Verdi: Othello (Othello: Historical Studio Production 1965) (Arthaus Dvd: 101505)

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Verdi's opera Othello in a sympathetic studio recording from the early years of television. The camera's roving eye lends Otto Schenk's production an intimacy which inspires a vocal and dramatic tour de force from Wolfgang Windgassen and Sena Jurinac in the roles of the tragic lovers Othello and Desdemona. Musical direction is in the hands of the great Verdi conductor Argeo Quadri. For unlike with other opera fi lms, the producers in Vienna did not use playback but recorded each scene live. A further drawback was the fact that the television studios were too small to accommodate a full-size opera orchestra. The musicians and conductor were situated in an acoustically appropriate but geographically separate hall, linked to the fi lm studio only by cables and monitors. This arrangement called for utmost concentration from all parties. The scenes were recorded live; editing technology as we know it today did not exist, so the work involved fi lming lengthy passages and repeating them as necessary. The very particular value of this video, now available to all fans of opera for the fi rst time on DVD, is that it documents in convincing fashion the great German Verdi tradition - a tradition in which Othello has always maintained a leading position