Announcing an Australian first regional staging of Wagner’s epic Ring Cycle, presented by Melbourne Opera

One of the biggest productions in all the performing arts, Richard Wagner’s epic Ring Cycle, will be staged in Bendigo by the critically and popularly acclaimed Melbourne Opera.

The $5 million production will employ over 250 Australian singers, musicians, creatives and technicians. Exclusively staged in the regional Australian destination, the production is expected to drive major tourism to the region with three full Ring Cycles performed over six weeks from 24 March until 1 May 2023 at the Ulumbarra Theatre. The production also marks Bendigo’s inaugural annual Easter opera festival, presented by Melbourne Opera.

Each Ring Cycle will be performed over two weekends, from Friday-Sunday, encouraging longer stays in the booming Bendigo region, which has hosted a number of international arts and culture exhibitions and events in recent years.

Wagner’s Ring is lauded as the inspiration behind many great themes, stories and soundtracks across the ages. With a plot that many say inspired The Lord of the Rings, the score includes many iconic moments with famous operatic and orchestral highlights such as Siegfried’s Rhine Journey and Funeral March, Wotan’s Farewell and Ride of the Valkyries, used to great effect in many films, perhaps most memorably in Apocalypse Now.

Distinguished international Wagner specialist maestro Anthony Negus will return once again to Australia to conduct the production, after highly successful productions of Die Walküre with the English National Opera at London’s famed Colosseum, and at his famous Longborough Festival Opera.

Melbourne Opera’s production features an all-Australian cast led by internationally acclaimed singers and helmed by creatively gifted Wagner director, Suzanne Chaundy, who is excited to culminate her staggered staging of Wagner’s epic Ring with a season of three full cycles.