By John Banner
Just back from my August trip where I attended the Munich and Salzburg festivals. Here are some of the points of interest.
Before Munich I travelled to Wurzburg where they were doing Götterdämmerung at the Mainfrankentheater. As a smaller company they don’t do the Ring but just the operas individually. Next year they are doing Rheingold.
By Jenny Ferns
Conductor: Kirill Petrenko | Inszenierung: David Bosch | Hans Sachs: Wolfgang Koch | Sixtus Beckmesser: Martin Gantner | Walther von Stolzing: Daniel Kirch | David: Allan Clayton | Eva: Sara Jakubiak | Magdalene: Okka von der Damerau
By Terry Clarke
Why do musical directors perform the Ring in four consecutive days? Is it because Wagner did it in 1876 and Cosima and successive directors slavishly followed his lead? There seems to me to be no good reason for doing so and many disadvantages. It is hard on the orchestra; the major roles are frequently doubled thus losing continuity. Even the redoubtable Stefan Vinke said he was daunted by doing the two Siegfrieds on successive nights. It is also hard on the audience, especially when the upholstery on the seats is losing its resilience.
By Terry Clarke
Set in the heart of the English Cotswolds, Longborough is a country house opera festival which increases its stature year by year. They are now building their second Ring having completed a cycle in 2013. It is a relatively small opera house made from a converted chicken shed with an audience of about 500 and a small pit so that the orchestra for Wagner is cut down to about 80 players.
Postscript to Review (issue 153) by Minnie Biggs - Die Walküre
Clearly two performances at the Met were not enough. How lucky are we in AU to have the Met HD cinema version arrive a month later?
By Robert Mitchell
The busy opera company in Malmö, Sweden’s third largest city, presented 10 performances of a new production of Der Fliegende Holländer in February and March 2019. The opening performances were conducted by American Steven Sloane. Making her European conducting debut, Australian Jennifer Condon conducted the majority of the rehearsals and led the final two performances to thunderous applause from both audience and cast.
By Christopher McCabe
By Dr Terence Watson
Creative Team: Director - Roger Hodgman; Set Designer - Richard Roberts; Costume Designer - Christina Smith; Lighting Designer - Matt Scott; Assistant Director - Brock Roberts; Choreographer - Elizabeth Hill
Members who attended the performances enthused about the excellent singing and atmospheric staging.
Here are some excerpts from reviews by the music critics:
By Minnie Biggs
Not a ‘review’. Not a ‘critique’. Not a musical analysis. Just a personal love letter. From a modest, relatively young Ring virgin. Adelaide, Melbourne, Bayreuth, Met on HD.
By Terence Watson
World Premiere of Justin Fleming’s Dresden at The King’s Cross Theatre, Sydney
Director: Suzanne Millar
Many members have written in appreciation of the WASO performances of Tristan und Isolde; some extracts follow.
Thursday, August 16, 2018:
Pattie Benjamin (who lived in Perth before moving to Sydney):
By Colin Mackerras
The Production and Conception
By Mailis Wakeham
By Terry and Julie Clarke
By Terry and Julie Clarke
When the curtain opens during the prelude to Gotterdammerung and you see three men on stage sitting on cinema director’s chairs you can be assured that you are about to witness another example of German regietheatre. This we duly did in Karlsruhe in May 2018.
By Michael Chesterman
On 23 May, Colleen and I went without much foreknowledge to a new production of Parsifal by the National Opera of Paris at the Bastille Opera House. We are very glad that we managed to include it during our relatively short time in Paris.
Some reviews in brief
Observations: Hitler at the heart of Wagner
By Jessica Duchen
The Wagner Family
By David J Baker
Wagner: A Film
By Tony Palmer
Gluck/Wagner: Iphigenia in Aulis
CD Review by Tim Ashley
Gluck: Iphigénie en Aulide
DVD Review by John operaramblings.wordpress. com
Christoph Willibald Gluck: the composer who deserves better
By Rupert Christiansen
Wagner’s Jews: A Fascinating Perspective on Wagner’s Attitude to the Jews
By Jim Pritchard
Wagner’s Complicated Relationship with the Jews, now on Film
By Judy Maltz
Richard Wagner was a great composer - but also a virulent anti-Semite
By Adrian Mourbyasks
By Terence Watson
Conductor: Anthony Negus; Melbourne Opera Orchestra.
Cast: Tristan: Neal Cooper; Isolde: Lee Abrahmsen; Brangäne: Sarah Sweeting; King Marke: Steven Gallop; Kurnewal: Michael Lampard; Michael Dimovski: Shepherd; Henry Choo: Sailor.
By Terence Watson
Director, Moira Blumenthal; Michael Misrachi and Michael Shur, Producers; Set & Costume Design, Hugh O’Connor; Video Design, Mic Gruchy; Lighting Design, Emma Lockhart-Wilson; Sound Design, Katelyn Shaw.
