On Monday afternoon the board of trustees gave the Salzburg Festival green light – for a reduced festival in August. Helga Rabl-Stadler, the tireless Festival President, shines – audibly even during the telephone interview.
COURIER: Respect your stamina! How did you get through these nerve-wracking weeks?
Helga Rabl-Stadler: I live alone – and I did not allow myself to be visited for the first five weeks of the lockdown. I am also a social person. Still, I never felt lonely. For me it was virus a big boost in IT and social media. At the beginning, I didn’t want to believe that Corona could affect our festival. I was convinced that the Whitsun Festival would already take place.
But the prognoses were getting darker …
So we decided to take our time until May 30th. For this we were criticized from all over the world: “Don’t egg around!” And I replied: “It is not a fooling around! It is a prudent reaction to constantly changing pandemic parameters! ”I was convinced of this approach – and was able to convince my team. Of course: Our doubts grew because the measures were not and not eased. Nevertheless, we have consistently devoted ourselves to the question of what we could implement in this or that scenario.
A sign of life was considered as a minimal variant in mid-August.
We found that July was definitely not going to go, which programmatically hurt me, and concentrated on August. Never have artistic director before Markus Hinterhäuser, Lukas Crepaz, the commercial director, and I talked on the phone as much as during this time. We knew: we have to send a strong signal for the power of art in difficult times. Because that was the philosophy immediately after the end of the First World War. I said: “I would be embarrassed to refuse our small-mindedness – in front of the founding fathers and also those 25 years later after the second World War, revived the festival from rubble and ashes. “
The central date for you was August 22nd? Because on that day in 1920 the first Salzburg “Jedermann” performance took place in front of the cathedral square.
Exactly. And we thought: maybe we’ll bring a big concert together? The obvious was Beethoven’s Ninth. The longer we talked about it, the greater the hope that we could achieve more. And we were lucky enough to be our governor Wilfried Haslauer has been very supportive.
No wonder. Because, as you always emphasize, the Festival is an enormous economic engine for the country.
Of course that’s true. In any case: we took the time all around Assumption Day, so Ferragosto. And then it turned out that the easing could make things a lot easier from August 1st. We were suddenly in a difficult situation. Because we had already made friends with the idea of two weeks: that’s enough in these uncertain times! But then we said to ourselves: This is irresponsible if you have the chance to do something bigger. The artists want to play! And we received an unbelievable number of letters: “Please play!” We realized how great the desire for a real experience – and not just a virtual one – is. The decision to do the whole August program was made only two weeks ago. And after the approval of the board of trustees, it is clear: the short-time work ends on May 31, then full work begins!
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