From the moment his velvety bass followed the Prelude and started the vocal journey in the new Vienna Staatsoper production of Parsifal there could be no doubt that in Kwangchul Youn Australians will hear one of the world’s foremost exponents of the crucial role of Gurnemanz in Sydney in August.

Together with two of the six flower maidens sung by Australians, Margaret Plummer and Caroline Wenbourne, both now resident members of the Vienna company, this was a production with a strong Aussie flavour and for at least two audience members (by coincidence I found myself sitting next to another Sydneysider) our sense of anticipation was immeasurably heightened.

^{Nina Stemme as Kundry in Wiener Staatsoper’s Parsifal. Photos © Michael Pöhn}

Just as Sydney’s title-role Parsifal, Jonas Kaufmann, is the current tenor du jour, in the all-star cast of this production the shining light was Nina Stemme as Kundry. Not only is her gloriously rich soprano perfectly suited to the role of seductress, whether as a straightjacketed schizophrenic in a bed-sized cage or a gold-costumed siren lying on a Freudian couch, she lit up the stage. With three...