Das Rheingold in Munich

Prelude to a Stunning New Ring Cycle by Tobias Kratzger

By: Susan Hall - Jul 29, 2025

Tobias Kratzer is reimagining Der Ring des Nibelungen for the Bavarian State Opera. His Das Rheingold premiered in the fall of 2024 and returned for the Munich Opera Festival’s celebration of the opera house’s 150th anniversary. Vladimir Jurowski conducts with remarkable clarity, drawing out the score’s conversational texture while honoring the gravitas of its E-flats and the shimmer of its beauty. The music punctuates and lifts the singers’ lines with purpose.

Nicholas Brownlee, an American bass-baritone nurtured by the Frankfurt Opera, emerges as a Wotan for now—and for the future. His voice is commanding yet nuanced, swelling and receding with intelligence and edge when the role demands it.

This is an emotionally and visually arresting production. Rather than focusing on the literal cost of gold, Kratzer redirects our attention to a deeper theme: the meaning of faith—for mortals and immortals alike. Alberich clings with primal certainty to the power of gold. Wotan, by contrast, is bound to a form of faith shaped by immortality—repetitive, rule-bound, and edging toward existential boredom.

Kratzer’s musical sensitivity is reflected in his staging. Characters often move laterally—left to right, then back again—rather than toward or away from the audience. This is a striking and effective alternative to conventional blocking, which typically privileges vocal dominance. The lateral motion also gives singers—especially those less comfortable with physical acting—a natural way to move with the music. As director Katrin Hilbe once observed, sometimes that’s all you need to hold an audience.

Still, Rheingold gives us more than the movement of singers. The turntable set evolves fluidly: from towering columns to a cluttered fire escape above junk, and finally to a cathedral nave, whereWotan and  Fricka—played with a mix of grace and cunning by Ekaterina Gubanova—prepare to launch the Ring’s  final reckoning.

From Loge’s stark-naked rebuke—intended to jar—to the transcendent beauty of Wotan’s ascent, the production walks a tightrope between unease and rapture. The lighting is alternately dark and electrically charged, while video projections that follow Wotan’s journey are by turns playful, poignant, and strange.

This Rheingold marks a triumphant start to Munich’s new Ring: bold in concept, loyal to the score, and brimming with imaginative force.