Summer knights
Two new releases each demonstrate how this can be accomplished with a minimum of stage business. Placido Domingo, Cheryl Studer and an inspired Vienna State Opera Orchestra under Claudio Abbado breathe life into a dull, dimly lit 1990 production on an Arthaus Musik DVD
Lohengrin is a prelude to Wagner’s mature phase, with leitmotifs and musical keys assigned to characters and situations and a through-composed score that Franz Liszt, who conducted the 1850 premiere in Weimar, said marked the end of the “old world of opera.” Though enthusiasm was at first limited to the musical intelligentsia, the stirring choruses and back story of Germans defending their Empire’s honor again invaders soon enough made Lohengrin a popular vessel for nationalistic pride during Germany’s unification.
The Vienna production by Wolfgang Weber unfortunately has a mail-it-in quality that ignores obvious dramatic threads such as the plot’s conflict between Christianity and paganism. Instead, we’re treated to a series of static tableaus so dark that some ensemble shots on the video directed by Brian Large seem blurry. Characters move tentatively, sapping scenes like the Act 2 confrontation between Ortrud and Elsa in front of the cathedral of much spontaneity or tension. Lohengrin’s Act 1 fight scene with Telramund is lame, if mercifully brief.
It’s up to the singers to make the evening, and they pretty much all deliver. In the title role, Domingo is handsome and dignified, with a Latinate sound that seems appropriate for a character whose otherworldly purity set him apart from pretty much everyone else on stage. The tenor also sounds a bit more convincing than he did in the recording made with Sir Georg Solti for Decca several years before this performance; the Grail narrative “In fernem Land” unspools with nobility and unwavering determination, conjuring visions of a magical distant land that seems a world apart from the drab stage setting.
Studer delivers a polished vocal performance as Elsa, vulnerable in the pivotal face-off with Ortrud and full of robust lyricism in the Act 3 bridal chamber scene with Lohengrin. Though her facial expressions and acting range are somewhat limited, you still get a strong sense of mounting anxiety and genuine heartbreak.
Hartmut Welker is a lyrical and intense Telramund, mining his character’s ambitions and insecurities without having to shout. Dunja Vekzovic is perhaps the weakest link in the cast as Ortrud, failing to capture the temptress’ unhinged state or menacing qualities until the very end of the opera, when she finally lets go and exults over Elsa’s betrayal of Lohengrin. Robert Lloyd is a commanding King Henry.
Abbado’s keen attention to tonal colors makes one appreciate the way Wagner made different sections of the orchestra portray the characters, or symbols such as the Grail. The woodwinds voice Elsa’s music with an aching quality reminiscent of the Vienna Philharmonic in Rudolf Kempe’s landmark EMI recording. Abbado favors relatively brisk tempi in the Act 1 and 3 preludes and keeps the sometimes problematic middle act from slipping into tedium. The only quibble is that his focus on drawing out the score’s ardent lyricism comes at the expense of some of its drama and bite.
Janowski, who has retreated from staged performances in response to the excesses of the Regie movement, probably would have felt quite comfortable with the Vienna production. His concert Lohengrin, recorded in November 2011, proceeds at a business-like clip, free of interpretive shortcomings or, for that matter, much insight. There’s a certain sense of genug, as if a clean, transparent reading will somehow compensate for decades of ill-considered liberties other artists have visited on the composer’s material.
I find the approach better-suited for this kind of early Wagner than for the elusive mysticism of a Parsifal; there’s an unforced “once upon a time” quality to this damsel-in-distress tale and a keen sense of the underlying pulse that allows the drama to unfold naturally, despite the numerous changes in tempi and instrumental voicings.
Klaus Florian Vogt’s tenor at first sounds almost too light and lyrical for the title role but rings out assertively in the Act 1 confrontation with Telramund and again, in the scene before the cathedral. Compared to Domingo’s more all-purpose Romantic sound, Vogt’s voice has a crystalline quality that seems to epitomize the character’s uprightness and honor, with effortless high notes, tender mezza voce and scrupulous diction.
His Elsa, Annette Dasch, has a lovely voice that only sounded a bit taxed toward the end of the 3 hour 20 minute performance. The concert format curiously underscores the lack of magnetism between Elsa and Lohengrin: While she’s certainly grateful for being rescued, one is more aware of how hard it is for the two characters to really relate when you’re not watching them try on stage. The lack of visuals also helps you suspend belief at Elsa’s implausible death-by-grief at the opera’s conclusion – a plot element even Wagner conceded was dramatically problematic.
