Wagner - Die Walküre (London, 2018)

Wagner - Die Walküre

Royal Opera House, London - 2018

Antonio Pappano, Keith Warner, Stuart Skelton, Emily Magee, Ain Anger, John Lundgren, Nina Stemme, Sarah Connolly, Lise Davidson

Opus Arte - Blu-ray

In contrast to Das Rheingold, which has a more obvious dramatic narrative and a number of wonderful theatrical set pieces, Die Walküre is much more contemplative as a standalone work, a conflict between the opposing forces that have been set in motion during the first day Prelude. Musically however and in terms of overall importance to the development of any Der Ring des Niebelungen (as well as the sheer exhilaration of any performance of Ride of the Valkyrie) it's Die Walküre that counts. Likewise if you are going to give a representative part of a the tetraology a DVD release, and Keith Warner's not greatly loved Royal Opera House Ring cycle first seen back in 2006 doesn't look likely to be getting a full release on DVD, this is the one you want to see. So how does Warner's Die Walküre stand up on its own terms?

Well in most respects it's a perfectly serviceable production but as is often the case with Die Walküre, its chances of a successful revival are reliant to a large extent on the strength of the casting. It's not that a strong concept and direction aren't important but the nature of this work demands singers who can bring the kind of intense dramatic conviction that this opera needs. This particular recording has a superlative cast of experienced Wagnerians and it gets off to an impressive set with its cast for Act I where Stuart Skelton is the standout, a Siegmund  of heroic magnificence. Ain Anger as Hunding and Emily Magee aren't quite at the same level but both are resolute and steady. Directing them however, Warner ensures that there's no standing around or histrionics, they incarnate the nature of the characters and put everything into expression of their dilemma, making them far more three-dimensional that is usually the case, and that sets up the whole tone of what follows in the subsequent Acts.

With its long Acts and tiring monologues it might be short on conventional drama, but it's hard to imagine a more dramatic musical opening that the thundering Vorspiel to Die Walküre. In the first few impressions of this production, Warner attempts to get across a sense of all that darkness of a world left in turmoil due to the weakening influence of the gods, but the production design also has the benefit of this being a place outside of time. The depiction of Hunding's lodge is semi-abstract then, expressionistic and dark, a box within a spiral. Sieglinde is seen hovering nervously in the fearful captivity of her husband, bewildered by the arrival of a stranger in exhaustion and distress. Roots and branches twist through the furnishings in the room, Nothung embedded in a smouldering beam.

Act II uses much of the same set with only the box room removed to establish a connection and reveal a shattered rundown Valhalla. It's difficult to make Act II dramatically engaging but the singing and musical performance alone are more than enough to make this compelling. Warner matches the highs and lows in the actions and movements, leaving it to the simmering rumble of the music to hold you in the grip of the predicament of Fricka, Wotan and Brünnhilde. Siegmund and Sieglinde's reappearance using a red rope that I presume is related to the Norn's Cord of Destiny, stumble into the room where Brünnhilde has just learned the history of Das Rheingold, the fate of the brother and sister tied up with the gods and their inevitable downfall.

Keith Warner manages to play Act II with the same attention to characterisation and motivation, showing more than just a bitter domestic dispute between an arrogant god who is henpecked and reduced down to size by a jealous and vengeful wife. There is a fire to their relationship that still burns even in such moments as this current crisis, and you can see the balance of power play out on a sexual level between them. It makes them more than just ciphers and suggests that their dispute is more than just a domestic quarrel, but that deeper forces drive their words and actions. John Lundgren and Sarah Connolly give a charged account of what can otherwise be a very dry scene in dramatic terms, Pappano musically holding the tension throughout. Only Nina Stemme disappoints somewhat, not living up to the expectations you might have for her Brünnhilde.

