Bayreuth finally lets a woman conduct a first night

Bayreuth finally lets a woman conduct a first night

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norman lebrecht

September 21, 2020

The restored Katharina Wagner has named Oksana Lyniv to conduct Flying Dutchman next summer.

Bayreuth says the Ukrainian will be the first woman to lead a new production.

Lyniv, 42, is music director of Graz Opera.

Ms Wagner has also been explaining her own summer-long absence. Sje told local media that she had been in a coma for six weeks in at the Regensburg university hospital, where her life was saved. She is now fully recovered.

Comments

  • I’am afraid that because of the Coronavirus she will start to work only in 2023…

  • Kurwenal says:

    Bad choice. She is the most overrated conductor of our times. Just because she was Maestro Petrenko’s assistant in Munich. By the way: She WAS music director in Graz.

    • A.L. says:

      Please list the criteria by which she is “most overrated”? How is she better or worse than the many dilettantes, mostly male of course, in the business? Me thinks she will lead a memorable Holländer, orchestra-wise. Singer-wise, I don’t know but don’t have much hope. But that won’t be her fault.

  • May says:

    Simone Young should have long been the first woman to lead a new production in Bayreuth.

  • Leporello says:

    Cheaper, I guess, to engage newbies.

  • Doc Martin says:

    I gather from a press report, Katharina Wagner had thrombosis, pulmonary hypertension and pulmonary embolism and was put in an induced coma. These conditions are common in many Cov-19 patients, although the press release suggested a negative test for Cov-19. She was incapacitated since April during the early phase of the pandemic. Not knowing her medical history or test results, I would postulate that in fact the cov-19 test result was possibly wrong. The news item mentioned “blood thinner”, anticoagulant. Clotting in the lungs is a major issue with cov-19. She may in fact have “recovered” from a bout of Cov-19 which subsequently led to PE etc.

    See this BMJ case report.

    https://casereports.bmj.com/content/bmjcr/13/9/e238168.full.pdf

  • Jane says:

    I much prefer a man driving the bus! So too would RW probably.

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