Kratzer’s “Tannhäuser” is entering its second year | Free press

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Bayreuth (dpa) – There are directors who leave their staging to be staging once they have got the premiere behind them. Tobias Kratzer is not one of them.

In the second year of production, the director of the acclaimed Bayreuth “Tannhäuser” from 2019 made very small adjustments so that it still looks as fresh as it is two years after the premiere.

To do this, when he resumes at the Richard Wagner Festival on the Green Hill, he targets the corona measures – and annoys the Russian star conductor Valery Gergiev.

One of the clips shows the Bayreuth gallery with portraits of conductors. There is a sign in front of Gergiev’s picture: “Come a little later”. Gergiev was the conductor of the production in the premiere year 2019 – and at the time he was known for not always showing up for rehearsals on time. He had “participated in all contractually agreed rehearsals”, said festival director Katharina Wagner at the time – but left it open how many there were. He was late twice, she admitted. In the single player from 2019, the focus was still on Christian Thielemann, the festival’s music director at the time.

In another recorded film, the Bulli with which Tannhäuser (Stephen Gould) and Venus (Ekaterina Gubanova – had missed the 2019 premiere because she injured her knee during rehearsals) stop so that all occupants are driving can be tested for the coronavirus. “Freshly (negative) tested” is then written on a sticker. In 2019 there was a swipe at this point at the staging by Sebastian Baumgartner, known as Bayreuth “Biogas Plant Tannhäuser”, which fortunately has long since been forgotten.

Completely different from Corona: The Bayreuth Richard Wagner Festival is taking place this year with a strict hygiene concept. Only half of the usually around 2000 viewers are admitted – and only if they tested negative, recovered from Covid-19 or are fully vaccinated. All employees, singers and directors must also be tested regularly. A fact that Kratzer does not want to go unmentioned on stage in 2021.

Kratzer’s staging is enthusiastic

In its second year, Kratzers is enthusiastically celebrated by Opernwelt 2020 as the production of the year, which was awarded the prize. A few boos are roared down by loud shouts of bravo. There is also a lot of applause for conductor Axel Kober, who this year is on the podium instead of Gergiev. Singer Lise Davidsen earned the most cheers for her clear and powerful portrayal of Elisabeth.

Kratzer’s version of the “Singers’ War on the Wartburg” is pleasantly entertaining and entertaining, which by no means means easy. He is not interested in the traditional image of women and the classic contrast between whore and saint in Richard Wagner’s early opera, but takes the two opposing female figures as symbols for different life and art designs, for avant-garde and established art. It is a humorous as well as clever and touching and artistically incredibly coherent plea for a reconciliation between pop and high culture – and tolerance.

The production face had to be replaced

In the process, he has to make up for a drastic loss of production in year two: He had to replace the British travesty artist Le Gateau Chocolat and thus the face of the production, because he was unable to come to the rehearsals due to the corona entry regulations. In the recordings, which make up a large part of the production, he is usually still to be seen – and not his substitute Kyle Patrick.

“But we made a very conscious decision, also as an aesthetic and almost political statement, not to replace him fundamentally in the videos, but to have him represented on stage by another artist and leave the videos,” Kratzer told the ” North Bavarian Courier ».

First black drag queen

Le Gateau Chocolat, who does not want to read his real name in the media, made headlines two years ago as the first black drag queen in festival history and said that he did not see his work on the Green Hill yet. “Whether I want to come back is another matter. Whether I have to come back: Yes, definitely! », Said the Briton at the time of the German press agency. “My role is also to present a reality that has not been part of this house for a very long time.”

The travesty artist, who lives in Brighton, UK, criticized the audience after the premiere because he had received a few boos. “What are you booing specifically?” Asked Le Gateau Chocolat (The Chocolate Cake). He did not flaunt any skills, but “presented nothing but a lifestyle”.

You will of course notice his absence, said Kratzer to the “courier”. “But I don’t think you have to cover it up. It’s a special year with special conditions. And we try to be very open about it. “

The Bayreuth Festival takes a break on Wednesday and continues on Thursday (4:00 p.m.) with the “Walküre” – a concert performance, accompanied by a color action by Austrian Hermann Nitsch, who has become known as a “blood artist”.

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