Tannhäuser lived for seven years in the dream world of the Venusberg, but even his return to the stifling society of Wartburg Castle brings no fulfillment. A pilgrim between worlds, he is homeless. The Icelandic director Thorleifur Örn Arnarsson, known for his compelling interpretations of mythical material and grand narratives, stages "Tannhäuser" as an existential drama of identity and a surreal journey into the human psyche. Wagner condensed the search for meaning and stability in a world that seems to be slipping away into a philosophical description of the world.

EPSG:4326

Tannhäuser

Opernhaus Zürich

Works by Wagner / Widmann / Xenakis / Saariaho / Pelzel

Friedrichsforum

The Irish princess Isolde is promised to King Marke of Cornwall. Together with her handmaiden Brangäne, she is escorted across the sea by the knight Tristan. Isolde’s lethal poison meant for Tristan is replaced with a love potion, and their passion leads them along a path to tragedy.

We present a revival of our acclaimed production of Wagner’s groundbreaking Tristan und Isolde, directed by Carmen Jakobi with the Longborough Festival Orchestra conducted by Longborough’s veteran Wagnerian Music Director, Anthony Negus.

Longborough Festival Opera

We're having a celebrity guest at the start of our weekend with the Bavarian State Opera: Hanna-Elisabeth Müller, a member of the ensemble from 2012 to 2016, is a sought-after singer who performs on the world's most important opera and concert stages. She sings Alexander Zemlinsky's extended setting of a poem by Richard Dehmel, whose poetry also inspired Arnold Schoenberg to create his most famous piece, the sextet "Transfigured Night." Interspersed with Richard Wagner's Tristan-like Wesendonck Lieder: unimagined bliss...

The Bavarian State Opera in Blaibach – Polyphonic

Blaibach Concert Hall

Richard Wagner’s music dramas take centre stage this season, but his music for small ensembles is equally captivating. Siegfried Idyll, featuring birdsong and a lullaby, was a tender birthday gift to his wife Cosima, free from the weight of his grand operas, though its themes later appeared in Der Ring. George Enescu’s lushly harmonic Octet showcases the rarely used combination of eight strings, blending the power of a larger ensemble with the intimacy of chamber music. Together, these works reveal a different, lighter side to the late Romantic tradition.

Chamber music: Wagner and Enescu

AMUZ (Festival van Vlaanderen Antwerpen)

In Wagner's interpretation, the medieval myth about the tragic love between the Irish king's daughter Isolde and Tristan, King Mark's henchman, to whom Isolde was married against her will, becomes a key work of musical theater at the beginning of a new era. This season, the Hamburg State Opera is bringing Ruth Berghaus' legendary production from 1988 back into the repertoire.

Tristan und Isolde (Tristan and Isolde)

Hamburg State Opera

The Apollo Orchestra with principal Conductor David Chan welcomes Susanna Phillips, soprano, as our featured soloist in Strauss’s Four Last Songs.

New World

Montgomery College Catherine F. Scott Commons

Conner Leavitt, tenor

Northwestern Bienen School of Music

Stories of tragic love unfold through the expressive power of the orchestra. Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde conveys the tender weight of grief with exquisite harmonies, and Tchaikovsky recounts forbidden lovers from Dante’s Inferno who are eternally tossed in the wind. The highs and lows of a bittersweet romance are on display in scenes from Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier.

Wagner, Tchaikovsky, and Strauss

Detroit Symphony Orchestra

There’s a good reason why Elgar’s Cello Concerto is a classic: deep emotions surge beneath its haunted surface and if anyone can uncover them it’s our soloist, the remarkable Kian Soltani. Today, it’s just one stage on an emotional odyssey devised by our Principal Guest Conductor Patrick Hahn: a voyage that embraces the infinite longing of George Crumb and Richard Wagner, the volcanic grief of Benjamin Britten, and Scriabin’s final, multicoloured starburst of pure sonic bliss. Join us and be transported. 

Elgar’s Cello Concerto

Glasgow Royal Concert Hall

Usher Hall, Edinburgh

There’s a good reason why Elgar’s Cello Concerto is a classic: deep emotions surge beneath its haunted surface and if anyone can uncover them it’s our soloist, the remarkable Kian Soltani. Today, it’s just one stage on an emotional odyssey devised by our Principal Guest Conductor Patrick Hahn: a voyage that embraces the infinite longing of George Crumb and Richard Wagner, the volcanic grief of Benjamin Britten, and Scriabin’s final, multicoloured starburst of pure sonic bliss. Join us and be transported.

