DIRS.INFO The most relevant business & tech news

☆ Germany Arrests 2 in Spying and Sabotage Case Linked to Russia
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-18 | by ( Christopher F. Schuetze | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Two men have been arrested in Germany over suspicions that they spied for Russia and were part of a plot to sabotage aid to Ukraine by trying to blow up military infrastructure on German soil, the authorities announced on Thursday. The two men, both dual citizens of Russia and Germany, were arrested on Wednesday in Bayreuth, a city about 120 miles north of Munich, German federal prosecutors said. The arrests came as worries grow in Germany about the reach of Russian intelligence and disruption operations. One of the men had been in contact with Russian intelligence services and had considered a U.S. military base in Germany as one of several potential targets, according to federal prosecutors based in Karlsruhe, in southwestern Germany, who oversaw the arrests. But the federal prosecutors said that the pair were suspected of working for a foreign intelligence service and, in one man’s case, of illegally taking pictures of military infrastructure and of planning explosive attacks and arson.

Locations: Germany, Russia, Ukraine, Bayreuth, Munich, U.S, Karlsruhe

CNN —A Polish man has been charged over claims he assisted an alleged Russian plot to assassinate Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky, according to authorities in Poland and Ukraine. Prosecutors said the man agreed to provide information to Russian spies about security at Rzeszów-Jasionka airport, in southeastern Poland, about 100 kilometers (62 miles) from the border with Ukraine. Ukrainian authorities said they uncovered the plot and handed key evidence to Polish officials, who then detained the accused on Polish territory. “Our security authorities have prevented possible explosive detonations that were intended to affect and undermine our military aid to Ukraine. The Russian Embassy in Berlin dismissed the accusations as an “outright provocation,” Russian state news agency TASS reported.

Persons: Volodymyr Zelensky, “, Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky, Prosecutors, Zelensky, Nancy Faeser Organizations: CNN, Ukrainian Security Service, Federal Public Locations: Poland, Ukraine, Jasionka, Zelensky, Ukrainian, Europe, Russia, Mykolaiv, Russian, Bavarian, Bayreuth, Karlsruhe, Germany, Berlin

The world also said goodbye to former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who died Nov. 29. Political Cartoons View All 1277 ImagesAnother political figure who died this year was former U.S. first lady Rosalynn Carter, who died Nov. 19. Among the entertainers who left the world this year was singer Tina Turner, who died May 24. Here is a roll call of some influential figures who died in 2023 (cause of death cited for younger people, if available):___JANUARY___Fred White, 67. A Hall of Fame forward who helped the Chicago Blackhawks win the 1961 Stanley Cup Final.

