Wagner - Tannhäuser (Berlin, 2015)

Richard Wagner - Tannhäuser

Staatsoper Unter den Linden Berlin, 2015

Daniel Barenboim, Sasha Waltz, Peter Seiffert, Ann Petersen, Marina Prudenskaya, Peter Mattei, René Pape, Peter Sonn, Tobias Schabel, Jürgen Sacher, Jan Martiník, Sónia Grané

Staatsoper Video on Demand

Some of Wagner's later operas lend themselves well to a more abstract expression by directors in collaboration with artists and sculptors, finding new ways to delve into the philosophical, spiritual and transcendental qualities of Tristan und Isolde and Parsifal. When it comes to Tannhäuser directors generally take a more conventional and literal approach to its divisions between the physical and the spiritual, and it has tended to be less effective when directors take the artistic conceptual approach like the one in the 2014 Bayreuth production. The work's big, bold and direct nature even constrains the more experimental directors like Calixto Bieito and Romeo Castellucci, limiting their ability to explore aspects of the work entirely successfully. And yet the limited dramatic potential versus the poetry of Wagner's libretto and the flow of his music does seem to call out for an imaginative response. Perhaps dance is the way?

There's certainly a ritualistic almost religious ceremonial aspect to Tannhäuser that can be developed as Castellucci did in a rather obscure fashion with topless archers during the work's overture, but recognising that there is a flow in Wagner's score throughout the opera, director and choreographer Sasha Waltz extends this sense of ritualised movement with additional dance elements. It should also be noted that Wagner introduced a ballet into the work for its infamous French premiere, so there's justification for seeing dance as very much part of the work.

Waltz's choreography moreover doesn't dominate or take over from the dramatic expression but it certainly enhances it and brings out or highlights that essential character in the score. Again, the limitations of this work are still felt, and although the Act 1 Venusberg Bacchanal features semi-naked dancers writhing languidly and feverishly to Wagner's music, capturing the hedonistic side of the scene, it goes on a long time in this hybrid version of the opera and - despite the nudity - runs out of ways to keep it dramatically interesting. The set is simple but beautiful, a cone at back of the stage that pours out bodies spilling over occasionally onto the stage, a whirlpool that holds Heinrich in a centrifugal force that proves difficult to escape.

Dancers also capture the rhythmic chants of the pilgrims in the subsequent scene, skipping around Landgrave and the singers of Wartburg who are dressed in stuffy formal costumes of tradition and convention as they try to spin Heinrich back into their orbit. Movement also ties into music and song, showing it as a force that Elisabeth can't live without, Waltz striving to make visible that fact that there is life and truth contained within this gracious. There are no static solid beams in the Wartburg hall either, the walls thick bamboo-like pillars that sway in response to the drama contained within them. These are simple sets yet they provide space for movement, even if it is just the flow of the figures with them, never allowing the work to become static and unyielding.

Choreography is not something I usually comment on in opera productions, for the obvious reason that they rarely have a significant presence in opera, but Sasha Waltz's choreography is superb here, keeping the work moving, only bringing the dance to the forefront to emphasise certain scenes, stepping back in others so that it never overshadow the singers or Barenboim's progression of the score, managing to be expressive and as one with the music. The procession of the pilgrims in Act III whirling to the chorus in the misty morning is just glorious. The dance choreography definitely contributes then, but it's also just good direction.

As a concept Waltz perhaps doesn't particularly have anything new to say but very much finds a personal expression for Tannhäuser. If nothing else, she finds an appropriate way to handle the miracle conclusion that fits with the overall theme of the production, visualising the staff sprouting green leaves as a human body, which is a nice touch and all the more effective for not bombarding the work with symbolism and imagery as others mentioned above. It's a beautifully designed and costumed production with lovely lighting that is moody and dramatic, all of which is very much in tune with the nature of Tannhäuser.

