Opera Australia: Ring cycle in Melbourne in 2013
Opera Australia has officially announced details of its Ring cycle in Melbourne in 2013, Opera Magazine reports. Three complete cycles will be given in November and December, before the co-producing Houston Grand Opera takes over the production for its first-ever Ring; it plans to present the operas over the course of four seasons, beginning in 2014.
The Melbourne production team will be led by the conductor Richard Mills and director Neil Armfield, and the cast will include Susan Bullock as Brünnhilde, Juha Uusitalo as Wotan, Gary Lehman as Siegfried and John Wegner as Alberich. This will be the biggest production in Opera Australia’s history. The project has already won the company the largest donation in its history; $5 million has been pledged by one of the city’s leading philanthropists, the Lonely Planet co-founder Maureen Wheeler.