Singer

Forget everything you think you know about Wagner! Kent Nagano, the Dresden Festival Orchestra, and Concerto Köln are setting new standards with their performance of the Ring cycle. For the first time ever, this monumental project is being heard in a historically informed interpretation. Just as in Wagner’s own day, the string players use gut strings; the wind instruments are reconstructed based on 19th-century models; the orchestra’s tuning is lower; and the text is at times declaimed rather than traditionally “sung.” Suddenly everything becomes intelligible — and at times it almost recalls the delivery of art song. Working with an international research team, Nagano has brought surprising insights to light. The result is striking. “Light and airy” is how Jan Brachmann described this Wagner in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung; in particular, the winds impress “with sharper definition in their individual colors: they creak, belch, and grunt with a kind of unruly physicality.” With Götterdämmerung, the Ring comes full circle this summer. And once more we have the chance to experience Wagner’s music as he himself most likely heard it.

EPSG:4326

Dresden Festival Orchestra | Concerto Köln | Dresden Festival Choir of the Richard Wagner Academy | Kent Nagano | Soloists

KKL Luzern Concert Hall

Alban Berg revolutionised the opera tradition in 1925 with a gripping story that combines drama, murder and social study. The folk opera stars Daniel Schmutzhard (Wozzeck) and Annette Dasch (Marie), together with chief conductor Vassilis Christopoulos on the podium of the Graz Philharmonic Orchestra, explore the expressive sound world of Berg’s masterpiece. After his successful Austrian debut in Graz with Richard Wagner’s Tannhäuser and stints in Vienna and Salzburg, director Evgeny Titov returns to Graz Opera with one of the most important operas of the 20th century.

Wozzeck

Oper Graz

Johann Strauss worked on a ballet based on the well-known fairy tale of Cinderella at the end of his life. Only a fragment of the piece survived. Axel Ranisch and Martina Eisenreich have created their own work inspired by this: In Vienna, 1899, Strauss is working on his ballet, but who is the mysterious librettist? And what does Ida Grünwald have to do with the project, when she is supposed to be merely typing the libretto? The story behind the creation of the Johann Strauss ballet, its storyline, and an unusual Cinderella narrative set in our present day – this fairy tale opera blends timelines and explores themes of self-discovery, emancipation, creativity, and the power of imagination.

Vienna, 1899: Johann Strauss is working on a new ballet. A competition is held to find a suitable libretto, but only one truly sparks the composer’s imagination...

The Cinderella Ballet: The talented seamstress Grete works in her stepmother’s fashion salon. Grete dreams of designing her own clothing, but her stepsisters, Yvette and Fanchon, mock her relentlessly. When the painter Leon enters the salon, everything changes.

Cinderella's Dream

Volksoper Wien

From a deep E-flat major chord, time and space are lifted, and on the waves of the Rhine, a world unfolds with gods, dwarves, giants and creatures of nature. However, the paradisiacal primordial state does not last long: After the Nibelung Alberich is spurned by the Rhinemaidens, he decides to renounce love forever and seize the gold from the depths of the Rhine. From this, he now forges a ring that grants him world power. But the father of the gods, Wotan, also wants to possess the ring. With the help of the fire god Loge, he actually succeeds in stealing the ring from Alberich. However, Alberich curses the ring: Misfortune shall befall its owner - a prophecy that will soon be fulfilled for the first, but not the last time. Richard Wagner created with DER RING DES NIBELUNGEN a parable about the origin and end of the world and realised his radical idea of a total work of art, in which text, music and stage action form a symbiosis. Wagner's endless melody and his leitmotif technique, which he had already developed in DER FLIEGENDE HOLLÄNDER and LOHENGRIN, reach an as yet unprecedented complexity in THE RING. With the creation of the RING tetralogy, Wagner also solidified the plan for his own festival theatre as a venue. At the request of his patron King Ludwig II, the premiere of RHEINGOLD took place on 22 September 1869 at the National Theatre of Munich. The audience, which was largely composed of professionals and art connoisseurs who had travelled from afar, expressed enthusiastic applause. Wagner's vision of performing the entire DER RING DES NIBELUNGEN  in his own festival theatre finally became a reality in 1876 in Bayreuth. Director Paul-Georg Dittrich, who has already introduced himself to Cologne with his production of DER ZWERG, will stage a new RING. In RHEINGOLD, he embarks on a search for the childlike origin of the world. What happens when free, yet unencumbered imagination is instrumentalised in a power-obsessed society? The musical direction is under the internationally sought-after conductor Marc Albrecht, who returns to the podium of the Gürzenich Orchestra after DIE FRAU OHNE SCHATTEN.

