Launching the Canon: Matthew Rye welcomes the start of a complete cycle of Wagner’s major works from Marek Janowski

Review of Der fliegende Holländer, conducted Janowski, Berlin, 2010 (PentaTone, 2 hybrid SACDs).

March 2012, Volume 6, Number 1, 78–80.

At a time when new opera recordings are almost as rare as hens’ teeth – and Wagnerian ones the rarest of the lot – this new project from PentaTone seems all the more remarkable. Between now and the end of next year, the company is releasing a complete cycle of Wagner’s ten canonic stage works recorded at concert performances at the Philharmonie in Berlin. Not only will this be the first such enterprise from a single conductor–orchestra partnership (even Solti and Karajan flitted between their various orchestras), but it will also be the first to take full advantage of up-to-date surround-sound technology and appear on SACD.