Wagner's Protestant Sing-Off

Wagner’s Tannhäuser

Metropolitan Opera

October 24, 2015

An Orphic rival at the epic song contest.
Photo credit: Marty Sohl

The way hip hop and pop singers run their vocals through the Auto-Tune audio processor to sound like vaguely robotic dance machines, there are many baritone roles that I would like to run through the Peter Mattei processor to sound like the Orphic divine incarnate. He is just so smooth. In fact, in tonight's stellar performance of Wagner's Tannhäuser, Mattei's singing was so swooningly delightful that it was hard to believe his character when in Act I he says that none of his songs have managed to move the princess Elizabeth since the accomplished songsmith Tannhäuser had left the picture. How could that be? Mattei is simply irresistible every time he opens his mouth. Even just intoning, "Where have you been?" to his friend Tannhäuser, Mattei makes you melt on the inside. His sound is so round and suave. He holds every syllable in his mouth and pushes it out through the skein of seductive expression. There's really just nothing like it. Peter Mattei is the reincarnation of Orpheus for our time. And there are so many roles that I would love to hear sung the way he sings. I could listen to him always and forever. Mattei’s embodiment of Wolfram’s Song to the Evening Star in Act III, O Du, mein holder Abenstern, was one of the most transcendent things I've heard at the Met, certainly so far this season.

Tannhäuser searches his soul.
Photo credit: Ken Howard

Jonas Botha is always a competent Wagnerian tenor. He has the stamina to withstand for the entire roughly four-hour duration and the power to project out over the massive orchestration with clarity. But he has little feeling and does little for me. Not like Peter Mattei. I also feel like he lacks something of the unbridled Dionysian that should exude especially from the early arias he performs at the bequest of Venus in Act I, Scene I, Dir Töne Lob! Die Wunder Sei’n Gepriesen! There he is, the star poet who has become the closest bosom buddy of the goddess of love herself. You would think that he would sound the part: manly and guttural, virile yet chthonic. Oozing testosterone out of his every note in the most raw and powerful way, the way he can sound in some of the best recordings. Botha is always just a little too contained and a little too strident to fully embody this important element of the Wagnerian cosmos. Jonas’ stage presence, too, is pretty flat to say the least. Granted, all he needs to do most of the time is strum his harp, yet he managed to make even that simple gesture look unnatural and borderline ridiculous (particularly when compared to the elegant and savvy stage presence of Peter Mattei).

The denizens of the local Venus Massage Parlor.
Photo credit: Ken Howard

But what is this Wagnerian world all about? I'm never sure how to take him. This is admittedly only our second Wagnerian operatic encounter. Despite being slightly underwhelmed a second time, I am still open to exposing myself to more. As in Die Meistersinger, the music in Tannhäuser is consistently extremely beautiful. But why does it so often seem like Wagner wastes his time on idiotic plots that only plod along? I guess that's what makes me curious to see how he treats some of the classic Teutonic mythological material that he was less responsible for coming up with. Maybe there he manages to plunge to even deeper more complex depths, especially structurally.

Wolfram works the crowd.
Photo credit: Ken Howard

In any case, it is clear by now that he loves song competitions. One of the modern feeling moments is the “rap battle” in court that features most prominently in Act II (but only after an interminably long processional in which every one and his mother slowly make their way out onto the stage). The song contest that climaxes in the denunciation of poor Tannhäuser for his frequenting the Venus Massage Parlor is really one of the only scenes in the whole opera with any action at all. And what offensive action it is. All of court society publicly lambasts him. And so, is it just me or does the story hinge on bigotry? For his lecherous lifestyle he is banished from court though his ladylove defends him and he is urged to make haste to Rome to repent of his sins. Good Lord! The horror! Frankly, how can anyone relate to this? No matter how good the music, when the plot is so flat and uninteresting I struggle to really enjoy an opera.

