In Wagner's operas redemption recurs as a grand and triumphal core. Nietzsche commented nastily. “Somebody or other always wants to be redeemed in his work: sometimes a little male, sometimes a little female.” But it's usually the female doing the redeeming. Alex Ross, in Wagnerism, observes: 'Although Wagner is noted for his hatreds, almost all of his mature work turns on the redeeming force of love.'
In his music and libretto for The Flying Dutchman, Wagner lifted an old ghost story to a climactic, if rather puzzling, celebration of redemption.
But what music! I've reported the reviews of this production below - but don't let them put you off experiencing this opera if you've never seen it.
Screening for us on Saturday, from the Met, is a rare recent production. In March the pandemic cancelled the Met's live and HD seasons, days before a scheduled transmission of Der Fliegende Holländer. What we see is a camera rehearsal “scratch taping,” bass-baritone Evgeny Nikitin in the title role, opposite soprano Anja Kampe as Senta.
All critics agree that François Girard’s new production falters. “Girard offers flashes of brilliance in a sea of confusion.” (New York Classical Review). Bachtrack comments "The static production may have been saved, and may have enhanced the story of the doomed seaman and his salvation, if there had been a good musical performance." That's damning because the conductor is the now controversial Gergiev. Here’s New Yorker, asking why the Met still brings him over. This interview gives a glimpse of the director’s intentions. But as Clive Paget puts it, the production is "a surprisingly tame affair". It probably isn't helped by Girard's taking the story out of the fishing village to a mystic place. The Dutchman purchases Senta from her father not with gold but with glowing crystals.
And the opera itself? It's all about redemption - check out the libretto here. Of all Wagner’s operas, this raises commentary about his goals and morals, the place of women in his worlds, and their offering to unsatisfactory men. There’s a fascinating account here of Senta and her sacrifice. It describes the opera’s “volatile mix of deep masculine neediness and feminine self-sacrifice, in which Senta gives far more than she can receive and the Dutchman takes far more than he deserves… Senta, at this point, is the one who needs redeeming. How do contemporary listeners engage with an opera that seems to afford her so little dignity, so little agency, so little independence of mind and spirit?.. But no element of the drama is quite so disturbing as the final scene, the death of Senta and the Wagnerian redemption of the Dutchman, who is likely a cipher for Wagner himself. With close attention to the text, we realize that this isn’t an opera about love, at least not for the Dutchman: 'The dull glow I feel burning here, / can I in my misery call it love? / Ah, no! it is a yearning for redemption,' he sings in Act II. "
Say it in leitmotifs
And then, there's the music. In this opera, Wagner took romanticism out of the aria and chorus form. The sounds of the Dutchman and Senta merge in powerful motifs declaring terror and redemption. There's a great piece on the man and his music here: https://www.seattleoperablog.com/p/spotlight-on-flying-dutchman.html.
In all of Wagner's work, is there a more spinechilling ode to redemption than Senta's ballad, recounting the legend and committing to the redemptive task?
Listen to the ballad sung here by Jesseye Norman - you don't need the words to feel the chill - and thrill - of sacrifice.
Here's Kirsten Flagstadt's Senta. And Birgitt Nielsen's.
This opera is very early Wagner - first performed in 1843, the year after his first success, Rienzi. It would be two years to Tannhäuser and another 5 to Lohengrin. Here's Ross again.
'In Wagner’s early operas, as in much nineteenth-century art, women tend to fall into two distinct and opposing categories. At times, they are selfless exemplars of the eternal feminine; at others, devouring femmes fatales. Senta, in The Flying Dutchman, throws herself from a cliff in order to release her beloved from the curse of eternal wandering. She constitutes, in the words of the German musicologist Eva Rieger, a “typically Wagnerian fantasy – to be loved eternally, without interruption, by a woman.” In Tannhäuser, the angelic Elisabeth goes up against Venus, and wins the contest by offering her life to the Almighty in exchange for Tannhäuser’s salvation. According to Rieger, “everything that is actively feminine is confined to the sinful, fear-inducing underworld, while feminine passivity comes across as pure and noble.” In Lohengrin, Elsa is paired with Ortrud, the vengeful pagan witch who inveigles Elsa into asking her fatal question.
Wagner stigmatized Ortrud as a “political woman,” in whom the instinct of love is replaced with “murderous fanaticism.”
Here's the full Met week (our dates)
Week 46 - The Antiheroes
(a discussible label for so diverse a group of characters!)
Tuesday, January 26 Mozart’s Don Giovanni Starring Hibla Gerzmava, Malin Byström, Serena Malfi, Paul Appleby, Simon Keenlyside, Adam Plachetka, Matthew Rose, and Kwangchul Youn, conducted by Fabio Luisi. From October 22, 2016.
Wednesday, January 27 Rossini’s Le Comte Ory Starring Diana Damrau, Joyce DiDonato, Susanne Resmark, Juan Diego Flórez, Stéphane Degout, and Michele Pertusi, conducted by Maurizio Benini. From April 9, 2011.
Thursday, January 28 Thursday, January 28 Gounod’s Faust Starring Marina Poplavskaya, Jonas Kaufmann, and René Pape, conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin. From December 10, 2011. It's an original concept that, according to NYTimes, intrudes on the wonderful music, but the stars are great.
Friday, January 29 Verdi’s Falstaff Starring Lisette Oropesa, Angela Meade, Stephanie Blythe, Jennifer Johnson Cano, Paolo Fanale, Ambrogio Maestri, and Franco Vassallo, conducted by James Levine. From December 14, 2013. What a lineup of women - and Maestri made Faust his years ago. Bachtrack agreed.
And then on Saturday, the Flying Dutchman arrives!
Saturday, January 30 Wagner’s Der Fliegende Holländer Starring Anja Kampe, Mihoko Fujimura, Sergey Skorokhodov, David Portillo, Evgeny Nikitin, and Franz-Josef Selig, conducted by Valery Gergiev. From March 10, 2020.
Sunday, January 31 Verdi’s Rigoletto Starring Diana Damrau, Oksana Volkova, Piotr Beczała, Željko Lučić, and Štefan Kocán, conducted by Michele Mariotti. From February 16, 2013.
Monday, January 31 Verdi’s Macbeth Starring Maria Guleghina, Dimitri Pittas, Željko Lučić, and John Relyea, conducted by James Levine. From January 12, 2008. Mixed reviews - here's Bachtrack - but Željko is a favourite baritone baddy in our house.
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