Der Ring des Nibelungen, Bayreuth, August 2022
Posted on 9 August 2022To say that this new Ring at Bayreuth never quite settles down is to put things politely. The young director Valentin Schwarz has lots of ideas, but they never really gel. There is no coherent vision bringing them all together. To put it bluntly his efforts are a failure — see my review in The Article.
Thank you for your in-depth, and what I felt was very accurte, review of this new Ring Cycle from Bayreuth. I watched the live-stream of the Götterdämmerung and found myself , sadly, more bored than anything else.
Two small errors that I’d like to point out. Tomasz Konieczny injured himself during the second of Die Walküre, not Das Rheingold. Michael Kupfer-Radecky replaced Konieczny for the third act. Egils Siliņš was the Wotan in Das Rheingold.
Secondly, I believe it was Grane’s head that Brünnhilde takes out of the plastic bag and then cradles during the Immolation Scene. I had, for a few moments, felt like I had wandered into a production of Salome!
Again, thank you for your very interesting thoughts about this production.
Cheers
Mike Scarola
USA
Thank you very much Mike. Yes, several people have said it was Grane’s head, but how would one know that? To me it didn’t look like Grane’s head with its mass of black hair. Yes, I agree I made an inadvertent error on when Konieczny’s chair collapsed — it was indeed Walküre, as you say.
Hi again, Mark. Actually, I think it was very clear. As Brünnhilde appears to be about to scale the ladder to leave the pool, she almost trips over the bag with the head in it. She picks it up and when she looks into the bag she sings “Grane, mein Roß! Sei mir gegrüßt!” at which point she takes the head out of the bag. Also, the long white hair and beard matched that of Grane in act one. At least that is how I came to understand it.
Cheers
Mike
Thanks Mike. That certainly makes it clear.