Word: rolf
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Along with its brilliant revivals of Mozart and Richard Strauss, the Salzburg Festival likes to present new operas by contemporary composers. But again and again, the living composers sound less alive than the dead. This year's opera: Penelope, by Switzerland's promising Rolf Liebermann, 43, music director of Radio Zurich. Last week the work opened in a brilliant production, made a less than brilliant impression on audience and critics...
...Bayreuth (July 22-Aug. 22), Wagner's two grandsons will mount seven of the master's music dramas. Salzburg (July 25-Aug. 30), as usual, will specialize in Mozart, but will also include the world premiere of Penelope, a new opera by a contemporary Swiss composer, Rolf Liebermann. At Edinburgh (Aug. 22-Sept. 11), six orchestras from five countries will lead the festivities, which include opera, ballet, theater, films and art displays...
Although Faust is one of the Met's most popular shows,* it has not had its face lifted since Papa Monteux made his Met debut with it in 1917. So this year it got a $75.000 rejuvenation: new sets and costumes by Rolf Gerard, new staging by Britain's Peter Brook, and a cast of the Met's brightest stars. Director Brook listened to the music carefully, decided that its sentimental tunes and melting harmonies belonged in a French romantic setting, despite the fact that Goethe's dramatic poem was laid in 16th century Germany...
Aida has had her face lifted. The stunning new decor and costumes by Rolf Gerard, and the dramatic staging of Margaret Webster demonstrate that Broadway techniques can effectively be applied to grand opera. The height of voluptuousness came in the first scene of Act Two. Blanche Thebom may not be the world's most beautiful Amneris, but when I saw her lounging on her divan being fanned and bathed by dozens of slaves, I couldn't help wondering why Radames chose the rotund Aida instead...
Death by the Window. When General Manager Rudolf Bing decided to overhaul Carmen last spring, he handed the staging job to Tyrone Guthrie, topnotch director of London's Old Vic, and Designer Rolf Gerard. From the start, they decided on "naturalism," e.g., the workers in a Seville cigarette factory ought to look, for a change, a bit like factory workers...