My Experience at Richard Wagner's Opera Parsifal

Happy start to the week to everyone reading this! I'm a little tired from all the choir activities we've had this May. After all, we're still celebrating our 20th anniversary, and in fact, the coming week will be just as intense with very long musical days. But today I want to tell you how our week ended, because we did it again, Venezuela! 🔥 This Saturday, May 23rd, we made history in Caracas by performing Richard Wagner's opera Parsifal for the first time ever in my country. As I mentioned in previous posts, we were joined by national artists and international experts in the genre.

Alongside Icelandic baritone Tómas Tómasson

This historic concert took place in the Ríos Reyna Hall of the Teresa Carreño Theater, and it was truly a delightful afternoon for me, as I was captivated by the beauty of Wagner's rich harmonies and the history behind the music. Although it wasn't a typical performance with a stage set, but rather an Italian-style presentation, the guest soloists wore top-quality costumes and used the finest props to bring their roles to life. We had it a bit easier this time; we simply accompanied the music from behind the orchestra, waiting for our musical entrance. But you know how it is when there's so much passion; every detail is savored, and it's always great to see the scenes from a different perspective than the audience.

Together with German Director Raoul Grüneis

I arrived very early that afternoon. A colleague and I were responsible for handing out some souvenirs from our choir, so we went backstage and took lots of pictures along the way 🤭 I had already met and exchanged a few words with the special guests: the German conductor Raoul Grüneis, the Danish tenor Magnus Vigilius, and the Icelandic baritone Tómas Tómasson. It was nice to meet them again just before the performance, including the Venezuelan baritone Anderson Piaspam, who is a member of our group. Once again, I didn't run into the Lithuanian soprano Aušrine Stundyte, and I thought she would be the only person I wouldn't be able to approach, even though I admired her up close many times during rehearsals. She's so passionate about her role that I felt incapable of bothering her to say hello. She's like a diamond that must be appreciated from afar; that's how I felt.

As you know, I always enjoy every concert since joining the National Choir, but this one was special for many reasons. In fact, it had been a long time since I'd taken so many photos with the choir, possibly because we're used to singing at home or because we always have performances where we barely have time to breathe between soundcheck, the concert, and the intermissions. The Teresa Carreño Theater has beautiful spaces that truly inspire us; it's noticeably larger, and this time we had international guests and a smaller vocal part. In fact, we didn't sing a single note in the second act of the opera, so we stayed to enjoy refreshments before our next performance, which took about an hour or more between music and intermissions. We were able to catch up, have coffee, and take lots of pictures... Me being me 🤣

I took these photographs at the dress rehearsal on Thursday:

I even dared to take a photograph from the audience's vantage point just minutes before the performance began. I was so excited and wanted to capture every moment of this opera, as we don't know if we'll ever perform it again. Backstage, I was so happy that I even forgot for a moment that the audience was on the other side, enjoying the orchestra and soloists on stage. During those moments of waiting, I had the pleasure of exchanging a few words with a great Venezuelan actress who was narrating the event. She was the wonderful Marialejandra Martín, one of my mother's favorites back in the days when Venezuelan telenovelas reigned supreme on national television. I immediately shared the photo with my mom, and the biggest surprise was that at the end of the day, already out of my tuxedo and ready to leave, I ran into the Lithuanian soprano Aušrine Stundyte in the parking lot ❤️ and wow, what a beautiful and kind woman! Her talent is as great as her charisma with the public, and it made me very happy, because exchanging a few, really very few words with her because I even forgot my little English 😅 made me feel that in that moment I finally connected with all the wonderful things I experienced this past week.

National Choir and Simon Bolivar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela

I have nothing left to do but say goodbye to this account of the joy I felt on Saturday being part of such a special musical project. You can find a lot of content about it, especially on the social media accounts of the Venezuelan System of Youth and Children's Orchestras and Choirs and on our personal Instagram account, @lacoral_sb. You can also find videos and photos of this historic performance on the Teresa Carreño Theater's social media. Thank you so much for being here and reading about my adventures. I truly write them with the same passion with which I experience them, and I love writing everything down here on my Hive blog more and more each time. Yes, I'm a little tired today; there's been a lot going on, and there's definitely much more to come. But there are also other details I didn't mention here: one of our best friends had a birthday, so we went out to party even though our feet couldn't take it anymore 🤣 It was a beautiful Saturday until midnight, but that's a story that needs its own post 🤭

The Gemini birthday celebrants of the choir