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.

Tannhäuser, Royal Opera, Covent Garden, December 2010

When the Paris Opera invited Wagner to produce a new version of Tannhäuser they asked him to insert the customary ballet in Act II, but he refused. Instead he expanded the Venusberg music to include a ballet in Act I, and the result was pandemonium. The aristocrats of the Jockey Club, accustomed to leaving their dining tables after the interval to view their favourite dancers, disrupted the production with cat-calls and dog whistles until Wagner was permitted to withdraw it after three performances.

Tannhäuser in the Venusberg, all photos by Clive Barda

What the choreography in Paris was like, I don’t know, but here in Tim Albery’s new production the choreography by Jasmin Vardimon worked well. It involved a long table with smartly dressed young men and women displaying enormous physical energy, and partially stripping off one another’s clothes towards the end of the scene. When the first part of Act I is over and Tannhäuser has abandoned his beloved Venus, the curtain closes across a proscenium arch on stage — this is a second proscenium arch, identical to the one at the front of Royal Opera House auditorium. It reappears in Act II, lying on the ground in a broken form, with the curtain a mere reddish rag on the floor. I wondered what the point was — is this to be the setting for the song contest at the Wartburg? Only when it reappeared in Act III, utterly broken into pieces of driftwood, did I see this as a metaphor for the Venusberg in Tannhäuser’s unconscious mind.

Elisabeth and the broken proscenium arch in Act II

Before Tannhäuser reappears from his pilgrimage to Rome in Act III, his old friend Wolfram stands on a piece of this driftwood bridging a chasm on stage, and after seeing a portent of death he launches into O du mein holder Abendstern (O you my precious evening-star). The evening star is of course the planet Venus, but how different is this celestial Venus to Tannhäuser’s Venus of earthly rapture. As different of course as the chaste Elisabeth to the lascivious Venus, well sung here by two different performers, Eva-Maria Westbroek and Michaela Schuster. Wolfram’s unassuming love for Elisabeth was convincingly portrayed by Christian Gerhaher, a remarkable baritone who has studied philosophy and is a qualified physician. He sang as if this were a lieder recital, filling the auditorium with beautiful sound. Tannhäuser himself was boldly and strongly sung by Johan Botha, whose ample frame suits the role of one who has taken his fill of earthly delights. Yet in Act I he sings that despite wandering in far distant lands, he never found rest nor peace (ich nimmer Rast noch Ruhe fand), and it came over with real feeling. This is the story of a man who succumbs to worldly delights yet cannot sate his desire for a deeper satisfaction, and cannot seem to redeem himself. His journey to Rome is a metaphor for his attempt to do so, but it only succeeds when Elisabeth is dead and he finally gives up the effort, resigning himself to his apparent fate.

Wolfram and the dying Elisabeth

Wagner used Christianity as the backdrop for this drama, and the miracle of the Pope’s staff yielding new shoots is a metaphor for the miracle of redemption. Other tales of this nature use other methods of redeeming the lost soul — Wagner’s story is not essentially Christian. Tannhäuser is simply a great opera, and Semyon Bychkov conducted brilliantly, with the musicians playing superbly and the brass going off-stage at one point to play horns from a balcony on the side. Musically it was terrific, and even though I thought the broken proscenium arch of Act II detracted rather than added to an understanding of the song contest, I felt by the end that it had its place in the overall scheme. When I commented on Act II to a friend in the second interval he wittily riposted, “I always think Act II is a good time for dinner”. This wonderful bon motnotwithstanding, here was five hours of excellence, not to be missed.

Performances continue until January 2^nd — for more details click here.