Tannhaüser - Royal Opera House Covent Garden (2016) - Tannhaüser - Royal Opera House Covent Garden (2016)

Description

Wagner’s early masterpiece Tannhäuser had controversial beginnings. Its premiere in Dresden on 19 October 1845 was met with incomprehension, as none of the cast, particularly the title character, were up to the score’s singular demands – quite a change from today, where Tannhäuser is seen as one of the most challenging and rewarding roles for Heldentenor. In 1869 the Paris premiere of a significantly revised version was wildly disrupted by members of the Jockey Club, political opponents of Wagner’s Parisian patrons. Despite its eventual success, Wagner remained dissatisfied with the work for the rest of his life; his wife Cosima’s diaries record Wagner saying just weeks before his death that he ‘still owes the world a Tannhäuser’.

In his critically acclaimed 2010 production for The Royal Opera, director Tim Albery focusses on the conflict at the heart of Tannhäuser (and of so many Wagner works) – the opposing pulls of the sensual and the spiritual. The opening Venusberg bacchanal, vividly choreographed by Jasmin Vardimon, is set beneath a towering replica of the Royal Opera House’s gleaming proscenium arch, designed by Michael Levin. The great song-hall of the Wartburg becomes the ruined palace of a war-torn land, the chorus of pilgrims refugees desperately seeking peace. Against this backdrop, the beauty of the score’s most acclaimed moments – including Wolfram’s ‘O du, mein holder Abendstern’, Elisabeth’s ‘Allmächt’ge Jungfrau’ and Tannhäuser’s glorious ‘Dir töne Lob’– shine forth.

More information is available on the opera house's official website.