Act III's opening Ride of the Valkyrie however is disappointingly underwhelming as far as Warner's staging goes, the Valkyrie looking like Shakespearean Weird Sisters holding horse skulls, but musically at least it certainly packs a punch under Antonio Pappano and ROH orchestra, and it helps too when you have Lise Davidsen among the number as Ortlinde. Elsewhere in the third Act there's impact aplenty where there needs to be, Lundgren's Wotan a fearsome presence, the Valkyrie and Brünnhilde credibly cowering before his rage. But again the third Act's sheer force is all there in the performances, Nina Stemme and Emily Magee raising their game impressively, the playing and of course the music itself just phenomenal.

In terms of production design you would hope for more in Act III, but the abstract approach is consistent in its follow through, a huge wall thrown up here between Wotan and Brünnhilde and her sisters. If the major part of the Act is very dull and unimaginative as far as Valkyrie scenes go in Die Walküre, it at least gives the closing conflagration scene a little more of a spark, so to speak, in a way that closes the opera on a huge emotional high. Warner's Die Walküre is not a classic production by any means but my goodness this gets across everything that is great about this work and it sounds like it near brings the house down during the curtain call of this 2018 performance.

Whether you consider Antonio Pappano as effective conducting Wagner as he is with Puccini and Verdi in the Italian repertoire, I liked his blood and thunder interpretation here. The Vorspiel to Act I seems to collapse in on itself at the end but elsewhere he really does draw out all the beauty, lyricism and simmering emotion that is built into the highly charged scenes. The state-of-the-art High Resolution audio recording and superb mixing certainly helps hear the quality, detail and sheer glorious weight of the musical performance. I don't think I've ever heard a recording of this work with such depth and dynamic range. You can just revel luxuriously in the sound world of Wagner here, particularly in the simmering eroticism buried in the Act II confrontation between Wotan and Fricka, which is just as gripping as any of the more familiar key scenes. But all the high points are emphatically hit here.

The HD presentation on the Opus Arte BD is impeccable. The image is clear and detailed, but as mentioned above it's in the High Resolution uncompressed soundtracks where the real benefit of the HD format really comes into its own, the spacious uncompressed DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 mix in particular capturing all the dynamic and detail of the performance. The English translation is also good, the subtitles making this easier to follow than the archaic language more often used without distorting the meaning in any way. The usual short features on ROH productions give a brief overview of what goes into a production like this. The booklet contains a synopsis and a good essay on the influence of Feuerbach on Wagner's Ring of the Niebelung by Barry Millington.

Links: Royal Opera House

Wagner - Tannhäuser (Bayreuth, 2019)

Richard Wagner - Tannhäuser (Bayreuth, 2019)

Bayreuther Festspiele, 2019

Valery Gergiev, Tobias Kratzer, Stephen Gould, Lise Davidsen, Elena Zhidkova, Stephen Milling, Markus Eiche, Daniel Behle, Kay Stiefermann, Jorge Rodríguez-Norton, Katharina Konradi

BR-Klassik streaming - 25 July 2019

Not for the first time I'm watching the opening of a new Wagner production at Bayreuth and wondering what the hell has this got to do with the opera. Usually you can at least relate the idea or concept even tenuously to some of the familiar themes of the work, but over the overture Tobias Kratzer's production of Tannhäuser opens with a film of a motley group of wayward circus entertainers doing a runner at a petrol station, running down a police officer in the process. It's this incident, rather than any deep conflict about the nature of his art, that inspires this production's Heinrich to return to that great institution of the musical arts. No, not Wartburg, but Bayreuth.

And therein lies the clue that the production is not so much concerned with the fate and condition of the exiled artist who chooses to set himself up in opposition to conservative notions of musical, social, moral and religious order and instead chooses to explore a personal and profane voyage of the discovery of physical pleasures, but rather it's more of an self-mocking reference to Wagner creating a cult for himself and setting up Bayreuth as a kind of shrine for pilgrims to come in worship every year. There's even a joking reference in the opening film to the closing down of the Biogas plant that was the setting for the last (equally mystifying) Bayreuth production of Tannhäuser that this one is replacing.

It's certainly very much within the Bayreuth ethos - certainly since Katharina Wagner took over the running of the festival - not to treat Wagner's works with sacred reverence, but to continually challenge and question the master's works to see whether they still have contemporary relevance and can withstand a modern outlook. It's rather impressive to see that while some of the ideas, philosophy and nationalistic sentiments can seem outdated, the works always seem to touch on other fundamental matters, not least this central ethos of the role of the artist as a vehicle for challenging and questioning the prevailing social order.

