Tristan Experiment

The opera really impresses by futuristic video and light effects combined with minimalistic stage design jointly produced by Günther Groissböck, Franz Tscheck, Philipp Batereau and Stefanie Seitz. Stong and colourful voices of Norbert Ernst, Kristiane Kaiser, Juliette Mars, Günther Groissböck and Kristján Jóhannesson accompanied by the orchestra of the Kammeroper of Vienna bring feelings of spectators to the highest degree of intensity while making trembling with each move of the music of Wagner. The opera “Tristan Experiment” was produced after the opera „Tristan and Isolde” which was written in the 19th century by Richard Wagner.

The history about Tristan and Isolde is a part of mythology of the Middle Ages North Europe which was a source for inspiration for Wagner. The ancient Celtic legend is in the middle of the story about eternal passion which is stronger than death. Once, during a duel, Tristan, King Marke's nephew, killed the groom of the Irish princess, Isolde. When the princess found out, she wanted to avenge his death, but the wounded knight's pleading gaze stopped her. Isolde felt compassion for the stranger and cured his wounds. Time passes. On King Marke's orders, Tristan kidnaps Isolde and takes her as a prisoner by ship to the royal castle in Cornwall.

Unable to forgive Tristan's new betrayal, Isolde asks her maid to put poison in the wine so she can drink it with Tristan and end her own torment. But instead of poison, the maid slips a love potion into the wine. Death follows the main characters on their heels. Under the influence of the luscious potion Tristan and Isolde become drunk with passion and forget all precaution: up to the tragic finale of the drama they are mercilessly pursued by King Marke and Melot, the Tristan's former friend and traitor.

The opera “Tristan and Isolde” remains one of the most discussed works in the history of music because of its novelty, the extraordinary fluidity of the texture and the constant changeability of the orchestral colors. The so-called "Tristan chord," permeating the entire fabric of music, carries a deep, unsolved mystery, a magical energy. Wagner deliberately leaves it unresolved even at the end of the opera. His music is a continuous flow of sensory, conscious, and unconscious, which rises into the cosmic realm. Wagner created an unsurpassed image of music outside time and space, a metaphor for an inexpressible, endless longing that finds neither support nor exit, like the feeling of longing for love which is stronger than death.