A 21st-Century
“Ring” for Wagner’s 200th Anniversary Year
Wagner’s Ring
presents the ultimate challenge for any opera company, and the New York Metropolitan
Opera’s new production of Der Ring des
Nibelungen, unveiled between 2010 and 2012 and starring some of the
greatest Wagnerian singers of today, is among the most ambitious Ring stagings ever mounted.

The Met’s production, directed by legendary theatre
visionary Robert Lepage, uses a 90,000 lb “tectonic” set – an infinitely
mobile, writhing, rotating raft of 24 individually pivoting aluminium planks
that came to be nicknamed “The Machine” – in a dazzlingly cinematic staging
that harnesses the latest interactive and 3D video technology to realize many
previously “unstageable” aspects of Wagner’s epic drama. It is at once a
state-of-the-art production for the 21st century and a deeply traditional
Ring. In Lepage’s words, “it’s the movie
that Wagner wanted to make before movies existed.” For the
Boston Globe,
it’s “a high-tech
Ring with a traditional heart”. In the London
Telegraph’s view, it’s “a triumph, at once subtle and spectacular, intimate and
epic”.
Already seen by over a million people in the theatre and
at cinemas around the globe, the Met Ring
was filmed live in high definition and is now being released on both DVD and
Blu-ray to launch Deutsche Grammophon’s celebration of the composer’s
bicentenary year in 2013.
With Bryn Terfel, widely acknowledged as one of the finest
bass-baritones of our age, performing his first complete cycles as the
embattled god Wotan and American soprano Deborah Voigt making her role debut as
his disobedient warrior-daughter Brünnhilde, alongside international stars Jonas
Kaufmann and Eva-Maria Westbroek as the incestuous Siegmund and Sieglinde, and
last-minute stand-in Jay Hunter Morris – a thrilling new tenor from Paris,
Texas – saving the day as the fearless but ill-fated hero Siegfried, the New
York Times declared the cast “as strong a lineup of vocal artists for a
Wagner opera as I have heard in years”.
Acclaim was equally enthusiastic for the cycle’s two
conductors: James Levine, the Met’s longstanding Music Director, who has
conducted 21 complete Ring cycles at
the Met; and Fabio Luisi, the Met’s Italian-born Principal Conductor, who took
over conducting the second half of the cycle after illness caused Levine to
withdraw. “Levine drew exciting, wondrously natural playing from the great Met
orchestra,” wrote the New York Times, while “Luisi brings out the
score’s three-dimensional detail and animal heat,” wrote New York Magazine.
Peter Gelb, General Manager of the Met since 2006, says:
“Nothing defines an opera house more than its new productions, and there’s no new
production that is more significant than a new Ring cycle. That is why I
invited Robert Lepage, one of theatre’s great visionaries, to create our new
cycle.”
Mark Wilkinson, President of Deutsche Grammophon, says:
“We are thrilled to be partnering with the Met to help take Wagner’s
spectacular, breathtaking music, boldly realized here by Robert Lepage, to as
wide an audience as possible. Both collectors and newcomers to Wagner’s
extraordinary world will find it at once spectacular, visually spell-binding
and deeply thought-provoking.”
To complement the complete Ring cycle on both DVD and Blu-ray, Deutsche Grammophon is
releasing two related titles: Twilight of
the Gods, a 2-CD compilation of audio highlights from the Met Ring – featuring all the major stars of
the production and such famous extracts as The
Ride of the Valkyries, Wotan’s “Farewell,” the “Magic Fire Music,”
“Siegfried’s Rhine Journey,” and the concluding “Immolation Scene” – and Wagner’s Dream, a frank and revealing
documentary about the five-year making of the Met’s new Ring that has already been acclaimed as “simply the best
documentary about the Met ever made” (Film Journal), “a must-see for any
creative soul” (Cinespect) and
“destined to be one of the classic documentaries about opera” (Philadelphia Inquirer).
--Olga Makrias, Universal Music
Lincoln Trio Opens
Music Institute’s 10th Season at Nichols Concert Hall
As the first of 10 stellar musical performances
celebrating 10 years at Nichols Concert Hall, 1490 Chicago Avenue in Evanston,
the Music Institute of Chicago presents ensemble in residence and faculty
members The Lincoln Trio September 23.
The program for the Lincoln Trio’s concert will include
Brahms’ Trio in C Major; Turina’s Piano Trio No. 1 in D Major, Op. 35; and
other works to be determined.
Other highlights of the Music Institute’s 10th anniversary
season at Nichols include a Billy Strayhorn festival featuring jazz great
Terell Stafford in late October, the internationally acclaimed Pacifica Quartet
in February, and pianist Sergei Babayan in April. Noteworthy annual events
include Family Concerts in December and March; the Martin Luther King, Jr.
concert with the Brotherhood Chorale in January; the Four Score Festival of
contemporary music in March; and the third annual Emilio del Rosario
Distinguished Alumni Concert, this year featuring violinist Rachel Barton Pine
and pianist Matthew Hagle in May.
