“Parsifal” for all: community, captivity, redemption

Old age and fear of death? There are many question marks behind Richard Wagner’s recent opera “Parsifal”, which parted ways and which Friedrich Nietzsche described as “surrender to Christianity”. Should religion recover in art, as Wagner desired one of his many considerations – and what, if we talk to the philosopher Ernst Bloch, can one learn from the “Buddhist-pink religion of Christian art”?

Perhaps the head of the state opera, Bogdan Rusic, thought that this opera, which has been carried to all distant fields, needs a new perspective from the outside, which does not breathe the spirit of the directing theater, but rather a more primitive approach to society. . When Rossich visited Serebrenko for talks about “Parsifal” in Moscow, he was already wearing an ankle bracelet. It is said that he stole money with his friends, according to the accusation of “the judiciary” that often appears as if it was primarily his mission to silence political voices: Putin’s Kremlin is the magic garden of Klingsur?

Serebnikov accepted the commission – and, as he himself emphatically asserted, he resisted the temptation to tie his political fate to the content of the opera. However, much could already be revealed, as he would also interpret the Knights of the Trophy as a group of prisoners with an injured king as commander. This locked mode was actually created by Latvian Alvis Hermanis Another Vienna “Parsifal” 2017When he sent the group around the amfortas to the Steinhof in Vienna. This provided an impressive stage design, but it produced a theatrical performance that left Wagner paralyzed (and it wasn’t for nothing that Hermannis advised that it would be best to watch this opera “with your eyes closed”).

With Serebrennikow this danger was avoided. The “Parsifal” theme invariably meets the often cited “ame russe”, the Russian spirit that succumbs to resistance and driving forces before programmatic transformation events occur, and not just desire turns into selfless love. Virility and objectivity is to be expected with this new Viennese “Parsifal” – and one can hear Wagner’s previous request when he instilled in his actors the evening before the premiere: “Little children, we can finally start tomorrow! Tomorrow the Devil continues! That is why you are! All of you who work with you are keen to let Satan enter you! ”

Philosophy instead of religion

Salvation of the world through mercy, Parsifal’s famous “knowledge through mercy” is very fundamental to this interpretation. For Wagner and Sereberinkov, he basically believed that “the most sympathetic person” was the best, as Lessing defined in the “Hamburg Theater”. If Parsifal is about self-knowledge and liberation, then basic knowledge should go hand in hand with the moment of empathy.

Compassion arises only from the primary task of human thought and feeling: self-knowledge. So, says opera director Rossich, “Parsifal” is more of a philosophical act than a religion, even if Wagner embarks on the path of Buddhism, which he wants to be understood as the primary driving force of the New Testament. The goal is knowledge, not religious indulgence – and so Serebrynikov also reads Wagner’s book on myths.

Serebrennikov takes Gurnemanz’s declaration of “time becomes a place here” very seriously as he sends Parsifal his entire life again, even with his dual character – he also takes the Grail Knights community as a mirror through which one can step in. Here, too, not for a “wonderland”, but for the self-awareness and self-confidence that others can take with them as well.

The “idea of ​​freedom”

“Life in captivity is one possible reading of this sentence,” says Serebrennikow in advance. But he consciously focuses on society, as he says in his text The Idea of ​​Freedom, which not only arises from the outside, but has restricted itself: a narrow-minded, shrinking and ideological world in which they lock themselves up and where everything happens differently than it should.

Output via video conferencing

Against this fact, the processes that charge Wagner’s world with a new, objective dynamic are initiated. Serebrennikow, who directed the production via videoconferencing, has a large vocal crew under the musical direction of music director Philip Jordan: Jonas Kaufman sings Parsifal, Elena Grania performs her first role in Kondre in Vienna. You can now hold on and look forward to the strength and admiration this role gives.

Ludovich Tzeere gives Amfortas, George Zebenfeld, Gurmans and Wolfgang a Klingsor hut. Russian film and theater actor Nikolai Sidorenko plays “Parsifal of the time”, who still completely surrenders to the pleasure principle which becomes something like Kunderi’s will drive to seduce. The vaunted and eagerly awaited “pure fool” will have a tough road ahead of the well-known Good Friday magic, which will have some surprises and ups and downs in the Serebrennikov prison cell.

Fans of The Cronenberg movie can look forward to an intense examination of the topic of “Russian prison tattoos”, as celebrated in “Oriental Promises”. This staging will turn a lot of meaningful games into a video play as Wagner material gets in and under your skin – mixed with the aesthetics and coding of Russian prison tattoos.

Open heavy material

In general, a spear has to be broken at this point for a first-rate audio and music interpretation of Wagner, but an approach that can put aside all preconceptions and longings in an over-interpretation. With “Parsifal”, of all things, Rossich’s idea of ​​the opera’s survival as a mediator can be fulfilled by developing new target groups that allow themselves to be excited without prejudice, in the pure deception mode. Wagner, this is Hollywood’s expectation, yes to Netflix, of drama thriving in big transformations and that the audience, just thinking of the idea of ​​a bell famous for its CGAE voices, is able to fulfill it in a very deep existential mood.

Musically speaking, Wagner succeeded in fact in the sum and testimony of his musical aesthetic work, about which not only major transformations, but also numerous small and substantial quotes of the work tell us – because without the “Götterdämmerung” buzz, “Parsifal” is also unavailable.

“Do not explain Wagner one-on-one.”

“So I cannot and do not want to explain Wagner’s ‘Parsifal’ one to one – although all Wagner symbols appear in our productions: the cup, the spear, the cross, the ‘Blessed Messengers of the Savior’ and so forth,” but added, “I think Actual metaphysics takes place in real life. ” During the filming of “Parsifal” material about Moscow last December, concrete ruin was discovered in the worst frost. “The sunlight fell through the holes in the destroyed walls. A magical and unrealistic moment in its beauty,” says the director: “As an artist, I discover God in this beauty.”

Light will play a major role in this ranking. In the end, however, the question of whether salvation really comes from above or from the people themselves. This staging and its implementation proves that you can take fate into your hands in times of plague. ORF Director General Alexander and Rabitz describes this “parsifal” Vienna as “a work of great symbolic power” in order to ensure the widest possible reception of this opera, which in this case does not only affect opera fans.

“Neither the epidemic nor political arbitrariness was able to prevent this graduation from being achieved,” says the head of the state opera militarily.