Der Rosenkavalier

I saw this last night at the McCaw Dome and was absolutely mesmerized for the entire 4 hours I was there. I guess that includes the chicken Caesar salad I had at the first intermission (excellent), as well as all the gawking I did at the second (why all the tee-shirts and sweat pants?), but my point is that this is one fine opera. I've been a big fan of Sir Georg Solti's Decca recording for years, but having only listened to it I had no idea what a dramatic tour de force it really is. I'm really not qualified to say anything about the musicianship, but I thought it sounded fine and the entire production as a whole really was impressive. The lighting and the sets were amazing. The acting was great, Peter Rose as Baron Ochs was especially brilliant: the perfect blend of Don Giovanni and Falstaff. As for the Marschellein, Octavian, and Sophie, the pathos was there, but the farce was in full force as well. Hopeful towards the end, which is something considering the satire dished out in the 2nd and 3rd acts. The decadence of the last days of the Austro-Hungarian empire is brilliantly skewered (the opera was first performed in 1911), and I shudder to think what Strauss thought of what happened to the German speaking world over the next 35 years. What a brilliant composer. Sheer genius.