In musical and singing terms it's a ravishing account, persuasive that this is a work of balletic grace. Daniel Barenboim measures that flow of sensuous delight to perfection, glorying in the rousing majesty of the opera's choruses, and the singing performances are all outstanding. Ann Petersen brings a sweet lyric softness as Elisabeth. Peter Seiffert is magisterial as Heinrich, Peter Mattei is an outstanding Wolfram, René Pape a reliable Landgrave, and Marina Prudenskaya is an excellent Venus. Whether the dance elements work for you or not, this is a glorious Tannhäuser to listen to and see performed to this standard. 

Links: Staastoper Unter den Linden

Wagner - Die Walküre (Salzburg, 2017)

Richard Wagner - Die Walküre

Salzburg Easter Festival - 2017

Christian Thielemann, Vera Nemirova, Peter Seiffert, Georg Zeppenfeld, Vitalij Kowaljow, Anja Harteros, Anja Kampe, Christa Mayer, Johanna Winkel, Brit-Tone Müllertz, Christina Bock, Katharina Magiera, Alexandra Petersamer, Stepanka Pucalkova, Katrin Wundsam, Simone Schröder

3Sat Live - 15th April 2017

It seemed like an interesting idea to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Salzburg Easter Festival by reconstructing the original sets created for the first production there of Die Walküre, overseen by the festival's founder Herbert von Karajan. In reality - or at least at the remove of a television broadcast - while the sets did indeed provide an impressive backdrop, they served as nothing more than a platform for a rather stagnant production devoid of any fresh ideas or real direction. Some committed performances however and the momentum of the work itself ensured that the production wasn't a total loss.

The reconstruction of Günther Schneider-Siemssen's set designs are about as far as the production goes in terms of recreating the original 1967 production. They are however stylised enough to still work to tremendous effect with a central design that works with a circular platform not unlike Pierre Audi's production for the DNO. The set designs prove to be relatively flexible for reconfiguration and spiralling and are updated with some projection technology that allows the static backdrops a little more movement without moving too far away from the original conception. The sets look suitably grand, ancient and mythological, but at the same time remain functional as a platform for the action to be played out without over-encumbering the performers.

In Act I, for example, Hunding's lodge and tree are as one; a huge twisting mass of an ancient sequoia erupting through the wooden floor of the house (and seemingly through the stage itself), providing a large hollow for a room, the hero's sword Nothung sunk deep into its bark. After the darkness of the opening of Die Walküre, the dark mists give way via lighting and subtle back projections to the brightening of Spring colour. Similar effects are used to bring darkness and shade to the tilted circular stage of the second Act, where Wotan seems to have the fate of the world marked out on the floor and handily written in erasable chalk, because Fricka has a few ideas of her own as to how things are going to play out.

It's darkly dramatic, but nothing more. Concept, themes or even direction in this Die Walküre however are almost non-existent. It's not even as if the Salzburg Easter Festival believed that they could lift the designs of an old production and expect it to work by itself. Vera Nemirova is brought in as the director to bring some kind of control over how the drama is played out, but she doesn't seem to bring a great deal to it. There are a few modern touches made to the costumes and props to prevent it looking too embarrassing, but the costumes still look frightfully outdated, Brünnhilde replete with armour, spear and winged helmet.

If there is one element that you can be fairly sure won't be old-fashioned about the production, it's Wagner's score with Christian Thielemann conducting the Staatskapelle Dresden orchestra. And, taking a look over the cast list, there's also a solid line-up with a good mixture of experience and freshness (Seiffert, Zeppenfeld, Kowaljow, Harteros, Kampe, Mayer) that on paper at least looks like it might be capable of making something more of the work on the performance side under Thielemann's direction. It does indeed win through on this front, but only in the long run and not without some initial concerns and bumps along the way.

The majority of the performances were routine and capable, but with a few exceptions not really managing to bring any great sense of life or urgency to the rather dull, traditional staging. Georg Zeppenfeld of course will always be one of those exceptions and his Hunding was flawless as usual. Peter Seiffert has the ideal tone for Siegmund, but he seems tired by the end of Act II. Siegmund would have been running from Hunding all this time so tiredness can be excusable. What matters is that, as tired as he might be, he's not yet ready to let Brünnhilde take him to Valhalla without Sieglinde, and there all the touching poignancy of the moment comes across. Vitalij Kowaljow's Wotan and Christa Mayer's Fricka were fine, but never really rose above the deadness of the direction given to them.

