WALKURE: Act I @ The New York Philharmonic

Above: tenor Simon O’Neill

~ Author: Oberon

Thursday February 15th, 2018 – We’ve been starved for Wagner of late, but now – in the course of a single week – we’ve had Dorothea Röschmann singing the Wesendonck Lieder, The New York Philharmonic offering Act I of DIE WALKURE (tonight), and, coming up: a matinee of PARSIFAL at The Met.

This evening’s Philharmonic program opened with Pulitzer Prize-winner John Luther Adams’s Dark Waves, music which readily brings to mind the opening of Wagner’s DAS RHEINGOLD. Long, deep notes are the sustaining quality throughout the piece’s twelve-minute span. Beyond that, horn calls on fifths and the brief tweeting of the piccolo emerge thru the murky, at times almost mechanical, layers of sound. The volume ebbs and flows, at times becoming massive. This is music that surely casts a spell, though one patron was apparently not pleased and expressed himself with high, hooting boos that became comical after a bit.

The Philharmonic’s new music director, Jaap van Zweden, yet again proved himself a Wagnerian of great skill and commitment. His presentation of the WALKURE Act I tonight was so alive – right from the rather fast tempo he chose for the score’s opening pages depicting Siegmund being tracked by his enemies – and the orchestra played superbly.

Six harps are onstage, and, as the Act progressed, we had marvelous solo moments from Carter Brey (cello), Anthony McGill (clarinet), Amy Zoloto (bass clarinet), and Liang Wang (oboe) as well as some noble calls from the horns.

As Hunding, John Relyea’s dark, menacing tone poured forth, full of irony and vitriol: this courteous host will likely stick a knife in your ribs given the opportunity. As with his magnificent Bartok Bluebeard at Carnegie Hall a year ago, Mr. Relyea proved himself yet again to be a singer of great vocal and physical command. One moment summarized the brilliance of Mr. Relyea’s portrayal: after Siegmund has told his history to Sieglinde, ending tenderly with “Nun weißt du, fragende Frau,warum ich Friedmund nicht heiße!” (‘Now you know, gentle wife, why I can never be called Peaceful.’), Hunding/Relyea interrupts the twins’ mutual attraction, singing venomously: “Ich weiß ein wildes Geschlecht!” (‘I know of your riotous race!’). Hunding’s denunciation of his guest, and his promise to slay him at dawn, drew black-toned vocalism from the basso.

Ten years have passed since I first heard Simon O’Neill’s Siegmund at a matinee performance at The Met. Both in voice and interpretation, Simon has kept things fresh in this arduous role: his singing – by turns helden or lyrical – is wonderfully present, and his diction and colourings are impressively utilized in the long narrative passages. For Siegmund’s story is a sad tale indeed, and although on this night – when he’s stumbled into Hunding’s hut as a hunted man – he will experience happiness ever so briefly, within hours  he will be betrayed to his death by his own father.

Mr. O’Neill makes these stories of loneliness and woe truly poignant; both here and in those passages when heroic tones are called for, he shows himself the equal of any Siegmund of my experience. His cries of “Wälse! Wälse!” in the Sword monolog were excitingly sustained. The cresting, poetic beauty of Simon’s “Winterstürme” and his powerful summoning of Nothung from the tree were highlights of the evening. And then, with van Zweden’s orchestra pulsing away with relentless vitality towards the finish line, Simon latched onto a clarion, hall-filling top-A at “Wälsungen blut!…” to cap the evening.

In 2012, Heidi Melton’s singing of the 3rd Norn in GOTTERDAMMERUNG at The Met gave me reason to believe she could be the next great Wagnerian soprano. But since then, in subsequent encounters, I have found her disappointing. This evening, her physical presence and the voice’s limitations in the upper range drew a blank with me.

So tonight, it was the excellence of the male singers, the thrilling playing of the orchestra, and Maestro van Zweden’s feel for this music that gave Wagner his due.  

~ Oberon