{"id":120308,"date":"2025-04-01T08:40:00","date_gmt":"2025-04-01T13:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/?p=120308"},"modified":"2025-04-01T07:49:26","modified_gmt":"2025-04-01T12:49:26","slug":"a-musical-tale-for-the-first-age-coming-soon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/2025\/04\/01\/120308-a-musical-tale-for-the-first-age-coming-soon\/","title":{"rendered":"A Musical Tale for the First Age &#8211; coming soon!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"intro\">Breaking news: rights to bring <em>The Silmarillion<\/em> to life have finally been released, but it&#8217;s not to any of the media giants you might have expected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ever since Prime Video started work on <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=TCwmXY_f-e0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power\">The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power<\/a><\/em>, there has been much speculation and anticipation as to whether the Tolkien Estate would finally sell the rights to bring <em>The Silmarillion<\/em> stories to life. In an exclusive reveal, our friends at Middle-earth Enterprises have told us that it looks like that will happen now; but it is the folks behind <a href=\"https:\/\/lotrmusical.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"The Lord of the Rings - A Musical Tale \">The Lord of the Rings &#8211; A Musical Tale <\/a>who have gained the long sought-after permission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The recent revival of the musical, which features music by A.R.\u00a0Rahman, V\u00e4rttin\u00e4, and Christopher Nightingale, with book and lyrics by Shaun McKenna and Matthew Warchus, has proved such a hit that it seems to have persuaded the Tolkien Estate that more live Middle-earth on stage could only be a good thing. The latest musical production began at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.watermill.org.uk\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"The Watermill Theatre\">The Watermill Theatre<\/a> in the UK, in 2023; it has since played in Chicago, Auckland, and is currently touring in Australia, to great acclaim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In addition, composer <a href=\"https:\/\/www.paulcorfieldgodfrey.co.uk\/tolkien-based-works\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"Paul Corfield Godfrey\">Paul Corfield Godfrey<\/a> has in recent years been given permission by the Estate to release recordings of his operas based on <em>The Hobbit<\/em>, <em>The Lord of the Rings <\/em>and <em>The Silmarillion<\/em>. This indicated to some that there was a move towards allowing more performance work based on the Professor&#8217;s writings; but this most recent announcement will nonetheless no doubt take folks by surprise.<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"600\" height=\"800\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/kip-r.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-120327 no-lazyload\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/kip-r.jpg 600w, https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/kip-r-225x300.jpg 225w, https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/kip-r-120x160.jpg 120w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Kip Rasmussen&#8217;s Eru and the Gods singing the First Song of Creation<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What we&#8217;ve been told<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>The same composition and libretto team who brought us <em>The Lord of the Rings &#8211; A Musical Tale<\/em> will now be creating <em>The Silmarillion &#8211; An Adventure Three Ages in the Making <\/em>(working title). It is as yet unconfirmed who the stage director and design team will be for this epic show, but we do know that producer Kevin Walrus is on board. He expressed his excitement to us, and hinted at the possibility for a series of shows: <\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>We are thrilled to build on the global momentum that we&#8217;ve already seen in our world tour of <em>The Lord of the Rings &#8211; A Musical Tale <\/em>production, with this expanded opportunity to play in the realms that Professor Tolkien created. Our first task will be to decide how many shows these new landscapes allow us to produce!<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>Rumour is that the production will open in New Zealand, sometime in late 2027. Middle-earth Enterprises&#8217; Fredrica Doritos told us:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>We know that the epic stories of the early ages of Middle-earth, found in <em>The Silmarillion<\/em>, are beloved by fans. The great drama, romance, peril and poetry of these tales makes them perfect for the stage; and the track record of the team who created <em>The Lord of the Rings <\/em>&#8211; <em>A Musical Tale<\/em> means that we know these sagas are in safe hands. We can&#8217;t wait to see Eru Il\u00favatar and Manw\u00eb brought to life on stage. What song of L\u00fathien Tin\u00faviel was powerful enough to lull Morgoth to sleep? Perhaps we&#8217;ll hear such a song in this stage show. We hope the fans will be as excited as we are, to see F\u00ebanor forge his gems on stage.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>We&#8217;ve also heard that artists already known for their Tolkien-inspired paintings may be brought in to be part of the design team. Could some of the folks whose masterpieces we&#8217;ve been enjoying in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/2025\/03\/30\/120301-middle-earth-march-madness-2025-reaches-the-elite-eight\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"Middle-earth March Madness\">Middle-earth March Madness<\/a> be part of these future shows? Certainly TORn friend Donato Giancola would make epic scenery designs; and Kip Rasmussen&#8217;s &#8216;Eru and the Gods singing the First Song of Creation&#8217; would make a wonderful show poster. <\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"564\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/bL-1024x564.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-120325 no-lazyload\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/bL-1024x564.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/bL-300x165.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/bL-768x423.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/bL-1536x846.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/bL-2048x1128.jpg 2048w, https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/bL-255x140.jpg 255w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Donato Giancola&#8217;s Beren and L\u00fathien in the Court of Thingol and Melian<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p>We here at TheOneRing.net are very excited by the news of this forthcoming stage production (or productions!), and staffers have started speculating as to exactly which stories will appear on &#8216;the boards&#8217;. Look for more content to explore our thoughts; and of course we&#8217;ll bring you updates as we receive them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Breaking news: rights to bring The Silmarillion to life have finally been released, but it&#8217;s not to any&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":120325,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3119,3138,198,197,22,3769,4092,6,98,240,149,152,154],"tags":[792,262,2088,1897,2014,2857],"class_list":["post-120308","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-amazon-tv-series","category-april-fools-day","category-fans-creations","category-fans","category-headlines","category-lotr-on-prime","category-middle-earth-enterprises","category-tolkbooks","category-silmarillion","category-stage","category-lotr","category-tolkien","category-tolkien-estate","tag-jrr-tolkien","tag-lord-of-the-rings-musical","tag-middle-earth","tag-silmarillion-2","tag-the-lord-of-the-rings","tag-tolkien"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/bL-scaled.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1tLoH-vis","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120308","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=120308"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120308\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":120345,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120308\/revisions\/120345"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/120325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=120308"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=120308"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=120308"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}