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Guidance
Parental guidance recommended
This performance contains nudity and violence. There are themes of incest. There are pyrotechnics used towards the end of Act I.
Language
Sung in German with English surtitles, which are displayed on screens above the stage and around the auditorium.
Synopsis
Raised by a scheming dwarf and unaware of his true family origins, a young man embarks on an epic journey. His destiny soon brings him face-to-face with a shattered sword, a fearsome dragon and the cursed ring it guards, and a Valkyrie forced into enchanted slumber...
Creatives
The artists and creatives behind the production
Composer
Libretto
Conductor
Director
Set Designer
Costume Designer
Lighting Designer
Discover
A journey from darkness to destiny. Moments of transcendent beauty and heroic triumph sparkle in the third chapter of Wagner’s Ring cycle – often considered the comic ’scherzo’ of the tetralogy – which follows on from the spectacular Das Rheingold and Die Walküre.
A long composition
‘I have led my young Siegfried into the beautiful forest solitude; there I have left him beneath a linden tree,’ Wagner wrote to Franz Liszt in 1857. ‘He is better there than anywhere else.’ Though Wagner began work on the third chapter of his tetrology, Jung-Siegfried (later Der junge Siegfried, and finally, plain Siegfried) in 1851, his eponymous hero would ultimately be left under that linden tree for many years: Wagner would not resume work on Act II of Siegfried until 1864 (following the completion of two other works, Tristan und Isolde and Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg), and he would not begin sketching Act III until 1869. The final revision of the score was undertaken in February 1871, before the opera had its premiere, as part of the cycle’s first complete outing, at the Bayreuth Festival in August 1876.
Musical moments
The music of Siegfried is perhaps the least well-known of Wagner’s four operas, although the Forging Song, when Siegfried forges the sword, Nothung, at the end of Act I, is a known highlight. Wagner’s skill for evoking subterranean atmospheres also comes into play, in the scenes with Fafner. There also is an extraordinary orchestral interlude between the second and third scenes of Act III, in which the violins carry a long, extended melodic phrase (an example of Wagner’s unendliche Melodie – the ‘unending melody’). Finally, Brünnhilde’s awakening involves a glorious burst of musical sunshine, as she and Siegfried celebrate their love in the face of death ‘Leuchtende Liebe, lachender Tod!’ (‘Radiant love, laughing death!’).
Antonio Pappano on the music of Wagner's Siegfried
Behind the scenes: into the Armoury and Props Department for The Royal Opera's Siegfried
Reviews
Access and resources for Ring cycle
Listen to an Audio Described introduction for Siegfried on SoundCloud.
There is lift access and there are step-free routes to over 100 seats in the Stalls Circle, Balcony and Amphitheatre. Some seats in the Stalls Circle, Balcony, Amphitheatre and the Donald Gordon Grand Tier are accessed by 9 steps or fewer. There are 10 steps or more to access seats in the Orchestra Stalls.
You can use the assistive listening systems in our auditoriums. Surtitles, captions and translations in English are displayed on screens above the stage and around the auditorium.
Join our Access Scheme for priority access to tickets and to inform us of your access requirements.
See our Accessibility page for more information or view a visitors guide (PDF, 12.0 MB).
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