Under Milan's ungraceful heatwave, we can only dream about last night's opening of the super-cool Baltic Sea Festival.
The ten-year-old festival, started by Esa-Pekka, Gergiev and Michael Tydén (director of Berwaldhallen), is Stockholm's double-fist of culture and environment -- wold-class musicians campaigning for Baltic Sea threats (such as overfishing) with founding partner WWF.
Yesterday opened with a semi-staged performance of Tristan and Isolde conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen and Ben Heppner's (barefoot) Tristan, Violeta Urmana's Isolde, Matti Salminen's Marke, Michele de Young's Brangäne and Jukka Rasilainen's Kurwenal.
Radio Sweden will broadcast concerts tonight (its 10th anniversary concert with Gergiev & Salonen); August 28th (Baltic Composers Project of world premieres); August 29th (Harding conducts symphony) and September 1 (Blomstedt's Beethoven 9th).
