This production takes a couple liberties with the original including the ending but makes its case powerfully. Nadine Secunde embodies Katerina in all her boredom, longing, oppression and finally despair. Her final frozen paralysis will linger with me a long time. Christopher Ventris resembles a svelt Alec Baldwin. He oozes sex. How often can you say that of a tenor? No wonder Katerina falls for him. And his betrayal of her is numbing. There is not a weak link in singing or acting throughout the huge cast. Anissimov conducts a slow performance in comparison with Rostropovich and Myung on CD (almost half an hour longer), but it does not seem slow. Indeed the production has an inevitable undertow toward disaster from the start. If you do not see this performance you are missing a milestone in 20th century opera. True there seems to be something fishy about the sound at times, as was the case in the company's Hamlet, but that is a minor irritation.

23 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Superlative, February 26, 2005

By	Archie (Ottawa ON Canada) - See all my reviews

I have long been a great fan of Petr Weigl, and gave his production of Lady MacBeth of Mtsensk 5 stars. At the time I thought that no live production could surpass it as a dramatic musical performance. I was wrong.

I bought this production because I am also a fan of Nadine Secunde and would have been prepared to overlook a few weak performances just to see what she could do with this musically and dramatically demanding role. As it turned out, not only does she do a superlative job, but so does the rest of the cast and orchestra.

Although the theatrical set could never be as good as that of the Weigl cinema production, the versatility of it and the lighting were more than appropriate and enhanced the drama. In addition, this production as all the bits that Weigl edited out.

I found the sound and the vision of the DVD very good indeed.

What with multiple camera angles and close-ups, sensitive editing has the ability to enhance the theatrical experience. This production certainly does that.

I cannot recommend it highly enough.

19 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Check second opinion, October 14, 2004

By	Ben Lin "operaben" (Taipei, Taiwan) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Let me leave the performance of this live recording to a later time...

I have to say that I totally DISAGREE with the previous reviewer in terms of the audio and video quality of this DVD release. On my system, the audio quality is absolutely 1st rate. No matter I used LPCM or dts5.1 for the reproduction. The sound stage and sound clarity is beautifully captured, with adequate dynamic, especially in the climax in ACT2. The video quality is first rate for today's DVD standard. (Of course, it can not compare with 1080i resultion of satellite broadcast). The lighting on stage is a matter of taste, but for most part, I think the major roles on stage are more than adequately spot-lighted. And just as a refernce data, the transport stream quatity on this DVD is close to the upper bound (mostly beyond 9 mb/s)