Personally, I was most interested in seeing how Anja Harteros coped in her scenic role debut as Sieglinde, and it wasn't without some trepidation. I admire the ambition, ability and range of Harteros to take in everything from baroque, grand opera and verismo (where she seems to me to be best suited) and extend that now into Wagner, even if not every style suits her voice. I had my doubts about her Act I performance, her Sprechgesang sounding rather thin and stretched, but her voice blooms into emotional expression terrifically. Her commitment can't be faulted and I was won over by her performance by the end of Act II. If nothing else, she brought some life to a production that for the most part felt rather static and routine.

Anja Kampe is another singer who can be relied upon to bring a certain fire to roles, but even though I've seen her sing Kundry more than capably, Brünnhilde is a role that can be beyond the reach of most mortals. I doubted Kampe's ability in her role debut when she seemed to struggle a little in her Act II opening exchanges with Wotan (her costume didn't really lend her any kind of conviction either), but like Harteros she grew in conviction as the opera progressed. Unlike the Act II scenes, there was palpable tension and fear in her Act III encounter with Wotan, a tension that carried over marvellously from the Valkyrie scene, where you can almost feel the dark cloud of the Warfather approaching.

While the lack of imagination in the direction didn't help the earlier scenes, much of this change from static delivery of long lines of text to a rather greater sense of mounting tension and danger is down to the wonder of the extraordinary inherent momentum that Wagner builds up in Die Walküre. The work itself more or less takes over, asserts its own power and comes through to a devastating conclusion/conflagration. It doesn't do it on its own of course, but those forces have to be controlled and managed perfectly. I didn't think Christian Thielemann was doing enough in the pit in the first two Acts to lift the production out of its routine delivery, but the efficacy of his tight rein is evident by the way that the dynamic shifts in the final scenes, from thunderous to deeply moving in its poignancy over questions of fate and how much influence we can have over it. That momentum in the music and singing performances carries this Die Walküre through, but other than that, there is little that is memorable about the revival of this classic production in Salzburg.

Links: Salzburg Festival

Wagner - Tristan und Isolde (Wiener Staatsoper, 2015 - Webcast)

Richard Wagner - Tristan und Isolde

Wiener Staatsoper, 2015

Peter Schneider, David McVicar, Iréne Theorin, Peter Seiffert, Albert Dohmen, Tomasz Konieczny, Petra Lang, Gabriel Bermúdez, Carlos Osuna, Il Hong, Jason Bridges

Wiener Staatsoper Live at Home - 18 January 2015

If due attention is paid to the music itself, Tristan und Isolde is a work that can withstand just about any kind of stage production. Even in the case of a particularly outlandish concept - Marthaler's Bayreuth production being one of the strangest I've seen, but Bill Viola's is also unique - the nature of Wagner's music and its thematic core cannot be steered off its course. There's not a whole lot of room for re-interpretation here, but it still needs performers of considerable ability to get across the full impact of a work that was once deemed impossible to play. Musically and in terms of stage direction, the Vienna State Opera's revival of David McVicar's production, plays it closely by the book, giving full consideration to the actual beauty of the composition as an expression of its themes.

Primarily, I find with David McVicar that mood is the most important consideration. He always strives to establish that right from the outset, even if that means straying a little from the period or tradition. That's of vital importance in a work like Tristan und Isolde. Without adding unnecessary layers or jarring anachronisms, McVicar's production of Tristan und Isolde is fairly simple, stripped back and notionally representational, but it recognises the use and the strength of symbolism in the work and finds a way to convey that according to the libretto, the stage directions and the music itself.

Act I is fairly straightforward, the journey clearly on a ship and at sea, even if the ship is skeletal and of a reduced size for a crossing of the Irish Sea. There would appear to be some contradiction between the silver moonlit scene and the blood red moon, but that's not inappropriate in a work that lies well outside the laws of nature and where symbolism is prevalent. The moon with its gravitational forces as a symbol of passion of the flame of love that burns brightly between Tristan and Isolde, is clearly indicated by the ebb and flow of their encounters and their transcendence interruptus, the fire almost extinguishing at Tristan's lowest moment during the false sighting of Isolde's ship on Kareol. It inevitably burns brightest, glowing red, expanding to almost fill the sky, during the Liebestod.

