Sunday, December 2, 2007
Annual Holiday Party
featuring Soprano Christine Brewer
(Dyer's Wife in Lyric's Die Frau ohne Schatten)
Christine will be singing the Dyer’s Wife in Die Frau ohne Schatten at Lyric Opera of Chicago, followed by performances in Paris. Upcoming performances include Fidelio with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and Brünnhilde in The Ring at the Metropolitan Opera. Within recent years roles that she has sung include Isolde and Queen Elizabeth I in Benjamin Britten's Gloriana. You will not want to miss this delightful lady, whom The Guardian in London described as ‘one of the greatest voices in the world.’ You may have heard her at Ravinia this past summer.
Millennium Knickerbocker Hotel
163 E. Walton (1 block east of Michigan Avenue)
Chicago
12:30pm – Social Hour
1:00pm – Buffet Luncheon, THE QUIZ and all sorts of prizes
2:15pm – Program – CHRISTINE BREWER, soprano
Reservations: Send checks for $50.00 per person
Sunday, November 25, 2007
A Special Invitation to All Wagner Society Members
from the
Evanston, Highland Park/Deerfield, and
Wilmette Chapters of
Lyric Opera:
Holiday Luncheon
with mezzo soprano Viktoria Vizin
The Michigan Shores Club
911 Michigan Avenue, Wilmette, Illinois
(One block east of Sheridan Road at Lake Avenue)
Invitation
(CLICK LINK TO DOWNLOAD and PRINT)
Monday, November 5, 2007
DR. PETER PACHL
Vice-President of the International Siegfried Wagner Society
and Director of the Pianopianissimo Music Theater, Munich
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Dr. Peter Pachl,
our Speaker
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Dr. Pachl's Biography of Siegfried Wagner |
Siegfried and Winifred in early 1916 |
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Siegfried Wagner and His Operas
Dr. Peter Pachl will speak on Siegfried Wagner (1869-1930), Wagner's only son, composer, conductor, and director of the Bayreuth Festspiele from 1908 until his death in 1930. The program will include audio and video.
He was born in 1953 in Bayreuth and got his basic music education in the school Regensburger Domspatzen. He then studied musicology, theatrology and linguistics at the University of München. He worked as a stage director in various German theatres (in Kassel, Bonn, München, Nürnberg, Mainz a.o.), with works of the operatic repertory (by Gluck, Mozart, E.T.A. Hoffmann, Massenet, Thomas, Lortzing, Nicolai, Cornelius, Wagner, Verdi, Strauss, Pfitzner, Zemlinsky, Puccini, Schreker, von Schillings, Strawinsky, Britten, Bernstein, von Einem a.o.) as well as the dramatic repertory (by Aristophanes, Lope de Vega, Ingrisch, Nestroy, Ramuz, Rosendorfer, Sartre a.o.).
In 1989 he became professor of opera stage direction in Hannover; where he has since taught such topics as: stage music in Weimar, in Bayreuth, in Vienna and in Bochum, as well as management of cultural products in Weimar, Dresden, Hamburg, the Hague and Berlin. Since 1980 he is art director of the München Music Theater Pianopianissimo; in 1990-95 he was art director and manager of the Thuringia State Theater and Symphony Orchestra as well as the Rudolstadt Festival, while in 1998-2000 he was art co-director and principal dramaturgist of the Hagen Theater. He has published numerous works, including the biography Siegfried Wagner, Genie im Schatten (1988, 1994), and made a large number of radio and TV productions.
In 1980 he founded the Pianopianissimo Music Theater in Munich, where he serves as Artistic Director. He founded the International Siegfried Wagner Society in 1972, where he is currently Vice President.
Tower Club - Ambassador Room
Civic Opera Building - 39th Floor
20 N. Wacker Dr.
Chicago, IL 60601
Times: 7:00 pm - Reception
7:30 pm - Program
Cost: Free - Reservations not required
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
DR. SVEN FRIEDRICH
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Dr. Sven Friedrich,
our Speaker
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Lembac's Portrait of Cosima, 1879 |
Dr. Friedrich's
Wagner
CD-ROM |
Cosima Wagner — A Remembrance
Dr. Sven Friedrich will speak on Cosima Wagner and afterwards will answer questions from the audience about The Bayreuth Festspiele – Past, Present and Future.
Sven Friedrich (born 1963) studied Theater History, Modern German Literature, and Communication Studies at the University of Munich where he received his Ph.D. with his dissertation on Wagner’s theatrical aesthetics. Since 1993 he has been Director of the Richard-Wagner-Research Institute and of its National-Archives as well as the Richard Wagner Museum in Haus Wahnfried, all in Bayreuth. Among his multitude of his duties include the responsibilities for the Franz Liszt Museum and the Jean Paul Museum also in Bayreuth.
Friedrich’s literary activities included co-editing the wagnerspektrum (http://www.wagnerspectrum.de), and curated the exhibition and its catalogue, Der Ring – Die Szene als Modell. Die Bühnenbildmodelle des Richard-Wagner-Museums und der „Ring des Nibelungen“ in Bayreuth (“The Ring” – the Model as the Scene. The Stage Models of the Richard-Wagner-Museum and Der Ring des Nibelungen in Bayreuth, 1876-2000). He has written numerous essays and books, and recently edited the 50,000+ page CD-ROM compilation of all of Wagner’s writings, librettos, and correspondence for Digitale Bibliothek (www.digitale-bibliothek.de).
Union League Club
65 W. Jackson Blvd.
Times: 7:00 pm - Reception
Wednesday,
May 30th, 2007
DR. KATHERINE SYER
Claiming the Ring
A Program in Honor of Richard Wagner's 194th Birthday
Dr. Katherine Syer will
survey several recent international productions of Wagner’s Der
Ring des Nibelungen, exploring how designers and directors
profile regional characteristics in production. By
loosening the interpretational lens away from Germanic or Nordic
influences, many opera houses around the world are claiming the Ring as their own.
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Katherine
Syer is on faculty at the University of Illinois at
Urbana-Champaign, where she teaches musicology and regularly offers
seminars on opera production history. Together with
William Kinderman, she is co-editor of A Companion to Wagner’s
‘Parsifal’ (Camden House/Boydelland Brewer, 2005), and she regularly leads
seminars during the Bayreuth Festival. She is currently
working on a critical production history of Wagner’s Ring,
with a special focus on stagings from the 1970s onward.
Dr. Syer was recently named a fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt
Society. She came to our attention at a symposium on
Parsifal at the University of Chicago in the fall of 2005 where she
was the respondent to a presentation by our member, Rachel
Nussbaum. |
