Find classical music concert, opera, ballet and dance reviews | Christiane Kohl

With a plethora of theatre seats, stools and benches it was as if Willy Decker and Wolfgang Gussman had been elected ‘Chair-men of the bored”.

Christian Thielemann and the Staatskapelle Dresden orchestra are let down by sub-optimal singers in Willy Deckers chair-laden production of  Die Walküre. 

Wagner demands vocal resilience from the large cast of singers in Das Rheingold, but Willy Decker wants strong thigh muscles as well.

An exceptional musical performance was enhanced by a streamlined but ultimately moving staging in an evening of near perfection in Dresden.

Frank Castorf's controversial but supremely well-cast Ring cycle is provocative to the last.

Singing, orchestral playing and scenic portrayal all combine to make a highly memorable second instalment of Wagner's Ring.

At the end, there was a profusion of boos and applause for the creative team: Castorf and co had given us a Ring cycle that was by turns infuriatingly indulgent, interestingly provocative, visually beautiful, puzzling and rewarding.

Frank Castorf's Soviet-era farm-setting does not obtrude on the emotional core of Wagner's Die Walküre, with excellent performances from Johan Botha, Anja Kampe and Claudia Mahnke, with superlative playing from the Festival Orchestra.

Attila Jun's outstanding Hagen and Catherine Foster's sublime Brünnhilde light up the last episode of Frank Castorf's puzzling Ring.

Kirill Petrenko starts Die Walküre with a flourish as Frank Castorf’s staging takes us back to the Baku oilfields in late tsarist Russia.

Dortmund Opera's daring new production of Tannhäuser is deeply stimulating and innovative, backed up by fine singing and orchestral playing.