Soloists, chorus, orchestra, technical staff and sets arrived in Bavaria
Since days the Festival theatre in Füssen is unusually animated. During the weekend here arrived six TIR with sets, technic, costumes, props and everything necessary for the upcoming spectacles of the Sofia Opera of the “Ring des Nibelungen” by Richard Wagner. In spite of the continuous rain and the cold (in Sunday the temperature dropped to 9 degrees Celsius) the teams of our first opera theatre unloaded the equipment on the dot and together with their German colleagues they started the construction of the sets for the spectacles. “Sofia has come” – under this title the local “Allgäuer Zeitung” described in a press coverage with photos the “landing” of the Sofia Opera in the little town in the Bavarian Alps.
Not easy from logistic point of view, most of all because of the traffic jams because of the streams of refugees at the Hungarian borders turned out to be the transporting of a part of the Opera’s teams. Seven busses transported the soloists, the chorus, the orchestra, the creative and the technical staffs – in total more than 230 people. The main casts came directly from Ljubljana after their terrific success at the famous International festival with “Tristan und Isolde” by Wagner. The guest-performance was within the organized by the Municipality of Sofia “Days of Sofia in Ljubljana”. In the early hours of Sunday arrived the last group, after18-hour travelling from Budapest, out of which nearly 8-hour stay at the Hungarian-Austrian border.
After the three triumphal performances of the “Ring” in Sofia in 2013, 2014 and 2015, the team of the director Plamen Kartaloff is very motivated to present itself in the best way here, in Wagner’s fatherland, in the favourite of his patron Ludwig II Bavaria. “When last summer, on the way from Salzburg to Bayreuth, I discovered for myself Füssen and its beautiful Festspielhaus, came the moment of illumination and courage to return our Wagner to his patron and protector King Ludwig II, to return and show our Bulgarian “Ring” to the one who first lit the fire in me to think about the opera as a theatre of audacity and great ideas”, shared Maestro Kartaloff in a large interview for “Allgäuer Zeitung”.
Besides the regional editions, in practice all big German media, among which “Süddeutsche Zeitung” and “Bild” already informed about the upcoming guest-performance of the Sofia Opera with the “Ring des Nibelungen”. The Bavarian television will reflect the rehearsals. It is expected the performances to be visited by connoisseurs of Richard Wagner’s work of art, as well as by many music critics.
Big is the interest for the upcoming first performance of Wagner’s tetralogy in Füssen and in the region of Bavaria. Everywhere on the streets, the squares, the hotels and the numerous restaurants can be seen posters, advertising banners and leaflets. The Festival theatre in Füssen is also diligently preparing itself for the spectacles from 12 to 17 September. Except for the Bulgarian “Ring”, which is to be performed here, Festspielhaus offers a correspondence meeting with posters and with different other productions of Wagner’s tetralogy from Germany, France, Finland.
Text and photos: Dimitar SOTIROV