Views & Reviews

By Minnie Biggs

Actually the Ring Cycle took place on my laptop - unaccustomed to watching it in that fashion I could not have imagined such a thing. But when needs must......

By Antony Ernst

So here we are, either in isolation, or in preparation for isolation, or, in some cases, compulsively buying toilet paper for when the – respiratory - virus hits. All over the world, normality has been suspended. Governments are trying to deal with a phenomenon which is threatening the foundations of society.

By Roger Cruikshank

By Ross Whitelaw

By Rhodri Bradley Jones and Dr Lourdes st George

“This was my first time at Bayreuth and it didn’t disappoint. The beauty of the theatre itself, the exquisite sound of the orchestra, the intensity of the audience and the class and style of everything were exceptional. And such a very powerful sense of history too. (Not all of it by any means good.)

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

By Terry Clarke

By Terry Clarke

By Minnie Biggs

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

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.

By Terence Watson

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

By Esteban Insausti

By Richard Mason

By Terence Watson

Ring of the Nibelungen - Washington
Die Meistersinger - Munich 
Tristan und Isolde - Berlin 

By Colleen and Michael Chesterton
 

By Terence Watson

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 Terence Watson

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 Dr Jim Leigh

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 Colleen Chesterman

By Terence Watson

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 Terence Watson

By Terry Clarke

By Katie French

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

By Katie French

By Max Grubb

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

By Graham Bruce

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.