Elsewhere, the predominant mood established by the production is that of darkness, Night being the other expression of the inverted nature of Tristan and Isolde's forbidden love, forbidden in that its fire is too all-consuming. Their love calls out for darkness, for the extinguishing of the day, for the extinguishing of life even. All three acts take place in near-darkness, lit only by the moon and by fires. It's Act II, where Tristan and Isolde attempt to express the nature of their condition and find that the meaning of words is unable to encompass the contradictory nature of that love, that McVicar turns a little more to abstraction, with a pointed tower on a stage of broken steps, crowned by a weaved circle of thorned wire. Whether you read religious significance into this, spirituality or transcendence, it at least represents the beauty and the terrible nature of their forbidden journey.

The simple abstractions and colours of the stage production reflect the majestic beauty and mystery of the score itself. Peter Schneider's handling of the score and direction of the orchestra could hardly be faulted. It was a rousing performance, measured and stirring, finding and presenting the extraordinary romantic surges in the score, holding back and letting the music assert its own power. Occasionally it's a little too cautious, the beginning of the Liebestod for example slowed down to let Irène Theorin take a gradual build-up that doesn't explode into soaring rapture as much as rest on soft and sweetly acceptance. It matches McVicar's directions for this scene, which has the moon swell and fall below the horizon, the rest of the world vanishing as Isolde calmly exits the stage without succumbing/transcending herself in the traditional manner. While he makes a mark there, and in Tristan pulling himself onto Melot's sword, elsewhere the stage directions are very closely followed.

The ideals that Isolde and Tristan represent are almost impossible to embody in flesh-and-blood singers. One of the greatest Isoldes of recent times is the incomparable Waltraud Meier, but since her retirement from that role Irène Theorin is one of only a few serious contenders, and she made a good case for Isolde here in Vienna. It's a stronger or perhaps more controlled performance than the previous Bayreuth one I've seen. Naturalism is not a consideration here, Isolde swinging between being alternately enraged and quickly composed, and Theorin glides between the ebb and flow of these two states with ease, vocally as well as dramatically. It's perhaps not as enraptured and soaring an Isolde as one might like, but that's fitted to the tone of the production here, and having seen her Elektra, she could well be capable of taking the passions in this role to other places.

Peter Seiffert is, alongside Robert Dean Smith, in demand as a Tristan when singers with the capability to sing such a role are thin on the ground in any generation. Neither of those heldentenors is perfect, but the ideal is close to impossible in any case. There are a few slight wobbles from Seiffert, much as when I saw him sing the role in Berlin a few months ago, but not many. It's a fine, committed performance here overall, working well with Theorin in the duets of Act II, strong, firm and expressive in the demanding and exhausting third act. Albert Dohmen's King Marke was smooth with a sorrowful gravity; Tomasz Konieczny's Kurwenal not always perfect but he was enthusiastically warmly received at the curtain call by the Vienna audience; Petra Lang a little stretched as Brangäne, but the ensemble overall was good for this production, fully getting across the necessary impact of this Wagner masterpiece on the screen, and all the more so I imagine in the house itself.

The Wiener Staatsoper's Live at Home in HD season continues in January with productions of SALOME on 23 Jan and THE QUEEN OF SPADES on 28 Jan. February broadcasts include SIMON BOCCANEGRA, TOSCA, ANDREA CHÉNIER and an EDITA GRUBEROVA gala concert. There are details of how to view these productions in the links below.

Links: Wiener Staatsoper Live Streaming programme; Staatsoper Live at Home video

Wagner - Tristan und Isolde (Staatsoper Berlin, 2014 - Berlin)

Richard Wagner - Tristan und Isolde

Staatsoper Berlin, 2014

Daniel Barenboim, Harry Kupfer, Peter Seiffert, Stephen Milling, Waltraud Meier, Boaz Daniel, Stephen Chambers, Ekaterina Gubanova, Florian Hoffmann, Maximilian Krummen

Staatsoper am Schiller Theater, Berlin - 18 October 2014

How representational do you really need to make Tristan und Isolde? Isn't the journey undertaken by the two protagonists more an emotional journey than one taken at sea from Ireland to Cornwall? Should you not be thinking more about the philosophical content of Schopenhauer and Feuerbach that Wagner is exploring in the opera rather than wondering where the characters are physically located? Can you represent all that, for example, in the huge figure of a fallen angel?

