The 2024 Bayreuth Festival season marked the third and penultimate year of Valentin Schwarz’s staging of Der Ring des Nibelungen. Like many current productions, Schwarz’s version opts for a contemporary setting, but it should not be considered a production which lacks mythology, as his concept draws deeply from a larger-than-life family drama. Here, Wotan is the patriarch of a wealthy family overseeing their[...]
It’s back! For the second time the Metropolitan Opera has revived Robert Lepage’s much loathed production of Wagner’s epic tetralogy, which is famously dominated by a vast mechanical contraption (“the […]
The exquisitely renovated Grand Théâtre de Genève opened its doors to three Ring Cycles in Feb.-March 2019. We were fortunately able to attend the third cycle (March 12-March 17, 2019). […]
Great singing and convincing acting marked the revival of Keith Warner’s production of the Ring at the Royal Opera House in October. Warner’s conception was generally forceful and intelligent; the […]
Exuberant enthusiasm characterized both the performance and the audience reaction to the third cycle of Francesca Zambello production of the Ring at the San Francisco Opera. The Orchestra under conductor […]