Die Walküre in HD

Conductor...............Philippe Jordan
Production..............Robert Lepage
Hostess..............Deborah Voigt

Brünnhilde..............Christine Goerke
Siegmund, brother.....Stuart Skelton
Sieglinde, sister.........Eva-Maria Westbroek
Wotan...................Greer Grimsley
Fricka, Wotan's wife.........Jamie Barton
Hunding.................Günther Groissböck

Opera is the greatest of all art forms because it centers on so many great female characters.  The opera is almost always about them.  Men tried to keep it all to themselves for as long as they could, but as soon as opera became commercial, that was over.

Wednesday I saw Wagner's Die Walküre delayed from last Saturday. I have seen this work many times, but this was very romantic for some reason.  I followed the story of Wotan better than ever.  In the previous opera, Das Rheingold, he is Fricka's husband, and they are happy but have no children.  He gains power by trading away the gold for Valhalla.  He is all powerful and uses his power to do whatever he wants.  By Walkure he is the father of everyone else in the story except Fricka and maybe Hunding.  He's been busy and Fricka is pissed.  All of the 9 Valkyries are his daughters by Erda.  Siegmund and Sieglinde are his children by a she wolf.

They did act bows to avoid making people stay in costume all the way to the end.  Act I is Siegmund, Sieglinde and Hunding.  The twins have not seen one another since the day their house burned down, killing their mother.  Siegmund has wandered alone while Sieglinde was forced to marry Hunding.  The singing in this act was beautiful.. Eva-Maria created the role in the original mounting of this production.  Her partner at that time was Jonas Kaufmann.  They truly looked like brother and sister.  Stuart sang well this time, but Eva has grown in the role.  She was wonderful, with great dramatic presence.

The staging was slightly different.  The planks at the front of the stage didn't stick up in front of the singers this time which looked much better.  When he sings, "du bist der Lenz" I want something spectacular to happen.  I want to feel that in that moment spring has arrived. 

In Act II Wotan, Fricka and Brünnhilde arrive.  Christine is very saucy at this point.  Her Brünnhilde has truly spectacular emotional range.  She shows us joy, love, pride, sympathy, sorrow.  It is the greatness of this performance that makes this production of Die Walküre the best that I have seen.  Wotan asks to see the joy again, and she justly refuses.

I have seen Jamie Barton's Fricka before and loved it again here.  I have also seen Greer Grimsley's Wotan before and found him very much improved.

Act III starts with Valkyries waving.  A bit too silly for me.  However, the act ended well.

Philippe Jordan brought us the emotional range that appeared in the interpretations of all the actors.  I truly loved this.  The Met seems to have realized that Christine Goerke would be something we would all want to see.  Thank you.

L'Amour de Loin

Tamara Mumford, Eric Owens

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Conductor:  Susanna Mälkki [Debut]
Production:  Robert Lepage

Jaufré Rudel:  Eric Owens
Clémence:  Susanna Phillips
Pilgrim:  Tamara Mumford

Eric Owens declared L'Amour de Loin by Kaija Saariaho to be a masterpiece.  I concur.

Eric Owens, Susanna Phillips

I enjoyed all the interviews but it was especially interesting to hear from Susanna Phillips that she was present at the premiere in Salzburg in 2000.

I love this opera.  It is the performance from this season that I have most looked forward to, and I was not disappointed.  Bravi tutti.  The chorus sat in rows under the led lights, standing to become visible to the audience. 

Kaija Saariaho

I found the production completely charming.  Susannah Phillips said that the sea of ever-changing lights was invisible to the performers, and they were all anxious to see the film.  Their show repeats on Wednesday, so perhaps a special showing?  There were birds flying that looked more like doves than gulls.  When Rudel is crossing, he dreams of Clémence leaping out of the sea and diving, rather like a dolphin.  This was the most curious part of the production.  It was all like a dream.  A dream of love.

This isn't my first time with this opera.  To read my first thoughts see here.

The Tempest

Conductor...............Thomas Adès
Production..............Robert Lepage

Prospero................Simon Keenlyside
Miranda.................Isabel Leonard
Ariel...................Audrey Luna
Caliban.................Alan Oke
Ferdinand...............Alek Shrader
Stefano.................Kevin Burdette
Trinculo................Iestyn Davies
Antonio.................Toby Spence
Sebastian...............Christopher Feigum
Gonzalo.................John Del Carlo
King of Naples..........William Burden

Today was the simulcast of Thomas Adès's The Tempest from the Metropolitan Opera.  This opera lies much closer to Shakespeare's play of the same name than did The Enchanted Island, which we all loved very much.  It's modern, generally like the clip in the previous post and the one above.