Usher Hall

In the final part of the Nibelung tetralogy, Siegfried goes out into the world, gets caught up in Hagen's intrigues and is murdered by him. Dying, he remembers his love for Brünnhilde.

Götterdämmerung

Vienna State Opera

When the Sønderjylland Symphony Orchestra and the Schleswig-Holstein Symphony Orchestra unite, music truly becomes borderless. Across national borders – but with a shared love of symphonic music – the two orchestras create a magnificent concert experience that is only possible in a region with such strong cultural ties. It is a unique opportunity to experience over 100 musicians together on stage, a luxury that is otherwise only found in the largest European capitals.

Collaboration concert: Wagner, Brantelid & Mahler

Alsion Concert Hall

German House

"Camille Saint-Saëns' Cello Concerto is fantastic: very dramatic, in a way truly theatrical," enthuses star cellist Gautier Capuçon. And with his globally acclaimed, sonorous voice, the Frenchman is the perfect soloist for this Romantic masterpiece. It's no surprise that it's so dramatic: after all, Saint-Saëns wrote eleven operas, just two fewer than operatic giant Richard Wagner. And so it's fitting that the two composers perform side by side here—especially since the Staatskapelle Dresden is an orchestra whose DNA is, so to speak, written into its DNA. But the top-class ensemble also manages to illuminate the lucid brilliance of Claude Debussy's impressionistic soundscape "La mer" with "effortless excellence" and "overwhelming beauty" (Hamburger Abendblatt). An evening not to be missed! (And just as an aside: Debussy was also, of course, an opera composer.)

Saxon State Orchestra Dresden / Gautier Capuçon / Daniele Gatti

Elbphilharmonie Hamburg

It is a young, but all the more beautiful tradition: shortly before the end of the season, great orchestral sound prepares a feast for the ears. The Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden is the orchestra of honour. In the 1840s, Richard Wagner referred to the orchestra, which he himself led as court conductor, with sincere affection as a 'wonderful harp'. Since then, the art-loving metropolis on the River Elbe has been a constant source of Wagnerian music. For the orchestra festival at the Alte Oper, the Dresdeners will continue to focus on Wagner, placing him in a surprising field of tension: Camille Saint-Saëns and Claude Debussy were among the German Romantic composer's greatest admirers and harshest critics. The Sächsische Staatskapelle, its principal conductor Daniele Gatti and Gautier Capuçon will devote themselves to these three magicians of sound par excellence.

Orchestra Festival: Saxon State Orchestra Dresden

Alte Oper

To open this concert, Wagner conceived his Sigfried-Idyll as a gift to his wife Cosima, blending pastoral tenderness and miniature Wagnerian leitmotifs. An intimate dialogue woven by horns and woodwinds already imbued with nostalgia. In his Serenade Opus 44 , a jewel of spontaneity straight out of Czech folklore, Dvořák alternates joyful village dances with more nostalgic melodies. They showcase bassoons and oboes with a subtle art of counterpoint. As for Brahms, his Serenade No. 1 marks his symphonic debut and deploys his classical architecture refreshed by romantic colors. The Orchestre National Montpellier reveals the full palette of melodies that seem blown by the wind – from the transparency of the minuets to the majesty of the finales. A sensitive homage to the instruments that sing, converse, and dance.

Montpellier Occitanie National Orchestra

Collégiale Saint-Étienne

He has never learned to fear. So he manages to forge the sword Notung and use it to kill the dragon Fafner. He wins the Ring of the Nibelung and is led by the forest bird to Brünnhilde, who has been put to sleep by the god Wotan. Siegfried awakens Brünnhilde and they both fall in love with each other.

Siegfried

The epic struggle between good and evil reaches its climactic conclusion in Richard Wagner’s Twilight of the Gods (Götterdämmerung), as the battle for the ring of power brings about the destruction of the gods’ world. Devoted love is torn apart by manipulation, and the final reckoning unfolds in a cataclysm of fire and water. In the operatic repertoire, few works rival the grandeur and emotional intensity of Wagner’s masterpiece. This new production of the monumental finale to the RING cycle offers operagoers an unforgettable experience when witnessed live.

