Wagner - Parsifal (2023)

The acclaimed new 2023 Bayreuth Festival production of Wagner’s final opera Parsifal is “a musical godsend” (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung). The successful and exclusive, multi-year partnership between Deutsche Grammophon and the Bayreuth Festival continues: The Yellow Label is the exclusive audiovisual partner of the mythical Wagner festival, and what was started with the 2015 production of Tristan und Isolde will now see its latest installment, presenting 2023’s new production of Parsifal. For the first time within this cooperation, this recording will be available both as video (2-Blu-ray video set) and audio release (4-CD set). Previous releases within this partnership include: Tristan und Isolde (2015), Parsifal (2016), Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (2017), the Grammy-nominated Lohengrin (2018), Tannhäuser (2019), Wagner concert at Wahnfried (2020), Der fliegende Holländer (2021), and Götterdämmerung from the 2022 production of Der Ring des Nibelungen.

Parsifal, the masterpiece which Wagner composed solely for Bayreuth’s Festspielhaus and which he wanted to be performed nowhere else, was presented in a celebrated new production on the Green Hill in 2023. Pablo Heras-Casado, who made his Bayreuth debut, was celebrated for his interpretation, as was his splendid cast featuring Andreas Schager, El?na Garan?a, Georg Zeppenfeld and Derek Welton. Stage director Jay Scheib takes at his word an expression that Wagner used in a letter to King Ludwig II: He stages Parsifal as a “farewell to the world”, a work that faces up to the question of how hope can exist when life has long since ceased to be possible…

The Blu-ray video set provides three sound formats, including Dolby Atmos, and a booklet with photos and information about the work and this production.