Without a winged helmet in sight, this unique production of "The Rhinegold" ("Das Rheingold"), casts Wotan as a coolly calculating businessman, with his wife a member of the board of directors. Recorded live at the Stuttgart Staatsoper in 2002, it was directed by Joachim Schlömer. "The Rhinegold" is the prologue to Wagner's Ring cycle, and opens up the rich world of gods, dwarves, giants, dragons and humans that the story inhabits. With beautiful orchestration and an unerring sense of the dramatic, the first opera explains how the Rhinedaughters came to lose the Ring and how it fel into the hands of Alberich the Nibelung; Wotan, king of the gods; and Fafner the giant. Each time it changes hands, the Ring confers upon the bearer a curse and this pattern is set to continue until it is restored to its rightful owners, the daughters of the Rhine. "In a masterly way Schlömer succeeds in presenting the characters' constantly changing web of relations. And since the stage is always open, the interludes are truly perceived as retrospective-anticipatory commentaries, and the music and scenery are linked interactively… The singing and action fit together perfectly…This Rheingold has an incomparable quality." (FAZ)