The Lincoln Trio:
The celebrated, Chicago-based Lincoln Trio, made up of
violinist Desirée Ruhstrat, cellist David Cunliffe, and pianist Marta
Aznavoorian, has been praised for its polished presentations of well-known
chamber works and its ability to forge new paths with contemporary repertoire.
The Lincoln Trio performs frequently, including recent engagements with Chicago’s
WFMT radio, Music in the Loft, NEIU Jewel Box Series, Fazioli Concert Series,
and the Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concert Series. Champions of new music, the
Lincoln Trio has performed numerous compositions written especially for them.
The trio made its Ravinia Festival debut in 2009.
Nichols Concert Hall:
The 2012–13 season marks the 10th anniversary of Nichols
Concert Hall, originally designed by noted architect Solon S. Beman as the
architecturally and acoustically magnificent First Church of Christ, Scientist,
located at 1490 Chicago Avenue in Evanston, in 1912 (celebrating its
centennial). Restored in 2003, the building has become Nichols Concert Hall, a
state-of-the-art, 550-seat performance space and music education destination,
which annually reaches approximately 15,000 people and hosts a world-class
chamber music series, workshops and master classes, student recitals, and
special events.
Music Institute of Chicago:
The Music Institute of Chicago believes that music has the
power to sustain and nourish the human spirit; therefore, our mission is to
provide the foundation for lifelong engagement with music. As one of the three
largest and most respected community music schools in the nation, the Music
Institute offers musical excellence built on the strength of its distinguished
faculty, commitment to quality, and breadth of programs and services. Founded
in 1931 and one of the oldest community music schools in Illinois, the Music
Institute is a member of the National Guild of Community Schools of the Arts
and accredited by the National Association of Schools of Music. Each year, the
Music Institute’s world-class music teachers and arts therapists provide the
highest quality arts education, reaching more than 10,000 students of all
ability levels, from birth to 102 years of age, at campuses in Evanston,
Highland Park, Lake Forest, Lincolnshire, Winnetka, and Downers Grove and
through its longstanding partnership with the Chicago Public Schools. The Music
Institute also offers lessons and programs at the Steinway of Chicago store in
Northbrook and early childhood and community engagement programs throughout the
Chicago area and the North Shore. The Music Institute offers lessons, classes,
and programs through four distinct areas: Community School, The Academy,
Creative Arts Therapy (Institute for Therapy through the Arts), and Nichols
Concert Hall.
The Lincoln Trio performs Sunday, September 23 at 3 p.m.
at Nichols Concert Hall, 1490 Chicago Avenue, Evanston. Tickets are $30 for
adults, $20 for seniors and $10 for students, available online or 847.905.1500
ext. 108. For more information visit
musicinst.org.
--Jill Chukerman, JAC Communications
Andris Nelsons
Renews Contract with City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra
The City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra announced today
that Andris Nelsons, one of the world’s most sought after conductors, will be
extending his contract with the CBSO on the basis of an annual rolling renewal
from the 2014/15 season onwards.
Andris was unanimously invited to be Music Director from
2008 by the CBSO’s players and board of trustees, after just a private concert
and recording session. Since his appointment, he and the Orchestra have created
many ‘once in a lifetime’ performances such as Wagner’s Lohengrin and the 50th
Anniversary performance of Britten’s War Requiem in Coventry Cathedral. The
partnership attracts some of the best singers and musicians from across the
world, performing to ecstatic audiences at both Symphony Hall, Birmingham and
throughout Europe. Award-winning recordings released by the record label Orfeo,
including acclaimed series of Tchaikovsky and Strauss, also continue to cement
this distinctive relationship.
Stephen Maddock, chief executive of the CBSO, said: “The
chemistry between Andris and the musicians and audiences of the CBSO family has
always been very special and there have been many electric performances and
recordings since his appointment here.
“As we start our Beethoven cycle in Birmingham, visit the
BBC Proms, the Edinburgh International Festival, and depart for a major
European Summer Tour, including a five day residency at the Lucerne Festival,
we are delighted to confirm the extension of this relationship and look forward
to sharing our plans for the future in due course.”
Away from Birmingham, Andris has earned himself a
distinguished name on both the opera and concert podiums, collaborating with
the Berlin Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Boston Symphony and New
York Philharmonic. He has toured Japan with the Vienna Philharmonic and
regularly appears at the Royal Opera House and the Bayreuth Festival.
Andris said: “My colleagues and friends in the CBSO family
are very important to me and it is a great pleasure to be continuing our
partnership into future seasons. We have shared many wonderful experiences over
the last four years and I am looking forward to exploring more thrilling music
together. It is a privilege to be working with this fantastic orchestra and to
represent Birmingham together across the world. I look forward, in hope, to the
continuation of the wonderful support that we have gratefully received from our
many audiences and partners!"
Over the summer, Andris and the CBSO will be appearing at
some of the most prestigious European festivals, including their residency at
the Lucerne Festival with the CBSO Chorus. Highlights in the 2012-13 season
include Mahler’s momentous Resurrection Symphony, Wagner’s romantic
opera The Flying Dutchman and a Beethoven cycle which features all of
the great composer’s symphonies.
For full details on the 2012-13 season or to find out more
visit
www.cbso.co.uk.
--Ruth
Green, CBSO