Wartburg Castle in all its splendor.
Photo credit: Ken Howard

Nevertheless, I get the symbolism of this uniquely Protestant opera. It's not like the point of the allegory is hard to grasp. It's there for the grasping, right on the surface. In fact, there isn't much else to get. It's not like it's terribly multifaceted as a work of art. In terms of the chronology of the setting of the opera in historical time, it takes place in Wartburg Castle, which is where Martin Luther will later live, as well as where he will later translate the New Testament from Greek into German. It is a place of great symbolic import. In fact, Tannhäuser will go off to Rome only to encounter a Pope who has little more than eternal damnation to offer him. Which is very disconcerting for the poor promiscuous poet.

Tannhäuser digests eternal damnation.
Photo credit: Ken Howard

As it turns out, this is a Protestant world, avant la lettre, and so it's not over until it's over. The Catholic Church of course is nothing more than a mere human institution by this account. The Pope has no direct access to the word of God. He can eternally damn whomever he wants, as much and as often as his heart desires, but it’s not binding. Individual prayer can save. God always gets the final word on salvation and damnation. And what's more, in a finale that echoes that of Goethe’s Faust, it is apparently the love of an ordinary mortal woman that saves the profligate troubadour in God’s eyes. The love of a pure-hearted woman is a better route to salvation than confession to the Pope himself. In addition to its Pagan-Christian dichotomy, it also seems to operate between the poles of the Protestant-Catholic divide. Again, that’s not opera material to me by any stretch of the imagination.

Pilgrims approach, with token body strewn upon the ground.
Photo credit: Ken Howard

This classic Met production was moderately effective, especially in the Venusberg and subsequent forest scenes. I found the trompe-l'œil sets and lighting effects very captivating. They really created compelling space on the familiar Met stage. At the end of Act III, when Tannhäuser is momentarily tempted to go back to his old debauched ways, the eerie optical illusion of the sudden appearance of Venus on her throne again in the deepest reaches of the stage at the same height of the evening star was a striking bit of stagecraft. Other than that, though, the blocking was pretty poor, with singers inexplicably throwing themselves face down on the ground in every other scene. Very strange!

Wagner, I'm still hopeful that you're going to win me over one of these days. So far, we’re 0 for 2.

– Lui & Lei

Tannhäuser prostrate before the corpse of his beloved savior.
Photo credit: Ken Howard

The object of desire.
Photo credit: Ken Howard

An Infernal Happy Ending

La descente d’Orphée aux enfers

By Marc-Antoine Charpentier

Gotham Chamber Opera - St. Paul’s Chapel, January 5, 2014

Photo credit: Richard Termine

Every opera has a musical passage, an aria or a duet that gives it its raison d’être: a focal point for the feeling a composer desires to evoke with the piece. In the case of Marc-Antoine Charpentier’s La descente d’Orphée aux enfers, the crux of emotions is found in Orpheus’ plea for Pluto’s mercy. In his attempt to persuade the god of the underworld, Orpheus appeals paradoxically to Pluto’s humanity, his ability to empathize with his plight. Charpentier’s Orpheus is both master rhetorician and singer, and tenor Daniel Curran, who sung this part in Gotham Chamber Opera’s recent production, endowed his embodiment of the lovelorn poet with many moments of gut-wrenching beauty, especially when his voice reached up into the higher range. Considering the beauty of the music Charpentier gives Orpheus to sing, it is clear how he might be able to penetrate Pluto’s “cœur impénétrable.” 

Photo credit: Richard Termine

One thing that baroque opera does particularly well is the lament. And the plaintive beauty of Orpheus’ petition to Pluto, which Curran sang with a level of refinement and style that seemed to temporarily stop time, achieved several moments of this particular baroque vocal artistry. Another element of this genre that keeps me coming back are the choral ensemble pieces. This is always where I tend to feel the debt of opera to Ancient Greek theater. Charpentier composed a series of ensemble pieces for his chorus of young men and maidens in the first act, penitent souls and harpies in the second, which provided the backbone for the whole opera. Against this multilayered vocal texture, Orpheus, the heart and soul of the piece, is really the only vocal part that comes to the fore.

