First day of rehearsal

Now we’re getting ahead. Monday and Tuesday Mette, my assistant, held some preliminary rehearsals and today I started working on the rehearsals for Das Rheingold. For the next four or five months there will be rehearsals non-stop! It’ll be amazing, exiting and pretty hard.

The rehearsals for Das Rheingold and Die Walküre are running somewhat simultaneously and from December the 6th we’re running Siegfried and Götterdämmerung at the same time. We have a rather intense programme on Götterdämmerung but of course the opera is also very long to say the least. And – contrary to the others – we have to finish it “in first attempt”.

I haven’t got a Wotan yet, and it’s a bit difficult to gather all the necessary singers for the rehearsals, because people are currently also working on Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria and The Tempest, and Poul Elming has a lieder recital on Sunday. It’s the biggest “obstacle” of the ensemble-house.

So today felt kind of amputated, especially as Anne Margrethe Dahl who’s playing Freia is absent because of illness. We’re now searching everywhere for another Freia to replace her. I think though that we have found a good solution.

Today I mostly worked together with Susanne Resmark, who’s new in the role as Fricka, Jens Krogsgaard, who’s new in the role as Froh, and Carsten Stabell, who’s new in the role as Fasolt – and Hans Lawaetz and Anders Jacobsen as Donner and Fafner. But they’ve both been a part of this before.

It all went really well. It’s so important for our production that the characters appear to be real human beings and that you get a clear impression of the family ties. It’s a family saga and you have to clearly sense that they come with a lot of luggage. The second scene of Das Rheingold is a challenge because there’s so much waiting time for the “minor” gods. But it is important to me that it’s alive all the time and doesn’t become hours just spent on waiting. So very often there are a lot of activities going on simultaneously.

Therefore it was actually okay working with a few of the performers of the scene today, so that we achieve making each of them perfect and give each of them contexts, etc. When Wotan and Loge are both in one place they often attract much of my attention.
It was a good rehearsal start, but also a preview of what a big puzzle it’s going to be gathering all the singers to enough rehearsals in the next couple of months because people take part in several of the Ring-operas and other performances at the same time…