Twilight of the Gods

Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre

Northwestern University Symphony Orchestra

Northwestern University

To open this concert, Wagner conceived his Sigfried-Idyll as a gift to his wife Cosima, blending pastoral tenderness and miniature Wagnerian leitmotifs. An intimate dialogue woven by the horns and woodwinds already imbued with nostalgia. In his Serenade Opus 44 , a jewel of spontaneity straight out of Czech folklore, Dvořák alternates joyful village dances with more nostalgic melodies. They highlight bassoons and oboes with a subtle art of counterpoint. As for Brahms, his Serenade No. 1 marks his symphonic debut and deploys his classical architecture refreshed by romantic colors. A sensitive homage to the instruments that sing, dialogue and dance.

The Voice of the Winds

Théâtre de Mende

Since 2016, the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra has hosted an ”Orchestra Academy”. The international RSPO Orchestra Academy is a one-year, advanced academic programme for young musicians. Under the guidance of the section leaders from the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and the Piteå School of Music, the musicians receive intensive training individually, in chamber music, and orchestral playing.

Concert with the RSPO Orchestra Academy

Stockholm Concert Hall

The Montpellier Occitanie Orchestra is pleased to present a series of open-air concerts, in the parks and gardens of Montpellier, but also in the heart of neighborhoods, in the Maisons pour tous. Whether you come alone, as a couple, with family, or with friends, these concerts will offer you the opportunity to share unique musical moments, outside of our traditional concert halls.

In garden and in courtyard #3

Jardin des plantes de Montpellier

The Ring Without Words is an orchestral suite that distills the most iconic themes from Richard Wagner’s monumental tetralogy, The Ring of the Nibelung. This 70-minute symphonic fresco encapsulates the essence of the 15-hour epic, telling the tale of a magical ring forged by the dwarf Alberich from gold stolen from the Rhine. While the ring grants immense power, it also brings ruin and destruction to those who possess it. Wotan, the king of the gods, attempts to control the ring but fails, leading to the gods’ downfall. Betrayed and manipulated, the hero Siegfried is killed by Hagen, son of Alberich. Brünnhilde, the Valkyrie, daughter of Wotan and wife of Siegfried, returns the ring to the Rhine, marking the end of an era. The Ring Without Words offers an immersive journey through Wagner’s world, highlighting its most memorable moments, including the prelude to Das Rheingold, the Ride of the Valkyries, Siegfried’s death and funeral music, and the apocalyptic conclusion in Twilight of the Gods. In a thrilling season finale, the soaring lyricism of Schumann’s Piano Concerto, performed by pianist Yefim Bronfman, contrasts with the destructive power of gold in Wagner’s epic, creating a stunning clash of opposing powers.

Wagner and the Legend of the Ring

Place des Arts

With their incestuous, adulterous love, they violate the guest and marriage laws that Wotan's wife Fricka watches over. Siegmund is therefore supposed to die in a duel with Hunding, but Wotan's daughter Brünnhilde, a Valkyrie, defies her father's will and fights for Siegmund. Wotan is forced to kill Siegmund himself. Brünnhilde is punished by her father: he surrounds her with a wall of fire and sinks her into a deep sleep.

Die Walküre

The final part of the tetralogy sees another broadening of the horizon. Siegfried sallies forth »to new glories«, encountering people driven by a desire for power and riches and without scruple in their determination to acquire them. Without Brünnhilde on hand to help him, the hero succumbs to a conspiracy at the Gibichung hall, also triggering the beginning of the end of the old world, which is still beset by the curse placed by Alberich in THE RHINEGOLD on the ring, which confers great power on its wearer. With Brünnhilde realising what has happened, she sees self-sacrifice as the only path to redemption: by eradicating herself through immolation and returning the stolen gold to the Rhine, she will be clearing the way for a new beginning for all. From Brünnhilde’s ashes Wagner rekindles the love theme, which until then has only been played in Act 3 of THE VALKYRIE. This charges the final moments of TWILIGHT OF THE GODS with an atmosphere of hope rather than simply the gloom of destruction. The game can begin again; will it take a different course next time?

Der Ring des Nibelungen – Götterdämmerung

Deutsche Oper Berlin

Wagner's Siegfried, the third opera in Richard Wagner’s monumental Ring Cycle follows the coming-of-age journey of its titular hero Siegfried, a fearless but naïve young man destined to play a pivotal role in the fate of gods and mortals.

