395 posts
|
Post by Distant Dreamer... on Nov 5, 2018 8:02:36 GMT
As the music fades away to the same E-Flat chord you began upon in Das Rheingold It would have been a wonderfully neat and symbolic idea to begin and end such a mammoth undertaking with the same chord with which you started, but Wagner actually ends Gotterdammerung in D flat, and the final chord of the whole cycle is a sumptuous D flat major. Thank you tmesis, I stand corrected.
|
|
2,539 posts
Member is Online
|
Post by n1david on Nov 5, 2018 13:00:46 GMT
Well I've had time to ponder my first Ring now after having been completely gobsmacked by the end of Gotterdammerung last Friday. These observations are going to be necessarily simplistic... I found Denis Forman's Good Opera Guide an invaluable preparation for this - there are quite a few longeurs in the plot and Forman properly prepared me for the pacing of the operas - the music is beautiful throughout, but boy is there a lot of talking about what we've already seen and there's a certain box-set mentality that needs to apply in thinking "well, this is part of the colour of the piece, it adds texture and character, but the plot will start moving again any hour now". Wasn't too keen on the staging and was again quite grateful for the prep I did beforehand - I found it difficult to get much of a sense of place for many scenes, as aspects of the set were reused in often not-so-obvious ways, for aesthetic effect rather than narrative clarity. Some of it was genuinely impressive, some of it simply bizarre. But then, the music and the singing won through and made the whole event a joy. I hadn't listened to much Wagner before this (one performance of Mastersingers) and was concerned I might find it oblique or difficult. But no, not at all. In terms of voices, I was quite happy with Brunhilde and Seigmund, found Seigfried a bit shouty by the end (but it's a hell of a part), wasn't quite convinced that Wotan was the Big Man on Campus that I might have expected (but that might be part of the point). All in all a superb experience, will be thinking about it for a while. Many thanks to the more erudite posters on here who gave sophisticated comments which gave me things to think over. BTW, according to the Guardian Pappano is now staying on until "at least" the end of 2022/23, albeit with a year's sabbatical for 2020/21 - which can only be a good thing given how much I enjoy music he conducts. www.theguardian.com/culture/2018/nov/04/antonio-pappano-stays-on-royal-opera-house-london
|
|
|
Post by Mr Snow on Nov 6, 2018 7:25:02 GMT
I would have to hear a very convincing argument against Der Ring Des Nibelungen being the greatest achievement in the history of opera. Well you won't get it from me! And as I hold Opera as the greatest of art forms one might add.... The Ring involves so many ideas, so many singers, such a big orchestra, so many resources that it's inevitable there's things to criticise, but somehow the sweep and scale of it makes some of that irrelevant. If you get this, it's overwhelming. I've thought about it every day since and can't wait to go back to the Rhinemaidens...
|
|
395 posts
|
Post by Distant Dreamer... on Nov 6, 2018 8:02:50 GMT
I would have to hear a very convincing argument against Der Ring Des Nibelungen being the greatest achievement in the history of opera. And as I hold Opera as the greatest of art forms one might add.... We are in total agreement about this too! Happy to talk opera 24/7!!
To prove our point about the complexity of the ring here is a cool infographic of how all of the main characters are intertwined:
|
|