Budapest Wagner Days

“No Tickets for Bayreuth? Budapest Has a Wagner Festival, Too.” So read the headline from the effusive 2013 New York Times review of the Budapest Wagner Days. A lot of water has flowed down the Danube since then, but the success of the Wagner festival conceived by Ádám Fischer remains – in the eyes of critics and the audience alike – unbroken. Naturally, we will get to marvel at this wonderful experience once again in June 2024.

The series of performances kicks off with a song recital by the world-famous Danish baritone Bo Skovhus, with a selection of late Romantic gems of the intimate genre by Strauss, Schönberg and Mahler, along with Wagner’s Wesendonck Lieder. Partnering with him on piano will be the versatile Austrian musician Stefan Vladar.

For quite some time now, the Ring tetralogy has served as the crux of the June festival, as its stories of gods and heroes drawn from Germanic mythology that make up this series of music dramas also holds up a mirror to today’s world. The perceptive staging by Hartmut Schörghofer will once again come to life under the baton of Ádám Fischer at the helm of the Radio Hungarian Symphony Orchestra, and, in the course of the four evenings, we will get to encounter such powerful singers as Iréne Theorin, who has taken our breath away year after year as Brünnhilde, and Christian Franz, who has likewise fascinated the audience on many occasions in the role of Loge. And the long list continues, starting with Johan Reuter’s commanding Wotan, Karine Babajanyan’s emotional Sieglinde and Stefan Vinke’s implacable Siegfried, along with returning Hungarian artists like Atala Schöck and Erika Gál.

And again in 2024, the Budapest Wagner Days will end with a programme that can both serve as an introduction to the composer’s works for those who are just getting to know him and as a source of great joy for die-hard fans, when Fischer helms the Hungarian National Philharmonic Orchestra in the Gods and Heroes concert, enchanting the audience with the most popular hits from the Wagnerian oeuvre.

Love and Death

Budapest Wagner Days Guest Performance in Vienna

Thursday, 27 June 2024. / 7:30 pm
Wiener Konzerthaus

Tristan: Stuart Skelton – tenor
Isolde: Elisabet Strid – soprano
Brangäne: Dorottya Láng – mezzo-soprano
King Marke: Jongmin Park – bass
Melot / Kurwenal: N. N.
Hungarian Radio Symphony Orchestra
Conductor: Ádám Fischer

Wagner: Wesendonck Lieder
Wagner: Tristan und Isolde – Act 2

For the first time in its nearly two decades of existence, a Budapest Wagner Days production is going to be performed outside of Hungary. With Ádám Fischer at their helm, the Hungarian Radio Symphony Orchestra is set to play in the century-old Wiener Konzerthaus. The list of soloists includes such world-famous artists as Stuart Skelton, Elisabet Strid, Dorottya Láng and Jongmin Park. Everyone involved is dedicating this production featuring the Wesendonck Lieder followed by Tristan und Isolde to the memory of the great Wagnerian tenor Stephen Gould, who passed away recently.

There is ample precedent for performing a single act of one of Wagner‘s operas in concert: the same has been done with Götterdämmerung and Lohengrin in Budapest over the past few decades. It is no coincidence that Ádám Fischer, the wonderful Radio Orchestra and the world-class soloists who have already achieved major successes in various Budapest Wagner Days productions are this time bringing Act 2 of Tristan und Isolde to the stage of the Wiener Konzerthaus, as this part of the music drama is not only well-rounded enough to stand alone in its own right, it also pulses with an enormous force of passion and tension. The Wesendonck Lieder song cycle comprising the first part of the evening, with Dorottya Láng serving as the soloist, meshes well with the atmosphere of Tristan und Isolde, since it was on that opera that Wagner temporarily interrupted work in order to write it. The organisers had originally asked the American tenor Stephen Gould, who received enthusiastic acclaim at Müpa Budapest among many other venues, to sing the part of the male title character in the production, but the artist’s painfully early death last September forever removed the hero of Bayreuth, an unforgettable Tannhäuser, Siegfried and Tristan, from the opera stage. The team performing in this Vienna guest appearance will also use this opportunity to bid farewell to the outstanding artist.

Presented by: Müpa Budapest

MORE DETAILS

A sip of Wagner

Sip on some Wagner! Throughout the entire Budapest Wagner Days festivals, we attempt to appeal to all of the senses, and this year you can’t miss our line of craft beers whose unique flavours are inspired by characters from the Ring. The Szent András Brewery’s craft beers can be tasted in four flavours, in bottled and draft versions. These beverages bearing the Budapest Wagner Days label can be purchased at Müpa Budapest’s snack bars, and you can even take all characters home in a gift box.

• Brünnhilde: a decidedly hoppy and pleasantly spicy New England IPA flavoured with apricots and basil (5.6%)

• Hagen: a high extract content imperial pilsner with a strong hoppy flavour (7%)

• Siegmund: an unfiltered Bavarian wheat beer with citrus notes and a fruity banana aroma (4.9%)

Find your favourite!

Wagner dinner

Throughout the Budapest Wagner Days festival, we are ready to welcome you from behind the display counter of the Atrium snack bar on the ground floor, but also at the terrace snack bar on the fifth floor, where you can enjoy our selection of food and beverages in a renewed environment as you admire the unrivalled panorama of the Danube below. As in previous years, during the 50- and 60-minute intermissions in the performances of Die Walküre, Siegfried and Götterdämmerung on 21, 22 and 23 June, our guests can also order an à la carte dinner at the Bohemian Event Venue.

Gift Collection

Discover the Budapest Wagner-days merchandise available at Vince Bookshop: wear the highly praising words of the prestigious critic of the New York Times on a t-shirt, cool yourself in the summer heat with a lovely Wagner fan, or enjoy a walk around the city all year around with a Wagner themed backpack!