cultural
Under the motto “The sound of the gods meets the gold of the Danube”, a classic open-air concert took place on the Tulln Danube stage for the second time on Thursday – with Lidia Baich, Andreas Schager and Piotr Beczala. An “atmospheric request concert” according to APA criticism.
The ambience of the largest river stage in Austria, according to the Mayor of Tulln Peter Eisenschenk (ÖVP), plays no small role in the creation of the specific atmosphere, writes APA culture editor Ewald Baringer. A picture-book sunset over the water provides a magnificent natural backdrop, the botanically lovingly designed waterfront promenade testifies to the quality of life in the garden city of Tulln, fish jump up between the stage and the auditorium and ducks swim past, and the nearby railway bridge runs back and forth once more barely audible a train.
Violin virtuoso Lidia Baich acted as a charming moderator through the evening, which began with Verdi (Beczala last sang the Radames – “Celeste Aida” – in Salzburg) and led via Vivaldi’s Sommersturm to Wagner. After all, the Danube stage is not far from the Nibelungen fountain, even the orchestra, expertly conducted by Michael Güttler, bears the proud name of the Nibelungen Philharmonic, so the blacksmith’s song from “Siegfried”, sung and hammered with relish by the Bayreuth-experienced Schager, also fits.
However, Schager also did a great job of Florestan’s dungeon scene from Beethoven’s “Fidelio”. In the second part followed the heartfelt prayer of Rienzi and excerpts from the “Twilight of the Gods”. Musically, the genius loci was convincingly satisfied.
Arias and interludes from Leoncavallo’s “Bajazzo” and Mascagni’s “Cavalleria Rusticana”, Gounod’s “Romeo und Juliette”, Puccini’s “E lucevan le stelle” and – as an encore – “Nessun dorma” brought more southern melting, both tenors lifted together, whereby heroic tenor and lyrical tenor got along well with each other. Baich, on the other hand, shone with the third movement of Max Bruch’s violin concerto. And finally there was an opulent medley of well-known operetta melodies. The Blue Danube Waltz as an encore to the encore was almost too much of a good thing.
The short interviews were also amusing, for example when Baich asked her husband Schager what the essential difference between Wagner operas and operettas was. Schager replied quickly that in the case of Wagner, everyone is usually dead in the end, but in operettas everyone is married. Whereupon Baich said that there was often no difference at all – and of course that got the laughs.
