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E-mail China Daily, December 20, 2024
With the Bayreuth Festival coming to Shanghai for the first time, the city will host the festival's only residency program in Asia. It is staging three masterpieces by notable German composer Richard Wagner (1813-83) from 2025 to 2027 and offering audiences an opera feast.
The Bayreuth Festival and Shanghai Grand Theatre unveiled a three-year plan on Dec 10. "Bayreuth in Shanghai "will present Wagner's three major works — Tristan and Isolde, Die Walkure (The Valkyries) and Tannhauser — as well as a series of educational activities and special editions of operas made for children.
Launched by Richard Wagner in 1876, the Bayreuth Festival is one of the top summer art festivals in Europe, focusing on presenting the composer's last 10 works including The Flying Dutchman and Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung). Taking place in July and August at the Bayreuth Festival Theatre in Germany, which the composer helped to design, the festival has been continuously drawing classical music fans from across the world to its 112 editions.
"We are very happy and honored to cooperate with Shanghai Grand Theatre and Shanghai Opera House, both top world institutions. China has a big market for operas and Shanghai has impressed me a lot as one of the most beautiful cities in the world," says Katharina Wagner, the composer's great-granddaughter and art director of the festival. "Our partners' and the city's professionalism and passion for art have convinced us to make Shanghai the destination (to carry out the three-year plan)."
She points out that the three works that will be performed represent Richard Wagner in different styles and periods. Among them, director Roland Schwab's 2022 production of Tristan and Isolde will debut in the metropolis at the Shanghai Grand Theatre from July 4 to 6 next year.
Based on the Celtic legend of Tristan and Iseult and inspired by the poetic novel adapted by Gottfried von Strassburg, one of the greatest medieval German poets, this autobiographical work premiered in 1865 under the baton of Hans von Bulow. Its writing reflects on Richard Wagner's affair with Mathilde Wesendonck and is deeply influenced by Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung (The World as Will and Idea) written by German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer.
It is also worth noting that the opera's renowned Tristan chords, chromaticized harmonies and endless melodies have influenced Romantic period (late 18th to early 19th centuries) music and laid the foundation for the development of classical music in the 20th century.
Katharina Wagner notes that Schwab's production of Tristan and Isolde is refreshing and presents dramatic scenes. Blending the original work with modern stage designs and projection technology, it explores love and death against the backdrop of futurism.
The stage is set in a huge oval room with an open ceiling, with the floor representing a psychological dimension, where the music and story development remain in tune with nature.
"We hope to present an authentic Tristan and Isolde. This time, we will keep the original cast and performers to the utmost extent, as well as the stage designs and materials," says Zhang Xiaoding, general manager of the Shanghai Grand Theatre.
Xu Zhong, president of the Shanghai Opera House and music director of the three-year plan, adds that they will co-produce this opera and several opera singers from China will have the chance to perform and learn from the world's best.
"There are many Richard Wagner fans in China. It is very exciting and encouraging to see such cooperation between the world's top opera festival and Shanghai, a cosmopolitan city. This plan will make his music more known to Chinese and Asian audiences," says Xu.
Shanghai is committed to being a global capital for the performing arts, eyeing audiences not only in Shanghai but also the world. Earlier in June, the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra presented four symphony concerts at the Shanghai Grand Theatre, with over 6,000 tickets sold out in five minutes. More than 40 percent of the ticket buyers were from 21 provinces and cities across China and abroad, according to the theater.
In addition to the debut of the highly anticipated operas, special children's editions will be staged in Shanghai for the first time. These one-hour operas will be condensed versions of Richard Wagner's works, aiming to popularize opera among children, enhance their understanding and cultivate their interest in this art form, according to the organizers.
