When Gerard Mortier took over direction of the Salzburg Festival ten year
ago he inherited something encrusted in tradition and money.  It was the
most elegant, the mostly costly, the most exclusive festival of its time.
It was also ambitious, in its own way, offering as it did stuff that could
not be experienced any other place--performances of music and of drama
specially staged for a very limited showing at Salzburg, and performed
by stellar orchestras, singers, and actors only there and no other place.

The formula worked.  Under Karajan it consistently sold out to a
well-heeled and well-dressed clientele that seemed pleased not only with
the repertoire but also with the ambiance of Old Salzburg and its lovely
environs.  Towards the end of Karajan's reign the price of the cheapest
seat at the Grosses Festspielhaus had edged up to the $100 mark.

Then Mortier arrived to change it all.  To update it.  The Festival this
year kicked off with Luciano Berio's __Cronaca Del Luogo__, a work that
defies crisp description, though it may be suggestive of many things.  One
could say that, whatever it is, it emblematizes this year's Festspiele,
about the way that Karjan's Rosenkavalier used to, in a quite different
modulation, of course.  Instead of von Hoffmannthal's Jedermann, the
traditional dramatic focus of the Festsspiele, the spotlight this year is
on "Schlachten" (Transl..:  either Battles or Slaughter), a twelve-hour
marathon of Shakespeare staged as if by the producer of Hair--lotsa
nakedness and eroticism, as you like it, with a leer (this presentation
isn't in Salzburg proper, but within a reasonable commute from it).
Moreover, the monopolistic hold of the Vienna Opera Orchestra has been
broken.  Other groups from other places now perform here exactly the
same stuff they perform elsewhere.  As there is more doing, two modern
large-capacity halls, really fair ground spaces, have been subsumed by
the Festpiele, plus one cinema in order to provide more seating for more
offerings.  The bad news? Well, where, before, seats were hard to snag even
months ahead of time, performances now are by no means sold out.  Despite
that, prices have not gone down.  It seems that customers have decided that
what's being offered isn't special enough to command the mind-boggling
outlay that it takes nowadays to attend a few days of the festival.  For
a couple attending, you start with about $ 500 for tickets per night, add
about $ 400 for hotel accommodations, about $ 175 for meals and God only
knows what more for incidentals and transportation, to and fro.  Mortier
has announced that he is leaving Salzburg, and that may be so.  It may also
be that Salzburg is beginning to leave him.  Seems that Festspiele these
days are globalizing and may experienced elsewhere at much lesser cost.
Neoliberalism is what's on in Salzburg.

Denis Fodor                     Internet:[log in to unmask]