Riders To The Sea DVD

They are all gone now and there is nothing more the sea can do to me Riders to the Sea is Vaughan Williams' most successful operatic achievement. It is short but the music is written on a grand scale and it is emotionally powerful. He based his opera on J.M. Synge's great tragic one-act play about Aran fisherfolk. The Irish dramatist spent several summers on the stormy West Coast of Ireland and the primitive life of the islanders whose existence depended almost entirely on the sea provided him with the material for his play. Vaughan Williams was inspired by the theme... of human endurance in the face of the natural elements and his opera is absolutely faithful to Synge's original play almost word for word. The tautly structured music is integrated perfectly with Synge's dialogue and at the end it opens out into a great dignified lament sometimes compared to the lament from Dido and Aeneas. This film made in the studio in 1988 by the Irish broadcaster Radio Telefis ''‰ireann is unique because it is the only audio-visual representation of any of Vaughan Williams' operatic and stage works currently available. The opera stars Sarah Walker in the central role of the mother Maurya who has already lost six men in her family to the sea and fears for the safety of her two remaining sons. Her daughters Cathleen and Nora are played by Yvonne Brennan and Kathleen Tynan and her son Bartley is sung by Hugh Mackey. Martin Murphy portrays J.M. Synge. The Radio Telefis ''‰ireann Chamber Choir and Concert Orchestra is conducted by Bryden Thomson. It is produced and directed by Louis Lentin. A new production of Riders to the Sea is being staged at English National Opera this November to mark the 50th anniversary of Vaughan Williams' death. [show more]

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