Die Walküre: Wes Herd dies auch sei

Final scene: Voigt, Terfel; (c) Ken Howard/Metropolitan Opera

In brief, I thought the best thing about the Met's Walküre was its phenomenal orchestra, and the worst its Picket Fence of Symbolism, as I am calling the set.  Update: the Met has posted pictures; tellingly, most of them focus on the singers. The singing was thoroughly committed, and held many pleasant surprises.  In the program was printed a "conversation with the director."  Lepage was asked how he planned to engage the new dimensions of Walküre, after Rheingold.  "Suddenly," said Lepage, "we deal with love and nature. Walküre is a piece where there are snowstorms, where there is lightning..." I had a sinking feeling. Lepage has often spoken of his fascination with the landscapes of Iceland, whence, of course, much of Wagner's source material hails.  And so we got a Walküre obsessed with landscapes, rather than ideas.  I grant, the forest for pursuer and pursued to weave through was effective, and yes, having the gods' conversations of Act II on top of a volcano can be an (unsubtle) metaphor for potentially explosive undercurrents.  But I was not seeing a Walküre with landscape-as-metaphor.  Lepage belabors the point of desired fidelity to the work. Failing to explore its layers and its ambiguities is, I would argue, a serious failing in this respect.

The good news: with the Met orchestra under Levine, and some very fine singing, the intimate emotional tensions and the enormous ideological stakes of Die Walküre were there.  I didn't think they were getting much help from the choreography, but they were there.  I loved the details of color and dynamics in the orchestra.  I thought Act I was less driven than I remembered Levine's '09 account of the score as being, although that could be just me. In any case, things seemed tauter in the second two acts, and it was gorgeously played throughout.  All the Valkyries, I think, should get a very special mention indeed for sounding great (no shrieking!) and seeming totally in control of, rather than controlled by, the stage business they were given with the set.  Veteran bass Hans-Peter König brought marvelously full sound to the role of Hunding.  He did not bark, nor did he snarl excessively; his brutality was the more effective for not being caricatured.  Offhandedly cruel to Sieglinde, he oozed contempt for the unkempt, exhausted stranger he found in his house.  Stephanie Blythe's Fricka can harangue me any time.  How often does one come away from a Walküre wishing that Wotan and Fricka's argument lasted longer?  Blythe's huge, gleaming, rounded sound has wowed me every time I've heard her; with this and good diction, her Fricka emerged as emotionally complex: sympathetic, as well as seething. And she was rocking a regal blue dress and a Widdergespann.  Outstanding.

Act I: Westbroek, Kaufmann; (c) Ken Howard/Metropolitan Opera

The Beloved Flatmate tells me that not everyone is as enraptured by the story of Siegmund and Sieglinde as I am.  So in my rhapsodizing, bear this tendency in mind, Gentle Readers.  I think I now understand better both why Jonas Kaufmann is adamant about not moving further into the Wagnerian repertory at this point, and why there is such eagerness for him to do so. The role of Siegmund sounds as though it sits low in his range, but it was a gripping performance, with dynamic nuance, breathtakingly wonderful attention to text, and ringing, prolonged high notes by which I was frankly thrilled. One expects the tenor to hold the "Wälse" cries.  These were an integrated part of Siegmund's anguish, here. The unexpected luxury of a held crescendo on "So blühe denn Wälsungenblut!" created an almost palpable moment of audience disbelief, which gave way to frenzy after the curtain.  Also, we got an answer to the question of why Siegmund does not notice the sword when it is gleaming and sticking out of the tree and there is a leitmotif: he is besotted with tenderness, too fascinated with Sieglinde to take his eyes off her for more than a moment.  This was a Siegmund with a dark, dangerous edginess, but also one who credibly embodied the exhaustion not only of the night's combat and flight, but of the long wandering as an outcast.

Eva-Maria Westbroek was phenomenal.  Many people--chief among them Gentle Reader Rob V., who shared with the enthusiasm of a devotee--had told me this, but I was still amazed by the quality of her full-bodied sound.  Her Sieglinde was radiant; even in her first movements to approach and help the stranger who has collapsed on her hearth, you see this downtrodden woman's instinctive tenderness, her enormous capacity for love.  Westbroek charted Sieglinde's tempestuous emotional journey with richly expressive singing and gesture, and I was deeply moved.  Her "Der Männer Sippe" was heartbreaking, hushed with shame rather than sparking with anger.  The emotional release of the duet was a joy (go here and here for excerpts from the dress rehearsal.) Westbroek handled the turmoil of Act II credibly and affectingly.  In this production, Siegmund, dying, reaches out to Sieglinde, who holds him until Brünnhilde tears her away; I cried.  "Fern von Siegmund!" was a sob, and "O hehrstes Wunder!" was, well, wondrous, filling the house.  I know this is a panegyric; I think it's deserved.

Bryn Terfel was a Wotan of immense energy, fearful in his rage and terrifying in his resignation and grief.  Also, he was a Wotan unafraid of piano singing!  To have the first "Das Ende!" an anguished cry and the second an anguished whisper is chilling. There were isolated moments where he didn't make it over the orchestra, but these were few.  Ideally, there would be none; but this was a Wotan with far more beautiful singing than I usually associate with the role, and I appreciated it.  Also--thank goodness!--Terfel brought to Wotan layers of tortured emotional complexity.  With his exemplary German, the sometimes self-contradictory journey of the god kept me on the edge of my seat (metaphorically speaking; I was in standing room.)  He shouted at his entrance in Act III, but intentionally; this was a Wotan whose rage was terrifying.  And I'm tearing up just thinking about the farewell scene.  I invariably find this devastating, but I was not prepared for weeping into my handkerchief, which Terfel's painfully vulnerable god had me doing. Deborah Voigt gave a game and committed performance as Brünnhilde, but also, to my ears, a somewhat uneven one (there's an interesting interview with her on the role here.)  Her detractors will, I suspect, be more disappointed than her fans.  There were a lot of moments which I thought were great: non-shrieked Hojotohorufe are delightful.  And, what is no small thing for me in a Walküre-Brünnhilde, she was dramatically credible as an exuberant adolescent dealing with several steep learning curves at once.  She was sometimes covered by the orchestra, and there were moments where I feared things were going to veer out of control.  Notwithstanding, I liked Voigt's portrayal of Brünnhilde a lot, and I honestly thought she acquitted herself well. I'm glad she did as well as she did, and I'll continue to keep my fingers crossed for her.  Despite the Picket Fence of Symbolism, I'm eager to go again.