Cast
Waltraud Meier — Mezzo-soprano
Program notes
The film portraits an artist, who regularly appears on all the world's great opera-stages, she has received continual critical acclaim, is a unique and interesting personality who despite her success has retained a naturalness and a grand sense of humour: Waltraud Meier.
Her world career began in Bayreuth. Since her sensational Bayreuth-début in 1983 her part as Kundry has been unrivaled. Presently she is celebrated as one of the world's great Isolden. The portrait gives an insight into her different work-areas as well as into her private life. For the first time, she was filmed during rehearsals and performances; studying a new score; backstage and at Bayreuths' concert hall.
The film also shows the world-star away from the big opera-stages, for example in the Vienna Prater, in her favorite-restaurant in Bayreuth as well as in Munich on the Viktualienmarkt and in the beer garden. Featuring interviews with Daniel Barenboim, Plácido Domingo, Hans Sotin, Stephan Suschke, Siegfried Jerusalem and Jürgen Flimm.
"Why should have Wagner become my composer? It's much more than simply saying I'm interested, challenged by the complexity of his work. There are so many areas you could begin to tackle in Wagner. Let's say you decide to look just at the psychological aspects, and then just at the philosophical aspects, and then just at the text as the text, purely technical. And then you look at the orchestration, the handling of melody, the handling of the voices. And then you look at everything together as a whole again – it's endless. That's what I find so fascinating."
