Word: nibelungs
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...hometown, Vastra Karup, Sweden. Level-headed and sharp-witted, Nilsson thrilled audiences from New York to Milan in operas by Verdi (Aida), Strauss (Elektra, below) and Puccini (Turandot) but won her most enthusiastic fans with dynamic lead performances in such Wagner works as The Ring of the Nibelung and Tristan und Isolde. Asked to name the primary requirement for playing Isolde, a punishing role she sang some 200 times, she said, "Comfortable shoes...
...finest Wagnerian soprano of her generation; on Christmas Day, in Vastra Karup, Sweden. Level-headed and sharp-witted, Nilsson thrilled audiences from New York to Milan in a variety of operas, but won her most enthusiastic fans with dynamic lead performances in such Wagner works as Ring of the Nibelung and Tristan und Isolde. Asked to name the primary requirement for playing Isolde, a punishing role she performed some 200 times, she said: "Comfortable shoes...
...devotion to the works of Richard Wagner is a worldwide cult, then a performance of The Ring of the Nibelung is that religion's ultimate rite: a fervent emotional and aesthetic observance. Any opera house that is able to produce the Ring cycle -- four long, mythic music dramas, based on old Norse and German sagas -- is assured of a sellout. Audiences travel across continents to submit themselves to the Ring's thrilling embrace. Among Wagner's many other theatrical gifts was his ability to build a climax at the end of every act, so that the audience is continually swept...
First broadcast on four consecutive evenings in June 1990, the Metropolitan Opera's RING OF THE NIBELUNG was a high-toned TV spectacular that swept up viewers in the passion and power of Wagner's masterpiece. Now Deutsche Grammophon has released the complete home-video version, on both VHS and Laserdisc, as well as a new recording of Siegfried, the final installment of conductor James Levine's separate CD Ring. With largely the same star cast, including Hildegard Behrens as Brunnhilde and James Morris as Wotan (Reiner Goldberg sings the role of Siegfried on the CD, while Siegfried Jerusalem plays...
...artists and thinkers; Sigmund Freud's researches, Arnold Schoenberg's music, Oskar Kokoschka's paintings, Arthur Schnitzler's plays, all had their roots in the city. But Hitler dismissed modern art as "decadent." To the impotent and solitary figure, power was what mattered, not aesthetics. The Ring of the Nibelung proved more fascinating for the drama than for the music. "Whoever wants to understand National Socialist Germany," Hitler often said, "must know Wagner." Particularly the heroic, irrational world of blood and fire...