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A dangerous temptation
Dec. 13th, 2003 02:27 pmI've bought just enough tickets to the Metropolitan Opera over the years to be on their mailing list. So what should arrive in today's mail but the special brochure for their three upcoming cycles of Der Ring des Niblungen.
Oh, my.
I've loved the Ring since my teens.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jwg, who used to despise Wagner, is a recent convert, having seen it on DVD earlier this year. Then again, I went to part of the cycle they did three years ago (along with glassdiva), while jwg found other ways to entertain himself. That involved buying individual tickets on Thursday morning, a chancy and tiresome process, and the seats weren't very good either.
So we're really tempted to buy whole cycles, now, while there are decent seats available. There is, of course, some downside to this proposition, like the fact that pretty good seats for a full cycle cost $1,000 apiece, and really good ones are $1,500. (The best seats in the house are reserved for people who join the "Golden Circle" for $3,750(!), which includes varous benefits that wouldn't interest me even if I were prepared to spend that kind of money.) Add into that the cost of spending a week in New York City, and you're talking about a pretty serious investment.
One possibility that crossed my mind is to buy a cycle and then split it with someone else who's interested but doesn't feel like spending the requisite time and money to see the whole thing. (Like some one reading this entry, maybe!) I'm not sure how I'd want to divide it up, however. Since I saw Siegfried and Götterdämmerung last time, I might prefer to see Rheingold and Walküre this time -- Plácido Domingo as Siegmund! -- although I'm also curious about the new Siegfried, Jon Fredric West, about whom I know nothing. He looks pretty good in his publicity shot, for what that's worth. (Full cast information, and much more, can be found here.)
Of course, I do have the whole 1990 production on DVD, which I can watch at whatever time of day I like, as often as I like, without it costing me anything. And it has Christa Ludwig's Fricka, which I'll never get to see live. But being there in person is something different -- among other things, I, rather than the filming director, get to decide where to look. So I'm tempted, like I said.
Looking at our schedule, we could really only do Cycle II (last week in April), unless we really were going to skip Götterdämmerung, in which case we could also do Cycle III (first week in May).¹
What to do, what to do?
¹The reason this would require skpping G. is that we have tickets on the Friday to see Così Fan Tutte in Boston, and somehow the idea of Wagner in New York, Mozart in Boston, Wagner in New York on successive days doesn't really work.
Oh, my.
I've loved the Ring since my teens.
jwg, who used to despise Wagner, is a recent convert, having seen it on DVD earlier this year. Then again, I went to part of the cycle they did three years ago (along with glassdiva), while jwg found other ways to entertain himself. That involved buying individual tickets on Thursday morning, a chancy and tiresome process, and the seats weren't very good either.So we're really tempted to buy whole cycles, now, while there are decent seats available. There is, of course, some downside to this proposition, like the fact that pretty good seats for a full cycle cost $1,000 apiece, and really good ones are $1,500. (The best seats in the house are reserved for people who join the "Golden Circle" for $3,750(!), which includes varous benefits that wouldn't interest me even if I were prepared to spend that kind of money.) Add into that the cost of spending a week in New York City, and you're talking about a pretty serious investment.
One possibility that crossed my mind is to buy a cycle and then split it with someone else who's interested but doesn't feel like spending the requisite time and money to see the whole thing. (Like some one reading this entry, maybe!) I'm not sure how I'd want to divide it up, however. Since I saw Siegfried and Götterdämmerung last time, I might prefer to see Rheingold and Walküre this time -- Plácido Domingo as Siegmund! -- although I'm also curious about the new Siegfried, Jon Fredric West, about whom I know nothing. He looks pretty good in his publicity shot, for what that's worth. (Full cast information, and much more, can be found here.)
Of course, I do have the whole 1990 production on DVD, which I can watch at whatever time of day I like, as often as I like, without it costing me anything. And it has Christa Ludwig's Fricka, which I'll never get to see live. But being there in person is something different -- among other things, I, rather than the filming director, get to decide where to look. So I'm tempted, like I said.
Looking at our schedule, we could really only do Cycle II (last week in April), unless we really were going to skip Götterdämmerung, in which case we could also do Cycle III (first week in May).¹
What to do, what to do?
¹The reason this would require skpping G. is that we have tickets on the Friday to see Così Fan Tutte in Boston, and somehow the idea of Wagner in New York, Mozart in Boston, Wagner in New York on successive days doesn't really work.
