GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG Opera North, The Lowry
To criticize Wagner’s
dramaturgy in Götterdämmerung for being too conventional is beside the point.
It has love duets, oath-swearing, a choral wedding scene, a vengeance trio and
a funeral march – all ideas other operatic dramatists use. I don’t buy the idea
that the Ring cycle’s parts bear the same relationship to each other as the movements
of a symphony (the first is shorter than the others, and the third is in no way
a scherzo), but Wagner knew he needed a finale, and a finale needs denouements
and drama.
What that drama
provides is a feast of opportunities for the soloists (and, in this case,
chorus), as well as the orchestra, to sock it to their audience. Opera North’s
2016 cast – in eight cases identical to that of 2014 – were up for all of them,
and the orchestra, if not quite on the peak of virtuosic form we saw on
Thursday night, were playing magnificently.
The prolonged standing
ovation that came at the end of the evening was testimony to the gratitude that
surged around the hall at the close of the whole vast undertaking, and the
vision of Opera North’s outgoing musical director, Richard Farnes, in making it
happen. You don’t often hear calls of ‘Maestro, maestro!’ among the bravos at
the end of an opera performance in England, but they were heard last night.
Peter Mumford’s filmic
staging of the story was as lucid and effective as before, but the chief glory
of this performance was in the emotional presence and acting of the principal
characters, combined with some very fine singing, and chief among those, I
think, was soprano Kelly Cae Hogan’s Brünnhilde. Her
power and tone were unflagging – and remember this was her third marathon appearance
in the role in five days – and she brought passion and intensity to every part,
with the immolation as a mighty climax.
I love Mati Turi’s Fred Flintstone-style interpretation
of Siegfried (and did when he took the role in both the latter parts of the
cycle before), and he made another fine job of it this time, despite some
strain creeping into the highest register towards the end.
But perhaps the most surprising elements,
in soloistic terms, were the heartfelt and energized characterization of
Gutrune by Giselle Allen, a wonderful dramatic singer, and the attention held
throughout her monologue by Heather Shipp as Waltraute – both newcomers to the
cast this year (though of course we’ve known them as great artists with Opera
North before).
Mats Almgren (Hagen) and Jo Pohlheim
(Alberich) fulfilled every expectation in their respective personifications of
evil and meanness, and sang with resonant malevolence, and Andrew
Foster-Williams made the weak-willed and covetous Gunther a petulant egotist
while singing with consistent strength.
The Valkyries from Das Rheingold (Jeni Bern, Madeleine Shaw and Sarah Castle) were
as liquidly lovely as before, and Fiona Kimm, Yvonne Howard and Lee Bisset made
baleful Norns. Opera North are lucky to be able to have singers from big roles
in other parts of the cycle taking the lesser ones here as a bonus. And the 50-strong
chorus (35 of them men) made that wedding scene – which all ends in tears in a way
that outdoes any TV soap opera) – completely thrilling.
****
Robert Beale
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