Among the rest of the cast, Susanne Resmark’s vibrato-laden Ortrud sounds overtaxed at key moments, such as Act 2’s “Entweihte Götter.” Gerd Grochowski is a bit foursquare as Telramund, with a middleweight voice that doesn’t have enough impact to punch through the orchestral accompaniment. Gunther Groissböck was excellent as King Henry.
The biggest stars of the evening, however, were the members of the Berlin Radio Chorus, so crisp and full of rapt wonder during Lohengrin’s Act 1 entrance and solemn and stirring during the Act 2 procession “Gesegnet soll sie schreiten.” In an opera with such prominent choral parts, their delicate touches and vivid characterization go a long way toward bridging magical and mortal realms.
Thank you Adriel for these reviews.
I, too, have always felt that Domingo’s Latinate sound makes a virtue of Lohengrin’s “otherness”; by the same token it counts against him in the DG Tannhauser where Studer shines as Elisabeth.
Praise for the sound of Miss Dasch’s voice is interesting -- she gets plenty of stick from Parterriani. For my own part, I only saw her once, as a bright-toned Pamina in Munich on the night we all wanted (with hindsight) to be at La Scala: 7 December 2006, Alagna vs. the loggionisti. But I got to see and hear Diana Damrau as a stupendous KdN and that was good enough for me.
Can I ask: are you American, and do Americans routinely talk of “suspending belief”? When I first heard the phrase “suspend your disbelief” I had trouble with it, thinking the reference should be to belief. It took me a while to get it. ["Inflammable" is another bugbear, especially on products that display multiple languages. One anglophone's inflammable is a francophone's flammable, it seems.]
I don’t get what ‘suspend your belief’ would mean. The meaning of ‘suspend your disbelief’ is clear- put your disbelief on a temporary sabbatical so you can be swept away by what might otherwise seem beyond credulity.
But, armer, as a fellow f***ing Brit, have you ever been baffled by the common tendency amongst those damn Yankees to say “I could care less” when they really mean “I couldn’t care less”?
I’ve always assumed that ‘I could care less’ has a kind of inaudible ellipsis at the end. (‘I could care less but it would be difficult’ or whatever).
I say “I couldn’t care less.” However, when people say, “I could care less,” I take it to mean, “I could care less, but why bother, because it’s not worth caring about.”
…..rather …the issue not worth worth caring or not caring about? Why bother?
Since I’m sure present company is not vulnerable to the anti-linguist bias that sometimes crops up on Parterre, here’s a partial analysis of “could care less” from a professional linguist (with further links to more discussion):
http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/001182.html
As to “flammable” vs. “inflammable”: the OED gives them as synonyms, though the latter is older (first citation 1605) than the former (a mere youngster dating to no later than 1813).
Interesting, Batty. Good to read from you again.
Very interesting, Batty, and I shall pass it on to my spouse, who cares a great deal about all such linguistic matters.
I am left wondering, enticingly so, as to what Mme. Norma Loquendi’s interpretive style in “Casta Diva” would be. Would she sing everything “come scrito”, or interpolate some of the approved Ricci variazioni, or just make shite up?
Actually, Camille, Norma Loquendi remarried and became Norma Desmond, and only does faces now.
I AM BIG!
Thanks for letting me know. I shall be on the lookout for her prima facie
Gloria was robbed of her Oscar.
Waxman sure deserved one!
I agree mit you!
He had certainly been listening most attentively to his R. Strauss, hadn’t he?
What’s a “francophone’s flammable”?
I guess “inflammable” is related to the word “inflame.” I guess the “in” of “inflame is not the “in” of “inaudible.”
…it seems not. The French would say inflammable and its contrary would be ininflammable.
D’amour l’ ardente inflammation ….
Inflammen, non perdonami…
Here’s one for Zinka and co. One of the greatest veristas ever, in one of her greatest recordings:
What a sweet recording and how nice to hear again after so many years! She was such an interesting artist.
Thank you so much for giving me the chance to remember this music and La Favero.
Suspend disbelief is probably used more frequently. What I guess I was driving at is you have to stop believing what you usually believe for the character’s implausible death to make some sense.
