Wagner's Valhalla

[Morigan]

Looking forward to seeing Tristan und Isolde at the Met in March, with the following cast.  It might be my favorite Wagner opera.

Conductor: James Levine
Isolde: Deborah Voigt
Brangäne: Michelle DeYoung
Tristan: Ben Heppner
Kurwenal: Eike Wilm Schulte
King Marke: Matti Salminen

I love this production, which I've seen once before.  (Not everyone agrees, as these Amazon comments on the 2004 DVD show.)  But if anything this cast is even better (IMHO) than the one on the DVD.

--Bruce

Oh dear, the reviews are very mixed! And some of them are absolutely mean :

"Here we have some of the most romantic music ever written, and we have a portly Tristan singing to a "morbidly obese" woman for over 3 hours."

[bhodges]

Yes, when Eaglen and Heppner first did it, there were a number of snide remarks.  (There was also a rather unflattering photo in the paper, with the two of them and a large rock, making all three look pretty much the same.)

I suspect it may be much better with Voigt, although vocally I had no problem with Eaglen. 

--Bruce

[uffeviking]

Yes, when Eaglen and Heppner first did it, there were a number of snide remarks.  (There was also a rather unflattering photo in the paper, with the two of them and a large rock, making all three look pretty much the same.)

--Bruce

I was there when they first did it, in Seattle in 1998, directed by Francesca Zambello, and I was moved to tears! I don't remember a 'rock', but I do remember how those two singers did their acting with their voices. Maybe Heppner has changed, and I understand, so did Eaglan - have not seen her live since then - ; but the performance had been praised universally. Yes universally, because a great number of visitors were from overseas, both East and West.

[uffeviking]

Anne, your Seattle friend probably also told you this new production was an event, weeks, even months before the performance. Seattle's General Director, Speight Jenkins discovered Eaglen during one of his talent hunting trips in England and brought her to Seattle, where she was selected Seattle Opera's Artist of the Year for her performance of Norma. She is Seattle's OWN, lives there, got married there and is a welcome guest in every Seattle school from Kindergarten to the Universities, and a treasured customer of the fishmongers and greengrocers at the famous Pike Street Public Market!

She is obese? Look around your supermarket next time you are there and see all the obese females pushing their carts around. And they can't even sing! 

[J.Z. Herrenberg]

You might like to know that it was the Havergal Brian Society that sponsored Jane Eaglen's first recital - in the Purcell Room on the (London) South Bank, where she sang songs of, among others, Havergal Brian. That was on 1 November 1985. I still have the booklet somewhere.

[Solitary Wanderer]

I've just received this CD-Rom and I'm having my first look atit.

Its quite amazing.

The complete cycle on one disc. Solti's famous version.

It has a running commentary, complete score and libretto in both german and english.

The commentary is especially interesting.

This looks to be a fabulous tool for delving deeper into the Ring

[M forever]

The complete cycle on one disc. Solti's famous version.

In mono. Just as acoustical reference material.

[uffeviking]

You might like to know that it was the Havergal Brian Society that sponsored Jane Eaglen's first recital - in the Purcell Room on the (London) South Bank, where she sang songs of, among others, Havergal Brian. That was on 1 November 1985. I still have the booklet somewhere.

Uffeviking, Seattle and the rest of the great-voice-appreciating world are sincerely grateful to the Havergal Brian Society!

Jezetha, you recommend I should get acquainted with Brian's work? Never heard a note of his! 

[J.Z. Herrenberg]

Jezetha, you recommend I should get acquainted with Brian's work? Never heard a note of his! 

Uffeviking, there are billions of people who haven't heard a single Brianic note, so don't feel ashamed... Do I recommened him? Yes, of course! If you like Wagner, the grandiose, an inventive use of the orchestra and massed choral forces, try Brian's 'Gothic' Symphony, on Naxos. And see what you make of it... It is his most ambitious work, written between 1919 and 1927 (Brian lived from 1876 to 1972).

[Haffner]

  Am I the only person here who feels that the Ring isn't long enough  ??   marvin

Yes: my favorite character, Wotan, was out of the action way too early!

[Haffner]

Wagner is extraordinarily masculine music- put it on before you take your girl out, murderously decisive, thrusting, ruthless, intuitive, dark, domineering.

I agree. My girl is mainly into Grieg, Beethoven, Mozart...Wagner is just too manly for her. This might seem really weird, so please forgive, but Wagner has the same effect on her as do heavy metal bands like Manowar and Krisiun: too much bass/baritone and testosterone!

Marv, I notice you have the Knappertzbusch Parsifal, I've heard it, along with the Levine and Jurowski live, but I know it from the Karajan, which is entirely in a class of its own.

How good is the Levine? I've been eyeing it recently. I actually liked alot of his Ring...though it's hard to listen to some of it after the Solti.

[uffeviking]

In about half an hour Die Walküre from the Met will be on your NPR stations!

[uffeviking]

Are you listening? Your NPR station does not carry it? Try http://www.king.org/programming/opera/index.aspx#met and here is the cast:

Bass James Morris (one of the definitive Wotans of our time), soprano Lisa Gasteen (Bruennhilde), tenor Clifton Forbis (Siegmund), soprano Deborah Voigt (Sieglinde), and bass Mikhail Petrenko (Hunding) head this Metropolitan Opera cast, with Lorin Maazel as the conductor.

[Sean]

Hi Haffner

How good is the Levine? I've been eyeing it recently. I actually liked alot of his Ring...though it's hard to listen to some of it after the Solti.

Levine's a committed Wagnerian, often shedding new light and colour, though without the most overarching mind to fully contain the great paragraphs. His Good Friday peroration music in Parsifal is superb, finding more strangeness and mystery in the fabulous harmonies than Karajan.

The Karajan otherwise though is entirely in a class of its own with no serious competitors: one of the greatest of opera recordings.

[J.Z. Herrenberg]

Hi Haffner

Levine's a committed Wagnerian, often shedding new light and colour, though without the most overarching mind to fully contain the great paragraphs. His Good Friday peroration music in Parsifal is superb, finding more strangeness and mystery in the fabulous harmonies than Karajan.

The Karajan otherwise though is entirely in a class of its own with no serious competitors: one of the greatest of opera recordings.

I love Karajan's Parsifal, too. But don't you think his Kundry (Dunja Vejzovic) is the one weak link, Sean? I find her voice too sharp, and not really seductively maternal in the central scene of Act Two.

[Sean]

Not a weak link, though she sounds like she's attacking 20th c music at times, especially at the point of that extraordinary leap (you know where I mean). It's Peter Hoffmann's Parsifal is the voice that lacks beauty unfortunately- he's on the note but sounds rough at times...

[uffeviking]

Nobody listened to today's Walküre? 

[bhodges]

Nobody listened to today's Walküre? 

  Sorry, Lis!  How did you like it?  This was with Maazel conducting, yes? 

--Bruce

[Sean]

I listened to about two minutes- didn't like the conducting or the singing, or the whole attitude, and I'd say opera's in as much trouble as the rest of art. Things are on the surface, performers are melodramatic and unserious, and what's happened to the quality of the announcers, the analysis and the Texaco quiz? That quiz used to be very impressive, now its just drivel...

[bhodges]

I listened to about two minutes- didn't like the conducting or the singing, or the whole attitude, and I'd say opera's in as much trouble as the rest of art. Things are on the surface, performers are melodramatic and unserious, and what's happened to the quality of the announcers, the analysis and the Texaco quiz? That quiz used to be very impressive, now its just drivel...

How could you even arrive at such a conclusion--or for that matter, any conclusion--hearing two minutes of it? 

--Bruce