The Citadel

Wagner reserved his most magical and powerful music for the final part of the Ring cycle – a series of four epic operas.

London Symphony Orchestra/Sir Simon Rattle

Barbican Centre

The two middle sections of the tetralogy set out two ways of experiencing life. On the one hand we are presented in THE VALKYRIE with Brünnhilde, whose maturation process takes her from her discovery of sorrow and empathy to a conscious reflection on what it is to be human. By contrast, Siegfried’s path is mapped out solely as a function of his sensory experience. Where initially the young man’s self-image stems only from his exploration of his own boundless strength, other senses and sensibilities soon come to bear, along with an awakening sexuality. SIEGFRIED presents an encounter not only between man and woman but between two principles – Siegfried’s innate, unquestioned vigour on one side and Brünnhilde’s wisdom born of observation on the other. And as these two diametrical forces unite in a love clinch, the end of the opera seems to be presenting the basis for a renewal of human society.

Der Ring des Nibelungen – Siegfried

To open this concert, Wagner conceived his Sigfried-Idyll as a gift to his wife Cosima, blending pastoral tenderness and miniature Wagnerian leitmotifs. An intimate dialogue woven by horns and woodwinds already imbued with nostalgia. In his Serenade Opus 44 , a jewel of spontaneity straight out of Czech folklore, Dvořák alternates joyful village dances with more nostalgic melodies. They showcase bassoons and oboes with a subtle art of counterpoint. As for Brahms, his Serenade No. 1 marks his symphonic debut and deploys his classical architecture refreshed by romantic colors. Under the expert direction of Jean-François Verdier, the Orchestre National Montpellier reveals the full palette of melodies that seem blown by the wind – from the transparency of the minuets to the majesty of the finales. A sensitive tribute to the instruments that sing, dialogue and dance.

Opéra Comédie

Music has the power to express emotions that we have no words for: happiness, grief, ecstasy and the dissolution of boundaries. William Walton, one of the most important English composers of the 20th century, finds in his neo-Romantic viola concerto a path between intimacy and emergence. The bizarre music-mystic Scriabin searched for a great synaesthetic mystery that was supposed to put humanity in a state of ecstasy. The closest he came to achieving this goal was with his captivating Poème de l’extase. Wagner's Tristan und Isolde is about the bonding of two people against all societal conventions, the celebration of an all-consuming and fatal love.

Skrja­bin - Wagner - Walton

Meistersingerhalle

Following the LA Phil’s acclaimed production of Das Rheingold, Gustavo Dudamel, famed architect Frank Gehry, and director Alberto Arvelo take on the second installment in Wagner’s grand Ring Cycle: Die Walküre. Envisioned as a three-part saga with each act standing on its own, this production boasts a cast of international opera superstars who bring to life a grand tale of love, fate, duty, and self-determination.

Die Walküre Act III

Walt Disney Concert Hall

Esa-Pekka Salonen is back with the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra as conductor and composer! In his Concerto for Organ and Orchestra, he uses every imaginable register – true to his multifaceted artistry. We also hear the dazzling Poème de l’Extase by Scriabin.

Salonen Sinfonia Concertante

Göteborgs Symfoniker

Matthias Pintscher, newly appointed conductor of the Kansas City Symphony Orchestra and an expert on the music of the 20th and 21st centuries, has programmed a birthday greeting and – in keeping with the music festival motto “The End” – two very different farewell works for his guest conducting engagement with the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra.

NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra / Leonidas Kavakos / Matthias Pintscher

A profound philosophical meditation on compassion and reconciliation, Wagner’s transcendent rendering of a medieval knight’s heroic quest for the Holy Grail returns in François Girard’s celebrated production, a “thoughtful and intrepid staging, full of striking imagery” (The New York Times). Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducts a cast of Wagnerian superstars, including tenor Piotr Beczała in the title role, mezzo-soprano Elīna Garanča as the enigmatic Kundry, baritone Peter Mattei as the ailing Amfortas, bass-baritone Ryan Speedo Green as the sorcerer Klingsor, and bass Jongmin Park as the wise Gurnemanz.

