In two weeks, OZ will put on its last two performances of Meistersinger von Nuernberg in this season, and I'm planning to attend both of them. To get a better understanding of this opera, I decide to do my homework, e.g. to read the libretto. The texts are ok, when I read them in silence. But when I read them out loud (a strange habit, I know, but these texts are supposed to spoken-- well, sung, actually--aren't they?) I have the feeling I'm reading a nursery rhyme,specially the chorus scene in the end of act 2.

I do respect Wagner-- as a composer-- but reading his libretti makes me think: "Why can't this man hire someone with a better sense of rhetoric to write the lyrics for him?" Then again, a perfectionist like him would probably drive the most patient librettist in the world mad.