Russian Quits Bayreuth Festival over Nazi Tattoos
BERLIN (AP) —A Russian baritone who was due to sing the lead role in Richard Wagner's The Flying Dutchman when the Bayreuth opera festival opens next week withdrew from the event Saturday after it...
View ArticleSinger Says Swastika Tattoo is ‘Not Political’
Yevgeny Nikitin, the Russian singer who withdrew from the opening of Germany's famed Bayreuth Festival after it was discovered he had a swastika tattoo on his body, has issued a statement explaining...
View ArticleBayreuth Festival to Name New Managing Director
The Richard Wagner Festival in Bayreuth, Germany is set to name a new managing director. Die Welt newspaper reports that Heinz Dieter Sense, the head of Berlin's Radio Orchestras and Choirs, will take...
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A Sampling of Noteworthy Wagner Recordings for 2013
If it’s a major composer anniversary year, that must mean a batch of new commemorative recordings. Whatever troubles currently plague the record industry, both major labels and independents have issued...
View ArticleWagner Week: Bayreuth Remains a Colorful, Controversial Mecca
The 2013 edition of the Bayreuth Festival opens on Thursday, led by a new production of the Ring Cycle that's expected to be as colorful and contentious as anything this German celebration of Richard...
View ArticlePatrice Chéreau, Iconoclastic Opera Director, Dies at 68
Patrice Chéreau, the opera director and filmmaker whose 1976 staging of Wagner's Ring Cycle became arguably the most important opera production of modern times, died on Monday in Paris at 68. The cause...
View ArticleStage Malfunction, Boos Greet Opening of Bayreuth Festival
BAYREUTH, GERMANY—The opening night of the 2014 season of the Bayreuth Festival, the mecca for lovers of the operas of Richard Wagner, was disrupted by a technical breakdown that resulted in a one-hour...
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Planet Opera: Bayreuth's Provocative Vision of Wagner
Just a few weeks after cheering the Weltmeister German soccer team to victory in Brazil, Angela Merkel will return to Bayreuth Festival to engage with the Masters of the Universe in Wagner’s Der Ring...
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In the Footsteps of Richard Wagner: Bayreuth
BAYREUTH, Germany—Just because the bicentennial of Richard Wagner’s 1813 birth has come and gone, I have not stopped walking in the footsteps of this artist who blazed so many trails. My earlier stops,...
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Has There Ever Been a Music of the Future?
Readers of my recent articles know that my visit to Bayreuth resulted in three articles. Wagner's art and theories have a way of sticking around in one's mind, provoking more questions and prompting...
View ArticleBayreuth Festival Opts for a Less Provocative Parsifal
Days after the Bayreuth Festival parted ways with the theatrical provocateur Jonathan Meese over his planned production of Wagner's Parsifal, the festival announced on Friday that Uwe Eric Laufenberg...
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Bayreuth Adds Parking Space, Prematurely Reveals next Music Director
The Richard Wagner Festival in Bayreuth, Germany on Monday made official what was known for several days in opera circles, that the conductor Christian Thielemann will become its music director...
View ArticleBayreuth's Wagner Festival Kicks off with 150th Anniversary 'Tristan'
BERLIN (AP) -- Bayreuth's annual opera festival is kicking off with a new production of Richard Wagner's Tristan and Isolde by the composer's great-granddaughter, festival director Katharina...
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An Opera Lover's Guide to Europe's Leading Festivals
One of the pleasures of traveling around Planet Opera is encountering operas and singers you don’t know or seeing familiar works in unfamiliar settings. These could be a quarry in Sweden, a floating...
View ArticleClassical Clicks: Andris Nelsons Parts Ways with Bayreuth
Here, at the WQXR offices, we read about, watch and listen to a lot of classical music. We created The Whole Note as a place to share content that has captivated us from around the web. We hope they...
View ArticleClassical Clicks: Cecilia Bartoli's 'West Side Story' in Salzburg
Here, at the WQXR offices, we read about, watch and listen to a lot of classical music. Our favorite stories from this week include an tour of Philadelphia's decaying Metropolitan Opera House by...
View Article5 Notable Performances from Bayreuth's Long History
The Richard Wagner Festival at Bayreuth in Germany has been thrilling audiences since 1876. With such a deep past and the 2017 edition of the Wagner Festival upon us, we thought it a perfect time to...
View ArticleRing-nuts Rule!
My name is Fred P. and I am a Ring-nut.Do you know what I am referring to? You might wish to read a charming article about Ring-nuts by Henry Alford that appeared in The New York Times in 2009. Yours...
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