Yesterday, the radio opera was Wagner’s “Das Rheingold,” the prologue to his Ring Cycle, but the last of the four libretti written, as he wrote them so to speak, backwards. He didn’t intend there to be four of them, but with each of the first three, he wasn’t satisfied, feeling more backstory was needed (he was right about that). However, since he wrote all the libretti before even a note of music, this one was the first one composed and the first one performed. It’s short for a Wagner opera – under three hours. The production is interesting – the only colors in it are the bright gold, and people’s skin tones (the skin which is visible – there are a lot of tattoos.) Everything else is black, gray, or white. (The Rainbow Bridge scene wasn’t photographed – I don’t know what they did with that.) I remember in the late seventies the Met tried a black and whie production, but for some reason they did it with Carmen. The run was a success because they had Jon Vickers and Marilyn Horne, but they never did that again. It does suit Das Rheingold a bit better – it’s a sordid story, and the beauty of the music can’t conceal that, even had he wanted to. In my opinion, which with $5.00 or se will get you a cup of coffee, the easiest of the four to listen to is “Die Walkure,” but “Das Rheingold” is the next easiest. After those, it gets complicated. I’m off to see Virgil now. I’ll comment when I get back.
This is the kind of story which really scares me. I may be staunchly PC as opposed to Apple – but that certainly doesn’t mean I think Microsoft is perfect. Far from it. If fidgeting with my hair were one of my coping mechanisms, I would be tearing it out daily over updates which reduce efficiency. But I never thought it was this bad. But here we are. And now what do we do?
Heather Cox Richardson (and Joe Biden) on the history of NATO. It occurred me that if our membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organiztion is in fact a Treaty in the sense that the Constitution requires our membership in it to be authorized by Congress, then getting out of it should require Congressional approval as well. And – while we could, we got Congress to pass a law to that effect.
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.