There is Prospero, well sung by a tattooed Simon Keenlyside, who is a bitter old man who has been living on an island for 12 years with his books on magic, his daughter Miranda, sung by Isabel Leonard, his slave spirit Ariel, sung by Audrey Luna, and the former King of the island Caliban, sung by Alan Oke.  They are a pathetic group.  Caliban is an ugly monster who stalks Miranda and hopes to marry her.  Ariel is a slave to Prospero and has been promised freedom at some point.

That's two baritones, a mezzo-soprano and a coloratura soprano.  A very strange coloratura soprano.  Ms Luna has an incredible whistle register which is where the part of Ariel mostly lies.  The Queen of the Night in Flute just has her occasional leaps to high F's, but Ariel's part goes to a high G and hangs around above a high C for extended stretches.  I've never heard anything like it.  It was well and enthusiastically done, but gee.  In one spot she sings "Bow wow, bow wow."  Ariel is made of air.  Perhaps it makes an odd kind of sense.  This is the only thing about the opera that draws your attention to the singing. 

Prospero has received news that those who banished him to this island, the King of Naples and Prospero's brother Antonio, are passing by in a ship.  His sources are presumed to be magical.  He commands Ariel to sink their boat and bring them to the island.  Prospero has his revenge and everyone is happy at the end.  In their miserable, sniveling ways.  Except his precious daughter Miranda has fallen in love with the King's son Ferdinand.

The music is all like the sample.  Played by the fabulous Metropolitan Opera orchestra, it makes a different impression than my previous encounter.  The general impression is of disintegrated fragments of harmony and phrase.  There isn't much in the way of flow.  However, it has its own distinctive sound.

The text is almost Shakespeare, but not.  We hear Miranda declare "O brave new world" in the right place.  But why couldn't they have used:

Full fathom five thy father lies;
Of his bones are coral made;
Those are pearls that were his eyes;
Nothing of him that does fade,
But doth suffer a sea-change Into something rich and strange.
Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell:
Ding-dong,
Hark! Now I hear them – Ding-dong, bell.

instead of the prose version?  As part of Prospero's revenge, Ferdinand, sung by Alek Shrader, is told that his father has died in the shipwreck.  We get something more modern sounding and not at all poetical, though it generally rhymes.  How does one manage that?  There is no antique vocabulary.

Robert Lepage was more suited to producing The Tempest than he had been for The Ring, perhaps because as a modern opera it could be performed by young people capable of swinging from chandeliers and falling through holes in the floor.  It didn't always make sense, but it looked good, worked fine and made the performances more interesting.

We got to the end and felt little enthusiasm, either in our theater or in the Met audience.  I managed a bravo for Keenlyside who was really quite good.
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Die Walküre rerun

Die Walküre in HD ran last night as part of a complete Ring cycle that finishes on Saturday.  Philistine that I am, I have not been exactly thrilled.  For me Wagner soars often enough to keep me in the game, but he also gives me gigantic extended scenes that bore me to tears.  One of my fellow bloggers says she has seen 9 complete Ring cycles in the last year.  Ugh.  I think I would give up opera.  My favorite Wagner has always been the Wesendonck Lieder.  Soaring and terse all at the same time.

Eva and Jonas were still wonderful--beautiful AND passionate.  I think I'm used to the machine.  I remember that in the house you can see the black-clad gremlins that lurk behind the set, but not in the movie theater.  I rather like that it doesn't really translate into an "interpretation," if you know what I mean.

James Levine has done a complete Ring before, which included Jessye Norman as Sieglinda.  I guess we should not feel too sorry for him.

I sincerely hoped that I would like Bryn more this time, but I didn't.  He's all talky and melodramatic when I only want that wonderful, soaring Wagner line.  Do I care what they're talking about?  Not really. 

I made it through 4 hours and went home.

Rheingold rerun

I went to see the repeat of Das Rheingold in HD. 

No one seems to know what the Ring is for except Alberich, but they all want it anyway.  I think this is the first time I noticed that one giant wants Freie because he likes her, but the other one only wants her because it will annoy the other gods.

There is a distinct possibility that I don't like either the music or the plot to Rheingold.  I didn't make it to the end.

Wagner's Dream

The film Wagner's Dream is really more Lepage's Dream.  Or maybe Peter Gelb's Dream.

At the beginning it is a toy that they are playing with.  They are used to playing with acrobats and their toys and designing toys for them, and so how different can an opera be?  The toy of a Rhine maiden cracks her head into the machinery, and no one seems to care.

The problem immediately becomes apparent, at least to me:  they are used to working with people who are young and athletic.  Their stand-ins all fall into this category.  They are unclear on the concept of opera.  When I see middle-aged, somewhat overweight stand-ins, I will understand that they are imagining Wagnerian singers playing these roles.