Persons: Wagner, Yevgeny Prigozhin, Prigozhin, Vladimir Putin’s, Henry Kissinger, Rosalynn Carter, Jimmy Carter, Silvio Berlusconi, Dianne Feinstein, James Buckley, James Abourezk, Nigel Lawson, Pervez Musharraf, Sandra Day O’Connor, Li Keqiang, Martti Ahtisaari, United Nations Bill Richardson, Gov, Sheila Oliver, Theodoros Pangalos, Tina Turner, Ike Turner, Suzanne Somers, Matthew Perry, Raquel Welch, Richard Belzer, Chaim Topol, Jacklyn Zeman, Lance Reddick, Alan Arkin, Paul Reubens, David McCallum, Richard Roundtree, Tom Sizemore, Jimmy Buffett, Sinéad O’Connor, Rita Lee Jones, Burt Bacharach, David Crosby, Fito Olivares, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Astrud Gilberto, Coco Lee, Tony Bennett, Harry Belafonte, Cormac McCarthy, William Friedkin, Bob Barker, Jerry Springer, Louise Glück, Jeff Beck, Mary Quant, Kaija Saariaho, Lloyd Morrisett, Fred White, Maurice, Verdine White, Ken Block, Walter Cunningham, Fay Weldon, ” Jan, Russell Pearce, Charles Simic, Lynette “ Diamond ” Hardaway, Donald Trump, Diamond, Constantine, Jan, Tatjana Patitz, George Michael’s, Lisa Marie Presley, Elvis Presley, Robbie Knievel, Evel Knievel, Ray Cordeiro, Elmo, Cookie, Gina Lollobrigida, Chris Ford, Crosby, Stills, Nash, Young, Cindy Williams, Shirley, “ Laverne, Billy Packer, Sylvia Syms, Alex ”, Barrett Strong, Norman Whitfield, “ Papa, Rollin ’ Stone, Tom Verlaine, Patti Smith, Bobby Hull, Paco Rabanne, Harry Whittington, Dick Cheney, Hsing Yun, ”, San Jose ”, Carlos Saura, Spain’s, Hugh Hudson, Oscar, “ Greystroke, Hans Modrow, David Jude Jolicoeur, Huey “, ” Smith, Little Richard, Lloyd Price, “, Leiji Matsumoto, Yamato ”, Tim McCarver, Stella Stevens, Jerry Lewis’s, John Munch, Ahmed Qureia, Betty Boothroyd, Ricou Browning, Gill, Gérard Latortue, Fontaine, Barbara Everitt Bryant, Ryan ”, Kenzaburo Oe, Judy Heumann, Gary Rossington, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Georgina Beyer, Traute Lafrenz, Rose, Peterson Zah, Tevye, Robert Blake, Jiang Yanyong, Bud Grant, Dick Fosbury, Pat Schroeder, Gloria Bosman, Jacqueline Gold, Britain’s Ann Summers, John Wick ”, John Jenrette, Juana La, Willis Reed, Darcelle, Paul O’Grady, Lily Savage, Emperor ”, Hedda Kleinfeld Schachter, Margaret Thatcher, Ben Ferencz, Nuremberg, Elisabeth Kopp, Michael Lerner, Jack Lipnick, “ Barton Fink, Bugsy Calhoun, Anne Perry, Thomas Pitt, William Monk, Al Jaffee, magazine’s, Charles Stanley, Richard Riordan, Todd Haimes, Tony Awards, Barry Humphries, Tony, Dame Edna Everage, Len Goodman, Carolyn Bryant Donham, Emmett Till, LeRoy “ Lee ” Carhart, Larry “, ___ Gordon Lightfoot, Tori Bowie, Vida, Grace Bumbry, Rock ”, Ovelha, Denny Crum, Heather Armstrong, Bobbie Spencer, Rolf Harris, Kenneth Anger, Doyle Brunson, Jim Brown, Timothy Keller, Andy Rourke, Ray Stevenson, Thor ”, Ed Ames, George Maharis, Carroll Cooley, Miranda, John Beasley, Kaija, George Winston, Ipanema ”, Robert Hanssen, Richard Snyder, Simon & Schuster, Françoise Gilot, Pablo Picasso —, Pat Robertson, Theodore “ Ted ” Kaczynski, Roger Payne, Treat Williams, Glenda Jackson, Daniel Ellsberg, Richard Nixon, Big, George Frazier, Lee Sarokin, Rubin “, ” Carter, Winnie Ewing, Sheldon Harnick, Jerry Bock, “ Fiorello, John Goodenough, Peg Yorkin, Sue Johanson, Yan Mingfu, John Berylson, James Lewis, poisonings, Mikala Jones, André Watts, Jane Birkin, Kevin Mitnick, San Francisco ”, Frank Sinatra, Lady Gaga, Hugh “ Sonny ” Carter Jr, Jimmy, Randy Meisner, Herman, Angus