Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. S. Jakubiak, O. von der Damerau; D. Kirch, A Clayton, W. Koch, M. Gantner, C. Fischesser; K. Petrenko, Bavarian State Opera; D. Bösch, Dir.; P. Bannwart, Sets; M. Nielsen, Costumes; F. Herold, Video; M. Bauer, Lighting.  Performance of July 27, 2019.

Sachs (Wolfgang Koch) and David (Allan Clayton) in Sachs' workshop.  Photo: Wilfred Hösl

As usual, Meistersinger closed out the annual Munich Opera Festival, a month-long celebration at what many feel is the finest opera house in the world today. That reputation is certainly built on world-class casting, a vast and rangey repertory, and dramatically thought-provoking and powerful productions, but mostly it is built on unstinting musical excellence. And credit for that must go to Kirill Petrenko, who is about to finish his tenure as the company’s General Music Director as he begins his leadership of the Berlin Philharmonic, the most prestigious conducting job in classical music. The Bavarian State Opera’s (and opera in general’s) loss is Berlin’s (and symphonic music’s) gain. Petrenko’s conducting of Meistersinger, and of an Otello we saw the previous week, affirmed my sense that he is the single greatest conductor I’ve seen in 35 years of regular opera and concert-going, with the possible exception of Carlos Kleiber. Watching him, and watching the orchestra, and watching the communication happening between him and the orchestra, is a joyous phenomenon.

The overture was surprisingly fleet. Surely, I thought, the players will never be able to maintain clear articulation at this pace, and the fugue section will become messy.  I was wrong: I’ve rarely heard such precision and such vertical clarity. And – better yet – the unfolding of each new section of the prelude felt exciting, as if the orchestra couldn’t wait to share each new treasurable moment, and yet there was no sense of rushing, nothing peremptory. The rest of the opera flowed with the same kind of passion, with constant attention to little details of instrumentation and, at the same time, a delirious surrender to the big moments of emotional overflow. I’ve never heard the haunting sonorities of Sachs’s “Melancholy” motif, which opens the third act prelude and ends so many of the big, joyous moments in that final act, played with such a sense of mystery and profound, ambiguous sadness, as if each new statement dug deeper into the protagonist’s soul. Petrenko conveyed these complex sentiments and yet also conveyed the sheer, radiant beauty of the score, clearly shared by the musicians who positively beamed from the pit.

Director David Bösch took a grim approach. He had directed a terrific Verkaufte Braut which we saw earlier in the week, set in a rustic, modern agricultural commune (complete with live, scene-stealing pig). His Meistersinger was similarly updated to a working-class present. The overall pictorial approach was dark and gritty; contemporary Nuremberg was portrayed – accurately – as a town balancing kitschy tourism with industrial work.  Sachs’s workshop was a run-down trailer, parked in a graffiti-filled section of the town. The fight at the end of the second act was (as in many modern productions) bloody and brutal. The competition in the final scene was a televised Eurovision Song Contest, complete with big-screen projections and calls for audience applause. A particularly humorous extension of this conceit was the Entrance of the Masters before the contest began. Each was accompanied by a dramatic 5-second video vignette showcasing the particular Master in a dramatic revolving pose, straight out of a WWE arena match. Beckmesser wore an embarrassing silver glam costume, desperately attempting to look cool and young. His utter failure drove him to despair and, in the final moments, to bring a gun on stage which he turned on himself as the curtain fell.

This final depiction of suicide was just one of several dark, ugly moments. I did not care for many of the choices Bösch made, although there was certainly an integrity to his approach. There were some concepts that did pay off, including the delightful portrayal of Walter as a jeans-and-leather-jacket-wearing, guitar-carrying rebel, a perfect contemporary expression of the character.  And ultimately, the dramatic elements were somewhat irrelevant in that the conducting and playing were so thrilling that all else seemed to fall aside.