Parsifal

Lincoln Center

The dwarf Alberich, ridiculed and rejected by the three Rhinemaidens, steals the Rhinegold,curses love and uses the gold to forge a ring that bestows great power. From then on, everyone lusts after it, but it brings death and destruction, laden with a curse.

Das Rheingold

Die Walküre Act I

With the hegemony of the gods at its zenith at the close of THE RHINEGOLD and the gods ensconced in the castle of Valhalla, trouble is brewing in THE VALKYRIE. The mortals are power-crazed, mistrust and materialism rule and all that the gods can think about is enforcing the old codes rather than questioning their raison d’être. Siblings Siegmund and Sieglinde are condemned to death because there is no place for their special brand of love in society. Brünnhilde, a Valkyrie, is charmed by them and dares to defy her father Wotan’s sentence by taking the pair under her wing. In THE VALKYRIE Wagner makes it plain whose side he is on: in the big love scene between Siegmund and Sieglinde, in which the elemental force of love outpunches all social mores, and in the evolution of Brünnhilde’s character, whose conduct is at first motivated by intuitive sympathy but morphs into deliberate action as a protest against inhumanity and injustice.

Der Ring des Nibelungen – Die Walküre

Union County Performing Arts Center (UCPAC)

‘In this realm, time becomes space…’ From CS Lewis to Terry Gilliam, Wagner’s Parsifal has been an inspiration to the very greatest creative artists. Vasily Petrenko conducts a symphonic suite that weaves all the power and beauty of Wagner’s five-hour masterpiece into one sumptuous orchestral tapestry: music that glows from within, sounding more radiant than ever in the Royal Festival Hall.

Wagner x Taneyev

Royal Festival Hall

Richard Wagner considered RHEINGOLD a "pre-evening" to his stage play DER RING DES NIBELUNGEN, a label that certainly deliberately refers to the prologues of the Baroque operas. Because here, as well as there, the gods are in control and create the conditions under which the fates of man will be decided. And just like the ancient deities of Monteverdi, their northern counterparts of Wagner are beings who embody the drives of human existence. All of the feelings, urges and thoughts that determine our own existence also appear in the two and a half hours of RHEINGOLD. Starting with the innocent games played by the Rheinmaidens whom the Nibelung Alberich robs of their gold, to this dwarf's unbridled lust for power and the scornful nihilism of the fire god Loge, to the father of the gods Wotan's attempt to create something that will last with his palace of Valhalla. And not lastly, the gold itself is a mute lead character: an item of gleaming fascination, it is simultaneously a touchstone by which each character is manifest and which divides gods and man alike into good and evil.

Der Ring des Nibelungen – Das Rheingold

Season 77 comes to a thrilling end with the all-time favorite symphony of Brahms, a radiant performance by Klein Competition winner and international star, Pearl de la Motte, and one of Wagner’s greatest hits.

Pearl de la Matte, 2024 Klein Competition Winner

Heritage Theatre

San Mateo High School

Guest performance in Bayreuth

Guest performance in Bayreut

Friedrichsforum, Bayreuth

V18 Season Ticket - RESIS FESTIVAL

Opera House, A Coruña

South African cellist Abel Selaocoe is a force of nature—celebrated for breaking boundaries and captivating audiences around the globe. He brings his unique artistry to the North American Première of Jessie Montgomery’s powerful new Cello Concerto. The evening then soars into mythic realms with the haunting legend of The Flying Dutchman and the sweeping grandeur of Götterdämmerung—a tale of betrayal, love, sacrifice, and the twilight of the gods.

Epic Wagner

David Pecaut Square

Blending sonic mysticism with maritime contemplation, this concert unites German and French Romanticism in a way that is both rich in contrasts and affinities. Richard Wagner’s music from »Parsifal« and »Tristan und Isolde« transports us into worlds of redemption and Liebestod (love death), metaphysical silence and burning ecstasy. Between these works come two French masterpieces that create their own unique sensuality: Camille Saint-Saëns’ First Cello Concerto is a virtuoso and dramatic concert piece without symphonic pretensions, while Claude Debussy’s »La Mer« is an impressionistic naturalistic panorama, full of movement and refracting sunlight. The Cello Concerto is interpreted by our »Artist in Residence« Gautier Capuçon, a master of the warm, cantabile tone.

Symphony Concert N° 10

Semperoper Dresden

There’s pathos and grandeur in equal measure in Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto, its slow movement one of the composer’s most achingly divine.