Cloud, Fezco, ” O’Neill, ___, Mark Margolis, Hector Salamanca, Saul, Sixto Rodriguez, flamed, Robbie Robertson, Tom Jones, Magoo, Timbaland, Aaliyah, Missy Elliott, Clarence Avant, Quincy Jones, Bill Withers, Ada Deer, Jerry Moss, Herb Alpert, Alpert, Michael Parkinson, Muhammad Ali, Miss Piggy, Jiri Cerny, Betty Tyson, Richard Nixon’s, John Warnock, Ron Cephas Jones, Howard Hubbard, Samuel “ Joe ” Wurzelbacher, Joe, Barack Obama, Gil Brandt, Tom Landry, Tex Schramm, Bill Richardson, Steve Harwell, Shabtai Shavit, Jordan, Ian Wilmut, Dolly, Prince Mangosuthu Buthelezi, Roy Kidd, Eno Ichikawa, Michael McGrath, Fernando Botero, Giorgio Napolitano, Matteo Messina Denaro, Michael Gambon, Albus Dumbledore, Harry Potter ”, Mankombu Sambasivan, Saad Eddin Ibrahim, Hosni Mubarak, Tim Wakefield, Dick Butkus, Michael Chiarello, Michael Chiarello ”, Masters, Burt Young, Paulie, Sylvester Stallone, Hughes Van Ellis, Kevin Phillips, Louise Meriwether, Mark Goddard, Major Don West, Rudolph Isley, Isley, unblinking, Piper Laurie, Chrissy Snow, Bobby Charlton, Bishan Bedi, Richard Moll, Xi Jinping, Wu Zunyou, Chandler Bing, Ken Mattingly, Bob Knight, Frank Borman, Steve Norton, Don Walsh, Mariana Trench, Terry R, Taylor, Daisaku Ikeda, Herbie Hancock, Bobby Ussery, George “ Funky ” Brown, Joanna ”, Marty Krofft, Pufnstuf, Donny, Marie ”, Terry Venables, Tim Dorsey, Serge A, Frances Sternhagen, ” “, Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett, Berkshire Hathaway, Gerald Ford, Shane MacGowan, Bernard McGhee Organizations: Wagner Group, Russian, White House, U.S, Supreme, United Nations, Greek Foreign, Republican, Hong, Boston Celtics, NBA, NBC, CBS, Television, Fame, Chicago Blackhawks, ”, New, of Fame, Louis Cardinals, “, Palestinian, Israel, South Dakota Democrat, Arab, Arab American U.S, Britain’s, Commons, . Census Bureau, Alabama ”, Zealand, Navajo, Minnesota Vikings, People, Playboy, Capitol, Juana La Cubana, New York Knicks, Guinness, World Records, Hollywood, Treasury, Southern Baptist Convention, Los Angeles, Roundabout Theatre Company, Air Force, Harlem Globetrotters, Janeiro Games, baseball’s, Germany’s Bayreuth, NCAA, Hall of Famer, Redeemer Presbyterian Church, Legion, Ames, Phoenix, FBI, Simon &, Christian Broadcasting Network, Republican Party, Christian Coalition, Harvard, Feminist Majority Foundation, “ Little, Communist Party, Millwall, New York Philharmonic, San, Brigade, Wing, Eagles, HBO, of Indian Affairs, M, Police, Carpenters, Adobe Systems, Pro Football Hall of Fame, Dallas Cowboys, escapist, Democratic, Zulu, Eastern, AA, Broadway, Communist, U.S . Senate, Red Sox, Yankees, Boston, Chicago Bears, Major, Isley Brothers, New York Times, Manchester United, India, Indiana, Nevada — Resorts, Atlantic City —, Navy, Associated Press, Soka Gakkai, Kentucky Derby, Kool, The, European, Barcelona, Tottenham, City Locations: Russia, Ukraine, Bakhmut, Russian, U.S, Finnish, New Mexico, New Jersey, British, Greece, American, Hong Kong, Italian, America, New York, Spanish, catwalks, Texas, Taiwan, Pakistan, Afghanistan, San, New Orleans, Rosebud, Arab American, Haiti, “, African, Brooklyn, London, Los, Mississippi, United States, Rivers, Georgia, Savannah, Louisville, New York City, Irish, HBO’s “ Rome, Brazilian, Ipanema, Moscow, Virginia, Montana, Vietnam, Canada, Asia, Chicago, Hawaii, France, South Africa, Wisconsin, Los Angeles, Czech, Eastern Kentucky, Colombian, ”, California, Tulsa, Finland, China, Nevada, Atlantic City, Florida, Berkshire

