With its ravishing music and stomach-churning storyline, Strauss’s powerful one-acter offers an experience like no other opera. Susan Nickalls speaks to conductor Edward Gardner about bringing it from Bergen to Edinburgh
Published April 22, 2021 at 12:34 PM EDT
The 2020-21 Metropolitan Opera Radio Broadcast season continues with Die Frau ohne Schatten – The Woman Without a Shadow, Richard Strauss’s epic fairy tale that grapples with the essence of being human.
This encore broadcast from 2013 features American soprano
Christine Goerke whose breakthrough performance as the Dyer’s Wife established her as a leading dramatic soprano.
German soprano
Anne Schwanewilms starred in the title role as the otherworldly Empress who must decide whether to sacrifice someone else’s happiness to achieve her own. Hungarian mezzo-soprano
Ildikó Komlósi was the Empress’s scheming Nurse, Danish bass-baritone
This encore broadcast from 2013 features American soprano
Christine Goerke whose breakthrough performance as the Dyer’s Wife established her as a leading dramatic soprano.
German soprano
Anne Schwanewilms starred in the title role as the otherworldly Empress who must decide whether to sacrifice someone else’s happiness to achieve her own. Hungarian mezzo-soprano
Ildikó Komlósi was the Empress’s scheming Nurse, Danish bass-baritone
Johan Reuter sang Barak, the humble Dyer, and German tenor
Torsten Kerl was the Emperor.
Vladimir Jurowski conducted the Met Orchestra in Strauss’s mesmerizing score.
Die Frau ohne Schatten will be heard over the
Toll Brothers-Metropolitan Opera International Radio Network at 12:00 p.m. ET on Saturday, April 24. Listen to it on Classical IPR.