Well, that image - based on a photograph by Isolde Ohlbaum - is the basis of the set for Harry Kupfer's original 2000 production for the Berlin Staatsoper, and it seems to be a powerfully iconic image to build a production around, even if it is difficult to relate it in any direct way to the tragedy of Tristan und Isolde (or Schopenhauer or Feuerbach for that matter). Dominating the stage, the huge angel lies prone, fallen forward, its elbows sunk into the ground, its right wing splayed, the left one shattered. Other than a few headstones scattered on either side of it, this giant is the only set for each of the three acts, occasionally slowly revolved and viewed from 360°. Tristan, Isolde, Brangäne, Kurwenal, King Marke and the others climb over it, lie on it and crawl beneath the broken wings.

There's a post-apocalyptic quality to the imagery which is also reminiscent here of the place beyond space and time occupied by Nikolaus Lehnhoff's production of Parsifal. There is something similarly apocalyptic about the subject of Wagner's retelling of the legend of Tristan und Isolde, the majority of the work taking place far beyond any physical place where the laws of man and rational behaviour hold sway. The forbidden love of Tristan and Isolde, freed from any inhibitions, knows no boundaries, subverts day and night, transcends life and only really finds its purest form in death. This is a work that likewise seeks to destroy the world as we know it and be reborn into something that transcends the physical and aspires to the divine.

That's something of a challenge for any composer to undertake, but I don't think anyone would question the genius of Richard Wagner's ability to convert that into the most sublime musical expression. Much like its abandoned first performances, the work itself still remains a challenge to perform, but the pay-off when it works and when everything comes together is enormous. There really is nothing else like it in all of opera - Wagner's own final masterpiece Parsifal excepted. The Berlin Staatoper, still currently residing at the Schiller Theatre while their Unter den Linden opera house undergoes renovation, with Daniel Barenboim at the helm for Kupfer's production, have one of the best teams in place to do this work justice, and the assembled cast for its 2014 revival certainly impresses.

The actual directing of Tristan und Isolde, as opposed to the production design, is undoubtedly just as complex as it appears to be simple. The motivation of the characters is to all basic intents that of all-consuming love, but obviously it goes beyond that to life-consuming love. You get a true sense of that in the Berlin production. By the end of Act I, having imbibed the love potion, it's not so much a case here of Tristan and Isolde barely being able to restrain themselves, as much as Brangäne and Kurwenal being scarcely able to prise them apart, even as they (notionally) arrive in Cornwall and King Marke strides up the back of the fallen angel to claim the wife Tristan has brought back for him.

Much intensified then, the same sense of burning ardour seeking consummation has therefore to be correspondingly heightened in each of the subsequent acts. That is undoubtedly the strength of this production and much of the reason for its success is down to Daniel Barenboim, one of the finest Wagnerian conductors in the world today. Barenboim seems to have an unerring ability to navigate the complex tidal surges in Wagner's operas, knowing when to hold back the immense forces, how to measure their release and when to let them completely overwhelm. In Tristan und Isolde, that force is deep, intense and slow-building, occasionally rising to an almost unbearable need for release. It's hard to believe that you can raise the stakes this early in Act I and continue to build intensity, but Barenboim and Kupfer's production does just that.

The complex nature of Tristan und Isolde however means that it also needs space to open up and expand, even as the outer world closes down on the two lovers. It needs a human-aspiring-to-superhuman quality to keep the metaphysical thinking grounded in reality and not merely floating off into the realm of abstract philosophical theorising. It needs great singers basically. I've detected some weakening in Waltraud Meier's voice in recent recordings and performances, but working perfectly with Barenboim's management of Wagner's score, her Isolde here was simply outstanding. It's true that her voice doesn't have the same soaring quality that is evident in the 2007 Barenboim/Chéreau Tristan und Isolde on DVD, and some adjustments have to be made, but she remains one of the foremost interpreters of the role. It was a gripping and utterly mesmerising performance.