Kratzer's hugely irreverent production doesn't initially seem to have much to offer on that front, and it probably doesn't help that Valery Gergiev's conduction of the overture sounds - in the broadcast performance of the premiere - very erratic in its pacing, rushing through it and smothering melodies. If anything, the crazy bunch careening in a camper van on their way to Bayreuth (their motto from RW - "Frei im Wollen, frei im Thun, frei im Geniessen" - ""Free in your desiring, free in you action, free in enjoying") seems like an open provocation on the nature of the Regietheatre, the team consisting of a dwarf Oskar, a black drag artist Le Gateau Chocolat, with Venus in a sparkly jumpsuit and Tannhäuser dressed as a circus clown. How the pilgrims, seen here in evening dress fanning themselves with programmes on the green hill, are going to react when this mob intrude is at least going to be interesting.

And interesting, rather than anything profound or revelatory, is indeed how it plays out. Act II opens with projected backstage footage of nervous performers preparing for a more traditional, conservative period production in as austere meeting room of Wartburg. The nerves around Heinrich's return seem to be over concern about his abandonment of the sacred tradition for the heresy of the anarchic madness of Regietheater. While the singing contest is going on and going south, Venus and her motley crew - Le Gateau Chocolat in an outrageous yellow puffball outfit - are seen climbing in a window of the Bayreuth theatre to add a further unwelcome intrusion upon the solemn festival proceedings (making fun of portraits of James Levine and Christian Thielemann on the way). Katharina Wagner is forced to call in the police.

It's certainly possible to explore Tannhäuser for more meaningful connections to contemporary situations, so Tobias Kratzer's production feels somewhat self-indulgent, but it's certainly amusing. And, if you consider the true spirit and range of Wagner lies in in something like Die Meistersinger von Nurnburg (essentially a superior reworking of Tannhäuser), where it leavens its solemnity with humour and true human feeling as well as with a spirit of anarchy, then this production does find a way of removing some of the more troublesome outdated principles and sanctimony for 'die holde Kunst' that can often get in the way of the true power and spirit of this work. Act III in particular is beautiful here, the transformation not some religious miracle or glorious sacrifice, but also there in Wolfram learning from Heinrich's inspiration and briefly winning the love and respect of Elisabeth, the conclusion downplaying the transcendence for what is real and human.

The production appears to hit its mark quite successfully. There's huge applause after Act I and Act II, with only audible boos at the conclusion, and most of them appear to be for Valery Gergiev. That's perhaps predictable, Gergiev not the most popular figure internationally for his support of Putin, but it's probably more politically motivated than any commentary on the musical performance. Despite the rather wayward overture - perhaps struggling to keep up with the on-screen visuals - Gergiev's account of the work is well-judged, harnessing the power of the work and not afraid to let its occasional bombast work in favour of the revised perspective. At the same time he captures the contrasting moods of the singing contest well, finding good expression for the deeper conflicts within Heinrich and Tannhäuser, the opera.

Whether you look at it as an in-joke or something celebratory, it's not a particularly thought-provoking Tannhäuser, but it is at least well-performed and entertaining. Elena Zhidkova, apparently standing in at short notice as Venus, gives a spirited performance that is a sheer joy, as is Lise Davidsen's soaring and beautifully controlled Elisabeth. Stephen Gould's Heinrich is generally solid, a little stretched in places, showing some nice interpretation and acting in his performance. Stephen Milling's and Markus Eiche are both reliably good in familiar roles as Landgraf Hermann and Wolfram von Eschenbach.

