The Death Of Klinghoffer: Chorus Of Exiled Palestinians
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Chorus Of Exiled Jews
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act I, Scene 1: It Was Just After One Fifteen (The Captain)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act I, Scene 1: My Grandson Didi, Who Was Two (Swiss Grandmother)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act I, Scene 1: Give These Orders (Molqi)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act I, Scene 1: So I Said To My Grandson (Swiss Grandmother)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act I, Scene 1: We Are Sorry For You (Mamound)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act I, Scene 1: Ocean Chorus
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act I, Scene 2: Now It Is Night (The Captain)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act I, Scene 2: I Think If You Could Talk Like This (The Captain)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act I, Scene 2: I Have Often Reflected That This Is No Ship (The Captain)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act I, Scene 2: I Kept My Distance (Austrian Woman)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act I, Scene 2: Those Birds Flying Above Us (Mamoud)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act I, Scene 2: Night Chorus
Track Listings (14) - Disc #2
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II: Hagar Chorus
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II, Scene 1: Come here. Look. (Molqi)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II, Scene 1: I've Never Been A Violent Man (Leon Klinghoffer)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II, Scene 1: You Are Always Complaining Of Your Suffering (Rambo)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II, Scene 1: I Must Have Been Hysterical British Dancing Girl)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II, Scene 1: It Is As If Our Earthly Life Were Spent Miserably (Omar)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II, Scene 1: Desert Chorus
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II, Scene 2: My One Consolation (Marilyn Klinghoffer)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II, Scene 2: Klinghoffer's Death
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II, Scene 2: Every Fifteen Minutes, One More Will Be Shot (Mamoud)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II, Scene 2: Aria Of The Falling Body
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II, Scene 2: Day Chorus
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II, Scene 3: Mrs. Klinghoffer, Please Sit Down (The Captain)
The Death Of Klinghoffer: Act II, Scene 3: You Embraced Them! (Marily Klinghoffer)
In The Death of Klinghoffer (1991), John Adams turns his cascading minimalism to the tragedy of the Achille Lauro. This spacious recording makes grand what seems so minor in the great scheme of things: a group of terrori... more »sts hijack an ocean liner and kill a wheelchair-bound Jewish retiree, Leon Klinghoffer. If the conceit of Adams' earlier opera, Nixon in China, seems a bit incredulous (Richard Nixon as opera subject?), The Death of Klinghoffer is genuine tragedy--Greek chorus and all. Alice Goodman is the librettist. This is one of the 20th century's best operas. A must. --Paul Cook« less
In The Death of Klinghoffer (1991), John Adams turns his cascading minimalism to the tragedy of the Achille Lauro. This spacious recording makes grand what seems so minor in the great scheme of things: a group of terrorists hijack an ocean liner and kill a wheelchair-bound Jewish retiree, Leon Klinghoffer. If the conceit of Adams' earlier opera, Nixon in China, seems a bit incredulous (Richard Nixon as opera subject?), The Death of Klinghoffer is genuine tragedy--Greek chorus and all. Alice Goodman is the librettist. This is one of the 20th century's best operas. A must. --Paul Cook
CD Reviews
No heroes, only pawns....
NYC Music Lover | New Rochelle, NY USA | 08/31/2001
(5 out of 5 stars)
"The Death Of Klinghoffer by John Adams is to my mind one of the great musical and dramatic works of the last 25 years. I heard it in Brooklyn and in San Francisco live in its first outings, and having now heard the cd's for the 1000th time, I am still blown away by the power of this score, especially in its choral writing and in its sheer beauty. Minimalist techniques are (as in Nixon in China) put at the service of the drama, and melody and achingly beautiful passages only heighten the impact of the piece. Most of all, we are reminded in this work that this is a trgedy on multiple levels: for Klinghoffer and his wife, for the captain and guests, and, above all, for the people whose lives are dominated and shaped by the ongoing, ugly and seemingly intractable -- not to mention ungodly -- conflict that won't be resolved by those that carry weapons. The backdrop of the dispute is that there are no heroic figures, no saviors, only tragic pawns and a huge array of victims. Adams brings to this sensitivity, beauty, and, sadly, an acknowledgment of the despair the world feels about the Middle East. When you listen to the choral passages, there's a level of pain mixed with anger that is truly remarkable -- something rarely found in music and opera, except in, perhaps, Fidelio, and there only fleetingly. This opera is a must for those who not only love music, but also those who say they revere and respect human life. As Henze's libretto for The Raft of the Frigate 'Medusa" concludes (paraphrased): "Those who remained, went on to change the world." That's what our response to hearing this music should be, since Marilyn Klinghoffer's rage at the end of the opera is interwoven with the same sense of sorrow and pain heard in the choral passages: how else do you rectify sorrow and pain but by struggling to change that which causes it?"
Great as an oratorio--not as an opera
Jay Dickson | Portland, OR | 05/14/2001
(3 out of 5 stars)
"John Adams' and Alice Goodman's follow-up work to their splendid NIXON IN CHINA was this, a very somber and sober envisioning of the hijacking of the Achille Lauro in the mid-Eighties. The work has some of Adams's most beautiful music to date, with choruses of tremendous power (particularly the opening paired choruses and the terrifying "Night" chorus), arias of undeniable facility and charm ("I must have been hysterical") and of great dramatic power (Marilyn's furious indictment "You embraced them!", which closes the work). Unfortunately, the various pieces don't seem at all of a unified whole--Adams keeps changing modes from set piece to set piece, and the thing doesn't really breathe. It doesn't help matters that the work is set retrospectively so that none of the characters seem to live the past, only to remember them; or that Goodman's libretto is much less fluid than her previously supple work for NIXON. (In KLINGHOFFER, the awkwardness of Goodman's words are best demonstrated by the fact that almost each chorus begins with the dreadful syntactic construction "Is not the...?"). The overall sense is of a work with tremendous poignancy and potential that sometimes veers into pretentiousness, without the humor and drama that finally makes NIXON a superior operative outing."
Buy this CD.
Mr. F. L. Dunkin Wedd | 05/06/2000
(5 out of 5 stars)
"Adams music in KLINGHOFFER is, as always, beautiful and sensitive. Fans of his previous work for voice THE WOUND-DRESSER will be pleased; as will fans of Adams's more energetic electronic music. His orchestral incorporation of the synthesizer is tasteful, and gives the orchestration a surreal, mythological sheen. Unfortunately, Nagano's conducting doesn't bring out many of the subtle nuances of Adams's score; there are many sub-themes and rhythmic quirks that often get lost in recordings of Adams that seem to get drowned out in this recording. There should be more live performances of this opera, but until then, buy this CD."
A great work of our time
Mr. F. L. Dunkin Wedd | 01/05/1999
(5 out of 5 stars)
"The Death of Klinghoffer was described by Gramophone as "one of the twentieth century's best operas" - and this is my view also. I found this work one of the most moving pieces of contemporary music I have ever heard. It is accessible, but never shallow; musician's music but never arcane; sensitive but never effeminate. It handles issues of complexity and difficulty with a very light touch; the political furore which surrounded its performance was never justified, and not based on either the words or music. I recommend this piece to all those of open mind as one of the great works of our time."
Track Listings (14) - Disc #1