Guntram (Complete opera)

"Reiner Goldberg and Ilona Tokody and stalwart Wagnerian archetypes, but it's the warm Straussian sound of the Hungarian players which makes this a treasurable reissue." BBC Music Magazine, October 2009 ****

Richard Strauss's first opera owes much to the influence of Wagner, to the extent that, like the older composer, he wrote his own libretto and even the names of the characters and the plot reveal Wagnerian influences with its 13th-century setting and a singing contest which takes place at court. The central role of Guntram is also typical of later Strauss in terms of the demands he makes on the tenor voice - one of the reasons that stage productions are so infrequent.