Bayreuther Festspiele, BR-Klassik

Strauss - Ariadne auf Naxos (Aix, 2018)

Richard Strauss - Ariadne auf Naxos

Festival d'Aix en Provence, 2018

Marc Albrecht, Katie Mitchell, Lise Davidsen, Eric Cutler, Sabine Devieilhe, Angela Brower, Huw Montague Rendall, Jonathan Abernethy, Emilio Pons, David Shipley, Beate Mordal, Andrea Hill, Elena Galitskaya, Josef Wagner, Rupert Charlesworth, Petter Moen, Jean-Gabriel Saint Martin, Maik Solbach, Sava Vemić, Paul Herwig, Julia Wieninger

ARTE Concert - 11 July 2018

For a work that I used to consider a bit of a one-note meta-theatrical joke confected as a compromise to a failed theatrical/operatic crossover, Strauss's Ariadne auf Naxos has continued to enjoy popularity and stimulate a variety of interpretations. It shouldn't be that surprising, because at its heart the work is precisely about how art as entertainment (and particularly opera) has a unique way of connecting with people to express and communicate a rich variety of life experiences.

And if that's not enough there's always the music of Richard Strauss, gorgeous and alluring in its own right, as well as forming a bridge between the words and the deeper intentions of the work; like Capriccio, making a clever self-referential commentary at the same time on its working methods and intentions. Director Katie Mitchell is also used to working with divisions between form and content and trying to find ways to bridge them in her stage productions. One other divide you will also find Mitchell tackling is the male/female divide in classic works, seeing to offer a 'corrective' to their traditional male-dominated bias. How will Ariadne auf Naxos stand up to such scrutiny?

A one-note joke or not, there is a certain boldness in how Ariadne auf Naxos turns its gaze on the process of opera and performance, in how it marries popular entertainment with high art, and it's obviously necessary for that marriage to be seen to be successful and mutually beneficial, but certain structural and ideological weaknesses remain that need to be addressed. Regardless of whether you agree with or find musical value in Strauss and Hofmannsthal's somewhat nostalgic neoclassical idealisation of opera's past, and some of the reactionary attitudes towards men and women that persist within it, there is at least the structural disjoint in Ariadne auf Naxos's division between Prologue and Opera.

Forced to adopt this as a fix after the failure to pair the operatic element with Molière's 'Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme' in the original 1912 version, the two parts don't sit perfectly well with one another either in the reworked 1916 version. Once the Prologue is out of the way, the dispute between the artists and the entertainers over how to simultaneously present their different perspectives because of the whim of the Richest Man in Vienna resolved by compromising artistic integrity for commerce, the meta-theatrical framing is largely forgotten about. Even though the contrasting dialectic remains at the heart of the work, it does tend to forget its original audience (the guests of the Richest Man in Vienna) and seems to start taking itself rather seriously presenting itself to the 'real' audience as a neoclassical drama/music theatre revue with a grand Wagnerian ending.

You could look at that as intentional, as the work itself taking on its own artistic life, removing itself from the framework of the craft, from the personalities and problems of its creation to become something that relates directly to an audience without any necessity of explanation or commentary, and if so, it's another level of cleverness. It does tend to make the intention of any director seeking to insert another level of remove or abstraction on the work rather more difficult, but it has been done, most successfully I believe in Katharina Thoma's 2013 Glyndebourne production. Katie Mitchell's response to the work, in collaboration with Martin Crimp, doesn't seem to have quite as much to offer.

The immediate intention of their Aix production seems to be to make that divide between creativity and creation visible again, but also to show how they are brought together through an audience. It's a worthwhile endeavour, certainly central to the premise of opera, and in the process Mitchell and Crimp also find a way to draw the Prologue back once again with the Opera. Rather than remaining invisible in this version of the opera, since they don't have any part to play in Ariadne auf Naxos (or 'Ariadne auf Naxos'), the Richest man in Vienna, his wife and guests remain seated throughout in this production to the left of the stage while the players perform for them on the right. Occasionally, they make comments on the performance (a role they performed in the first version), and in one or two places are drawn in to participate or get closer to the drama. When the opera finishes, it's indoor fireworks that are set off and the performers put on their party hats and take a bow to their on-stage audience. It brings the work full circle in a way that Strauss and Hofmannsthal neglected to do and for which they could be justifiably be criticised.

