This is a Wagner newsletter, and I am writing about Strauss, but there is an important Wagner connection to Ariadne, perhaps less a connection than a push-back. Hofmannsthal and Strauss wanted to redefine a Gesamtkunstwerk for the 20th century, one where the divergent art forms work all and severally, eac0h component retaining its integrity. Hofmannsthal’s criticism of Elektra (1909) was that his text was[...]
Wagner’s only mature comic opera returned to the Met this season, in a six-performance revival of the Schenk/Schneider-Siemssen gorgeous storybook production, which premiered here in 1993. Pre-pandemic rumors held that […]
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 […]