As we mentioned last week, you can still catch Lohengrin this Sunday. It's a little quiet this week thanks to Thanksgiving, but it looks like a good week for opera lovers. The LA Times just profiled opera star Bryn Terfel, and you can check him out tomorrow night in the other music center, at the Walt Disney Concert Hall. The program is heavy on Schumann (we're a nostalgic bunch). more ›

The LA Opera has embarked on its final push through the epic undertaking of Richard Wagner’s Ring cycle. All four of the operas that comprise the Ring cycle, share the same daring design by Achim Freyer (director, designer), Amanda Freyer (costumes) and Brian Gale (lighting)... more ›

The LA Opera is days away from beginning its final cycle of Richard Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen. The entire Ring cycle is comprised of four self-contained operas that run well over 16 hours including intermissions and curtain calls. With our current multitasking lifestyles and short attention spans, it’s amazing that that an event like this is something that attracts us and compels us. But it certainly does. more ›

After all the buildup, the promotion and the hype, the stakes for the LA Opera’s first performance of Richard Wagner’s complete Ring cycle were equally high to the stakes that characters face within the opera. Do or die. Succeed or fail. Win all or lose everything. more ›

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If Wagner was still alive today, he would have just celebrated his 195th (!) birthday yesterday. His influence was felt by many including Baudelaire, Freud, Joyce, Nietzsche, and any/every important contemporary of his. Some recent adaptations in mainstream media that come to mind include a terrible Tristan + Isolde movie and Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy (based off of Wagner's Ring cycle). more ›