Richard Strauss: Arabella: Glyndebourne Festival Opera (Bernard Haitink) (1984)

With its romantic Viennese plot and its lush waltz-time melodies, the last collaboration between Richard Strauss and Hugo von Hofmannsthal has often been labelled a second Rosenkavalier. Happily however, Arabella has been recognised as a masterpiece. The craft of detail that Strauss brought to this amorous comedy about the complications surrounding his heroine's betrothal to a rich landowner, benefits from careful staging, scrupulous preparation and intimacy, all qualities in which Glyndebourne has excelled since its beginnings in 1934.