Intermezzo

Pantherpants! Ariadne auf Naxos in Salzburg

Ariadne auf Naxos - Haus für Mozart, 29 July 2012 (Salzburg Festival)

Most of us know Ariadne auf Naxos only as the familiar prologue-plus-opera. But this was put together only after the failure of an earlier version in which Molière's play Le bourgeois gentilhomme replaced the prologue. Or not quite. Conveniently for Strauss and Hofmannsthal's purposes, the original play was performed to musical accompaniment, incorporates ballets, and cues a musical entertainment at the end.

However Hofmannsthal saw fit to adapt it further. He added a final scene (later expanded to become the prologue) to explain the opera's content, cut dialogues and reassigned lines.

Miaow. Jonas Kaufmann in leopardskin

Congratulations Marianne Glittenberg, Kostüme-lady, on the cut of your trouser. Just released, photos from today's dress rehearsal of Sven-Eric Bechtolf's new Salzburg Festival production of Ariadne auf Naxos, where Jonas Kaufmann plays the Tenor and Bacchus.

Ariadne auf Laptop

This Saturday, 25 February, Ariadne auf Naxos will be streamed live from Festspielhaus Baden Baden on Medici TV.

The show begins at 8pm (which is 7pm UK time), and will also be broadcast on the 3sat TV channel at 8.15pm CET.

Philippe Arlaud's new production is conducted by Christian Thielemann and features Renee Fleming in her first stab at the title role.

Renee Fleming slams press sexism

One of the pressures a female opera singer has to face is that journalists are tougher on women than men. It's a form of sexism says Renee Fleming, interviewed by Die Welt as she sings her first Ariadne in Baden-Baden (trailer above).

She also talked about the difficulties of long-term planning now that she's 53.  Having just signed contracts for performances five years ahead, she's had to think hard whether she'll still be any good then.  She's given up some roles - recently, Violetta - but if scheduling was more flexible, perhaps she'd keep them in her repertoire for longer. As things are, she prefers to give up a role too soon than to sing it worse than she did before.

Interviewer Lucas Wiegelmann was impressed by her "perfect German" - despite a few "charming mispronunciations" such as "Hoffman-Stahl" for Hugo von Hofmannsthal (a bit like 'Cameroon'  for Cameron).

Not everyone is so impressed. Renee recently heard one of her daughters singing beautifully, and asked if she'd picked up hints from one of her own recordings. "No, Jonas Kaufmann," was the reply.

Ariadne auf Naxos mit Diana Damrau in München

Ariadne auf Naxos - Bayerische Staatsoper, Prinzregententheater, Munich, 16 July 2009

This Robert Carsen production was the big hit of last year's Munich Opera Festival. This year it was revived with the original cast for a final handful of dates at the intimate and acoustically spectacular Prinzregententheater before it transfers to the larger Nationaltheater in September with a new cast.

With city centre traffic totally snarled up in the Merkel/Medvedev summit motorcade, it was a long hot (32°C)  walk to the theatre. Never have I been so grateful to sit on cold hard seats for two hours - this production is played, controversially, without a break. As the prologue ended, the Komponist (Munich's reigning Queen of Pants, Daniela Sindram) handed the score down to Bertrand de Billy in the pit, then strolled to the front of the stalls to watch the whole opera section - in character of course:

Carsen so successfully integrates the two sections that this doesn't seem gimmicky - it's just another one of the identity games that are played throughout. Transformation is everywhere. As we entered the theatre, a ballet troupe were rehearsing on stage, surrounded by mirrors that reflected and replayed their every move. Later the dancers reappeared in the opera section, clad in Carsen's frequently-favoured Tanztheater aesthetic with long black dresses and flowing hair.

There was a brief glimpse of another of his trademarks in the Prologue (was gentle self-parody the aim?) as some of the cast appeared in caricature mask heads. Things were never quite what they first seemed - some of the elegantly robed and tressed dancers turned out to be big hairy men - the acting troupe (look carefully):