BAYREUTH, Germany (AFP) — A highly intellectual and visually-packed reading of Richard Wagner's final opera "Parsifal" by Norwegian director Stefan Herheim, was rapturously received by the first-night audience of the prestigious Bayreuth Festival on Friday.
This year's only new production on the town's legendary "Green Hill" took the audience on an intriguing time journey through German history, from the 19th century of Kaiser Wilhelm through to the 1930s and the rise of Nazism.
It also provided a learned and scholarly exploration of the history of "Parsifal" itself, Wagner' "stage consecrational festival-play" written specifically for Bayreuth's Festspielhaus theatre.
"Parsifal" was premiered in Bayreuth in 1882 and not allowed to be performed outside the Festspielhaus until 1913.
In Herheim's dazzingly multi-layered reading, Wagner's Bayreuth home Wahnfried and the Festspielhaus itself feature prominently.
In the garden of Wahnfried, for example, where Wagner now lies buried, the director assembles the social elite of Wilhelminian society around the master's grave.
Klingsor's magical kingdom in Act II is a field hospital during World War I where nurses and flower maidens attend to wounded soldiers.
Later on, swastika flags are raised over Wahnfried and the flower maidens appear in Nazi SS uniforms, but the house is quickly burned and destroyed under Allied bombing.
The final act is set in the post-war Bundestag in Bonn, which was the German capital until reunification in 1989.
Musically, Italian maestro Daniele Gatti, making his Bayreuth debut, gave one of the slowest-ever readings of Wagner's longest opera, stretching the score out to four hours and 40 minutes, excluding two hour-long intervals.
While that may have been singer-friendly, for some audience members it was too long and Gatti was greeted with a few boos when he took his bows.
The singers shone with exemplary diction and strong acting, notably British tenor Christopher Ventris in the title role and German baritone Detlef Roth as Amfortas.
Korean bass Kwangchul Youn was also cheered for his portrayal of Gurnemanz.
The Bayreuth Festival is set to continue Saturday with a performance of "Tristan and Isolde" in a revival of Christoph Marthaler's bleak reading last seen in the Festspielhaus in 2006.
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