A classic production from the Bayreuth Festival is made available here for the first time on DVD! Staged and directed by Richard Wagner's grandson Wolfgang Wagner at the Bayreuther Festspiele in 1999, this production of Wagner's only comic opera features an all-star cast and the Bayreuther Festspiele chorus and orchestra under the direction of Daniel Barenboim. Wolfgang Wagner's timeless staging of Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg is "exhilaratingly conducted" (Gramophone) by Daniel Barenboim. He is joined by Robert Holl, a Sachs of "innate wisdom", Peter Seiffert's "glorious Walther" (Classics Today) and internationally renowned Wagner singers Emily Magee and Andreas Schmidt. Die Meistersinger was intended as a "satirical play" that would serve as a counterweight to the song contest on the Wartburg depicted in Tannhäuser. However, there are two sides to the comic effects and this dual perspective renders the opera in a "spirit of calmly smiling resignation", as Wagner himself proclaimed. Often referred to as a benchmark production and now available on DVD for the first time, this recording will certainly appeal to more than just the sworn circle of Wagner aficionados.

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