It is about nothing less than love. This is what the Wartburg singing community asks for, and this is what Tannhäuser also seeks: he finds almost endless lust with the goddess of love Venus, and hopes to attain bliss with the "pure" Elisabeth. In his vacillation between satisfaction and renunciation, between guilt and protest, in being torn between fulfillment and exaltation, he corresponds entirely to the grammar of the Romantic age - and still speaks directly to us today.

The Bayreuth Festival's annual new production is one of the most eagerly awaited events of the operatic calendar, and in 2025 Matthias Davids brings his experience as a multi-award-winning director of musical theatre to Wagner's only mature comedy, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. This highly anticipated staging is matched by a superb musical line-up, with Daniele Gatti conducting an international cast including Georg Zeppenfeld as Hans Sachs, Michael Spyres as Walther von Stolzing and the young Swedish soprano Christina Nilsson as Eva. All in all, it promises to be a fresh and revitalizing take on this most inspiring of Wagner's works, which asks fundamental questions about art, inspiration and what it means to be truly creative.

Suspecting her missing husband is being held as a political prisoner, a noblewoman disguises herself as a male prison guard. She discovers him weakened in the darkest dungeon, but will she be able to rescue him before it is too late?