The Ring is an imaginary landscape.  What other opera takes place primarily outside?  It is an imaginary landscape of rivers, mountains, forests, caves and glens.  The characters are heroes and immortal gods.  In my imagination this would work best as a cartoon.  There will always be a disconnect between the imaginary landscape and the reality of a production of The Ring.  Lepage has tried to bridge this disconnect with his machinery, and it is fun to watch them all try.

And O they try so hard.  So much work.  I always enjoy watching other people work.  For me it is very enjoyable to watch opera in production.  I do miss it so.  The best seat in the house for an opera is in the wings.  It never looks like there is much space in the wings at the Met.

Dwayne Croft is the only one of the real singers that seems to be having any fun with this new concept.  He laughs as he jumps from one piece of the set to another.  The rest frown and look terrified.  Eric Owens is openly hostile.  If they are doing something daring and don't look terrified, it's probably the stand-ins.  Acrobats cross the rainbow bridge.

I'm trying to make this clear:  What is probably the farthest thing from an acrobat?  Quick.  This is a no-brainer.  The farthest thing from an acrobat is a Wagnerian.  No offense, guys.  50 is the right age for a Wagnerian.  25 is the right age for an acrobat.  I assure you, none of these people work out on the flying trapeze with Natalie Dessay.

And for me that is the problem with Lepage's Ring.  They never manage to stop looking terrified.  It ruins the tension in the scenes.  The emotion of the scene is replaced with terror.  Jay Hunter Morris is the best at faking it.
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Götterdämmerung

When I'm watching, I always remember that the libretto was written backwards--Götterdämmerung first, Rheingold last--and then it was composed in the opposite order.  This is why we have to listen to all those retellings of things we've already seen.  In the original concept the other three operas didn't exist.  It is also why we have to rehear every damn Leitmotiv that ever appeared.  Yes, that's Nothung all right.  And we know about the damned curse.

The Rhine maidens are still my favorite parts.  Eric Owens as Alberich and his son Hans-Peter König as Hagen were the only members of the cast with voices to match the traditional quality for a Wagnerian.  König received the ovation he deserved.  He was simply magnificent.

Our hostess Patricia Racette introduced the "legendary Waltraud Meier" in the role of Waltraute.  This was the best scene in the opera.  She deserves her legendary status.

I enjoyed watching Jay Hunter Morris and Deborah Voigt.  Debbie was suitably melodramatic, and it was nice to see at least an attempt to have her ride Grane into the funeral pyre.  Jay is adorable, but sings the lightest Siegfried imaginable.

I keep remembering Placido Domingo saying, "Better too soon than too late."  He was referring to the fact that he began singing Otello while still in his thirties.  Deborah Voigt has been afraid of singing Brünnhilde, and has put it off into her 50's.  Her voice has more and more of an edge.  Let's just say I wouldn't want to sit and listen to an audio only version of this Ring, but the visual parts were quite pleasing.  Her Brünnhilde blazes emotionally just as she should, but she will not erase the memory of Eva Marton in her prime.

Wire walking seems to have disappeared as a concept--good riddance.  When she sets the pyre ablaze, we hear the music for "Loge her," but not the words.

This is a member of our audience getting into the mood for Wagner's Twilight of the Gods.  They went down in style.  For me personally it was too much sitting for someone whose back is going out from not enough exercise.

And now I really must go outside and walk around.

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Siegfried Success

What you want and never get with your Siegfried (live from the Metropolitan Opera in HD) is a sexy Siegfried.  We have him in the sexy Heldentenor from Texas, Jay Hunter Morris. In her interview Deborah Voigt mentioned there was more electricity opposite Jay than the tenor he replaced. Those of us who have experienced the male teenager at home recognized him in Jay's portrayal of the 17 year old Siegfried.  All teenagers think they know everything, but this one actually might.

In his interview Morris mentioned that he no longer sang as loud as he could.  He gets through the very taxing role in fine form by allowing the natural ping in his voice to carry the day.  I loved it.  Jay, you need to hire a good photographer.  I have undoubtedly seen him in San Francisco, but I scour my memory without success.

I liked the log machine a lot more this time than I have in the previous two operas.  The technical gimmick of the forest bird was masterful.  A yellow bird appeared to flit around the stage from tree to tree while Mojca Erdmann sang off stage.  The projections grow ever more complicated.

Another thing that I liked much more this time was Bryn Terfel's Wotan the Wanderer.  He seemed to handle the character better as someone who has tried everything and failed.  He is bitter and seems to be fully prepared for the ultimate humiliation when Siegfried breaks his spear.  He roles up his runes and leaves.

The dragon, shown above, is quite handsome.