The phrase and concept of suspending disbelief was coined by that venerable Brit, S.T. Coleridge.
Once again, thank you Adriel for this review. Lohengrin was the first opera I ever fell in love with and I never tire listening to as many different performances as I can. My favorite part of the Abbado/Domingo DVD is actually the orchestral prelude to the great double chorus “Heil Koenig Heinrich” where is camera is on Abbado’s thrilling conducting. I found it amazing that the flatulent critic Anthony Tommasini reveled that his NYT’s book of opera omitted Lohengrin.
TT, flatulent?
Somebody bring us a lighted match. Time to find out if his farts are flammable or inflammable.
Why yes, flatulent, as in a gasbag. All of TT’s reviews are flammably inflammable, gaseous rhetorical nonsense.
Back to the opera under review: thanks Adriel. It sounds like neither recording would serve as one’s introduction to Lohengrin. SFO is mounting a production this fall and I’ve never seen it nor heard it before (in its entirety) so I’m in the market for a study aid.
Cruz, the entire “rat” Lohengrin from Bayreuth is available on YouTube. I highly recommend it, even if it’s not traditional.
Lengthy excerpts of more traditional productions are also available if you look under “Lohengrin gesamt.”
From what I can tell, the version we’re getting next season is in the non-traditional mode:
http://www.houstongrandopera.org/rentallohengrin
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/entertainment/2004416834_apmusiclohengrin.html
“Too much to hope” for rats in SF? Thanks, Batty, for the pointers.
Cruz, if you get the Bayreuth rat Lohengrin, you could use it as a study aid for the artistry of Petra Lang … whom I understand will regale you with her Ortrud in SF!
- If I was going to get another Lohengrin, I think I would try to hunt down the old Buenos Aries Victoria de los Angeles -- Christa Ludwig one. Not so bombastic, perhaps, but a lot more elegant.
Yes, Lang is scheduled to sing Ortrud here. (I write “scheduled” not because I have inside knowledge to the contrary, but so much in life is certain — opera singers’ health included). I’ve never heard her. Live.
*so much in life is UNcertain…
The Steber/Varnay/Windgassen/Keilberth Bayreuth 1953 is also fascinating. That plus the rats and you’ve got generations of Bayreuth covered
Thanks for including the year, lorenzo. I’m finding that a lot of these singers can be heard with many of the same costars, on multiple recordings, so knowing the year really helps.
CruzSF, I was at a dinner party at a friend’s place in Venice; I had brought a baritone friend who was in town to sing at Fenice. Across the table was a very old, church-mouse poor lady composer who was a regular at this table. I was telling my friend about this particular Lohengrin which I had just discovered to my great delight, and she shouted across the table, “I was there!” We all laughed. She trumped my ace. It was the first of many “I was there” moments; happens here all the time
and it always make me laugh.
That’s a good one. Funny to think that in 60 years, some of us here will be able to say that about some of this year’s performances, across a dinner table and wine. I wonder which performances will be talked about (fondly) in 60 years…
Let’s not forget:
1959 Konya Leonie Varnay Blanc; Cluytens
1960 Konya Gruemmer Gorr Blanc; von Maticic (HEIL!)
Both Konya recordings mentioned by Krunoslav are from Bayreuth. The Cluytens/Rysanek set is from 1958, not 1959. It is, apparently, the premiere performance of the production, and Konya’s Bayreuth debut.
While he was the best Lohengrin of the period, the best overall recording of the opera remains the EMI set made by Kempe around 1964. Thomas, Grummer, Ludwig, Fischer-Dieskau and Frick are all in top form, as is the orchestra and Kempe’s lucid and transparent reading.
The Buenos Aires set is of interest for De Los Angeles, but beware: the production is heavily cut, and the chorus sings in Italian.
Do you not have the Kaufmann/Harteros from a few years ago? The singing is wondrous.
I’m afraid I don’t have that one (yet), louann. I tend to add to my collection in anticipation of a live performance. Unless I get on a jag due to something I’ve read (hence the short-lived buying frenzy of German Baroque earlier this year). Lohengrin hasn’t been performed locally since I’ve started going to performances, so it hasn’t made its way into my library yet.
“His Elsa, Annette Dasch, has a lovely voice”
…when placed on a continuum from Hannelore Bode to Leonore Kirchstein, perhaps.
Lovely, meaning that it will not stay with us for long.