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Plácido Domingo assumes with "respect, emotion and love" his debut as director of an opera by Richard Wagner, something he will do this Tuesday at the "Wagnerian Temple" of Bayreuth and at Valkiria the piece with which he was discarded as the tenor of this festival, 18 years ago.
"I have been preparing for five months, interposing Macbeth that we have created with Daniel Barenboim in Berlin to go to Bayreuth, studying scores, repeating with orchestra or singers, and even a concert in St. Petersburg, "explained the artist in an interview with Efe, from Bayreuth Theater.
"It's a challenge that involves a lot of responsibility, love for Wagner and respect," he continued, referring to Bayreuth, the festival that has acclaimed him as Sigmund of The Valkyrie in 2000.
On this occasion, he received Efe, always made up and dressed in Sigmundo, during the second intermission and after his scenic "death" at the hands of Wotan; As a director, he could not afford "such a license", he joked, since "the Master works until the end".
His return to Bayreuth coincides, in addition to the return to this place of the Bavarian mezzo-soprano Waltraut Meier, who was his Siglinda in 2000. "We both sang together" Valkyrie "and we spent 18 years without coming, "Remember Domingo.
"I did not come back the following season or the following season, although I would have liked to do it," Domingo recalls. He was prevented by the "demanding" character of festival director and grandson Richard Wagner, Wolfgang, who refused to give him a place because in 2001 he could not be in Bayreuth a day of rehearsal.
Bayreuth "lost" Domingo's presence – "for a single day," he insists. He did not return in the following years as a tenor, although he could have done it as Sigmundo, Lohengrin or Parsifal, the three characters in his Wagnerian repertoire.
Meier also did not return to the festival that had been his home during the life of Wolfgang Wagner, with whom he played in a huge rage.
Ten years after taking the reins of Bayreuth, Richard Wagner's great-granddaughter, Katharina, meets: Domingo as a director and mezzosoprano in Lohengrin's Oltrud who opens the season, directed by Christian Thielemann.
"Today's directors leave a little bit of history," admits Domingo about Frank Castorf, head of the "Ring" to which his "Valkyrie" belongs, a replacement that at its premiere, there are three seasons, unleashed a storm of boos.
Castorf translates Wagnerian myths into oil wells, roadside brothels, and ends on Wall Street.
"It is very clear about this, he thinks that the ambition of the Nibelung gold is the same as what is now considered oil," says Domingo, referring to his current "Valkyrie". tenor, then with a Jürgen Flimm decided to humanize Wagner
Respects Castorf's personal interpretation of the "struggle for power and corruption" and considers that this demonstrates "the vitality of Wagnerian myths open to a thousand representations" but acknowledges that it "misleads" the audience and even the performers.
"The installations, the videos, break our concentration", he says, about these elements, present in the "Ring" of Castorf, as well as in the "Lohengrin" which opened this season, designed by the American Yuval Sharon.
In the honor of Domingo Bayreuth jumped, for the first time in the history of this traditionalist festival, the standard to represent the "Ring" in its entirety, since only the "Valkyrie" is represented , his second piece
He was quite laborious, says Domingo, to include the three galas in which he will conduct at Bayreuth, tomorrow 18 and 29, closing of the season, in his engagements this summer.
The Bavarian city arrived after performing in tenor opera "Thais" at the Teatro Real in Madrid and then in concert at the Perelada Festival (Girona, north-east of Spain); between a gala in Bayreuth and the following, he will spend a few days – "on vacation", he says – in Mexico, then he will sing at the Salzburg Festival.
"It's true that the orchestra here plays almost without seeing, but you have to direct them, motivate them, and look at the Bayreuth pit, that's a lot of responsibility," he explains. on the old theater erected by order of Richard Wagner in 1850. ideal to represent his music, which is always devoted exclusively to the cult of the great composer.
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