This Act Iact hinges on hidden identities that are known to the audience. (Wagner uses this situation in operas that are not part of the Ring: in the operas bearing their respective names, Parsifal does not know his own name, and his son Lohengrin is forbidden to reveal his.) The program tells even the first-time viewer the names of the characters, and, from his leitmotif and his covering his missing eye with his hat, the "stranger" or "old man" (described but not seen on stage) and Wotan, Wolfe, and the Wanderer who will appear in Siegfried can be recognized as one and the same individual. Siegmund (whose name means "victory protector or shield") and Sieglinde (meaning "gentle victory") each withhold their own names until the act's climax. (It would appear that, unlike Parsifal, Siegmund does know his own name, though he will not be the first to utter it.)

During a raging storm, Siegmund seeks shelter at the house of the warrior Hunding. Hunding is not present, and Siegmund is greeted by Sieglinde, Hunding's unhappy wife. Siegmund tells her that he is fleeing from enemies. After taking a drink of mead, he moves to leave, claiming to be cursed by misfortune. However, Sieglinde bids him to stay, saying that he can bring no misfortune to the "house where ill-luck lives."

Returning, Hunding reluctantly offers Siegmund the hospitality demanded by custom. Sieglinde, who is increasingly fascinated with the visitor, urges him to tell his tale. Siegmund describes returning home with his father one day, to find his mother dead and his twin sister abducted. He then wandered with his father, until he parted from him as well. One day, he found a girl being forced into marriage and fought with the girl's relatives. However, his weapons were broken and the bride was killed, and he was forced to flee to Hunding's home. Initially, Siegmund does not reveal his name, choosing to call himself 'Woeful'.

When Siegmund finishes, Hunding reveals that he is one of Siegmund's pursuers. He grants Siegmund a night's stay, but they are to do battle in the morning. Hunding leaves the room with Sieglinde, ignoring his wife's distress. Siegmund laments his misfortune, recalling his father's promise that he would find a sword when he most needed it. Sieglinde returns, having drugged Hunding's drink to send him into a deep sleep. She reveals that she was forced into a marriage with Hunding.

During their wedding feast, an old man had appeared and plunged a sword into the trunk of the ash tree in the center of the room, which Hunding and his companions had all failed to remove. She expresses her longing for the hero who could draw the sword and save her. Siegmund expresses his love for her, which she reciprocates, and she begins to grope for where she recognizes him from, and then realizes she recalls his voice and that they resemble each other. When she learns from him the name of his father, Wälse, she tells him that his name is Siegmund, and that the Wanderer left the sword for him.

Siegmund now easily draws the sword forth, and she tells him her own name, Sieglinde, and that they are siblings. He gives the blade the name "Nothung" (or needful, which evokes the dire need for a weapon against Hunding, that it will fill for him). He and Sieglinde flee together from Hunding's house.

Parsifal, figure of Arthurian legend also known as Sir Percivale, who is in turn a later form of a hero of Celtic myth. The name originally occurs as Pryderi, an alternative name of Gwry in Pwyll Prince of Dyved, a tale in the Mabinogion. Gwry is the original of Gawain, and in the later Percivale stories Gawain appears, often fulfilling the same role as the hero.

The great feature of the Percivale cycle is the Holy Grail, and Welsh sources connect this sacred talisman with Percivale, who finds the Grail. Chrétien de Troyes is the author of the first great artistic treatment of the theme; in Chrétien's unfinished poem Percivale finds the Grail at the Fisher King's castle and heals the king. The Parzival of Wolfram von Eschenbach is one of the greatest medieval poems. Drawn largely from Chrétien, von Eschenbach's story is highly spiritualized and appears essentially in the form used by Richard Wagner in his music drama Parsifal. In the Morte d'Arthur of Sir Thomas Malory, Percivale is admitted to the Grail with Galahad and Bors.

Götterdämmerung? ("Twilight of the Gods") is the last of the four operas that comprise Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung), by Richard Wagner. It received its premiere at the Bayreuth Festspielhaus on 17 August 1876, as part of the first complete performance of the Ring.

The title is a translation into German of the Old Norse phrase Ragnarök, which in Norse mythology refers to a prophesied war of the gods which brings about the end of the world. However, as with the rest of the Ring, Wagner's account of this apocalypse diverges significantly from his Old Norse sources.

The term Götterdämmerung is occasionally used in English, referring to a disastrous conclusion of events.

Siegfried is the third of the four operas that comprise Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung), by Richard Wagner.

