Festival Dialogues 2013

Only Art... The Festival Dialogues examine the season’s new productions. Wagner and Verdi form a special focus this year, with Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg on the one hand and Don Carlo and Falstaff on the other. Then, of course, there is Mozart with Lucio Silla and Così fan tutte and Birtwistle with his opera Gawain. The new Jedermann will certainly be at the heart of the discourse – the dialogue between the old image in the mirror and the ego that has remained young.
What unites these pieces? Is a central theme visible? Nietzsche, the 21st century’s ancestor, analysed the “roiling and thoughtless splintering and fraying of all foundations, their dissolution into an ever-flowing and dissolving becoming, modern man’s incessant weaving and historicising of everything that has become”. This is exactly what leads to a longing for wholeness and security, whether it be emotional, intuitive, aesthetic or mystical.
Thus, what could be more apposite than becoming completely absorbed by music or, respectively, opera as a total work of art? The questions whether the whole is attainable, whether the suggestion of meaning in a world that is increasingly hard to fathom is achievable, these questions seem to be answerable today only by art. This can only happen in a concentrated sequence, at a specific place, amidst a special atmosphere, and when everyone strives to achieves the optimum: in other words, at the Salzburg Festival!
As always, the circle of outstanding experts will be selected to be as interdisciplinary as possible. 

Concept and organisation: Michael Fischer
A brochure containing all the lecturers and dates will be printed in the spring of 2013 and will also be available at www.festspielfreunde.at.