☆ Apollo 17 samples reveal that the moon is 40 million years older than previously thought
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-23 | by ( Ashley Strickland | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

CNN —Lunar dust collected by Apollo 17 astronauts in the 1970s has revealed that the moon is 40 million years older than previously believed. After landing on the moon on December 11, 1972, NASA astronauts Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt collected rocks and dust from the lunar surface. A new analysis of that sample detected zircon crystals and dated them to 4.46 billion years old. “When the surface was molten like that, zircon crystals couldn’t form and survive. A lunar zircon grain is shown under a microscope.

Persons: Eugene Cernan, Harrison Schmitt, ”, Philipp Heck, Robert A, Heck, Bidong Zhang, Zhang, Audrey Bouvier, Jennika Greer, Greer, they’re, ” Heck, “, ” Greer, Dieter Isheim Organizations: CNN, Apollo, NASA, Polar Studies, Field, Research Center, University of Chicago, University of California, Bayreuth University, University of Glasgow, Northwestern University, Field Museum, Northwestern University Center, Atom Locations: Chicago, Los Angeles, Germany, Evanston , Illinois

BERLIN (AP) — Christian Thielemann has been chosen as the new general music director of Berlin's Staatsoper, months after Daniel Barenboim ended his three-decade reign, the city government said Wednesday. The 64-year-old German conductor will take the job at the Staatsoper, or State Opera, on Sept. 1, 2024. He moved on to serve as music director of Berlin's Deutsche Oper from 1997-2004 and of the Munich Philharmonic from 2004-11. Now 80, he was general music director from 1992 until he stepped down at the end of January, saying that his health had become too poor to carry on. Barenboim said in Wednesday's statement that he has known Thielemann since he was his assistant at the Deutsche Oper as a 19-year-old.

Persons: Thielemann, Daniel Barenboim, “, Joe Chialo, ”, Herbert von Karajan, Barenboim, Richard Wagner, Elisabeth Sobotka Organizations: BERLIN, Berlin's, Staatsoper, State Opera, Nuremberg’s, Deutsche Oper, Munich Philharmonic, Vienna Philharmonic, Richard Wagner Festival Locations: Berlin's Staatsoper, Berlin, Munich, Dresden, Bayreuth, “, East Berlin, Germany's

NEW YORK (AP) — Tenor Stephen Gould, who announced earlier this month that he had been diagnosed with incurable bile duct cancer, has died. Gould's agent Stephanie Ammann confirmed the singer died Tuesday in Virginia. He debuted in Richard Wagner’s “Ring” cycle in Bayreuth in 2006, earning raves during the challenging four-nights of performances. It’s often discovered by accident — for example, through routine blood tests or imaging done for an unrelated reason. He is survived by his sister.

Persons: Stephen Gould, Stephanie Ammann, “, Tristan, Isolde ”, Siegfried, ” Gould, Gould, Richard Wagner’s, ”, “ Siegfried Organizations: Bayreuth, Associated Press, Mayo Locations: Virginia, Germany, “ Götterdämmerung, Bayreuth

☆ At Bayreuth, the Work on Wagner’s Operas Is Never Done
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-01 | by ( Zachary Woolfe | More About Zachary Woolfe | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

It was a fresh addition to the staging, if still something of a letdown, a mild finale after 15 keyed-up hours. There were more tweaks to this “Ring.” The kidnapping and hoarding of children — an obsession with youthfulness; a sense of violence passed through generations — is one of Schwarz’s themes. You can tell Schwarz intended these revisions to heighten certain aspects of his interpretation. Last year, Cornelius Meister conducted the premiere because Pietari Inkinen had to drop out with a case of Covid late in the rehearsal process. Meister’s work ended up being blandly neutral, not quite compatible with Schwarz’s vivid, provocative staging.

