Kentridge's video Winterreise impresses in Siena

By Benedetta Saglietti, 17 July 2015

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Reviewed at Teatro dei Rinnovati, Siena on 16 July 2015

Schubert, Winterreise (W. Müller), D.911

Matthias Goerne, Baritone

Markus Hinterhäuser, Piano

William Kentridge, Director

COC triumphs with Kentridge’s brilliantly conceived Wozzeck

John Gilks, 25th April

William Kentridge's production of Berg’s Wozzeck has it all: wonderfully imaginative and disturbing designs, terrific acting and singing plus fabulous orchestral playing.

*****

Oh To Believe in Another World: Shostakovich and Stalin on film

Mark Pullinger, 24th April

William Kentridge's film, a patchwork collage depicting Shostakovich's complicated relationship with Stalin, is played as film score to his Tenth Symphony at the Southbank's genre-crossing Multitudes festival.

***11

A toy-box of tyranny: Shostakovich, Stalin and Kentridge collide

Kurt Gottschalk, 7th December

Shostakovich’s Tenth Symphony is a massive and aptly complicated work to which William Kentridge’s film adds contextual layers of stop-motion animation and vintage footage in a surreal nightmare of tyranny.

****1

Bleak and hopeless: William Kentridge's Wozzeck at the Met

Robert Levine, 2nd January

Despite theatrical drawbacks, this Wozzeck is heartily recommended due to Yannick Nézet-Séguin's staggering understanding of all facets of Berg's score.

****1

Barbed wire fences and gas masks: Wozzeck in Sydney

Zoltán Szabó, 30th January

Kentridge’s use of video technology creates another, highly complex, visual score next to Berg’s sonic one.

****1

Skilfully constructed: Wozzeck at the Salzburg Festival

James Imam, 8th August

A skilfully constructed production, and one that plays with the our perspectives. Whether the images are flashbacks from a war-troubled Wozzeck or a Büchner-esque portent of the horrors to come is left for the audience to decide.

****1

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Benedetta Saglietti

Benedetta Saglietti hold a degree in music history. She is the author of Beethoven, ritratti e immagini: uno studio sull’iconografia (Beethoven, Portraits and Images: An Iconographical Study) and a contributor of program notes for musical institutions. Her book reviews appeared in scholarly journals such as Studi Filosofici, Síneris, Revista de Musicología, Ad Parnassum. Selected articles and essays are here.