Evan Baker, author and lecturer on opera (who began his career on the San Francisco Opera staff), will present The “Rube Goldberg” Effect in Wagner Productions at the Nov. 8 Wagner Society of Northern California meeting in the Jewish Community Center of San Francisco. Baker explains:
A Rube Goldberg Machine is an over-engineered contraption designed to perform a simple task in a complicated way. Wagner’s operas are never easy to produce, and the implementation of special effects — the sinking of the Holländer’s ship, swimming Rheindaughters, and the Verwandlung (change of scenery) in Parsifal are prime examples.Nonetheless, stage designers, theater technicians, and stagehands are an exceedingly clever group of people. Their solutions to these effects may seem complicated and “Rube Goldbergese,” but in actuality, the execution was quite simple. A look “behind the scenes” in the creation of these effects with audio, animation, and digital examples will be offered, along with a recreation of the original Verwandlung from the forest to the Temple of the Grail in Parsifal.
At 7:30 p.m. Nov. 16, in St. Mark's Lutheran Church, the pianist will give an all-Wagner recital, including several of Wagner's own rarely-performed piano works, along with transcriptions of Wagner operas. Möller first gained prominence as a prizewinner at the 1985 International Beethoven Competition in Vienna. Since then he has been concertizing in Japan, China, North and South America as well as in Europe.
Born in Hamburg, Möller studied piano and conducting at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria. From 1983 to 1989 he assisted Herbert von Karajan and other world-renowned conductors at the Salzburg Festival. In 1990 he took up an appointment at the University for Music and Performing Arts Vienna. He is president of the Vienna International Pianists Association and their festival, the “VIP Academy.”
Selections at the recital include Wagner’s Sonata in A Major and Wesendonck Sonata, the Tristan Prelude arranged by Möller, and Liszt transcriptions of Wagner.