That's fine as far as it goes, but obviously Katie Mitchell will have other issues with Ariadne auf Naxos as it stands, not least of which is the pomposity that is allowed to remain in the performance of the opera seria part of 'Ariadne auf Naxos'. Whether you agree that Strauss got carried away and forgot about it supposedly being a pastiche, it's clear nonetheless that the musical composition is much more considered than clever, Strauss fully aware of the variety of musical forms and techniques employed and how they interrelate with the drama. What is harder to swallow is how men and women are depicted, where the women are waiting for a man, "a new god", who even though he may be unfaithful is better than nothing and necessary to deliver them from their loneliness and misery. It depends how you play it obviously, and with how much tongue in the cheek.

Katie Mitchell is obviously not going to have any of that, or leave any room for ambiguity. In her version, Ariadne is pregnant, and it's the delivery of the baby - which takes place on-stage - that is the birth of a new god, Bacchus. Where this leaves the real Bacchus in the opera I'm not entirely sure, he could be Theseus returned or Hermes, the messenger from the Gods who delivers her this 'gift'. It's very much one of those feminist twists that Mitchell can employ that seem unnecessary and don't always work terribly well (Miranda, Lucia di Lammermoor), but here I liked how it deflated the grand Wagnerian sweep accompanying the woman finding her man. The playing out of the drama within a dining room instead of a desert island also helps in that regard, reminding you that it all remains a theatrical construct.

Some of it works and some of it doesn't, but what works and what doesn't will obviously depend on the individual viewer. The role reversal dressing of the richest man in Vienna in a dress and his wife in a suit felt gratuitous and unnecessary to me, and I felt that Zerbinetta's role and the risk of her appearing to be a bimbo may have been underplayed, allowing the Ariadne storyline to dominate, but the "discussion" between Zerbinetta and the Composer in the Prologue is touching, all credit to Sabine Devieilhe and Angela Brower. What really makes it come alive here however is the fine musical performance of the Orchestre de Paris under Marc Albrecht, playing down the propensity for the work to seem overblown or just too damn clever, finding instead the incredible variety of expression within it.

That incredible variety also extends to the singing roles in Ariadne auf Naxos, and the cast assembled here are outstanding. Lise Davidsen is not the most natural actress, but less can be more for Strauss, particularly when you can express everything so well through the voice. Davidsen is just superb, carrying gravity and a commanding vocal presence that is just extraordinarily rich and expressive in her hold and control and swelling of a line. Sabine Devieilhe doesn't have quite the same volume but is an appropriately flighty and bird-like Zerbinetta, and always impressive. If her presence isn't given the same stature in Mitchell's production, she remains dignified and 'luminous' in her eye-catching dress. Eric Cutler's Bacchus may also be given shorter shrift here, but his singing is clear and lyrical. Angela Brower also makes a very favourable impression as the Composer.

Links: Festival d'Aix en Provence, ARTE Concert

Cherubini - Medea (Wexford, 2017)

Luigi Cherubini - Medea

Wexford Festival Opera, 2017

Stephen Barlow, Fiona Shaw, Lise Davidsen, Ruth Iniesta, Raffaella Lupinacci, Sergey Romanovsky, Adam Lau

National Opera House, Wexford - 31 October 2017

There's one essential element that you need for a performance of Cherubini's Medea and it's a fairly obvious one. No, it's not Maria Callas, but you're on the right track; it needs a character with the fire and personality that Maria Callas was capable of bringing to one of the most challenging roles in opera - or theatre, for that matter. There aren't too many Maria Callases around obviously, which might be one of the reasons why Cherubini's opera isn't performed more often these days, but there's no question that the Wexford Festival have found a great Medea in Lise Davidsen.

Finding a singer capable of harnessing the forces and challenges of this particular role is not however the only element that is essential to putting on a successful Medea, and there are other reasons why the opera is not performed very often. There are questions over which version to go with (French or Italian? The opéra-comique version with passages of spoken dialogue or the musical interpolations for the recitative provided by Franz Lachner for a German version of the work?). There's also the nature of the Classical opera and its fashionability, and Cherubini has never really been fashionable, not even in his own time.