Persons: Wotan, “ Das Rheingold, “ Rheingold, ”, Brünnhilde, Siegfried, Schwarz, — it’s, Cornelius Meister, Pietari Inkinen, it’s, “ Siegfried ”, gawkily reedy, Gutrune Locations: Hagen

☆ Review: Wagner Would Have Liked AR, but Not This ‘Parsifal’
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-26 | by ( Zachary Woolfe | More About Zachary Woolfe | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

After a squabble within the notoriously squabbling Bayreuth Festival about funding the expensive augmented reality, or AR, glasses, money was allotted for 330 sets in a theater of 1,925 seats. A much smaller group, including critics, gets the glasses, which superimpose on that live staging a crowded AR environment that is constantly in motion. They miss the space between them and the stage seeming to fill with twinkling stars as the soft prelude begins. The fly that seems to land on the outside of the AR lenses. The rocky ledge that appears to fill the area beneath the seats in the third act.

Persons: straightforwardly, Pablo Heras

☆ At Wagner’s Festival, New Technology Reveals a Leadership Rift
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-24 | by ( Thomas Rogers | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The American director Jay Scheib was looking at a bank of monitors inside the Bayreuth Festival Theater on a recent afternoon. He was rehearsing his new production of Wagner’s “Parsifal,” which opens the storied Bayreuth Festival on Tuesday, and as performers circled a large metallic monolith onstage, the screens showed three-dimensional flowers floating through blank space — psychedelic animations that will come to life for audience members who see them with augmented-reality glasses. Through those glasses, Scheib said, the flowers, and other items during the performance, will appear to float through the auditorium. In keeping with the opera’s themes, he added, these moments are meant to provide the audience with “sacred visions” of “a world where wonder still exists.”Scheib’s production is one of the most ambitious, and high-profile, attempts to incorporate augmented reality into opera performance. But it also caps months of tumult at Bayreuth, after plans to outfit nearly 2,000 audience members with the glasses for each performance were downscaled because of an apparent money dispute between the festival’s artistic and financial leadership.

Persons: Jay Scheib, Wagner’s, Scheib Locations: American, Bayreuth, “

☆ Rembrandts of 'extraordinary rarity' could fetch $10 million at auction
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-30 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

LONDON, June 30 (Reuters) - Two rediscovered Rembrandts, the last known pair of portraits by the Dutch master to have remained in private hands, could fetch around $10 million at auction next week. Signed and dated 1635, the depictions of married couple Jan Willemsz van der Pluym and Jaapgen Carels, who were close to the artist's family, have a price estimate of 5 million - 8 million pounds ($6.35 million - $10.16 million). "They are things of extraordinary rarity,” he said, adding the Amsterdam-based Rijksmuseum had analysed them. The portraits are among the highlights of Christie's July 6 "Old Masters Part I Sale", part of the auction house's Classic Week. Also on offer is a panel by Greek-born Spanish Renaissance painter El Greco, "The Entombment of Christ" (6 million - 8 million pounds) and a bust of Helen of Troy by neoclassical sculptor Antonio Canova (2.5 million - 4 million pounds).

Persons: Jan Willemsz van der, Jaapgen Carels, “, they’ve, Henry Pettifer, ”, El Greco, Helen of Troy, Antonio Canova, Fra Angelico, Saint John the, Magdalen, Queen Charlotte, King George III's, Marie, Louise Gumuchian, Barbara Lewis Organizations: Christie’s, International, Reuters, Virgin, Saint John the Baptist, Thomson Locations: Amsterdam, Spanish, Bayreuth

[1/3] Lucky Strike cigarettes are seen during the manufacturing process in the British American Tobacco Cigarette Factory (BAT) in Bayreuth, Germany, April 30, 2014. The company also did not announce a new share buyback programme, as widely anticipated by analysts. BAT (BATS.L) had in February last year announced a buyback worth up to 2 billion pounds ($2.4 billion). The group forecast on Thursday its 2023 revenue would rise 3-5% in constant currency terms, adding growth would be affected by the sale of its businesses in Russia and Belarus. The company's distributor in Russia, SNS Group of Companies, said in March last year BAT was in talks to transfer its Russian business to SNS.

Search resuls for: "Bayreuth"

11 mentions found