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Opera Australia to scale Ring's epic heights

AMONG international opera companies, Wagner's 15-hour opera The Ring is known as "The Curse''.

That is not only on account of its apocalyptic plot but for the strain it puts on the personnel and finances of companies that stage it.

Opera Australia's artistic director, Lyndon Terracini, is undeterred.
Terracini yesterday confirmed the badly kept secret that OA would stage the four-day epic in 2013, the bicentenary of the German composer's birth. The effort will constitute the company's entire spring season. The co-production with Houston Grand Opera has a $15.5 million budget, with a $5m donation from Lonely Planet founders Maureen and Tony Wheeler, and a $2m enticement to stage the event in Melbourne from the Victorian Major Events Company.

That figure is $500,000 more than the VMEC is rumoured to have chipped in for Tiger Woods's $3m appearance fee at the Australian Masters late last year. The VMEC distributes $80m a year to sporting and cultural events.

The Masters generated a reported $30m in tourism and business for Victoria and Terracini is confident The Ring will also be a money-spinner. He said it would attract interstate and international tourists who would stay for up to two weeks, the longest span over which audiences will be able the view the entire cycle.

Ticket prices are not yet confirmed but Terracini said they would be similar to other international productions, of which there will be many in the bicentenary.

In 2004, State Opera of South Australia staged the first Australian production of The Ring. Touring shows came to Australia in 1913 and in 1998 but the full opera has otherwise not been performed in the Asia-Pacific region.

State Opera of SA general director Stephen Phillips said it cost $15m in 2004 to stage "the Everest of the operatic repertoire".

"Our production was absolutely colossal. I've got the feeling they (OA) are going to employ a lot of new technology," he said.

Richard Mills will conduct the orchestra and theatre and opera director Neil Armfield will oversee 350 crew and cast, including 34 principal roles.

Four leads were announced yesterday: English soprano Susan Bullock as Brunnhilde, Finnish bass-baritone Juha Uusitalo as Wotan, American tenor Gary Lehman as Siegfried and Australian John Wegner as Alberich.

While each of those singers has performed in their role previously, Armfield has never seen The Ring. "It helps me start from a blank page," he said.

Michaela Boland, National arts writer
From: The Australian
August 26, 2010 12:00AM