GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG at Opéra national de Paris - Opéra Bastille

At last the dusk approaches: it has been heralded, promised almost, since The Rhine Gold, and we have been awaiting it with impatience. The whole universe of the Ring, solidly constructed during the earlier days, the gleaming fortress, the resplendent god avid for annihilation, the radiant son of the Wälsung, the love of the Valkyrie: everything seemed to have been created only for this fateful and spellbinding moment when everything is swallowed up. The Twilight of the Gods is perhaps the most monumental opera in the history of music: the more the world of the Ring seems to collapse, the more time stretches out immobile, allowing us to contemplate its slow and tragic slide. Wagner presents this unstoppable plunge toward ruin in a single sweep of three long acts crowned by the Valkyrie's immolation, the blazing pyre which consumes the old world and gives birth to a new humanity.