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Hamburg State Opera celebrates Wagner's 200th
Spectacular sets, huge productions and the most epic operas in history - Hamburg State Opera certainly know how to celebrate Wagner's 200th birthday. Performing no less than 10 of his operas over three weeks, this ambitious opera company makes quite an impact, as you can see...
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1. Poster for the Wagner Wahn festival
One of the many posters around Hamburg advertising the celebrations.
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2. Tannhäuser
Predating the Ring Cycle, Wagner's Tannhäuser is no less impressive in scale and imagination when tackled by the Hamburg State Opera for their Wagner Wahn festival.
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3. Tristan und Isolde
The music of Tristan is revolutionary, literally from the first chord onwards, and so the Hamburg State Opera succeed in making the staging suitable radical.
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4. Das Rheingold
Wotan, king of the Gods, and Alberich, the scheming dwarf who renounces love, thrash out their differences on another huge set.
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5. Die Walküre
Another show-stopping set from the creative minds of the Hamburg State Opera, led by their inimitable creative director Simone Young.
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6. Erda and Wotan
Erda, the earth Goddess, turns up in the fourth act of Das Rheingold to convince him to ignore his pursuit of power with the Ring itself.
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7. Loge in Das Rheingold
In the Hamburg production. Wotan's cunning servant Loge is presented as a sparkly-suited magician, never too far away from an improvised pyrotechnic or a scarf up the sleeve.
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8. Loge strides over the mountains
The centrepiece of Hamburg's Das Rheingold is a revolving model of the mountains.
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9. Nibelheim
Nibelheim is presented as a dark, industrial nightmare world, complete with malfunctioning machinery and sparking circuitry.
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10. Shadows and cameras
Hamburg's Das Rheingold also makes innovative use of shadowplay and video cameras, at one point showing footage of the singers as they perform, occasionally getting the orchestra and the audience in shot.
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11. Siegfried
Siegfried, the third opera in Wagner's epic Ring Cycle, gets a typically unique production in time for the composer's 200th birthday. The Hamburg State Opera
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12. Another cool poster
Another cool poster publicising the Wagner Wahn festival.
