The Ring of the Nibelung The Rhinegold

Frank Castorfs staging of the Ring premiered in 2013 and filmed in 2016 provoked controversy right from the beginning For Castorf the Rheingold of our days is oil thus he places the first part of the tetralogy at a gas station on Route 66 Die Walküre is situated in Baku Azerbaijan which was seized by the Bolsheviks in 1920 for its oil whereas Siegfried takes place in a socialist equivalent of Mount Rushmore and at Berlins Alexanderplatz Götterdämmerung is set somewhere in the GDR ending up at New Yorks stock exchange Whilst Castorfs staging polarized Marek Janowskis musical reading was unanimously praised as was the excellent cast including in this opera Iain Paterson Wotan Nadine Weissmann Erda Albert Dohmen Alberich and Roberto Saccà Loge