Five days before the performance, we received an email from the Bavarian State Opera stating that Jonas Kaufmann would be sick for our performance on the 27th as well as the subsequent performance on the 31st. One could suggest that Kaufmann has an uncanny ability to foretell the state of his voice and his health days in advance, but the more convincing, and sad, conclusion is that he has abandoned a sense of professionalism and now sings by whim and not by obligation. His replacement, Daniel Kirch, a Stuttgart-based tenor, acted decently, but the voice is strained and lacks the requisite glamour for the role. Wolfgang Koch was a sturdy but not particularly revelatory Sachs. Christof Fischesser was a solid Pogner. Martin Gantner fulfilled the production’s complex vision of Beckmesser with skill and excellent vocalism (he is one of the few who can belt the high note at the end of the Act III workshop scene with Sachs). David was the excellent tenor Allan Clayton. Sara Jakubiak had the vocal amplitude and proper intensity for a convincing Eva. Okka von der Damerau was a gusty Magdalene.

Erick Neher
Erick Neher, a Society member and contributing editor for The Hudson Review, is a writer on classical music, opera, theater, and film. By day, he is the Vice President of Marketing for Hearst Magazine Media.
© Wagner Notes, November 2019, a publication of the Wagner Society of New York. All rights reserved.

Principals: S. Gould, L. Davidsen, E. Zhidkova, M. Eiche, S. Milling. Bayreuth Festival Orchestra, V. Gergiev and C. Thielemann (8/13) cond., T. Kratzer, director; R. Stellmaier, sets and costumes; M. Braun, video. Performances of July 28 and August 13, 2019.

A team of young creators headed by a director sporting a baseball cap; a black performer in drag; extensive use of video: the new production of Tannhäuser in Bayreuth this summer had enough advance buzz to generate pre-opening jitters for another regietheater production expected to provoke and shock the audience. Happily, the director Tobias Kratzer, a winner of the Faust Award for Excellence in German Theater for his brilliant Götterdämmerung in Karlsruhe, gives us a fresh and captivating take on the story of a singer who strays from society for sensual pleasure, only to be punished for his sin, then redeemed by the sacrifice of a woman. I was fortunate to attend two performances, on July 28 and August 13, the latter conducted by Christian Thielemann in place of Valery Gergiev. This afforded me an opportunity to savor the details of the production, which could become a classic.

The production team provides a helpful discussion of their concept in the written program. They view the opera Tannhäuser as a journey experienced by Wagner during his turbulent time in Dresden, of “disillusionment and expectations.” As the overture begins, the curtain opens to a full video screen with an arial view of the Wartburg Castle, which is the setting of Act II of the opera. A van travels through the forest; the scenery gradually changes to a contemporary urban setting. The van’s occupants are an eccentric mix: Tannhäuser in a clown outfit, Venus in glittering form-fitting pantsuit, a dwarf in the image of Oskar in Günter Grass’ The Tin Drum, and a drag queen named Le Gateau Chocolat. They steal gasoline and their Burger King dinner, using a fake credit card with Wagner’s 1849 invocation “Frei im Wollen, Frei im Thun, Frei im Geniessen” (free in willing, free in doing, free in enjoying).  Venus runs over a policeman, whereupon Tannhäuser comes to his senses and throws himself off the van, to awaken in the vicinity of the Bayreuth Festival House. The pilgrims, formally dressed, line up at the lamppost as they approach the “Mecca.”

Tannhäuser (Stephen Gould) and Venus (Elena Zhidkova) at Burger King. Photo: Enrico Nawrath.	Tannhäuser (Stephen Gould) and Elizabeth (Lisa Davidsen); Act iii. Photo: Enrico Nawrath.

Act II features the storming of the Bayreuth Festival House by Venus, Oskar, and Chocolat and their confrontation with the police.  The stage shows a “traditional” enactment in the interior of the Wartburg Castle, and a screen above depicts “the back story”: Elisabeth, Tannhäuser, and other performers getting ready for their entrance. Venus and her two companions, whose van crashed into the barrier of the Festival House at the end of Act I, gain access to the House from the balcony, and the disparate worlds of static opera and real life perfor­mance collide. Venus sneaks onto the stage disguised as one of the singers. The physical presence of Venus in Act II makes her a more interesting character, contrasting the two women who vie for Tannhäuser’s attention. Elena Zhidkova, who was a late replacement for Ekaterina Gubanova after the latter’s injury during the rehearsal period, was perfect for the physical demands of the role, moving with athletic energy and ease.

The invasion by the outsiders is brought under control as Katharina Wagner summons the police (shown on screen) and several police men and women storm onto the stage. Tannhäuser is arrested as he sings of “Rome.” Elisabeth, by no means a simple saintly figure, was shown earlier as a troubled wrist-cutter and almost steps out of her rarefied surroundings into the world of Tannhäuser at the end of Act II but returns to her society.

