In Venus’s domain of the Venusberg, the great singer Tannhäuser tires of Venus’s love and escapes. In a song contest at home on the subject of love, Tannhäuser argues for the importance of physical desire – revealing his sin with Venus, to the people’s horror. Elisabeth, whose heart he won long ago, intercedes on his behalf. Tannhäuser is ordered to make a pilgrimage to the Pope to seek redemption.

Tannhäuser bitterly returns home – the Pope has refused him salvation. He vows to return to Venus. News arrives that Elisabeth is dead; she has sacrificed herself for Tannhäuser’s sake. Tannhäuser realizes the extent of her love and his soul is saved.

Wagner’s early masterpiece Tannhäuser had controversial beginnings. Its premiere in Dresden on 19 October 1845 was met with incomprehension, as none of the cast, particularly the title character, were up to the score’s singular demands – quite a change from today, where Tannhäuser is seen as one of the most challenging and rewarding roles for Heldentenor. In 1861 the Paris premiere of a significantly revised version was wildly disrupted by members of the Jockey Club, political opponents of Wagner’s Parisian patrons. Despite its eventual success, Wagner remained dissatisfied with the work for the rest of his life; his wife Cosima’s diaries record Wagner saying just weeks before his death that he ‘still owes the world a Tannhäuser’. The Royal Opera performs the last version known to be approved by Wagner, from 1875 in Vienna.

In his critically acclaimed 2010 production for The Royal Opera, director Tim Albery focusses on the conflict at the heart of Tannhäuser (and of so many Wagner works) – the opposing pulls of the sensual and the spiritual. The opening Venusberg bacchanal, vividly choreographed by Jasmin Vardimon, is set beneath a towering replica of the Royal Opera House’s gleaming proscenium arch, designed by Michael Levin. The great song-hall of the Wartburg becomes the ruined palace of a war-torn land, the chorus of pilgrims refugees desperately seeking peace. Against this backdrop, the beauty of the score’s most acclaimed moments – including Wolfram’s ‘O du, mein holder Abendstern’, Elisabeth’s ‘Allmächt’ge Jungfrau’ and Tannhäuser’s glorious ‘Dir töne Lob’ – shine forth.