Peter Seiffert was an impressive Tristan, the intensity of the performance stretching him once or twice, but he was equal to the challenge. Stephen Milling sang wonderfully and with gravity, but there wasn't great personality to his King Marke. Boaz Daniel was a last minute stand-in for a stranded Tómas Tómasson as Kurwenal, and he made a terrific impression, his singing energetic and passionate, making his presence fully felt. Likewise Ekaterina Gubanova gave us a beautifully sung Brangäne that was warm and heartfelt. If there were any weak link this perhaps mightn't have worked so well, but with such a fine cast and a strong conceptual approach backing up the unbeatable combination of Meier, Barenboim and the Staatskapelle Berlin, this was every bit as emotionally devastating and transcendentally uplifting as you would expect Tristan und Isolde to be.

Beethoven - Fidelio

Ludwig van Beethoven - Fidelio

Palau de les Arts 'Reina Sofia', Valencia, 2007

Zubin Mehta, Pier' Alli, Waltraud Meier, Matti Salminen, Juha Uusitalo, Peter Seiffert, Ildikó Raimondi, Rainer Trost, Carsten Stabell, Javier Agulló, Nahuel di Pierro

Sky Arts TV

Revised twice after its first performance as Leonore in 1805 and taking its final form as Fidelio in 1814, Beethoven's only opera is a beautiful testament to humanity, its capacity to love and ability to endure and thrive even in the direst of circumstances. Pier' Alli's direction, set and projections for the 2007 production of the work at the Palau de les Arts 'Reina Sofia' in Valencia is largely period, literal and doesn't attempt anything too adventurous, but it accompanies the sentiments of the work perfectly, as does conductor Zubin Mehta, taking the orchestra through a grand and very moving account of the score that Beethoven laboured over for so many years.

Pier' Alli's direction is quite literal in the sets and their depiction of the 18th century Seville prison and dungeons where the entire work takes place. It's dark, the lighting is sombre, imposing high doors shut off any indication of the world outside and spikes, chains and instruments of torture (emphasised in the projections at the start of Act II) testify to the horrors of the State Prison under the command of Don Pizarro, the governor of the jail. Yet even within such a place, love, hope and more noble sentiments still exist in Jaquino's unrequited love for Marzelline, in Marzelline's love for Fidelio, the young man who has earned the trust and admiration of her father the jailor, Rocco. Fidelio is actually Leonore in disguise, the most faithful of all, hoping to find out if her husband Florestan is imprisoned there and do what she can to help him escape.

The direction doesn't really need to do much to emphasise the brightness in the darkness, and you're not going to notice this anyway when everything that is needed to describe this situation is there in Beethoven's magnificent score, in the stirring sentiments of the libretto and expressed so well in the singing voices. The music is as beautiful, noble and warm as Mozart, ennobled further perhaps through the recognition of the darkness in which the finer spirit of mankind endures. That darker side is more evident when Marzelline's hopes for marriage are put aside (but not discounted) in the later scenes of the first Act and in the early part of the second, as Pizarro plots to dispose of the prisoner he is secretly holding in the deepest dungeon. Its most beautiful expression is there in the scene where the other prisoners take hope in the rare glimpse of light on their walk in the courtyard and express their belief that "We shall be free, we shall find peace".

The light is never snuffed out, no matter how bleak it gets and hope, faith and belief in the supremacy of goodness endures in the hearts of the characters of Fidelio. And no more so than in Leonore/Fidelio. The casting for this production gives us such great singers as Waltraud Meier in the title role and Matti Salminen as Rocco. One could question whether their voices - more Wagnerian than Mozartian - are really right for Beethoven, but it's interesting casting. Neither unfortunately are at their peak here, but their abilities, experience and personality contributes enormously to the overall power of the production. For similar reasons, I wasn't particularly keen on Peter Seiffert's singing as Florestan, nor do I think he carries the role well either. The use of the more Mozartian voices of Ildikó Raimondi and Rainer Trost to express the youthful idealism of Marzelline and Jaquino provides good contrast however and they complement well with the Wagnerians, particularly in the outstanding ensemble finale to Act I.

