Richard Wagner: Tristan and Isolde – Prelude and Liebestod | with Daniel Barenboim & Waltraud Meier

They’re the two most famous sections of Richard Wagner’s opera Tristan und Isolde (Tristan and Isolde): The first act prelude, and Isolde’s ‘Liebestod’ from the third act. They’re presented here by an extraordinary lineup: Daniel Barenboim conducting the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, Waltraud Meier singing Isolde’s Liebestod. The much-loved pieces were performed in the year 2006, in a concert encore at the Berliner Philharmonie. The prelude alone of Tristan und Isolde wrote musical history. It begins with the legendary ‘Tristan chord’ – so harmonically ambiguous that, with it, Wagner had broken with every conventional theory of harmony in one fell swoop. The chord creates an ominous suspense that cries out for harmonious resolution, yet every move to resolve it only further compounds the initial tension. This creates a perpetual, musical limbo. The opening motif of the Tristan chord is woven all throughout the opera’s prelude – leading it to be characterized as “desire, made into music“.