Act III takes place in a desolate area with the broken van and other metal scraps and the pilgrims as homeless vagrants. Elisabeth appears and shares a meal with Oskar.  She has sex with Wolfram, who disguises himself as Tannhäuser by donning the clown outfit, and then commits suicide by slitting her wrist. As Tannhäuser cradles her body, we see on the above screen the happy pair embarking on a road trip in the van, this time with Tannhäuser (and not Venus) in the driver’s seat. The last scene, with its swelling and dramatic music, ends as the pair rides off into the sunset, in Tannhäuser’s imagination. This was one of the most moving and hopeful endings of the opera I have experienced.

On August 13, with Thielemann at the helm, the orchestra was in top form. Stephen Gould showed again, with his stamina and powerful but nuanced singing, that he is the reigning Tannhäuser. The young Norwegian soprano Lise Davidsen, hailed by many as the next great Wagnerian soprano, impressed with her huge and brilliant voice that became creamy in soft singing. Markus Eiche was a sympathetic and warm-voiced Wolfram. Stephen Milling headed a strong ensemble of singing knights.

The success of this production rests on the meticulous care taken to develop the four main characters in a modern interpretation. Unlike the Castorf Ring, it did not distract me from enjoying the music, because the director, who had a good understanding of the opera, giving precedence to the music. A delightful bonus of an outdoor performance by Tannhäuser’s companions during the first intermission attracted not only the festival-goers but also the local audience who were not attending the performance. A splendid integration of theater with real life.

Ako Imamura
Ako Imamura, a Society member, is a familiar face at international performances and a reviewer for "Bachtrack."
© Wagner Notes, September 2019, a publication of the Wagner Society of New York. All rights reserved.

It's back! For the  second  time  the  Metropolitan Opera has revived Robert Lepage's much loathed production   of   Wagner's epic tetralogy,   which is famously dominated by a vast mechanical contraption ("the  machine")  with  twenty-four moving planks. Alas, after nearly ten years in the Met's repertoire, this massive effort, which cost tens of millions of dollars to create and millions more to accommodate on the Met stage, is unlikely ever to escape its alliterative condemnation by New Yorker critic Alex Ross as "witless and wasteful." Rumors fueled by open-ended statements from the Met's management suggest that the next time the company presents a full Ring Cycle, it may be in a new production. This may well underscore the sheer folly of the house's decade-long infatuation with Lepage’s Ring, which the Met’s administration has assiduously declared "visionary" despite almost unanimous critical and popular comment to the contrary. Still more rumors, widely welcomed in many corners, hold that the sets of the beloved old Schenk production are still tucked away somewhere, like a sleeping Brünnhilde resting up to save our aesthetic sensibilities.

Photo: Alberich (Tomasz Konieczny enjoying the gold (briefly). Photo: Ken Howard/Metropolitan Opera.

Bayrueth, after all, stages a new Ring every six or seven years regardless of how the previous production was received (poorly, the last four times). The Paris Opera just announced a new production to replace Günter Krämer's dismal effort, which is roughly the same age as the Met’s. Many of the defects in Lepage's production persist. The machine’s creaks are less intrusive than they were when the individual operas premiered, but they remain too audible to be excused. Mechanical problems are still in evidence. In Cycle II’s Das Rheingold,  the  music  stopped  for  nearly  a  minute when a stage elevator failed to deliver Erda on time for  her  dramatically vital  admonition  of  Wotan to give up the ring. Apart from a couple of showy transformations  ̶  the   descent   into Nibelheim and Brünnhilde's fading  into  her  magic sleep come to mind  ̶  the  machine's  best  uses  arrived  when  it was perfectly   stationery and delivered    reasonable  background scenery via projection. Act I of Die Walküre and most of Siegfried went   forward successfully for this reason, but only because this was when the machine moved the least. Stage direction   has also improved. Characters emerged in greater relief, and the human conflicts that drive the work were less cartoonish than I recall from the individual premieres.
 
