Richard Wagner: The Last of the Titans - a flawed look at a flawed man

Richard Wagner: The Last of the Titans
by Joachim Köhler
Translated by Stewart Spencer
New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004

Few historical figures have had as much written about them as Richard Wagner. Despite the library shelves groaning with books about the Bayreuth Master, Joachim Köhler has added to the hoard with almost 700 pages of text, splendidly translated by Stewart Spencer.

Wagner receives little sympathy from Köhler, and little attention is paid to the music. Instead, Köhler puts Wagner on the psychoanalyst's couch and repeats ad nauseam the litany of Wagner's antisemitism. That Wagner resented and even hated the Jews as a race is hardly news, but Köhler only touches on the many Jews with whom Wagner was friendly and who admired his work.

Wagner's difficult, even traumatic childhood is well-known. Köhler's strained efforts to read Wagner's childhood demons into the operas is not particularly enlightening. While his analysis of the libretti is sometimes insightful, he neglects almost completely any commentary about the music (there are no musical examples).

That is strange because he recognizes that Wagner's innovative use of the orchestra inevitably puts the singers at a disadvantage. Even at the Festspielhaus in Bayreuth, with its amphitheater seating, darkened interior, and orchestra pit buried under the stage, the theatrical elements of the operas still often predominate. Köhler sees Parsifal, the scoring of which is as luminous as the libretto is obscure, as an exercise in sexual obsession, a perspective which ignores the explicit Christian references in the text.

Wagner was the musical colossus of his age, and his successors for decades thereafter either counted themselves among his acolytes or struggled to escape his shadow. Probably no other composer, Beethoven perhaps excepted, had a more profound impact on his contemporaries. But Wagner is too often judged by those who, like Köhler, put more emphasis on what Wagner said than on what he did. Wagner profoundly affected the course of 19th Century intellectual life, musical and otherwise. (See Jacques Barzun, Darwin - Marx - Wagner - Critique of a Heritage). But that "titan" of the title of Köhler's book hardly emerges from this biography.

Köhler does cast some new light on the baleful influence of Wagner's widow Cosima. She became, late in Wagner's life, not only his wife, muse, and amanuensis, but also the CEO of "Bayreuth, Inc." In her eyes and those of her family who succeeded her as keepers of the Bayreuth grail, Wagner's work was an enterprise that it was her duty to preserve intact.

 Wagner was a great artist, but in many ways an appalling human being. Still, for those of us who love his art, his many character flaws are forgotten as soon as we enter the world that he created. (See M. Owen Lee, Wagner: The Terrible Man and His Truthful Art).

 - WTJU Opera

LETTER FROM BAYREUTH

Wagnerians could be nowhere else this summer of the bicentennial of Wagner’s birth but in Bayreuth for the new production of the Ring. This writer was one of the privileged few to have a ticket for one of the three Ring cycles presented at the Festival this summer (the second cycle, August 14-19). The brutal heat, topping 95 degrees in Central Europe, had finally abated, leaving cool evening air in its wake, making the atmosphere of the Festspielhaus at least tolerable.

Much critical commentary has already been written about the staging by Berlin director Frank Castorf. To characterize it as "Eurotrash" is almost a compliment. Rarely has such egotistical, willfully ugly, vulgar, and patently condescending staging been seen on any operatic stage, let alone one as exalted as Bayreuth's. The staging was especially unfortunate in that Castorf has a virtuoso director’s facility for using props and movement on the stage for visual effect. Yet his staging reflected his contempt for the audience in the house. This production seemed to say "I want to see just how much crudity served up by my ego you can tolerate in the guise of service to great art." That said, it speaks to Wagner's genius and the commitment of the artists for this Ring that somehow Wagner's mighty vision survived the offense visited on his creation by Castorf's production.

To pick just a few examples, what kind of imagination could conceive of the Rhinemaidens as voluptuous floozies turning tricks in a rundown second-rate motel run by Wotan? This is, after all, Der Ring des Nibelungen, but where are the Nibelungs? Nowhere to be found, rendering the chorus of clanging anvils that accompanies the voyage of Wotan and Loge to Nibelheim completely pointless. In Siegfried the purpose of the forging of the great sword Notung is to give Siegfried a weapon with which to dispatch Fafner and seize the gold. Fafner is done in by a burst of fire from Siegfried’s Kalashnikov assault rifle! Thereafter Notung becomes nothing more than a pointless prop. To a red Berliner of Castorf's generation, knee-jerk anti-Americanism comes with the territory, even though it has nothing to do with Castorf's narrative, assuming that there is a narrative. wake, making the atmosphere of the Festspielhaus at least tolerable.

Fortunately, this Ring was saved from disaster by the performing artists. The singing, with few exceptions, was of a high order. Wolfgang Koch's Wotan, while the voice is a bit light for the role, was lyrically sung. Sorin Coliban's Fafner, while well sung, was eclipsed by the Fasolt of Günther Groissböck. He has a resonant bass voice and an appropriately menacing stage presence. Nadine Weissmann's Erda was sung with a rich contralto voice, even though Castorf asked her to engage in stage behavior that was often unspeakably vulgar. Of the Rhinemaidens, Julia Rutigliano's Wellgunde was especially well-sung.

