DER FERNE KLANG (The Distant Sound) [Taster] by Franz Schreker

pf: Gerd Albrecht cond/ Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra

Years composed: 1903-10
Vocal score prepared by: Alban Berg ("'Lulu' would not have been possible without 'Der Ferne Klang'")

FULL CAST: https://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/...

SYNOPSIS: The storyline for Schreker’s opera covers a period of 15 years. The opera takes place in Germany and Venice circa 1900. Young composer Fritz leaves his Grete, no longer able to stand the petit bourgeois confines of his surroundings and feeling that he is destined for greater things. His plan is to return when he is famous and offer her riches, celebrity and his undying love. Grete is gambled away by her alcoholic father to a landlord and goes on the run. At the end of her tether, she is taken up by a matchmaker and agrees to follow her. After some time, Fritz – driven by a yearning for Grete – finds her again in the dance salon “La Casa di Maschere”, where she is now a courtesan called Greta. Fritz calls her a harlot and leaves again. Greta succumbs to the advances of a Count who had been wooing her for a long time in vain. Five years later, Fritz succeeds in having his opera “The Harp” premiered in a court theatre. Grete, who has since been abandoned by the Count and is now a common streetwalker called Tini, was at the performance. However, when she recognises herself in the main protagonist, she feels faint. The premiere turns into a fiasco. Grete learns that Fritz is terminally ill. The two of them meet again. However, their new-found happiness together comes too late: Fritz finds his mysterious “distant sound”, the mirage of which he has been chasing all his life, while dying in the arms of his long-lost love, Grete. (Source: https://www.universaledition.com/fran...)

LIBRETTO: ?????

No subtitles this time, because I don't have an English translation of the libretto. If anybody happens to have one, please let me know.