All of those issues are well-addressed by Stephen Barlow, who conducts a magnificent account of the Italian version with Lachner recitatives at Wexford, and it truly reveals the merits of the work. There's no overblown Romanticism, but rather the restrained and measured elegance of the Classical tradition is adhered to; a sense of order in the music however that feels constantly threatened by the actions of its principal character. The music carries within it a hint of that menace, tying it to the dominant nature of the role that Medea exerts on the piece, her efforts to maintain control over her actions and her life always seeming to be in danger of giving in to her darker nature and spilling over into horrible violence.

Finding a way to meaningfully draw out that aspect of the work also seems to inform Fiona Shaw's approach to the direction. She takes into consideration that Cherubini composed the opera in 1797, with the horrors and dark violence of the French revolution would undoubtedly found its way into the composition. Certainly there are parallels to be drawn towards violence being inflicted on an unsuspecting royal family, but as an actress who has played this role on the stage, Shaw looks beyond that and tries to examine where exactly such murderous thoughts and intent might have derived from. She finds that in the references in Medea's murder of her own brother to help Jason steal the Golden Fleece and that idea is woven into the production. Violence begets violence, as the Greek classics often warn us, and it's hard to argue with how this element in presented here.

The overture hints at the sins of the mother being visited upon the children of the next generation. The Wexford production opens with the children of Medea playing as they make the sea crossing to Corinth, but the storms left behind on Colchis are still present with them in the figure of Medea's brother who has a silent physical presence here. It's this more than any classical references that are important, and the nature of this corruption of the soul should still have relevance today. It doesn't necessarily have to be spelled out in terms of contemporary political topicality, but there is certainly room for that if the audience want to apply it to the world around them.

Shaw's production at least makes a more open interpretation possible by placing the action of the drama in a more contemporary setting. Act I sees Glaucis and her ladies working out at the gym, getting into shape for her forthcoming wedding to Jason. The arrival of Medea then is in marked contrast to this scene, bringing an unwelcome dose of reality into the picture. "Hey, Jason - what about those promises you made to me? What about the kids? What about the brother I killed just so that you could give the Golden Fleece as a wedding present to your new bride?"

Heavily paraphrased by me, that is nonetheless the import of Medea's words, and the contemporary setting just hits home the human sense of betrayal that Medea feels. But it's not just a matter of reducing classical mythology down to the level of a domestic dispute, and Shaw's production delves deeper into those archetypal themes with the symbolism of the sea, the waves, an island - all of it suggesting isolation, raging emotions, deep pain and urges towards violence that result in Medea's descent into madness.

The singing is fully up to the demands of the work and the intent of the production, showing just what Cherubini's opera has to offer. Lise Davidsen, in casual jeans and jumper, doesn't look at all like a demented enchantress, but that's the point. You don't know what will trigger Medea's reactions, but if those buttons are continually pushed, you will know all about it. You'll also know it from Davidsen's delivery, which is just phenomenal. It's not just that Davidsen meets the technical demands of the role, but she really does make it seem like Medea is on a hair-trigger, treading a line between outrage and entreaty, so that when she does finally explode and kill her children, it almost seems proportionate. And when it comes to it, the size of that voice does as much damage as Medea does to the gym equipment.

Ruth Iniesta also has a strong voice as Glauce, but it felt a bit overpowering, not quite as refined and controlled as Davidsen and almost too big for the O'Reilly Theatre. Raffaella Lupinacci made a terrific impression as Neris with some lovely lyrical singing. Sergey Romanovsky couldn't be faulted as Jason and his characterisation was also good, fitting in well with the production. While you can never have any real sympathy for Jason, his fault here is not so much betrayal and serial infidelity (as it can be in other opera versions of this story), but rather he is undone by his own weakness and misjudgement of Medea. There needs to be some kind of understanding of his position in order for the loss he suffers as a consequence to be utterly devastating, and in combination with Fiona Shaw's direction and Stephen Barlow's conducting - not to mention some impressive work from the orchestra and the chorus - the full force of Cherubini's Medea is felt by the time we get to that conclusion.

Links: Wexford Festival Opera