Wagner, Der Fliegende Holländer

From Seen and Heard International
By: José M Irurzun; Picture © Javier del Real
Soloists, Orquesta Sinfónica de Madrid. Coro Intermezzo. Conductor: Jesús López Cobos. Teatro Real de Madrid. 19 and 20.1.2010 (JMI)

Anja Kampe as Senta.

The new year starts in Madrid with these performances of Wagner’s Dutchman, a work that
has not been performed at the Teatro Real since the end of 19th century, except for a visit by Berlin Staatsoper a few years back. The current performances of this opera have been good rather than brilliant, although clearly better than those seen lately in Barcelona and Seville.

This co-production between Barcelona’s Liceu and Madrid’s Teatro Real has stage direction by Àlex Rigola and was premiered at the Liceu some three years ago. The production moves the action to modern times, which is acceptable, bearing in mind this is a legend which can fit any era. Rigola is a man of the theatre but this time he concentrated mostly on the aesthetics, rather than the stage action, almost as if it was not greatly important. Act I takes place on two levels: the berthing quay and the bridge of the Norwegian boat, each stage perfectly adequately, particularly at the arrival of the Dutch ship. In Act II, Daland’s home becomes the dining room of Daland and Co. since Daland is shown as an industrialist. The room has a soft drinks machine and large windows at the back, through which we can see the ocean. The last act takes place in the breakwater next to Daland’s factory with spectacular projections of waves hitting the breakwater stones. The weakest parts of the production are the actual stage direction and an inability to draw decent standards from the large chorus: a few stage management details, achieved more or less well enough with extras are not sufficient to ensure the production’s success.

Musical direction was the responsibility of Jesús López Cobos, who produced a performance much in line with others he has conducted in recent years – an effective and clean reading, always under control but with a certain imbalance between the brass section and the strings, particularly in the Overture. López Cobos delivered his best work in the final act and overall I would say that his performance was rather better than some he has given recently although still rather short of romantic atmosphere. The orchestra played very well though, certainly much better than anything heard in Barcelona three years ago, and some fine chorus work was a very nice surprise.
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Wagner, Tristan und Isolde

By James L Zychowicz

Reprinted with permission from Seen and Heard – Music Web’s Live Opera, Concert and Recital Reviews.

Soloists, Chorus and Orchestra of Lyric Opera of Chicago, Sir Andrew Davis (conductor) Lyric Opera Center Chicago 31.1.2009 (JLZ)

Production:
Director: José María Condemi
Stage, Set and Costume Design: David Hockney
Lighting: Duane Schuler

Chorus Master: Donald Nally
Conductor: Sir Andrew Davis

Cast:
Isolde: Deborah Voigt
Tristan: Clifton Forbis
Brangäne: Petra Lang
Kurwenal: Jason Stearns (Jan. 27-Feb. 8; Greer Grimsley, Feb. 12-28)
Marke: Stephen Milling
Melot: Daniel Billings

The Act I Set

Since its premiere in 1865, Richard Wagner’s signal work of musical modernism, Tristan und Isolde, remains a truly powerful opera, and this recent production by Lyric Opera of Chicago was exceptionally moving. With its fine international cast, an experienced conductor and orchestra, and an effective production by David Hockney, the combined elements produced a fine synergy; invoking the cliché, that this was as near to Gesamtkunstwerk as one might hope to experience anywhere.

Deborah Voigt was compelling both vocally and dramatically as Isolde, a role in which she seemed to be fully absorbed. Her steely vocal edge in the first act shocked us into grasping Isolde’s sudden realization of her fate at the hands of the English knight whose own destiny had been so recently in her own hands. She commanded the stage in the narrative “Wie lachend sie mir Lieder singen” sustaining the mood in the encounter with Tristan that followed. The recognition scene at the end of the act was stunning vocally, as her voice soared freely to express the ecstasy induced by the love potion. In the second-act duet “Tristan! Isolde! O sink hiernieder” the particularly focused rapport with Clifton Forbis’s Tristan added enormous intensity to the lovers sense of psychic unity expressed in Wagner’s Schopenhauer-inspired libretto. As this Isolde reprised Tristan’s music from the second act at the famous “Liebestod” with which the opera ends, the audience understood the entirety of the depth of love depicted on stage. Voigt’s portrayal was intensely musical and emotionally compelling in all three acts.

Deborah Voight (Isolde) and Clifton Forbis (Tristan)

Clifton Forbis was a strong and persuasive Tristan, as easy in his role as Voigt was in hers. Forbis gave a welcome physicality to the role from the start, responding dramatically to the relentless accusations that Isolde weighed on him in the first act. His body language and gestures were a perfect foil for Isolde’s rage, and the full voiced singing he produced for the second-act duet demonstrated his own commitment to a Tristan equally absorbed in the magic that ultimately sealed his fate. The joint lyricism was as intoxicating as it should be, evcen when interrupted by Melot’s betrayal of the lovers to King Mark. As lyrical as Forbis was in the second act, his “delirium” in the third act, was marvellously sung too always underscoring the meaning of the text to perfection. This was a tremendous performance, matching Deborah Voigt’s characterisation magnificently.

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Strauss, Elektra

By Bernard Jacobson

Reprinted with permission from Seen and Heard – Music Web’s Live Opera, Concert and Recital Reviews.

Seattle Opera, soloists, cond. Lawrence Renes, dir. Chris Alexander, set designer Wolfram Skalicki, costume designer Melanie Taylor Burgess, lighting designer Marcus Doshi, Marion Oliver McCaw Hall, Seattle, 18, 19, & 29. 10. 2008 (BJ)

It is too easy, in discussing Strauss’s Elektra, to stress the sheer aggressiveness of the score at the expense of other equally important qualities. From a composer who had already established his modernist and psychologically penetrative credentials in Salome, the drama of Elektra’s obsession with avenging her father Agamemnon’s death naturally drew clamorous orchestral writing and dissonant superimpositions of mutually contradictory chords that grind terrifyingly on the ear.

Yet Hofmannsthal’s and Strauss’s Elektra is not merely a violently inclined madwoman–her madness, and her lust for vengeance, are the twisted results of a love for her lost father and a capacity and longing for family happiness that have been unhinged by the trauma of that father’s murder by his wife Klytämnestra and her lover Aegisth. (I give the characters’ names in their German versions for consistency’s sake.) This shattering experience, intensifying the “Elektra complex” posited by Jung as a daughter-father counterpart to Freud’s “Oedipus complex,” is just one psychologically significant element in the plot – Freud’s emphasis on the importance of dreams, too, is evoked by the nightmares that have poisoned Klytämnestra’s sleep and also torture her daughter.

If it had been merely bloodcurdling, Seattle Opera’s new Elektra would have been a less astounding achievement. What this stunning production managed to do, without shortchanging the violence of the action or the uncompromising vehemence of Richard Strauss’ music, was to reveal the humane and lyrical side of both in their full glory. Yes, the composer of Elektra was the composer of Salome; but very soon he would be the composer of Der Rosenkavalier, and you could hear that in the warmth and lyricism that, together with the moments of gruesome discord, emerged from the pit.

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