The Rhinegold

Cologne Opera

The story of The Magic Flute begins like an adventure: a prince rescues a princess from a dark ruler, accompanied by a birdcatcher and magical devices. But the boundaries between good and evil, light and dark become blurred and the characters are far more complex.

The story of The Magic Flute has been interpreted and reinterpreted in many ways. But one of the reasons it continues to captivate audiences to this day is that it features complex characters, who are portrayed as diverse and dazzling as real people. A mother, for example, who wants to save her daughter – or perhaps uses her as an instrument of revenge. A young woman who discovers a strength within herself she didn’t know she had. A coward who might actually be braver than he believes. A villain who, on second glance, no longer appears (only) evil.

The Magic Flute

What began in 2023 with a concert performance of »Das Rheingold« and continued in 2024 with »Die Walküre« and now with »Siegfried« is no less than a redefinition of standards in Wagner interpretation. The project »The Wagner Cycles« is dedicated to a unique collaboration between academic expertise and practice, tackling Richard Wagner’s monumental opera tetralogy. In Dresden and on tour through Europe’s musical centers, the results of this spectacular sound workshop and the historically informed perspective on Wagner’s epoch-making theatrical oeuvre have been celebrated as revolutionary. In the third part of the »Ring«, »Siegfried», depictions of nature and the visceral portrayals of action reveal Wagner at the height of his expressive musical powers. As in previous years, the newly-won transparent orchestra sound and the focus on the singers’ treatment of language will ensure novel listening experiences.

Richard Wagner: »Siegfried«

Kulturpalast Dresden

Lucerne Festival

Now he's going out into the world: the free hero Siegfried is tasked with rectifying what Wotan, the father of the gods, messed up at the beginning of the story. Part three of Wagner's "Ring of the Nibelung" can finally be experienced in Kent Nagano's original sound project.

The Wagner Cycles mit Dresdner Festspielorchester und Kent Nagano

Palace of Culture

Now he is going out into the world: the free hero Siegfried is supposed to fix what Wotan, the father of the gods, messed up at the beginning of the story. Part three of Wagner's "Ring of the Nibelung" can finally be experienced in Kent Nagano's original sound project.

Richard Wagner: Siegfried

Museum Ludwig

What began in 2023 with a concert performance of »Das Rheingold« and continued in 2024 with »Die Walküre« and now with »Siegfried« is no less than a redefinition of standards in Wagner interpretation. The project »The Wagner Cycles« is dedicated to a unique collaboration between academic expertise and practice, tackling Richard Wagner’s monumental opera tetralogy. In Dresden and on tour through Europe’s musical centers, the results of this spectacular sound workshop and the historically informed perspective on Wagner’s epoch-making theatrical oeuvre have been celebrated as revolutionary. In the third part of the »Ring«, »Siegfried», depictions of nature and the visceral portrayals of action reveal Wagner at the height of his expressive musical powers.

The Wagner Cycles on Tour RICHARD WAGNER: »SIEGFRIED«

Philharmonie de Paris

Kölner Philharmonie

With "Das Rheingold," Richard Wagner opens his monumental "Ring of the Nibelung": a mythological world theater about power, love, and the loss of innocence. Whoever renounces love gains power. This fateful law draws both Alberich and the god Wotan into the spell of the cursed ring. From the famous depths of E-flat major, a world unfolds between idyllic nature and moral decay. Andreas Homoki's successful production returns under the musical direction of Gianandrea Noseda. Michael Volle sings Wotan.

Baritone

Daniel Schmutzhard

Events

Upcoming events

Nov 29 - Dec 17, 2026

Das Rheingold · Opernhaus Zürich

Past events

Sep 10, 2026

Dresden Festival Orchestra | Concerto Köln | Dresden Festival Choir of the Richard Wagner Academy | Kent Nagano | Soloists · Lucerne Festival

Feb 13 - Mar 18, 2026

Wozzeck · Oper Graz

Future and recently performed repertoire

Wozzeck in Wozzeck by Berg

Oper Graz

Papageno in The Magic Flute by Mozart

Volksoper Wien

Alberich in Götterdämmerung by Wagner

Lucerne Festival

Alberich in Das Rheingold by Wagner

Oper Köln

thunder in Das Rheingold by Wagner

Opernhaus Zürich

Alberich in Siegfried by Wagner

Kölner Philharmonie

Alberich in The Ring of the Nibelung by Wagner

Concerto Köln

Johann Strauss / Leon in Cinderella's Dream by Eisenreich

Volksoper Wien

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