I write up Tannhäuser in Paris for the Indy, but what appeared in print was heavily cut. Here is the full version. (You can hear a broadcast of the show on France Musique on 9 February.)
It’s Christmas in Paris, and Venus saunters onto the Bastille stage in the first bars of Wagner’s overture, stark naked. While British audiences were shoehorned into endless Nutcrackers, the French capital hotly anticipated a season highlight in Robert Carsen’s new production of Tannhäuser, the Paris Opera’s first since 1984, which opened on 6 December – but the first performances were semi-staged due to a strike by stagehands. It wasn’t until later that the full monty was unfurled. And it was worth waiting for.
Re-settings of operas that actually work are rare, but the transformation of Tannhäuser into a radical artist creating a scandal succeeds because it enhances the work’s core issues: sex versus spirituality (or prudishness), progressive art versus the establishment. How appropriate, too, for Paris, the city of Manet – whose ‘Dejeuner sur l’herbe’ adorns the programme – and the territory where Tannhäuser caused a comparable scandal in 1861, albeit because the Jockey Club objected to the lack of a ballet in the second act.
The ballet appears, instead, right after the overture, in the Venusberg – the realm of the senses inhabited by the goddess of love – and this time the Jockey Club members wouldn’t have known what had hit them. The nude Venus, Tannhäuser’s model, drapes herself across a mattress while he paints her in a frenzy, aided and abetted by a crowd of male dancers who portray the wild, messy confluence of creativity and sex in an orgy of scarlet paint.
Act II’s song contest is transformed with great aplomb into a painting competition in a posh gallery; the artists’ songs introduce the unveiling of their paintings (which the audience never sees). Symbolism returns for Act III, when the conventional, uptight Elisabeth – who alone understands Tannhäuser’s art but is fatally wounded by his sexual betrayal – takes off her dress, lets down her hair and begins to merge with the image of Venus. Tannhäuser, refused absolution by the Pope, returns from his pilgrimage seeking the Venusberg instead, but now Elisabeth and Venus mingle as he learns to integrate their opposing qualities in his work. And with the final chorus comes Tannhäuser’s salvation: his canvas is hung among the most famous and scandalous nudes in the history of art.
The American heldentenor Stephen Gould is a towering hunk as Tannhäuser, his voice as powerful as his presence. His Elisabeth is Eva-Maria Westbroek, her ‘Dich, teure Halle’ delivered from the front of the stalls with a heart-lifting combination of natural radiance and vocal ease. Exquisite richness of tone from the mezzo-soprano Béatrice Uria-Monzon as Venus and superb performances from Franz-Josef Selig as Hermann and the substantial chorus.
Most unforgettable, though, is Matthias Goerne as Tannhäuser’s friend Wolfram, portraying a generous yet introverted soul tortured by unrequited love for Elisabeth. Goerne’s magical phrasing, charcoal-soft baritone and gut-wrenching inwardness make him unique at the best of times, but it would have been worth the journey to Paris just to hear him sing Wolfram’s Song to the Evening Star. Meanwhile under Seiji Ozawa’s mercurial baton, the orchestral playing was full of élan, and proved unfailingly sensitive to the singers. Christmas crackers for grown-ups don’t come much better than this.
7 comments:
Great write-up, Jessica. Thanks for posting that. Wish I could have been there, but thanks to the Beeb's wonderful Christmas broadcasts (caught Carmen, Fille, and R&J) it's not like I passed the holidays deprived.
Judging from your review, though, wouldn't you say that more than ever they would have been justified in having one singer portray both Venus and Elisabeth?
Good point, WSF, but I suspect the Venus & Elisabeth voice types are too different - luscious mezzo rolled into highish lyricodramatic soprano could be tricky. Anyone know instances of Tannhauser where this has been successfully attempted?
Bayreuth in the '70s- Colin Davis conducting a Götz Friedrich production (still ludicrously unavailable on DVD). The lady in question was Gwyneth Jones.
Good Lord, that was a heavy cut. Thanks for posting the original. A lovely read.
Quite a few singers actually have done both Venus/Elisabeth in the same performance (or recording) - Jessye Norman and Birgit Nilsson immediately comes to mind and more recently Angela Denoke. Deborah Voigt was originally scheduled to sing both at the MET a few years ago, but the conductor (Thielemann) preferred another singer for the Venus part.
In many ways, I actually feel that it makes sense - to display the two opposite sides of one persons character, but ultimately, it depends on the singer of course.
Ah, I stand corrected...I'm a relatively recent Wagner convert, etcetc.
On reflection, I think that in the Carsen production it seems to make sense to have them played by separate singers - they are two very distinct characters and it's in his art that Tannhauser needs to integrate them - my impression is that in this interpretation, that transformation on his part is what can eventually make him a great artist. Something like that, anyhow.
Deborah Voigt...was that before or after she had to lose all that weight?
The foyer discussions in the Bastille centred largely on whether the naked Venus was played the singer herself or by a double. We were sitting high up in the theatre so weren't certain. I suspect that that was the case, though - the upkeep of a body like that is generally a full-time job!
When the same Carsen Tannhäuser production was set up in Japan, Michelle DeYoung sang the part of Venus, and many thought that she played the nude Venus herself, however in an interview she revealed that (at least in Japan) it was a body double. I don´t know about Beatrice Uria-Monzon, but hopefully other readers do..
When Deborah Voigt was hired for the MET Tannhäuser she was quite a bit heavier than she is today. As a matter of fact in the interview I read with her, she stated that before she lost all that weight she was turned down by several opera companies (as most are probably aware) but at the MET the weight issues didn´t seem to be important.
Post a Comment