It received its premiere at the Bayreuth Festspielhaus on 16 August 1876, as part of the first complete performance of the Ring.

Das Rheingold introduces a primeval collection of gods, nymphs, giants, and dwarves who instigate the situations inherited by Wotan's children, the humans Siegmund and Sieglinde, and the Valkyrie, Brünnhilde. It is a brief glimpse of an Edenic world, already beginning to be corrupted by greed and lust for power. Musically, Das Rheingold introduces many of the motives associated with objects and ideas of importance in the drama. Among these are the Rheingold, the Ring, Walhall, Wotan's spear, and the renunciation of love. Das Rheingold also introduces Wagner's huge Ring orchestra, its versatility, and at times, Wagner's sheer audacity with sound.



At one astonishing moment in the transition to Scene Three, the orchestra falls silent, leaving the enslaved Nibelungs' forging rhythm to ring out on 18 tuned anvils. Rheingold requires six harps for its conclusion, accompanying the forlorn cries of the betrayed Rhine Daughters. The extraordinary prelude, which is in essence the prelude to the entire cycle, should also be mentioned. The first sound the listener hears is a low E flat, played on the double basses, which seems to appear out of nowhere. This single thread of sound slowly becomes a remarkable extension of the single key of E flat, layering arpeggio upon arpeggio and figuration upon figuration, adding different orchestral voices with their different colors to suggest the growth of a mighty river from its source to an overwhelming torrent.



Wagner wrote in his autobiography that the sound came to him in a trancelike state in which he felt almost drowned. Although there is no evidence to contradict this account, Wagner often used fanciful accounts of unmediated inspiration to explain his compositions. Against Wagner's wishes, Das Rheingold was premiered in 1869 for Wagner's patron, King Ludwig II, in Munich. Wagner had intended to introduce the complete cycle at his new Festival Theater in Bayreuth, and neither the work nor the opera house had yet been completed. Ludwig did not want to wait to hear the completed operas.

Tickets to a concert of religious festive classical music to celebrate Mass on Christmas Day in the Smetana Hall at Prague's wonderful Municipal House.

The world of Japanese car design set against the backdrop of Japan's unique culture is explored in a sophisticated new exhibition at the Science Museum, from 29 November 2008.

Japan Car, an exploration of the car as a "mobile cell", has been conceived by two world class names from outside the world of automobile: Kenya Hara, the man responsible for much of the success of Muji, and Shigeru Ban, the distinguished Japanese architect currently designing a new satellite gallery in Metz for Paris' Pompidou Centre.

The exhibition shows how Japanese car design reflects the 'soil and the spirit of Japan', shown through concept cars and special home market models. Japan Car explores three themes while examining the future of mobility in cities. Japan, being both highly innovative and densely populated, can be seen as the driving force behind transport solutions for twenty-first century cities.

Organisers: Science Museum, Design Platform Japan
Supported by: Embassy of Japan in the UK
Partners: Toyota Motor Corporation, Honda R&D Co. Ltd, Nissan Motor Co. Ltd, Mazda Motor Corporation, Mitsubishi Motors Corporation, Suzuki Motor Corporation, Daihatsu Motor Co. Ltd, DENSO Corporation, Hitachi Ltd, Akira Yamaguchi, WOW, Seiji Morimae
Sponsored by: Tau Corporation, Yamagin Corporation, Arai Shoji Co. Ltd and Nippon Design Center Inc.
In cooperation with All Nippon Airways, JVC, S-CUBE, Light-Breeze, Akari-Lisa Ishii, I.C.O.N. (Lighting Consultation), Keio University (Shigeru Ban Laboratory)

Tickets to a rare concert of classical music at the beautiful Municipal House in Prague, Czech Republic.

PROGRAMME
Beethoven Trio Prag
J.W.Goethe - Songs
Artistic leader: V.Návrat
Soprano: M.Mátlová
W.A.Mozart, J.S.Bach, L.van Beethoven, P.I.Tchaikovsky, F.Schubert, P.Vranický, A.Dvořák

Tickets to a rare concert of classical music and spoken word at Kavarna Na Pradle in Prague, Czech Republic.

PROGRAMME
Literary-Musical Salon
S.Rašilov, J.Šťastný - recitation
J.Klepáč - piano
O.Macura, V.Špaček - poetry authors

Tickets to a classical music concert in the Smetana Hall of Prague's famous Municipal House featuring works by Smetana and Dvořák.

PROGRAMME
B.Smetana - My Country/Moldau
A.Dvořák - Symphony No 9 "From the New World"
Conductor: Miriam Němcová