Die Walküre was the only one of Castorf’s creations that had any coherence. His visualization of Hunding's hut was convincing, as was the way in which the scenery and props were used by the characters to impart the action. The most consistently fine singing in this Ring was by Johan Botha and Anja Kampe, as Siegmund and Sieglinde. Botha's acting can be stiff and with little nuance, but what singing! He has a large tenor voice which he employs with just the kind of bel canto sensitivity and warmth that Wagner, who admired Bellini's operas, intended. If anything, Kampe was even better. She captured the fear and hatred she had for her husband, the brute Hunding (Franz-Joseph Selig), utterly convincingly. Her voice soared over the orchestra with a sweet tone and fine phrasing. Weissmann and Rutigliano distinguished themselves as Valkyries Schwertleite and Siegrune. Winterstürm and Wotan's Abscheid, were high points of this Ring, and Castorf actually made the magic fire believable.

Castorf’s Siegfried was almost unbearably vulgar, even given his low standards. The conclusion of Act III, with the arrival of two mechanical crocodiles to see the lovers off, is probably the stupidest bit of staging I have seen in over 40 years of opera-going. But Koch’s Wanderer and Burkhard Ulrich’s slippery Mime were nicely realized, not to mention well-sung. Catherine Foster’s Brünnhilde hit her stride in Siegfried. But Siegfried ultimately belongs to Siegfried, and Lance Ryan disappointed in the title role. He has great upper extension to his voice, and it has the bright edge needed for this role, but his voice has a leathery quality with little nuance. Everything he sang sounded pretty much the same.

Die Götterdämmerung, of course, is probably impossible to stage–how to stage the end of the world? Castorf’s effort, though, was particularly feeble. Having been given the Ring by Brünnhilde, the Rhinemaidens simply cast it into a charcoal brazier, while Hagen looks on helplessly, as the object of his affection goes up in smoke. At least Attila Jun looked and acted the part of the consummate villain Hagen, and he sang the music with conviction and a big, dark voice. Foster was at her best in the Immolation Scene, even though she was given no help by the staging.

I have saved the best for last. Conductor Kirill Petrenko and the orchestra covered themselves with glory. They were rewarded at the end of each opera with huge ovations, each one of which was richly deserved. Under his leadership the orchestra phrased with the singers, and despite a massive sound, rarely drowned them out, aided immeasurably by the unique acoustics of the Festspielhaus. The brasses had a rich, dark sound that is so characteristic of the brass in the best of German orchestras. The sound of the lower strings was fat and lush, and the woodwinds played to perfection, especially the bass clarinetist, whose plaintive recurring solo lines so often signify a change in the mood throughout the Ring.

As bad as Castorf's production was, this Ring was redeemed by the singers, Petrenko’s conducting, and the magnificent playing of the orchestra. As a concert performance, it would have been a first-class Ring, but even despite the production, it was well worth the trip to the beautiful city of Bayreuth in the summertime to honor the bicentennial of the birth of Wagner, Germany's greatest opera composer.

The Met's Ring Production

For those who missed this season's Ring cycle at the Metropolitan Opera, take heart. You didn't miss much. Wagner's titanic four-part saga of the downfall of the gods in the Met's new production by Robert Lepage was a mostly depressing and vapid affair. It illustrates what can be accomplished when a virtually limitless budget is applied to realize a production that has no original ideas.

Wagner's great creation, of course, is mythical in conception and monumental in execution. Because it is mythical there is no reason for the Ring to be staged in the German woods and forests, even though the Rhine plays a central role in the tetralogy. The Rhine could be any river, and it is nonspecific to Germany. The Ring has been staged with great success in the forests of the American Northwest by the Seattle Opera, and less successfully by Francesca Zambello in the American West for the joint Washington/San Francisco production, among others.

Still, there must be some thought behind a production of the Ring other than "what can I do next with this absurd stage machinery that I have created?" Lepage's stage contraption, known to the Met's General Director Peter Gelb as "the Machine," is a collection of large panels that rotates and revolves on the same axis. The singers in the cast, whose primary job after all is to sing Wagner's stupendously difficult music, spend much of their time trying to avoid being flattened by the Machine.

Occasionally there are impressive moments, as when the gods cross the rainbow bridge to enter Valhalla at the conclusion of Das Rheingold or when Wotan and Loge descend into Nibelheim to confront Alberich and seize the ring of power. One of the great challenges in all opera is staging the end of the world that concludes Die Götterdämmerung. Lepage's realization of that cataclysmic event is so tepid, even foolish that the Met audience was left tittering at the absurdity of it.

The singing in the principal roles was adequate, which is accomplishment enough in this era so lacking in great Wagnerian voices. Still, the singers deserve great credit in making something musical out of the antics they were often asked to perform. Meriting special distinction were Stephanie Blythe's Fricka and Eric Owens' menacing, hate-filled Alberich. Bryn Terfel as Wotan and Deborah Voigt as Brünnhilde, although both are among our most distinguished singers, were simply miscast. Jonas Kaufmann may yet be one of our great Siegmunds, at least for those who remember Placido Domingo's peerless portrayal of that doomed character. The Met Orchestra played with distinction for Fabio Luisi, although the special fire that is lit in Wagner by James Levine was absent.

Some say this Ring was conceived by the Met with HD broadcast in mind. The New York critics seem generally to agree that this Ring was even less compelling in the theater than on the big screen. The Met's HD broadcasts present great promise for the company, but they also may put the in-house theatrical experience at risk.

This reviewer finds the Met in HD broadcasts generally unsatisfying, although for an out-of-towner, they are better than not being able to see the Met's productions at all. Next year is the Wagner bicentennial, and one can only hope that other companies with the resources to stage the Ring will do better than did the Met, even if they have fewer financial resources at their disposal. Come to think of it, maybe throwing fewer dollars at Lepage's Ring would have made it less undisciplined and ultimately more successful.