And here is Deborah Voigt in the final scene.  She tries to convince Siegfried to admire from a distance, but her heart just isn't in it.

Renée Fleming was her usual professional self in the interviews.  It was an excellent Siegfried.  I don't know if Levine would have been an improvement over Luisi.  Everyone seemed well coordinated and dynamic.

P.S.  It occurred to me after posting this that this installment in the Log Machine Ring included no wire walking.  Perhaps it has started to occur to the producers of this mess that scaring the wits out of your performers is not the path to great acting achievements.  Good riddance.

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Rheingold

Wotan...................Bryn Terfel
Fricka..................Stephanie Blythe
Alberich................Eric Owens
Loge....................Richard Croft
Erda....................Patricia Bardon
Fasolt..................Franz-Josef Selig
Fafner..................Hans-Peter König
Freia...................Wendy Bryn Harmer
Froh....................Adam Diegel
Donner..................Dwayne Croft
Mime....................Gerhard Siegel
Woglinde................Lisette Oropesa
Wellgunde...............Jennifer Johnson Cano
Flosshilde..............Tamara Mumford

Conductor...............James Levine
Production..............Robert Lepage

The Metropolitan Opera has invested deeply in its new Ring cycle.  As Peter Gelb explained, they have even shored up the building to support the incredible piece of machinery that serves as the set for all four operas.

I really loved the beginning of Rheingold.  The rippling Rhine and the floating Rhine maidens were fabulously exciting.  And the staircase image going down to Nibelungenland was striking.  The rest was comme si comme sa.  I think we in the movie theater have the best view.

Loge and the Rhine maidens were on wires.  All of Loge's attention was focused on maintaining his balance on the wire, and nothing was left over for developing a character.  Bryn Terfel and Stephanie Blythe had "no wire walking" clauses in their contracts, I'm sure.  Or?  Was Bryn on a wire in the staircase scene?

Rheingold is a very funny opera, and I laughed out loud several times.  Nibelungens screaming and running here and there were especially amusing.

My son thought the tempos were too slow, but I was fine with it.  James Levine looks very frail these days, but the music is still there.

I would have thought that Bayreuth in the 50's would have proved once and for all that it isn't about the set.  In fact, it's never about the set.

It's about the singers:  how they sing, how they PHRASE, how they move, how they look, how they sing, and how they understand and conceive their roles.  They make the drama, not the stupid set.  The main role of the director is to conceive the characters within the drama and communicate that concept to the singers.  Who are they to one another?  How do they feel?  If your concept is that they are sticks of wood or at best pretty pictures, your opera will fail.

I don't know what to say about the singing.  No eggs were laid.  Eric Owens was an amazing Alberich.  I wanted to see this before I actually saw it.  Bryn was a terrible disappointment.  If he wants to impress me, he's going to have to try one hell of a lot harder.

The Ring is scored for an absurdly large group of brasses.  Even such a large orchestra as the Metropolitan Opera orchestra would have to call in extra players, players who had never played The Ring before.  I'm making excuses.  The performance of Das Rheinglold included a lot of out of tune brass playing.

This has to be contrasted with the really quite wonderful San Francisco Die Walküre. Maybe I'll go after all.

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La damnation de Faust

Faust.......................Marcello Giordani
Marguerite..................Susan Graham
Méphistophélès..............John Relyea
Brander.....................Patrick Carfizzi

Conductor...................James Levine
Production..................Robert Lepage

Goethe's Faust was one of the primary inspirations for the Romantic. Berlioz was so taken with it that he composed music for it when he was only 15. The large work La damnation de Faust is not really an opera. He liked to imagine visions and set them to music without really bothering to worry about dramatic continuity.

The Metropolitan Opera is staging works extremely well. The stage is filled with a large four story grid where the singers, dancers and chorus work, including some dancers suspended on wires from above, with computer generated projections behind and in front. Faust's library is a projection quickly replaced by flocks of birds swirling in the background. I felt the episodic nature of the visuals completely suited the episodic nature of the work. Bravo.


I have not heard this work enough times to form an opinion of how it should be sung. The singers were Susan Graham, who introduced her own opera, Marcello Giordani as Faust and John Relyea as Mephistopheles. In my imagination Berlioz is melodramatic for a Frenchman, such as his melodramatic choral works: Requiem and Te Deum. I was relatively unprepared for the intensely lyrical performance presented here. Susan Graham is very fine in French repertoire precisely because her lyrical voice and style suit the lyrical French so perfectly.

I was much happier with Marcello Giordani as a partner for Susan than I was last week when he sang with Karita.  He was fully up to the lyricism established for Faust.   Even Relyea met the challenge of lyricism while looking very evil in his red leather outfit.

This must all be James Levine's idea. People in the movie theater, not many, only clapped for him.