Die Fledermaus

Composer: Strauss II, Johann

Librettist/Text Author: Genee, Richard

Librettist/Text Author: Haffner, Carl

Conductor: Bohm, Karl

Orchestra: Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra

Chorus: Vienna State Opera Chorus

Adele: Holm, Renate

Alfred: Kmennt, Waldemar

Dr. Blind: Kuchar, Erich

Dr. Falke: Holecek, Heinz

Eisenstein: Wachter, Eberhard

Frank: Kunz, Erich

Frosch: Schenk, Otto

Ida: Lukan, Sylvia

Prince Orlofsky: Windgassen, Wolfgang

Rosalinde: Janowitz, Gundula

Set Designer: Schlubach, Jan

Costume Designer: Bilach, Barbara

Television Director: Schenk, Otto

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Playing Time: 02:17:08

Catalogue Number: A05004507

Libretto

Die Fledermaus

Synopsis

Die Fledermaus

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Full of fizz and subtle humor, Die Fledermaus (The Bat) has become a staple of New Year's Eve programming in many opera houses around the world. In this sparkling production, director Otto Schenk has freed it from the conventional bonds of the theater, broken it up into fully telegenic, whirling visual sequences, and heightened it with the tumultuous gaiety prescribed by Strauss. Act II, often a stiffly staged ball, has at last become one great hurly-burly, a huge festival, an orgy of swaying figures – drunken or otherwise intoxicated. Foremost among them are the frenzied Eberhard Wachter as Eisenstein, the delicious Renate Holm as Adele and the noble Gundula Janowitz as the long-suffering Rosalinde, who does a magnificent gypsy dance. Competing for the title of show-stealer are fabled Bayreuth tenor Wolfgang Windgassen as Prince Orlofsky and actor-director Otto Schenk himself as Frosch. Karl Bohm leads the Vienna Philharmonic and the Chorus of the Vienna State Opera in this spirited recording.