What's on at this year's Bayreuth Festival

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The Bayreuth Festival, the annual month-long summer music festival dedicated exclusively to the works of Richard Wagner (1813-1883), is staging seven different operas this year, including a brand new production of the massive "Ring" cycle.

The 95th Richard Wagner Festspiele, which opens on July 25 and runs until August 28, will include the new four-part "Ring" and revivals of three earlier stagings.

Following is a list of the operas being performed on Wagner's fabled "Green Hill" this year:

--- "Der fliegende Hollaender" (The Flying Dutchman), opens the festival on July 25th. The Dutchman is Wagner's first "mature" opera and was written in 1841 and first performed in Dresden in 1843. It was not staged in Bayreuth until 1901, 18 years after the composer's death. The current production by Claus Guth was unveiled for the first time in 2003 and is now entering its fourth year. It is the ninth different production of "Hollaender" at Bayreuth. Conductor is Marc Albrecht from Germany.

--- "Tristan und Isolde" (Tristan and Isolde), a music drama written between 1857 and 1859. First performed in 1865 in Munich and first performed in Bayreuth in 1866. The current production by Swiss theatre auteur Christoph Marthaler was unveiled for the first time last year when it received damning reviews. It is the 10th new staging of the work in the festival's history. There is one significant change in the line-up this year, with conductor Peter Schneider from Germany replacing Japanese maestro Eiji Oue, who last year became the first-ever Asian to conduct in Bayreuth, but whose interpretation of Wagner's headiest score was panned by the critics.

--- "Parsifal", Wagner's last opera, was dubbed by the composer as a "stage consecrational festival-play". He worked on the score from 1877 until 1882, the year it premiered in Bayreuth. It is one of only three works by Wagner to have received their world premiere in Bayreuth's Festspielhaus, the theatre designed and built by the composer himself. The others were "Siegfried" and "Goetterdaemmerung" (Twilight of the Gods), the last two parts of the four-opera "Ring" cycle. "Parsifal" was not allowed to be performed outside Bayreuth until 1913. The current production, unveiled in 2004, is by the self-styled provocateur of German theatre, Christoph Schlingensief and is the eighth different staging of the work at Bayreuth. Conductor is Adam Fischer, who replaces French composer and conductor Pierre Boulez.

--- "Der Ring des Nibelungen" (The Ring of the Nibelung), arguably Wagner's masterpiece, a sprawling 16-hour tetralogy comprising "Das Rheingold" (Rhinegold), "Die Walkuere" (The Valkyrie), "Siegfried" and "Goetterdaemmerung" (Twilight of the Gods). The composer first toyed with the idea of a work based on the Nibelung saga back in 1848 and began writing what would eventually become the final libretto in 1850. The final text was not finished until 1853 and Wagner began composing the music in November of that year. He completed the composition of "Rheingold" and "Die Walkuere" by 1856, but broke off the composition of "Siegfried" during the sketch of Act II in 1857, not resuming work until 1864. Wagner only began composition of the final opera in the cycle, "Goetterdaemmerung", in 1869, finally completing it in 1874. The "Ring" was first performed in its entirety at the first-ever Bayreuth Festival in 1876.

The new production, which will the 13th complete staging in Bayreuth, was originally to have been directed by controversial Danish film director Lars von Trier. But he pulled out and has been replaced by German theatre director and writer Tankred Dorst.

The Ring will be performed three times in its entirety during the month-long festival, with one single additional performance of "Rheingold". "Tristan" and "Hollaender" will be each be performed six times and "Parsifal" five times, making 30 performances in all between July 25 and August 28.

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AFP 201041 GMT 07 06