Photo credit: Richard Termine

The approach to sets and costumes was on the minimalist side, especially when compared to the recent pyrotechnics of Gotham’s spectacular Baden-Baden 1927, which in many respects was on a whole other level. Here poor male chorus members had to sport very un-manly costumes (pastel colored shirts and berets, poison ivy belts) in Act I, though the ladies had better luck with flowing gowns and scarves that achieved lovely effects with the simple yet effective choreographies.

Photo credit: Richard Termine

I enjoyed the irony of staging a descent to the underworld in a church, with the bonus special hellish effects of the ground trembling under the audience’s feet, courtesy of the NYC subway. The subway’s low shuttering rumble seemed perfectly timed with the narrative on at least two occasions as the story unfolded. Gotham’s set choices were simple, yet made great use of the space. The addition of a white spiral staircase to connect the stage to the church’s balcony created two dynamic levels of action – most effective when divinities “up above” were involved, Apollo in Act I and the Pluto-Proserpina couple in Act II. The series of translucent white canvases around the stage served as screens for computer-animated graphic projections that started as airy clouds when things are all bucolic and happy, then transitioned to very Inferno-like underground roots that seems to pump with blood like veins when the action moves to the underworld. The canvases also served as space dividers between the singers and the musical ensemble, which was rather unusually hidden away behind the stage and only visible to the public as a group of silhouettes.

Photo credit: Richard Termine

Act II was more successful, both visually and vocally. The Dantesque projections and gruesome damned souls were a great contrast to the almost psychedelic joyful tones of Act I. In the underworld the breezy light voices of virtually the whole cast were overshadowed by the power of Pluto, who brought some manly thunder to the otherwise gracious singing. Bass Jeffrey Beruan’s Pluto was sensational. His deep, dark, rich voice filled the space effortlessly, and towered over everybody else. As king of the underworld, Beruan's characterization ranged from intransigent authority figure to hopeless romantic when he finally concedes to Orpheus’ plea.

Whether or not there were other acts that went missing, it is striking that what remains of Charpentier’s two act cantata is a positive take on the myth that conveniently disregards the tragic end of the story. We are left with an optimistic belief in the viability of resurrection. And religious imagery is, in fact, present elsewhere as well. In Charpentier’s version, Eurydice is dancing in the garden with her cohort of young maidens on the eve of her wedding to Orpheus when she stumbles on a snake that leads to her fall.

Marc Tansey, Still Life, 1982

 Unlike the standard tragic denouement that is conspicuously missing from Charpentier’s optimistic truncation, this version of the myth of Orpheus holds true on the promise that art is able to betray death, that through artistic expression one is able to achieve immortality. In line with the promotional poster for the Gotham production, though nature inevitably fades and a bouquet of flowers eventually wilts away, its representation in the artist’s painted still life will live on forever. So Charpentier’s Orpheus and Eurydice live happily ever after.

Photo credit: Richard Termine

Gotham’s treatment of the ending does not let the couple off so easy. During the concluding musical interlude, as the reunited lovers ascend the spiral staircase together, Orpheus gives us a glimpse of his fateful lack of self control: he looks back too soon to lay eyes on his irresistible love. And this is the fleeting freeze frame this production engrains on our mind’s eye at the last moment before the house lights suddenly and dramatically cut to black, though the libretto and the score only ever get so far as depicting in music and in words the joyous reunion of the young couple. There is an insistence on presenting the conclusion of the tragic story, thus giving us closure, but at the same time undermining the message of the promotional poster: namely, that art saves. Instead, we are reminded of the fact that the artist is also just as capable of irremediably losing that which he regains.

With all this hype around Gotham Chamber Opera right now with everyone waiting for the company to fill the vacuum left by New York City Opera, this production serves as a reminder of their actual caliber. As ever, musically they are truly remarkable and consistently worth following, with a variety of talented young voices always vital and fresh. But their productions are not always at a level one comes to expect from the major leagues. The beauty often lies in the inventiveness they always manage to muster with their many ad hoc venues. They’re still a young company that shows heaps of promise but still has room to grow and we’re eager to track their growth.

- Lui & Lei

Michel Martin Drolling, Orpheus and Eurydice, 1820