Sometimes, however, the direction was simplified to address safety concerns, which had visibly marred the production in previous outings. Brünnhilde's entrance in Act II of Walküre, which literally tripped up Deborah Voigt at the installment's premiere in 2011, is now a much safer but far less dramatic walk along machine's flat top. The changes in dramaturgy are welcome and generally improved the experience, but nothing can mask the production's utter lack of any interpretive theme; even Schenk;\'s production, which was criticized for being too picturesque in its traditionalism, concluded with a slow fade out of the gods' divine light as the mortals contemplated the beginning of their age. In Lepage's production, Rhine overflows its banks, with its waters undulating at the surface like nothing had happened and nothing had mattered. Nearly ten years on, it remains what the Germans derisively call "ideelos"  ̶  "idea-less, " or "free of ideas."
 
The Cycle's vocal event was the emergence of Christine Goerke as the leading Wagnerian dramatic soprano before the public today. This was her first Met Brünnhilde, and the first time she performed all three Brünnhilde roles in a composite cycle; her earlier performances in Canada and Houston unrolled incrementally over successive seasons without culminating in full cycle performances. Her Chicago Brünnhildes have also unfolded season-by-season, but will end with full cycle performances in the spring of 2020. Traditionally, we have judged Brünnhildes by their ability to reach the glorious high notes  ̶  the C's, of course, but also the B's and G's that the right throat can cast gleamingly alongside Wotan's vicissitudes and Siegfried's raptures. Goerke floated these notes in fine form atop the superstructure of a superb technique, but her real uniqueness came in her exploration of the role's earthy qualities. Brünnhilde, as she matures, must experience the darker and more complex side of human feelings and develop empathy for frailty both human and divine. In this her low notes, especially in Götterdämmerung, were extraordinarily paired with the exuberant upper register, which vaulted above the orchestra.
 
Cycle II subscribers had the good fortune of hearing the German Heldentenor Andreas Schager's Siegfried. After a long career in operetta, Schager has catapulted into leading Wagnerian roles in Europe over the past few years. With an utterly clarion tone and effortlessly expansive top voice, he has mastered Parsifal and Tristan. His Met Siegfried performances (which included his house debut in the matinee Cycle's Göterdämmerung) proved a stunning success, arguably the best the house has heard since the days of Lauritz Melchior. Some observers objected to his puerile and insouciant stage antics, but that is who Siegfried really is and, for better or worse, the person Wagner wrote  that he wanted us all to become.
 
Michael Volle, now a Met stalwart in the Wagnerian repertoire, was a tower of vocal and dramatic force as Wotan. He brought a deeply human interpretation of the role that reminded one of James Morris's best nights. His performance never faltered in either musical or dramatic power.
 
Most of the rest of the casting was equally luxurious. Stuart Skelton and Eva-Maria Westbroek delivered a gorgeously sung Act I of Die Walküre, though Skelton is not the most compelling actor in the operatic firmament. Gunther Groissböck matched them with a malevolent Hagen and also contributed a suitably menacing Fafner. Tomasz Konieczny's Alberich resounded with stentorian force and the astute diction that this moving role greatly needs to be the focal point of evil ill will. Jamie Barton's Fricka was lighter than Stephanie Blythe's had been in the first installments, but still carried the day in another triumph for her promising career. It was a bit too odd to see Eric Owens cast as Alberich's evil son Hagen. After enjoying a solid success as Alberich in earlier years and mixed reviews as Chicago's Wotan, he seemed a bit too glib for the role of a master conspirator. At times he was a bit too charming, even to the point of get­ ting a few laughs with comic gestures that accompany his more deceptive moves. Hagen is written to be purely malevolent, his only pretense to humor expressed in a biting sarcasm. Owens's portrayal here did not seem quite true.
 
The Met Orchestra has sounded better in Wagner, not the least in the horns, which squalled out of tune at some point in each of the four operas in Cycle II. Philippe Jordan approached the sprawling score with an economy of style that recalled Pierre Boulez's fast but famously engrossing Bayreuth Parsifal performances, and he seems to have risen above the glacially slow and dramatically ponderous renderings he gave in Paris's Ring a few years ago. Rheingold dragged a bit listlessly, but Jordan's interpretations improved considerably over the subsequent evenings. Siegfried ranked among the best performances of the opera I have ever heard, while Götterdämmerung ended the Cycle in a truly spellbinding fashion.
 
Paul du Quenoy
Paul du Quenoy is Associate Professor of History at the American University of Beirut and an international music and theater critic.
© Wagner Notes, July 2019, a publication of the Wagner Society of New York. All rights reserved.