Der fliegende Holländer, Bayreuth Festival, July 2012

The 2012 Wagner festival at Bayreuth started in dramatic fashion when the singer in the title role for a new production of The Flying Dutchman suddenly pulled out. Evgeny Nikitin, covered in body-tattoos from his former career as a heavy-metal singer, found himself the focus of attention, and although claims of a swastika seem unfounded, his presence became a hot issue and he withdrew. The festival administration, once run by Hitler admirer Winifred Wagner, took no chances on that score, but all turned out well, and Samuel Youn, who replaced Nikitin, fell to his knees at the end, gratefully accepting thunderous applause for a powerfully sung performance. Adrianne Pieczonka sang a glorious Senta, and her father Daland was warmly portrayed by Franz-Josef Selig as a suave, lightly-bearded character in a double-breasted suit. Benjamin Bruns delivered a beautifully sung helmsman, and Michael König a passionate Erik.

Daland and Dutchman, all images Bayreuther Festspiele/ Enrico Nawrath

The singers, including the fine chorus, were superbly supported by Christian Thielemann, hidden away in the covered orchestra pit of this extraordinary opera house. As one of today’s greatest Wagner interpreters, he gave the music huge excitement, starting with the overture, which brought out and contrasted the elemental power of wind and sea with the plaintive call of the woodwind.

Senta and her toys

The Dutchman roams the seas, halting every seven years to seek redemption through true love, yet this production contains no ships, save a small dinghy at the beginning seating the sea captain Daland and his helmsman. When the Dutchman arrives with his tiny suitcase and strange skin condition, a girl in sexy lingerie tries her luck, but he rejects her. Daland then offers his daughter Senta, whose conventional world is represented as a factory packing electric fans into cardboard boxes. Her yearning to get away is hardly surprising, and her red dress is the only real dash of colour in this dull environment, apart from her cardboard toys splashed with red paint.

Senta’s simple environment contrasts with the hugely elaborate set at the start, showing an alien, electronic world from which the Dutchman emerges, yet the studied uniformity in both worlds emphasises Senta as the one who is different. Subtlety and irony are absent, and for his first production at Bayreuth, 30-year old theatre director Jan Philipp Gloger may have underestimated the power and clarity of Wagner’s music to such a sophisticated audience. After the stamping and cheering for singers and conductor, his production team was greeted with a barrage of boos.

Senta and her Dutchman

In a question and answer session the following day, the director apparently gave clear and reasonable explanations of his interpretation. For example when the Dutchman first arrives he rolls up his sleeve and appears to stab himself in the arm. To the audience this looks rather as if he were giving himself an injection, but in fact it demonstrates that he does bleed when wounded. Later in the opera when he has fallen for Senta his arm bleeds, showing he has become flesh and blood. Such explanations are obviously helpful, but the production should not need them.

Apparently Herr Gloger could relate details of his production to the music itself, which may help explain why the conductor, Christian Thielemann — a great Wagnerian — endorsed him so clearly during the curtain calls, despite the adverse audience reaction.

Performances of Dutchman continue until August 24 — for details click here.

Der Fliegende Holländer, Royal Opera, Covent Garden, October 2011

Jeffrey Tate in the orchestra pit gave Wagner’s Flying Dutchman a wonderful clarity, helped of course by the singers, particularly Anja Kampe as a beautifully pure voiced Senta. This was the role in which she made her Covent Garden debut when the production was new in 2009.

The singers for the other main roles are different this time round, but none the worse for that, and the whole cast made a very fine team. Danish bass Stephen Milling came on very strongly at the beginning as a warm-hearted Daland, and Latvian bass-baritone Egils Silins sang the Dutchman with a noble bearing that was extremely effective towards the end when his voice carried enormous power. This was far better than my recollection of his performance in the same role at the Deutsche Oper in Berlin in the most frightful production I’ve ever seen. John Tessier gave us a feisty and strongly sung Steersman, and Endrik Wottrich was a forceful and anxious Erik.

Daland's crew in merry mood, all images Mike Hoban

The huge chorus was in top form, and musically this was excellent, helped enormously by Tim Albery’s production, which fully deserves a revival three seasons after its first appearance. The openness of the stage allows David Finn’s lighting to play a superb part. Singers are occasionally lit in ways that show only their head and shoulders, yet this can change to reveal the whole body, and the use of colours is very clever. Daland is warmly lit, the Dutchman is coldly lit, and when the Dutchman’s crew appear from nowhere they are in an eerie greenish light. This occurs in an enclave of the stage that previously opened up for Daland’s crew — who have been fooling around and even falling into the water — when suddenly … they scatter as the otherworldly crew take their place. After these ghostly sailors have finished their chorus the opening in the stage slowly closes and we see them no more. It’s very effective.

