Jetzt dürfen Sie!
A balmy summer’s morning during the year 2001, 18th August to be precise: today is ‘spielfrei’ (no performance) and the Festspielhaus appears almost deserted, the stage is quiet, rehearsal spaces are empty, it’s even possible to find a space in the car park.
Colin Bayliss
Clemens Bieber
Bea and Alec Bobotek
Stephen Charitan
Jerry Floyd
Diana Herbst
Hildegaard Arnold Kiel
Walter Meyer
Anne Midgette
John F. Runciman
Per-Erik Skramstad
Julia Thornton
Mark Twain
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But walk through the canteen (also closed) towards the Chorsaal and you will find a throng of smartly dressed visitors milling around and a buzz of expectancy in the warm Franconian air. These guests are not hapless opera-goers who have misread the date on their highly-prized Karten, but distinguished guests from the world of opera assembled for the presentation of the Wilhelm Pitz-Preis. This price is awarded for outstanding services to opera in Germany, and almost always to someone with a close personal connection to Bayreuth, by the Union of German Opera Choruses, otherwise known as the VdO (Vereingung deutsche Opernchöre & Bühnentänzer). Named after the celebrated chorus director of ‘Neu Bayreuth’, the illustrious list of previous recipients includes Wolfgang Wagner, Götz Friedrich, and Norbert Balatsch with the Bayreuth Festspielchor.
Conductor Pierre Boulez will be awarded the prize today in a ceremony including speeches from VdO executive Stefan Meuschel and Manfred Jung (who sang the role of Siegfried in the celebrated Boulez/Chereau Jahrhundert Ring) and framed by the klangwunder of the Bayreuth Festival Chorus itself. As well as singing in most of the opera performances (only Rheingold, Die Walküre and Siegfried are ‘chorfrei’), it’s always very much been the chorus’ role to act as ambassadors for the festival, providing musical enrichment to indoor and outdoor Festspiele events. On 25th July, the day of the premiere each year, the chorus traditionally sing around Richard Wagner’s grave at 9.30am sharp (bring a brolly, it’s usually raining!).
Today the chorus give a polished rendition of the famous Schwanenchor from Lohengrin conducted by their current chorus director Eberhard Friedrich (the first chorus director in the history of the festival to have a street in Bayreuth named after him before he assumes office) but for the Wilhelm Pitz-Preis, it is also desirable to sing a piece which has a special connection to the person receiving the honour. Pierre Boulez is, of course, also a composer. Although the Bayreuth Festival Chorus is a magnificent choir in its respective repertoire, it is perhaps not so suited to the rendering of complex contemporary music, so the decision was made (a relief to all concerned) to play instead a recording of Boulez’s setting of a Malarmé poem for soprano and instrumental ensemble through a large loudspeaker erected in the Chorsaal. Everyone listens intently to the (je m’excuse , M. Boulez) intermittent squeaks, boings and plink-plonks of this piece and when the ‘music’ comes to a stop, polite applause follows – at which point, the music starts up again. An embarrassed tittering can be heard, as the audience realise their mistake in assuming the piece was over. After three or four minutes of plink plonk there is once again a long silence, followed by somewhat cautious applause. Manfred Jung, who is next to speak, steps up to the podium but as he opens his mouth to begin, more plink plonk tones suddenly emanate from the loud speaker – the piece still hasn’t finished. Jung sits down again and the mood of determination in the audience can be clearly discerned: ‘we are not going to applaud again until we definitely, definitely know that this piece is finished’. The plink plonks continue for a while until the tense silence is suddenly broken by an unmistakable voice with a strong French accent. “Jetzt dürfen Sie” (“now you can”). The whole room erupts with thunderous applause, laughter and cheers, as the only man in the room who knows when the piece is actually over tells the assembled guests that it is finally safe to applaud his composition.
After the excitement of the plink plonks, the rest of the ceremony seemed to go by in a whirl, so the diligent amongst you will be delighted to learn that you can read transcripts of all the speeches in a book about the history of the prize, “Wilhelm Pitz-Preis 1984 bis 2001”. Boulez’s long association with Bayreuth continued as conductor of Christopher Schlingensief’s controversial Parsifal. Has the performance of one of his compositions ever met with such a wildly enthusiastic reception as on that morning in August, though? I wonder. Watching the whole proceedings from a seat in the back row, Antonio Pappano, conductor of Lohengrin that year, and, who knows, a future recipient of the Wilhelm Pitz-Preis himself. 
About the author
Julia Thornton first sang with the Bayreuth Festival Chorus whilst still a student at the Royal Northern College of Music in 1993 until the year 2006, when she left to concentrate on solo work. Her association with the works of Richard Wagner continues, however: she sang the role of Helmwige in Freiburg Opera’s production of Die Walküre in 2008/9 and will sing Brünnhilde in Freiburgs hip-hop opera project for young people Der Rap des Nibelungen!