London Symphony Orchestra/Nathalie Stutzmann

This program highlights the viola’s deep, expressive voice in Canadian composer Cassandra Miller’s Concerto, a poignant reflection on separation premiered in 2023 by Lawrence Power. Meanwhile, Debussy paints a vivid portrait of the sea with impressionistic colours, immersing listeners in a nostalgic and dreamlike soundscape. Enjoy a musical journey that is both powerful and poetic.

Wagner and Debussy: From Love to the Sea

Under the direction of Bruce Walker, the Walla Walla Symphony Youth Orchestra (WWSYO) will present their concert for the Spring session, featuring the winners of the WWSYO Concerto Competition.

Walla Walla Symphony Youth Orchestra Concert: From Shadow to Light

Walla Walla Community College

Asher Fisch is one of the world’s finest Wagner conductors, and he leads an all-star cast including celebrated British baritone Christopher Maltman as the Dutchman, Daniel Sumegi as Daland, and acclaimed soprano Anna-Louise Cole as the devoted Senta.

The Flying Dutchman

The University of Western Australia

Opera love stories tend to unfold quickly, leaving the composer with the task of supporting a plot with music that speaks volumes. The chord progression at the beginning of Wagner's Tristan and Isolde is a textbook example of musical foreshadowing. In Bartók's psychological thriller Bluebeard's Castle, two extraordinary artists portray a doomed couple.

Søndergård Conducts Wagner and Bartók

Orchestra Hall Minneapolis

The word “epic” could have been invented to describe the music of Götterdämmerung, the heaven-and-earth-shaking culmination of Wagner’s four-part Ring cycle, complete with vengeance, magic fire, and the redemptive power of love beyond death. Orchestral excerpts from this operatic thrill ride meld with the instantly charming neoclassicism of Prokofiev’s First Symphony and the US premiere of Olga Neuwirth’s Zones of Blue, a clarinet concerto performed by its dedicatee and longtime friend of The Cleveland Orchestra, Jörg Widmann.

Wagner’s Götterdämmerung

Severance Music Center

Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony overflows with grateful enjoyment of nature. The symphony is a deeply personal depiction of what made Beethoven happiest: lonely walks through rural landscapes, small babbling brooks and mighty thunderstorms. It is uncomplicated and comes straight from the heart.

Beethoven 6

Aarhus Music Hall

A string of Strauss' best songs, set to voice by Miah Persson – combined with Beethoven's nature-enjoying Pastorale symphony and the overture to Tannhäuser: The very best from the classical world.
Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony overflows with grateful enjoyment of nature. The symphony is a deeply personal depiction of what made Beethoven happiest: lonely walks through rural landscapes, small babbling brooks and mighty thunderstorms. It is uncomplicated and comes straight from the heart.

Welcome to an evening in the spirit of love, where the singers of the DR Vocal Ensemble explore virtuoso and expressive choral music.

Songs of Love with the DR Vocal Ensemble

Trinity Church Copenhagen

The viola figures prominently in tonight's Pro Musica concert. Dvořák's 3rd String Quintet has added an extra viola to the standard string quartet and dates from Dvořák's time in America in the early 1890s, where he went all out to find the American 'primordial music', just as he had done with his own Czech folk music idiom. We can therefore look forward to both tribal rhythms, folk tunes and Dvořák's take on what could be a new, American national anthem.

Dvořák's String Quintet & Viola Power

Odense Concert Hall

The UNLV Symphony Orchestra, conducted by the orchestra's artistic director Taras Krysa, performs Wagner's The Ring of the Nibelung.

UNLV Symphony Orchestra: The Ring Cycle!

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

The works on this program are the quintessence of Romantic-era expression, with a focus on themes of individualism and emotionalism, and a lush, hyper-dramatic musical vocabulary. The performance begins with the Prelude from Wagner’s opera Tristan und Isolde and depicts the passions and frustration of the doomed lovers.

