Make a wish
“Everyone now tiptoes around James Levine, with breath held and fingers crossed waiting for the next health update. He has already received ecstatic notices in some quarters for this performance, but to my ears that is either misplaced charity or simply wishful thinking….
“This was the first time I had heard Levine live this season, and although there were no outright disasters, the orchestral playing struck me as woefully unfinished, tonally undernourished and at times even tentative, as if the musicians were guiding the conductor instead of vice versa. It is painful to report that Levine looked very frail as he struggled onstage to take a bow at the end, supported on either side by Voigt and Terfel. The conductor continues to issue bulletins confidently saying that his strength increases daily, and one can only pray that it’s true.” Peter G. Davis, reviewing Die Walküre, in Musical America (subscription required).
La Cieca,
Thanks for the laugh.
At that long ago performance I had about the same seats as on Monday. I am not complaining about Levine, and I have praised Kaufmann no end, and meant to. He is as wonderful as they come. No doubt nostalgia plays a part in my opinions, but I am not alone, all the old ears are not dead. On the other hand, I have no reservations in agreeing with operaddict. I can do a scientific test. Go back to the Met and after that third act run home and listen to Nilsson and Stewart in recordings. In the first case a Terfel that looks like a Barbiere Bartolo impersonating God, in the other a properly interpreted godly Wagner scene.
Anyway, I had no hand in the production then, as I don’t do now, but that upside down Brünhilde now was just the drop that overflowed the glass. What unWagnerian nonsense! Karajan had no machine noise with his magic fire music! God bless Herbert, and divine Nilsson too.
You do realize that 45 years ago, there were members of the audience making similar comments about the production because it was different from 1935 -- Flagstad and Schorr didn’t have to deal with this un-Wagnerian silliness, etc. And do you really think anyone intended the machine noise to be audible over the music?
operaddict talks about a lack of grandeur compared to those days. That’s not surprising as society has grown more casual, less formal. We’re all products of our times, so our art will reflect our society. I don’t understand why opera should remain frozen in the past, like a fly in amber, other than it makes some audience members more comfortable.
What is scientific about comparing a live performance in the theatre to a recording? A recording that may have been played over and over until its every detail, every fault, every thrill and every nuance is ingrained, to the extent that some (not necessarily you, La Valkyrietta), when attending the live performance, may find it difficult to listen with fresh ears.
How can I compare Terfel’s appearance to a sound recording of Stewart?
I can’t wait for the last scene of the new Siegfried. How will Brunhilde get back on her feet and start singing? Isn’t she supposed to have her shield on top of her? How will Siegfried discover that she’s not a man?
One other question. When Hunding kills Siegmund, he has a bunch of his gang with him. They all stand and watch and do nothing. Why don’t they attack Wotan? Particularly after Wotan dispatches Hunding. Are they supposed to recognize Wotan?
Arianna d Nasso: Many modern productions and standards can be viewed as living corpses waiting to be preserved in the nearest available formaldehyde to stop their rapid deterioration levels, they give off.
Multi-millions of dollars spent on a glorified xylophone contraption, looking also like a joined set of kid’s adjustable see-saws. Thee sorts of mod art structures designed to be displayed, using ‘the soaring marvels of free space’: were old hat, even 30 years ago.
As for commenting on its noise: surely Le Page could have included in its cost, a oil can man to run round and grease the joints with a few cents worth of oil. What is the MET going to do when they are finished with it; sell it for scrap metal?
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We’re all products of our times, so our art will reflect our society.
Let me copy from a Wagner letter to Liszt of May 8th. 1857. No doubt most have read it, but some may not have (including Lepage and Terfel, perhaps). He was living in Zurich, was working on Walkure, and had just taken possession of the little country house next to Mathilde’s villa.
“…With a local prima-dona, whom you heard in “La Juive”, I studied the great final scene of the “Valkyrie”. Kirchner accompanied; I hit the notes famously, and this scene, which gave you so much trouble, realised all my expectations. We performed it three times at my house, and now I am quite satisfied. The fact is, that everything in this scene is so subtle, so deep, so subdued, that the most intellectual, the most tender, the most perfect execution in every direction is necessary to make it understood; if this, however, is achieved, the impression is beyond a doubt. But of course a thing of this kind is always on the verge of being quite misunderstood, unless all concerned approach it in the most perfect, most elevated, most intelligent mood; merely to play it through as we tried, in a hurried way, is impossible…”
For no reason at all to replace the soprano with a contortionist that can bear to be put upside down a long time, to introduce alien machine noises that are not in the score, is not really in the Wagner spirit, as we can gather from this and many passages on the subject. I think what Karajan did was closer to Wagner than what we currently have. This opera is an intimate drama, a series of dialogues, not according to Valkyrietta, but to whatever we have left of written Wagner’s ideas and intentions. Yes, fashions change, but if you change something that is not a circus into a circus, well, you are not following the will of Wagner.
I’m sure many love the machine. Fine, life is to be enjoyed. As for me, and I think I speak for Wagner’s will when I say I can’t wait for it to be discarded.
I also liked the von Karajan production very much. I agree with LC that at the premiere and while von Karajan conducted the Walkuere was very subdued and dark. The critics did not like that. He was trying to produce a “lyrical” Wakuere, with lighter voices than usual, i.e., Crespin as Brunhilde and Janowitz as Sieglinde. von Karajan conducted Das Rheingold more in the standard manner.
The production worked quite well in revivals with other singers and conductors. I’d prefer it to the two productions that followed it.