I was lucky enough to have tickets this Saturday for the opening night of the Royal Opera's brilliant new production of Das Rheingold, with Bryn Terfel's eagerly anticipated debut on the heavyweight role of Wotan. Judging by his performance, he is destined to become known as one of the greatest Wotans of all time. No doubt most of the press reviews will be hung up on things like the non-traditional staging and the naked Rheinmaidens, which is the shame, because I actually think it is hard to find fault with anything here. The acting, the singing, the sets, the costumes, the lighting and the overall sound were all outstanding and it was by far the best staging I've seen, and surely one of the most succesful "non-traditional" staging there has ever been.
If you want to see for yourself, there is a behind the scenes documentary focusing on the conductor on BBC1 this Wednesday, and Radio 3 will broadcast a performance in January. The BBC will be showing it on TV at an as yet unspecified date.