The Definitive Ring of Wagner by Solti

For his Musik Drama, Richard Wagner had made it clear with his directives that more important than the singing was the acting and the orchestra accompaniment component. Wagner was concerned entirely with the outline of his musical leitmotifs that are woven in the fabric of this music drama. An Introduction to the Ring, the beautiful white box set presented by Derryck Cooke, still stays in my mind as the ideal introduction set for anyone visiting the Nibelungen Ring Drama for the first time. Cooke collaborated with Georg Solti and the Vienna Philharmonic. These recordings were engineered by Mr. John Culshaw between 1958 and 1965. Das Rheingold has to be one of the most famous of Solti's recordings. I have heard many Rheingolds in the past thirty eight years from Masters like Furtwangler, Keilberth, Karajan, Boulez and Maazel. They do not come even close to Solti. Solti and Decca have created a miracle. The `Gramophone' magazine has voted it in 1997 as the greatest opera recording ever made. I will agree with it. An extract of a review of Siegfried’s performance by Solti and Vienna Philharmonic: Reviews of the 1962 Solti’s Siegfried recording with the Vienna Philharmonic are positively overwhelming, praising the recording as a landmark achievement in sound and musical interpretation. Critics highlighted the exceptional playing of the Vienna Philharmonic, the stellar cast led by Wolfgang Windgassen as Siegfried and Georg Solti's conducting as magnificent and powerful. The recording was described as revolutionary for its time, considered by many to be the greatest recording of Siegfried and a pinnacle of the Solti Ring Cycle. Orchestral performance: The Vienna Philharmonic's playing was described as exceptional and magisterial. Singing: The cast was considered unbeatable with Wolfgang Windgassen's Siegfried praised for being both lyrical and heroic. Hans Hotter was considered more impressive than ever on this recording and Joan Sutherland and Birgit Nilsson were singled out as having legendary interpretations of their roles. Solti's conducting was hailed as powerful and magnificent.

Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) Projects – How beneficial are they?

Many of the Liquefied Natural Gas projects like the Driftwood, Magnolia, Cameron and Lake Charles terminals are going to have a negative impact on communities that inhabit these areas as they already have air quality and breathing difficulty issues. There are close to nine projects currently where the Air Quality Index is clearly indicating at cancer risk due to air toxicity along with respiratory problems. Take, for example, the `Cancer Alley’ that exists along the route of the Mississippi River between New Orleans and Baton Rouge. It has seriously elevated cancer risk as a result of petrochemical plants and other dangerous projects. The sad part of the population break up in these regions is that there are Hispanic and Black Africans, representing a low-income community. The greedy corporations are able to get away with murder as they are not going to be touched by environmental racism which is at work here. Big banks lending big money are least bothered about the value of life and the impact on the climate of this region. This is a disgraceful offense to human rights. The banks are equally guilty along with their partners, the fossil fuel clients. The banks hold the key to the future of this region. If they have no moral ethics, then the people living in these regions are doomed. Just like you need insurance to drive a car, fossil fuel facilities need insurance to operate. Calcasieu Pass LNG and Cameron LNG are sinking Louisiana fishing families. For generations, people sustained their families and community from the bayou. But ever since these terminals showed up in their backyards, their livelihood, safety and way of life have been forever changed. By insuring these terminals, insurance companies like Chubb are equally responsible for the harm they cause to communities and our climate. It also means that they also have the power to stop it. Chubb big shots claim that they are climate protection leaders. So far, they have not used their opportunity to prove this as a fact. Elsewhere, a new report brings out into the open the impact on human rights and climate destruction of two planned LNG terminals in the Gulf Coast. Rio Grande LNG and Texas LNG are two NEW LNG export terminals slated for Brownsville, Texas in the Rio Grande Valley. These two projects will have enormous, damaging impacts on community health, Indigenous rights, endangered species and shared climate. While other banks have stepped away from these projects due to community opposition and an unstable global LNG market, Macquarie Capital, Société Générale, and Credit Suisse are still financing them. We have to stop believing the corporate lies: LNG (liquefied “natural” gas) is NOT a solution — it’s a HUGE part of the climate emergency we’re facing. That’s because LNG’s main component is methane, which has eighty times more climate-warming power than carbon. Plus, LNG is the FASTEST GROWING fossil fuel sector, at a time where our climate can’t handle a single additional project. Both of these projects would cover more than 1,600 acres of land, including sacred Indigenous sites and ecologically essential wetlands. They would pollute Indigenous communities already facing the brunt of climate chaos and severe health impacts from fossil fuels. These projects are happening WITHOUT consent from local communities — directly violating human rights.