Radiant Romance

Florida State University

This evening will be unforgettable: Star director Tiago Rodrigues, author and special guest of the 2026 Wiesbaden May Festival, takes a close look at Wagner's "Tristan und Isolde." His production traces the eventful path of the Tristan myth through rewritings and ambiguities to the present day. In a vast archive, dancers Sofia Dias and Vítor Roriz turn over pages of this story, bringing it close to our present through their questions. Produced at the Opéra Nancy, Rodrigues' interpretation was met with enthusiasm there, not least because it "increases the concentration on singing and listening" (Concerti). And this becomes a true delight, as only young, internationally successful Wagnerian singers grace the Wiesbaden stage: Ric Furman (Tristan) launched his international career with prizes at Wagner competitions after an engagement at the local State Theatre. Carla Filipcic Holm (Isolde) is one of Argentina's most sought-after sopranos and is currently taking European stages and the hearts of the press by storm. While Irene Roberts, celebrated from the Metropolitan Opera to the Bayreuth Festival, takes on the role of Brangäne, Tommi Hakala returns to Wiesbaden as Kurwenal after his success in the title role of "The Flying Dutchman."

Tristan and Isolde: Music drama by Richard Wagner

Hessisches Staatstheater Wiesbaden

Opera Wilmington and Osher Livelong Learning Institute at UNCW continue their collaboration to bring you Opera Talks focused on two Met Opera Live in HD screenings in April and May.

UNCW opera historian and bassist Dr. Helena Kopchick Spencer again guides Opera Talk attendees through the stories behind the operas as well as the operas themselves.

Coming up next is Eugene Onegin, at times celebratory, at times poignant and heartbreaking. Timing is everything in this opera, which Tchaikovsky based on a verse novel by Alexander Pushkin. Onegin, a man of society, gets his timing all wrong, rejecting the love of Tatiana, a country girl, when they first meet.

When he sees her again five years later, he realizes that he loves her deeply. Tatiana is now married, however, and refuses to leave her husband even though she still harbors great affection for Onegin.

Expanding our understanding of the opera and the world in which it takes place is the purpose of Opera Talks. Kopchick Spencer brings her enthusiasm, vast knowledge and sense of humor to each one.

The final session, May 27, spotlights El Último Sueño de Frida y Diego, a contemporary work by Gabriela Lena Frank. This “last dream” of the famous artists is fashioned as a reversal of the Orpheus and Euridice myth. Frida Kahlo leaves the underworld on the Day of the Dead to unite briefly on earth with her lover Diego Rivera.

Opera Talks

Cinemark Myrtle Beach

Mayfaire Town Center

University of Delaware Wilmington Campus

Josh Jones will play Procession, Jessie Montgomery's inventive percussion concerto. Mussorgsky's colorful Pictures at an Exhibition in Ravel's iconic orchestration will complete the program.

Pictures at an Exhibition

Ohio Wesleyan University

Wagner's Ring des Nibelungen consists of four operas – or "music dramas," as the composer called them. He also considered these works to be symphonic in nature, a further development of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. Which is why it is worth listening to the Ring in a concert performance. Siegfried combines the growth and development of a hero with nature music. The "Forest Murmurs" section in the second act is pure magic. Yannick Nézet-Séguin continues his concert-version Ring cycle at the Festspielhaus with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra.

Richard Wagner: Siegfried

Festspielhaus Baden-Baden

Even "birdsong and an orange sunrise" can be found in his "Siegfried Idyll," explained Richard Wagner. The work for chamber orchestra was a birthday surprise for his wife Cosima and was first performed in 1870 in the stairwell of their home in Tribschen near Lucerne. The title alludes to their son Siegfried, but Wagner primarily quotes from the musical drama of the same name in his four-part opera "The Ring of the Nibelung."

Day And Night

Zeughaus Neuss

It's a shame the composers can't meet in person this evening. It would certainly be entertaining to hear what the antipodes Brahms and Wagner would have to say to each other. While the musical theater reformer, who landed his first international hit with "Tannhäuser" in 1845, and the symphonists world-famous not only for his "Hungarian Dances" treated each other with at most mild malice, there had been a proverbial blowout between Brahms and Hugo Wolf. Brahms' attacks on his older colleague, which Wolf regularly published thereafter, were often amused to recount to his friends. But regardless of what one thought of the other, what one heard were nothing but masterpieces.

Pretty best enemies

Theater Duisburg

He was condemned by Satan to sail the world's oceans until a woman frees him from this curse through her loyalty. One day, when Senta's father returns home from a long voyage with a mysterious man, Senta is the only one who recognizes the Flying Dutchman in the sinister foreign captain. At the cost of self-destruction, she decides to redeem him.