The phantom crew suddenly replaces Daland's men

The lighting brings out the phantom nature of the Dutchman who perpetually sails the seas, landing only once every seven years to seek salvation in a woman’s undying love. When it appears he may have found redemption this time, he too is cast in a reddish glow, but it is not to be.  As the gangplank to his ship rises, Senta clings on, but in the end she is defeated and takes her place centre stage with her magnificent three-mast model ship, and the lighting does the rest.

It’s a super production with an excellent cast — don’t miss it. Performances continue until November 4 — for details click here — and BBC Radio 3 will broadcast it on November 12 at 6 p.m.

Der fliegende Holländer, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Wagner Wochen, February 2010

The stars of this performance were Manuela Uhl as Senta, and Hans-Peter König as her father Daland. Both sang very strongly, and along with Endrik Wottrich as Erik, they portrayed their roles with great sensitivity. Egils Silins as the Dutchman was not in the same league as Uhl and König. He would have made a good Hunding in Walküre, but did not have the voice to dominate in this particular cast. His stage presence was also weak, and when facing Senta alone on stage he held a rather pathetic stance. A good director should be able to overcome this, but I’m afraid Tatjana Gürbaca was not up to the job. She was probably more concerned with her own strange concept, in which the men were shown as financial traders, and the women as performers and party girls. In the end the Dutchman gave Senta a knife to kill Erik, which she did, and Senta’s nurse Marie killed Senta the same way. I haven’t the faintest idea what story Ms. Gürbaca was trying to stage and, judging by the enormous amount of booing at the end, nor did most of the audience. The words, however, were by Wagner and so was the music, beautifully played under the direction of Jacques Lacombe.

In the previous two operas this week, Lohengrin and Rienzi, the lighting was wonderful but there was no mention of the lighting designer. In this opera, however, Wolfgang Göbbel took credit and it was appalling — far too bright much of the time, and when lights were shone directly into the auditorium it suggested that the director wanted to insult the audience as well as Wagner. Indeed the director was the problem, rather than Herr Göbbel, who designed wonderful lighting for Korngold’s Die Tote Stadt at Covent Garden a year ago. But if you closed your eyes, as I did most of the time, the great music still came through with fine effect.

This is apparently Ms. Gürbaca’s first Wagner opera, and I hope it may be her last.

Wagner Week at the Deutsche Oper in Berlin, February 2010

On February 9^th I shall be in Berlin for a week of Wagner operas at the Deutsche Oper. Here is the list, with details of the performers.

Lohengrin: production by Götz Friedrich, conducted by Michael Schønwandt, with Ben Heppner as Lohengrin, Ricarda Merbeth as Elsa, Waltraud Meier as Ortrud, and Eike Wilm Schulte as her husband Telramund. I recall that Shulte sang a very strong Kurwenal in the Metropolitan live relay of Tristan in March 2008.

Rienzi: production by film director Philipp Stölzl, conducted by Sebastian Lang-Lessing, with Torsten Kerl as Rienzi, who sang Tristan at Glyndebourne in summer 2009. Camilla Nylund will be his sister Irene, Kate Aldrich her lover Adriano, and Ante Jerkunica as Adriano’s father.

Der fliegende Holländer: production by Tatjana Gürbaca, conducted by Jacques Lacombe, with Egil Silins as the Dutchman, Hans-Peter König as Daland, Manuela Uhl as his daughter Senta, and Endrik Wottrich as Erik. Ms Uhl had the misfortune to portray the eponymous role in the dreadful production of Salome by the Deutsche Oper last year, but let’s hope she has the advantage of a sensible production for this opera. Mentioning last year in Berlin, I recall Jacques Lacombe conducting an excellent Ariadne auf Naxos for the Deutsche Oper, and last summer a very fine Tosca for the Royal Opera in London.

Tannhäuser: production by Kirsten Harms, conducted by Ulf Schirmer, with Stephen Gould as Tannhäuser, Nadja Michael as Venus/Elisabeth, and Dietrich Henschel as Wolfram. Both Stephen Gould and Nadja Michael were together at the Royal Opera last January in Korngold’s Die Tote Stadt, an opera, like Tannhäuser, where a young man is pulled into a vortex of desire by a woman portraying two roles.

Die Meistersinger: production by Götz Friedrich, conducted by Donald Runnicles, with James Johnson as Hans Sachs, Klaus Florian Vogt as Walther, and Michaela Kaune as Eva. She was the Marschallin in the Deutsche Oper’s Rosenkavalier last year, and I saw both Vogt and Kaune in the Bayreuth Meistersinger this past summer, where he sang brilliantly despite the diabolical production. Beckmesser will be Marcus Brück, with Ulrike Helzel as Magdalena, and Paul Kaufmann as David.