A magnificent orchestra, exuberant harmonies and dissonances, and a climax with cosmic love await those who drink of Wagner’s enchanting work and abandon themselves to the ultimate love story.  

With Tristan and Isolde the Danish National Opera once more presents one of Wagner’s great works. The most recent was The Flying Dutchman (‘08), which was Giordano Bellincampi’s first Wagner opera as conductor. With Tristan and Isolde the Danish National Opera launches a dramatic and musically capti­vating ‘12-’13 season, presented by a top team both on stage and behind the scenes; not least the leading aesthetic figure of Danish theatre, Mikael Melbye, who is staging Wagner’s opera, and Gior­dano Bellincampi, who is conducting the great work. The demanding title roles as Tristan and Isolde are sung by Robert Gambill and Danish Ann Petersen, who was also a part of the Reumert Prize-winning production of Die tote Stadt (‘10) at the Danish National Opera.  

Psychological love journey The opera takes us on a psychological journey with the two lovers, the nobleman Tristan and the Irish Princess Isolde. They fall deeply in love and see each other as soulmates. A love potion inten­sifies their emotions and in the end they choose a death in which they can be united throughout eter­nity. The love story is based on an ancient Celtic romantic legend.  

The epoch-making ‘Tristan chord’
Tristan and Isolde was premiered in 1865, at the same time as Wagner was deeply involved with The Ring of the Nibelung. Musically, Tristan and Isolde was a revolution in the German Romantic tradition and a milestone in the history of western music. Among other things, the first chord of the opera, which has later been called “the Tristan chord”, was an epoch-making event, involving a tension that is only resolved at the end of the opera. Wagner also uses the colours of the orchestra to create atmo­spheric universes that form the background for the captivating medi­tative mood and fantastic love duets of the work.    

Ultimate love. Liebestod
Wagner was interested in myth and was stirred by the contemporary thinking of philosophers and artists about the ultimate, unifying love that can only be realized in a so-called “love-death”, as represented by the concept Liebestod. Wagner though that Gottfried von Strassbourg’s romance from the 13th century about Tristan and Isolde was a unique point of departure, and the composer himself wrote the poem that became the libretto of Tristan and Isolde.    

The production team
It is with great pleasure that the Danish National Opera looks forward to working again with Mikael Melbye, who will be designing and directing Tristan and Isolde. Last year Melbye was behind the great success at the Danish National Opera of Die tote Stadt, which won the Reumert Prize for Opera of the Year 2010. Melbye was also behind Puccini’s The Girl of the Golden West (‘09), Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande and Strauss’ Salome (‘99, debut at the Danish National Opera), all nominated for the Reumert Prize. At the Royal Danish Theatre he staged among other works the opening production at the new Opera House, Aida (‘05). At the DNO Mikael Melbye is also staging Mozart’s Don Giovanni, which will be sent on a nationwide tour in February-March 2012. 1   In Tristan and Isolde you can see costumes by Deirdre Clancy and projections by Wendall Harring­ton. Both were on the team behind Die tote Stadt and The Girl of the Golden West. The lighting design is by John Bishop, who is making his debut at the Danish National Opera with the lighting design for Don Giovanni (‘12).  

The Danish National Opera’s artistic director Giordano Bellincampi conducts Tristan and Isolde. At the Danish National Opera he has conducted among other things Wagner’s The Flying Dutchman (‘08), Puccini’s Manon Lescaut, The Girl of the Golden West and La Bohème and Verdi’s Il Trovatore, La Traviata and Rigoletto. Bellincampi thus adds a final flourish to eight years as artistic director of the Danish National Opera with the 2012-13 season, when he conducts both Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde and Puccini’s Tosca. He is artistic director of the Danish National Opera until May 2013 and from September ‘12 he has been appointed principal conductor of the Duisburg Philhar­monic and the orchestra of the Pomeriggi Musicali in Milan.      

Cast
Ann Petersen has earlier enchanted audiences at the Danish National Opera in among other roles Marietta in Die tote Stadt (‘10), Leonore in Beethoven’s Fidelio (‘07) and Die Marschallin in Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier (‘05) and is now going from strength to strength in her international career. She has just sung Wagner, both as Isolde at the Opéra de Lyon (‘11) and as Elsa in Lohengrin at the Teatro Colón in Argentina (‘11). In the future she can be heard as Isolde at the Welsh National Opera (‘12), the Empress in Strauss’ Die Frau ohne Schatten at the Royal Danish Theatre (‘12), Freya in Das Rhinegold at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden (‘12), Eva in Die Meister­singer in Baden-Baden (‘13), Senta in The Flying Dutchman with Torsten Kerl at the outdoor Arena Orange, France (‘13), and Marietta in Die tote Stadt at the Dallas Opera with Torsten Kerl (‘14).  

Elena Batoukova-Kerl comes from a major international Wagner career and will now be making her debut at the Danish National Opera in the role of Brangäne. The other soloists are well known names at the Danish National Opera who also have thriving national and international careers. King Marke is sung by Petri Lindroos, who most recently sang Sarastro in The Magic Flute at the Danish National Opera (‘08). The role of Kurwenal is sung by Morten Frank Larsen, who most recently sang Don Fernando in Fidelio (’07),the Count in The Marriage of Figaro (‘06) and Pelléas in Pelléas et Mélisande (‘02). David Danholt sings the Shepherd and has sung innumerable major roles at the Danish National Opera, including the Steersman in Wagner’s The Flying Dutchman (‘08); in the spring he will be singing Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni (‘12).