Parsifal - The Opera Australia Concert Performances, 10, 12 & 14 August 2017
By Colleen Chesterman
Lohengrin - Melbourne Opera, 7, 10, 12 & 19 August 2017
By Michael Chesterman
Tristan und Isolde - Bayreuth 20 August 2017
Parsifal - Bayreuth, 22 August 2017
Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg - Bayreuth, 27 August 2017
By Jenny Ferns
Ring of the Nibelungen - Washington
Die Meistersinger - Munich
Tristan und Isolde - Berlin
By Colleen and Michael Chesterton
Tristan und Isolde - Hobart, Tasmania
By Colleen Chesterton
Tristan und Isolde - Metropolitan Opera
By Minnie Briggs
By Douglas Sturkey
Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg - Glyndebourne
Tristan und Isolde - English National Opera, London Coliseum, First Night
By June Donsworth
By Colleen Chesterman
On the night of 19 November 2016, a packed audience in the Federation Concert Hall in Hobart heard Swedish soprano Nina Stemme and Australian tenor Stuart Skelton perform an abridged concert version of Wagner’s magnificent Tristan und Isolde under the baton of Marko Letonja, conducting the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra.
By Alviro Olave
By Colleen and Michael Chesterman
By June Donsworth
By Colin Baskerville
Christian Thielemann, My Life With Wagner
London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2015, isbn 978 0 297 60855 4. Translated from the German by Anthea Bell.
By David May
The Berlin Staatsoper staged an unforgettable performance of Tristan und Isolde at the Schiller Theatre in Berlin on 28 December last year, which I was lucky enough to see.
By Terry and Julie Clarke
By Richard Mason
By Katie French
By Max Grubb
I attended the last three performances of a new production of Parsifal on 2, 5 and 8 March, 2013. The first performance on Saturday 2 was a live relay to the Ziegfield Cinema on W 53rd Street and the final two performances in the ‘house’.
By Terry & Julie Clarke
I have written before about performances of Wagner’s works in small private opera houses in the English countryside. For the past ten years Lizzie and Martin Graham have pursued the almost impossible dream of mounting a full Ring Cycle at their home in Longborough in the beautiful Cotswolds Hills west of Oxford.
By Roger Cruickshank
By Liz Jacka, Colleen & Michael Chesterman & Lyn Longfoot
By Colleen Chesterman
This Boydell Press 1912 book is one of two books on music found by our older son at a Blue Mountains book shop and given to Michael and me as Xmas presents.
By Barbara Brady
By Terence Watson
Eastman Studies in Music, University of Rochester Press & Boydell & Brewer Ltd, Woodbridge 2012
Wagner and the Erotic Impulse - Laurence Dreyfus
The Centrality of Love - Barry Emslie
By Terence Watson
Eva Rieger: Richard Wagner’s Women, Boydell & Brewer, 2011
Nila Parly: Vocal Victories: Wagner’s Female Characters from Senta to Kundry, Museum Tusculanum Press, 2011
By Colleen Chesterman
By Mike Day
Presented by Fritz Gubler with a Forward by Dame Kiri Te Kanawa; An imprint of Arbon Publishing Pty Ltd, Crows Nest, Australia 2012
By Roger Cruickshank
By Dr Lourdes St George
I had the great privilege of attending the 7-hour Teatro Colón Ring on 30/11/2012 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The world premiere was held on 27/11/2012. It was a unique and wonderful occasion despite all the dramas on & offstage,
By Terry Clarke
By Colleen Chesterman and Terence Watson
By Katie French
What follows is a commentary: it is neither a deep musicological nor historical investigation, nor a review. It is a very personal response to a book which describes itself as ‘A celebration’.
By Richard Mason
Conductor: Derrick Inouye [replacing Fabio Luisi, replacing James Levine]; Producer: Robert Lepage; Sets: Carl Fillion; Costumes: François St-Aubin
By Colleen and Michael Chesterman, Charles Manning
Live, New York, Thursday, 30 September 2010
By Richard Mason
Live, New York, Tuesday, 5 October 2010
By John Collis
Dendy Cinema Screening, Canberra
By Ian Cowan
By Dr Jim Leigh
A three part exposition and introduction for audience members of the current Bayreuth production
By Richard Mason
Vienna Staatsoper – 16th June 2010 [opening night of a new production]
Johan Botha [Tannhäuser], Anja Kampe [Elisabeth], Michaela Schuster [Venus], Christian Gerhaher [Wolfram], Ain Anger [Landgraf], Gergely Németi [Walther], Alexandru Moisiuc [Biterolf], Marcus Pelz [Reinmar], Alois Mühlbacher [Shepherd]; Production: Claus Guth, Christian Schmidt; Lighting: Olaf Freese; Movement: Konrad Kuhn; Conducted by Franz Welser-Möst
Review
By Terence Watson
“Katharina Wagner Should Be Shot”
By Patricia Baillie
Katherina Wagner’s 'Die Meistersinger' - The Final Wrap!
By Robert Lloyd
By Terence Watson
By Jan Bowen
Given the current global financial crisis, Wotan’s difficulties in coming up with the ready to pay for Valhalla almost certainly struck a chord with many modern day cash- strapped members of the audience. The enduring relevance of Wagner’s magnum opus was strikingly evident in the Vienna Staatsoper’s recent Ring Cycle if for no other reason than its timing.
By Colleen Chesterman
By Trevor O'Brien
[Trevor O’Brien’s meditation on the music-drama is a sensitive introduction to ways of responding to this somewhat enigmatic work - Editor]
Is it that Wagner is hard to comprehend, or is it that only at times when one can relate personally to the emotions and experiences of which Wagner wrote that a clear understanding of his work evolves? Personal interaction with Wagner’s operas at various moments in our own development seem to expand the understanding and give a clear insight into our own lives.
