Tuesday 28 February 2006

The Ring again

Thoughts of spending an entire day listening to the Ring on the radio started me thinking about my ideal way to hear the Ring in the opera house. The last few times that I've heard a complete cycle (the most recent a few years ago at the Hungarian State Opera in Budapest) its been spread over a week and each opera is scheduled to finish at 10.30/11.00 pm, with the later ones starting at around 4.30pm/5.30pm/ Now that's all well and good, but I'd like something a little more relaxed. How about doing the operas split over the whole day, starting late morning with generously long intervals, with the whole thing over by mid to late evening so you could follow it with a decent dinner! I know it makes me sound old, but I'd like to enjoy the Ring in relaxed comfort and not squashed hugger-mugger into the operatic timetable. This is something a festival could do, though I'm not aware of anyone currently trying to present the Ring this way. And another thing, could we please have a short interval after the Prologue to Götterdämmerung, I can't be the only one for whom the heavenly length of the Prologue and Act 1 combined is just a little too much for my bladder, my knees and my concentration.

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