Inside the Music
Götterdämmerung

“All that exists, must end...” Even Alain Altinoglu’s series of musical lectures on Der Ring des Nibelungen cannot escape Erda’s prophecy. As La Monnaie’s new production of Richard Wagner’s tetralogy reaches its climax, our Music Director will settle behind his piano one more time to guide you through the story and score of Götterdämmerung.

How did Wagner’s initial sketches for an opera called Siegfrieds Tod evolve into a four-and-a-half-hour epic that pushes the boundaries of the art form? How do musicians maintain their focus and keep their muscles flexible throughout such a demanding performance? And where, within this score, lay the seeds of a modernist composition style that a composer like Schönberg would later explore? Discover it all during this accessible lecture in our Main Auditorium.