Der fliegende Holländer

Richard Wagner’s Siegfried Idyll was a gift to his wife Cosima on the birth of their son. The music, one of the composer's sunniest creations, takes up motifs from the opera Siegfried, which Yannick Nézet-Séguin will also be bringing to his Baden-Baden guest performance this spring. In Götterdämmerung, the conclusion of the Ring tetralogy, the older Siegfried will embark on a trip on the Rhine. But today’s audience beats him to it: with Robert Schumann's cheerful and Romantic “Rhenish” Symphony.

Yannick Nézet-Séguin

Die Walküre, the second part of Wagner’s iconic Ring des Nibelungen, was conceived as a theatrical spectacle with a hidden orchestra. The Antwerp Symphony Orchestra flips the script, placing the music front and centre in a concert performance free of visual additions. Under the baton of Jaap van Zweden, the orchestra and soloists reveal the full dramatic power of Wagner’s score, proving it shines even without staging. Immerse yourself in the epic tale of Siegmund and Sieglinde, and let the music transport you to a world of myth, passion, and timeless emotion.

Jaap van Zweden conducts Die Walküre (1. Akt)

Heuvel Eindhoven

Queen Elisabeth Hall

PLT - Theater Heerlen

The story of Pelléas and Melisande is one of literature's greatest love stories, along with Romeo and Juliet and Tristan and Isolde .

Luisi & Pelléas and Mélisande

DR Koncerthuset

Courtney Lewis leads a program blending timeless classics with bold new sounds. Wagner’s grand Meistersinger Prelude sets the tone, followed by a highly anticipated world premiere from Anna Clyne. Ellington’s Celebration infuses jazz energy, leading to Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5, one of history’s most iconic and powerful works.

Beethoven’s Fifth

Jacoby Symphony Hall

Guest Concert

Festhalle Wörth

Maybe you don't have a green thumb and you don't care about garden design, but perhaps you still know that strange feeling when a houseplant dies? Empathy, maybe even guilt, arise. And then you ask yourself since when this photosynthetic shrub actually lived in your heart – rent-free!

Heaven

Pfalzbau Ludwigshafen

Jan Lisiecki, “perhaps the most ‘complete’ pianist of his age” (BBC Music Magazine), performs one of Mozart’s spellbinding piano concertos at the center of a deeply spiritual program that muses on the interplay of shadow and light. Returning to the SLSO podium, Hannu Lintu leads the orchestra through Wagner’s shimmering melodies, inspired by a holy relic; Samy Moussa’s visionary expression of timelessness and paradise in Elysium; and the mysticism and wonder of Respighi’s Church Windows.

From Mozart to Wagner

Powell Hall

Blast off on an out-of-this-world adventure with your Fayetteville Symphony Orchestra! Experience the music from two of John Williams's most iconic film scores, paired with some of the classical greats that inspired them. This concert is a great fit for lovers of music that evokes character and tells a story.

John Williams and His Influences

Methodist University

Choral Fantasy

Carson Center for the Performing Arts

Internationally renowned Wagner interpreter Simone Young returns to the San Francisco Symphony to conduct a can’t-miss symphonic synopsis of Wagner’s massive Ring cycle, featuring her own selection of orchestral excerpts. In her serenely invigorating orchestral piece The Space Between Stars, Sydney-based composer Ella Macens “wanted to convey the energy and magic of our night sky.” Set in a single searing movement, Saint-Saens’s Cello Concerto No. 1 is bursting with sonic surprises—a music-box minuet here, a sudden silence there—as well as the requisite solo pyrotechnics, taken here by the acclaimed French cellist Gautier Capuçon.

Richard Wagner

Events

Upcoming events

Apr 25, 2026 - Jun 10, 2027

Der fliegende Holländer · Wiener Staatsoper

Jun 20 - Jul 18, 2026

Longborough Festival Opera · Longborough Festival Opera

Jun 21 - Oct 13, 2026

Tannhäuser · Opernhaus Zürich

25 - 26 Jun, 2026

Zubin Mehta & Rudolf Buchbinder · Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra

Jun 25 - Jul 8, 2026

Die Walküre · Bayerische Staatsoper

Past events

Jun 21 - Oct 13, 2026

Tannhäuser · Opernhaus Zürich

Jun 21, 2026

Works by Wagner / Widmann / Xenakis / Saariaho / Pelzel · Ensemble Modern

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