The Orchestra Attendants Create a New Chalk Drawing at the East Gate for each Performance.
Bayreuth – Festspielhaus – Stage Entrance. From here, soloists, orchestra, choir, and staff from the technical departments and workshops can reach dressing rooms, warm-up rooms, choir halls, and workshops without complicated detours, as all of these are located on the east side of the complex. And, of course, from there, they can go directly to the stage for the performance. Therefore, an important institution is also located here: the chalk board, where the title of the evening’s performance is announced, along with the start times of the acts.
In an age where rehearsal schedules can be viewed online and downloaded to smartphones if needed, this “school board” is a somewhat old-fashioned, yet immensely efficient form of communication: direct, limited to the essentials, without unnecessary additional information, and quickly adaptable. Almost every staff member directly involved with the performance passes by here on their way into the Festspielhaus and can confirm the key timings. And these are communicated in Bayreuth not without charm and imagination: The orchestra attendants of the Festspiel Orchestra, who are responsible for its care, let their creativity run wild here – and come up with surprising, sometimes quite encrypted, visual creations.
It becomes evident in the first week of the festival. During the dress rehearsal week, everything was conventionally painted: Lohengrin – 4:00 PM – 6:05 PM – 8:55 PM, for example. In the premiere week, however, it’s somewhat surprising: “Lohengrin’s Father” suddenly appears written there one evening. An undiscovered work by Wagner? Hardly, the Grail narration from Lohengrin reveals it: “… my father Parsifal wears his crown, his knight I – am called Lohengrin.” And it continues with variety: The sometimes astonishingly simple, sometimes very complex visual creations bring a smile to the face of many a passerby.
The design of this board has a tradition, says Roland Schneider, who, in collaboration with his colleague Julian Klein, is responsible for the creative design of the board. And every orchestra attendant entrusted with this task has the ambition to avoid repeating themselves as much as possible. “Overall,” Roland emphasizes. “Not just in one season.” He is now working in his third season in Bayreuth, also on the board – sometimes he runs out of spontaneous ideas and has to seek inspiration online. And then, for example, he discovers the Norwegian “Lohengrin” chocolate bar, which has the shape of a bone, or the Mercedes Benz “Parsifal” from 1902. These depicted as chalk drawings – naturally, very few recognize them: “We are always happy when we make people ponder. But sometimes we immediately add what the solution to the riddle is. That still broadens the horizon.” Sometimes he also refers to the staging: “For Parsifal, I designed a signpost pointing in three directions: Grail Castle – Magic Garden – Bonn. The last scene in the Herheim production is modeled after the old Bonn Bundestag.” The start times were accordingly “converted” into kilometer indications. According to him, the most beautiful visual creation of this season so far was Roland’s for Tristan und Isolde: “The famous Tristan chord as notes – that wasn’t easy at all, in chalk. But with different colors, it then worked.”
However, managing the board is a rather secondary task for the two Bayreuth orchestra attendants. Their main responsibility is to ensure the optimal condition of the orchestra pit: They make sure that chairs and music stands are correctly set up – according to the opera’s cast, even during orchestra rehearsals outside the pit. They ensure that the large instruments are in their places and that all instrument stands are prepared, because not every instrument is played all the time and some musicians play multiple instruments in one performance. They make sure that the correct sheet music is on the stand and that it is fully returned to the archive afterward. They are also responsible for preparing the conductor’s stand: score, baton, and the suit for the brief appearance on stage for applause. But they don’t only have tasks in the orchestra pit, but also on stage: They prepare the locations for stage music with stands, lights, and sheet music. In rare cases where a singer’s cover has to sing from the side, they also provide for this. In many performances, they also become musically active themselves: Roland Schneider and his colleague Julian Klein both study percussion in Leipzig and Hamburg, respectively. This is no coincidence either: “In some operas, percussion stage music occurs – but usually only a few bars. We take on that additionally. The regular percussionists are needed in the pit, so orchestra attendants are traditionally percussionists.” And somehow they are also “jacks-of-all-trades”: “If there are problems in the orchestra pit that are more practical in nature – from a wobbly stand to a creaking chair – we are usually the contact persons and try to find a quick and practical solution together with colleagues from the workshops or, if necessary, with the orchestra management.”
More about the orchestra attendants can also be found in the podcast contribution “Underground” from 2010.