FULL Das Floss der Medusa Salzburg 2025 Kathrin Zukowski, Georg Nigl, Udo Samel

Information on the Performance

• Work Title: Das Floss der Medusa  
• Composer: Henze Hans Werner  
• Libretto: Ernst Schnabel  
• Venue & Opera Company: Felsenreitschule, Salzburg, Austria, Salzburger Festspiele  
• Recorded: July 18, 2025
• Type: Concert Live
• Singers: Kathrin Zukowski, Georg Nigl, Udo Samel
• Conductor: Ingo Metzmacher  
• Orchestra: ORF Radio-Symphonieorchester Wien  
• Chorus: Chor des Bayerischen Rundfunks, WDR Rundfunkchor, Salzburger Festspiele und Theater Kinderchor  
• Chorus Master: Max Hanft, Paul Krämer, Alexander Lüken, Regina Sgier, Wolfgang Götz  
• Stage Director:   
• Costume Designer:   

Information about the Recording

• Published by: ORF, Unitel  
• Date Published: 2025  
• Format: Broadcast
• Quality Video: 4 Audio:4
• Subtitles: nosubs  

• ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON THIS PERFORMANCE

  Das Floß der Medusa (The Raft of the Medusa) is a 1967 secular oratorio by the German composer Hans Werner Henze. It is regarded as a seminal work in the composer’s alignment with left-wing politics.

  Henze wrote it in 1967 to a text by Ernst Schnabel as a Requiem for Che Guevara. It tells the story of the French frigate Méduse which ran aground off the west coast of Africa in 1816, an ignominious episode in French political and maritime history, immortalised by the 1818-19 painting of the same name by Théodore Géricault. The oratorio employs a large orchestra, a speaker, a soprano, a baritone, and choruses. In the course of a performance, the chorus members move from left side of the stage, “the Side of the Living”, to the right side, “the Side of the Dead”. The text is principally in German, with the addition of passages in Italian drawn from Dante’s Divina Comedia sung by some of the dead. Aside from the dedication, and one possible musical reference to a popular leftist slogan chant of the 1960s, “there’s very little else in the text or music arouse political emotions”, wrote one critic. He thought the work “expertly put together, scintillating in its scoring and at [its] best moments … a superheated, expressionist narrative.”

  Part 1
  Die Einschiffung zum Untergang [embarkation for disaster]

  Prolog des Charon
  Motto “Vom Hafen aus…”
  Ordre und Musterrolle [Order of the Day and Roll-call] “Vive le roi!”
  Journal der Überfahrt [journal of the passage] “Die See war still…”
  Eine Antwort [an answer] “Den Bänken von Arguin…”
  Versuch zur Rettung [rescue attempt] “Drei Tage Kampf um das Schiff…”
  Die Ausschiffung [disambarkation] “Wir standen an der Reling…”
  Ballade vom Verrat [ballad of betrayal] “Wir schauten auf…”
  Gesang mit neuen Stimmen [hymn for new voices] “Per correr migliori acque…”
  Anweisungen für den zweiten Tag [instructions for the second day] “Es kam der zweite Tag…”
  Part 2
  Die neunte Nacht und der Morgen [ninth night and the morning]

  Feststellung der Lage [situation report] “Ein Ende vor Augen…”
  Motto “Wieviele Königreiche…”
  Appell unter dem Monde [roll-call under the moon] “La luna, quasi a mezza notte tarda…”
  Die Rechnung zum Tode [reckoning to death] “Mitternacht”
  Die Ballade vom Mann auf dem Floß [the ballad of the man on the raft] “Da ging ein Mann über das Floß…”
  Fuge der Überlebenden und Ankündigung der Rettung [fugue of the survivors and prospect of rescue] “Wir haben kein Gesetz…”
  Finale “Schau auf!”

  Quoted from Wikipedia

   

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