THE NIGHT OF DIONYSOS
APOCALYPSE
TRISTANISOLDE
THE MAIDS
DELIRIUM OF A CHILDHOOD

ISMAEL IVO

TRISTANISOLDE

As the poles of the human being, love and death accompany events in Richard Wag-ner's opera "Tristan and Isolde", comple-ted in the year 1857. It is considered the most radical work of the composer.
However, in the danced interpretation of this opera through Marcia Haydée and Ismael Ivo, the old fable of love, death and betrayal is not illustrated but used as backdrop for its own unfolding theme of love. It is not so much the "final scenes", which one finds so often in his work's history of appraisals, that focusses the interest of "Tristan and Isolde", but the path of a human relationship into this dark and final situation. The search for an answer to the question what it is that so often fails the unconditional fulfilment of all dreams, hopes and longings, at the same time leads to an analysis of the existential, the generally human core of the oeuvre. "Tristan and Isolde" can be understood as a discourse on the cruelity of desire, in which love forms a chain of links and connections between persons.
"Isolde's death of love" - romantically transforming final accord of the oeuvre - acts as a leitmotif through the events. Various interpretations of the musical theme lend a structure to the diverse stages of a relationship: finding one another in recognition, first tender con-tacts, ecstatic rush of feelings, wounding of the soul, the expiration of love.

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