PRESS RELEASES
Celebrate 100 Years of the Salzburg Festival With New Limited Edition Box Set
DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON CELEBRATES
SALZBURG FESTIVAL CENTENARY
WITH 58-CD LIMITED EDITION BOX SET
To mark the 100th anniversary of the world’s greatest classical music festival, Deutsche Grammophon – in cooperation with the Eliette and Herbert von Karajan Institute – presents a carefully curated 58-CD retrospective edition.
Released on 31 July 2020, 100 Years of the Salzburg Festival showcases both legendary recordings and rarities, while the notes included in its comprehensive booklet explore the origins of the Festival and recall some of the most significant moments in its history so far.
The Salzburg Festival was launched in style in August 1920 with the first staging in the city’s Cathedral Square of Hugo von Hofmannsthal’s Jedermann (“Everyman”), a modern play with medieval resonances. Since then it has grown to become the world’s largest annual festival of opera, theatre and classical concerts, the diversity and excellence of its artistic offerings attracting international audiences year after year to the Austrian city on the banks of the Salzach River.
Closely associated with the Festival from the start, Deutsche Grammophon has made and released numerous recordings of Salzburg performances and productions, and many of the musicians and singers invited to take part in the Festival over the years have been members of DG’s family of artists. To celebrate the centenary, the Yellow Label is issuing a comprehensive anniversary edition. Comprising 58 CDs, the box set offers a vivid portrait of the Festival’s eventful history. 100 Years of the Salzburg Festival is released on 31 July to coincide with the opening of this year’s Festival on 1 August.
Notable of course for its countless artistic highlights and memorable performances, the history of the Salzburg Festival is also fascinating for the way in which it has reflected the sociopolitical and cultural developments of the last century, in part through the individual styles and performances of the leading musicians and actors of each new generation. Many of the artists who have helped shape and raise the profile of the Festival over the decades are to be found on the recordings included here, which are presented in chronological order within their respective sections: operas, concerts and recitals. The set also includes two bonus (German-language) spoken-word albums.
Among the star names featured on 100 Years of the Salzburg Festival are conductors Claudio Abbado, Leonard Bernstein, Karl Böhm, Herbert von Karajan, Zubin Mehta, Riccardo Muti and Georg Solti; singers Lisa della Casa, Plácido Domingo, Hans Hotter, Christa Ludwig, Anna Netrebko, Jessye Norman, Hermann Prey, Cheryl Studer, Rolando Villazón and Fritz Wunderlich; and instrumental soloists Martha Argerich, Alfred Brendel, Anne-Sophie Mutter and Grigory Sokolov.
A number of rare recordings provide further gems here. These include a studio recording of the 1958 production of Jedermann (the play has long been an annual fixture at the Festival; Herbert von Karajan’s iconic 1959 reading of Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice; and, appearing here for the first time on CD, performances of Mozart’s Symphonies Nos. 26 and 30 conducted by Bernhard Paumgartner, who was then President of the Salzburg Festival (the second bonus disc contains an audio self-portrait of this revered figure).
The recordings are accompanied by a richly illustrated 160-page booklet whose essays by Karajan expert Richard Osborne and Salzburg dramaturge Margarethe Lasinger offer intriguing insights into the Festival’s origins as well as recalling some of the most outstanding performances to have taken place in the last 100 years and some of the exceptional musicians most closely connected with its history.
Describing his vision for the Festival in 1921, Hugo von Hofmannsthal wrote, “Organising a musical and theatrical festival in Salzburg means revitalising ancient living traditions; it means doing once again, at an ancient, manifestly sublime location, things that had always been done there.” His vision has well and truly borne fruit, as this centenary edition so abundantly demonstrates.
For more information, please contact:
DL Media · 267-541-2784
Nuria Hunter · nuria@dlmediamusic.com
Don Lucoff · don@dlmediamusic.com
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Tim Plumley · UMe
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