It's a testament to the production and the rich voices of Meier, Salminen, Uusitalo and Seiffert that Fidelio's themes come through even more strongly in the greater bleakness of the Second Act. Pier' Alli's depiction of the deep dungeon that holds Florestan is superb, a projection of images of spikes and chains taking us down there, and a clever mix of real sets and projected staircases (with virtual prison guards?) creating a truly bleak picture of Florestan's predicament. Beethoven's score rises above it all however, and Zubin Mehta is unable to resist including the third Overture from Leonore as a beautiful moment of contemplation before the finale. It's an imperfect solution to the hurried ending in Beethoven's revised version of the opera, but it rounds out an overall very fine performance of this great work.

D’Albert - Tiefland

Eugen D’Albert - Tiefland

Opernhaus Zürich, 2006

Franz Welser-Möst, Matthias Hartmann, Matthias Goerne, Peter Seiffert, Petra Maria Schnitzer, Lázló Polgár

EMI Classics

Born in Glasgow in 1864, Eugen D’Albert’s musical education in Austria is however one that, based on what is evident in his opera Tiefland (1903), indicates that he is very much a disciple of the Wagnerian school, with even a bit of verismo in his choice of subject and its handling. Apparently Bizet’s Carmen was also an influence on the composer, but although there are a few musical leitmotifs that bear the mark of the original Catalan/Pyrennean setting of Tiefland (based on the play Tierra Baixa - The Lowlands - by Àngel Guimerà, also made into a controversial film by Leni Riefenstahl), the influence is more in the subject of romance, passion and jealousy in a bucolic setting leading to tragedy (a hint of Gounod’s Mireille in there also) than in the actual musical arrangements.

The poor fool caught in the middle of a romantic entanglement here that eventually stirs killing passions is Pedro, a simple shepherd in the mountains who is offered the hand of the miller’s daughter Marta and a place down in the lowland valley by the landlord Sebastiano. Pedro innocently accepts, unaware of the reality of the situation that is known to everyone else in the lord’s household. Sebastiano is in debt and needs to marry a rich woman, but that won’t happen as long as the knowledge of his affair with Marta is widely known and spoken about. His intention then is to safely marry her off to an innocent fool that she couldn’t possibly love so as to keep up appearances of respectability while she remains his “bit on the side”.

Musically, Tiefland follows the Wagnerian model, with long solo singing of emotional intensity that purposefully drives the drama forward, with little in the way of conventional arias, duets or choral arrangements, but the chromatic music has a strong musical presence and leitmotifs that support the singing and indicate the nature of the characters and their motivations. Matthias Goerne is strongest, both in voice and dramatically, making Pedro’s wide-eyed naivety convincing while at the same time showing that he has inner depths and integrity that could indeed draw Marta to rather precipitously fall in love with him. Petra Maria Schnitzer perhaps doesn’t look like she has natural gypsy dancer roots, but sings well as Marta. Peter Seiffert doesn’t quite have the fullness of tone or the menacing build that you would associate with Sebastiano, but takes on the villain role with some relish and without overplaying.

The staging of this 2006 production at the Opernhaus in Zurich attempts to visually steer the drama away from its obvious models and references, and is thereby quite successful in allowing the piece to stand on its own. Some of the decisions are quite bizarre – the opening prologue takes place in what looks like a science-fiction laboratory where the announcement of Pedro’s engagement takes place in a virtual reality, cleverly assembled on projected screens – but thereafter, up until its reappearance in the final scene, the rest of the production is more naturalistic, taking place however in a lush stately house rather than in any period country exteriors.

The 140 minute opera is spread across two-discs on the EMI Classics DVD. The image is 16:9, the image fine, showing a well-lit stage. Audio tracks are LPCM Stereo, Dolby Digital 5.0 and DTS 5.0. The sound is a little thin without the low-end, and sometimes a little echoing, but the singing and orchestra can all be heard clearly. Subtitles are in English, German, French, Spanish and Italian.