FRIEDRICH KLOSE (1862-1942): Ilsebill.

Description: Although its formal title is "Dramatic Symphony", this 1903 work is an opera inspired by Wagner and, especially, Lohengrin. A folk-opera from a Brothers Grimm tale about a poverty-stricken fisherman who catches a huge fish which grants wishes. His wife Ilsebill makes them and is granted them until she overreaches herself and the pair end up poor again, Klose was hailed at its premiere as the "new man" of German music theatre. At a time when Richard Strauss's tone poems and Mahler's massive symphonies were current, Klose was admired specifically for his orchestration (!). In his "glowing, mellow, extraordinarily differentiated colors" (one critic of the period), we may hear much of Strauss and less of Mahler, but this is still strikingly original orchestration as the instrumentation grows with Ilsebill's ambitions, culminating in a full romantic orchestra, organ, six offstage trombones, several choirs, bells and thunder machine. 2 CDs. German-English libretto. Norbert Schmittberg (tenor), Sabine Türner (soprano), Jaroslaw Sielicki (baritone), Opernchor, Extrachor und Kinderchor of Theater Aachen, Aachen Symphony Orchestra; Marcus Bosch.