Parsifal at The Met: Revival Redemption at Monsalvat

I had some difficulty tuning in last night and, there were several glitches on Sirius including an infuriating “This is a test of the Emergency Broadcast System . . . “ a few minutes into one of Gurnemanz’s 3rd act monologues and worse – Sirius dropping out during Parsifal’s final line and receiving the “content not available” message before Mahler began playing from another Sirius channel. Even these, however couldn’t (fully) spoil the effect that was being made over the air, and, based on good evidence, emanating from the house itself.

Yannick Nézet-Séguin led what can only be described as an extraordinary reading of an extraordinary score and his love for this score was made palpable in its execution. Moments, like some of those orchestral interludes during Gurnemanz’s monologues that change its tone which many others either gloss or languish over, here crackled with life, a vibrancy in the strings that was electric. The first transformation scene went about as beautifully as Knappertsbusch, with a similar sense of moving forward and at Gurnemanz’s response (my favorite line from any opera) to Parsifal’s observation:

"Du siehst, mein Sohn,
zum Raum wird hier die Zeit!"

We were all along for that journey. Here was shape and form, expansive where it needed to be, then firm . . . taut with a momentum like some great galactic force pulling each of us, inexorably, into its core. I was, as I always want to be by Parsifal, overwhelmed and transported.



That same care and detail, without being over precious was to be heard also in the Good Friday music, every measure part of the journey.

In the title role Klaus Florian Vogt will not likely be to the liking of some (most?) of our listers here. My first encounter with him – about ten years ago – found me perplexed . . . the tone that, I thought, of a countertenor. After a few years I’ve come to love his interpretations of both Parsifal and Lohengrin. Vogt began his musical career as a horn player with the Philharmoniker Hamburg and played in the pit for Parsifal. There is a purity of tone – almost treble like – in his singing that I feel works wonderfully in this role paired against both Frau Herlitzius and Herr Pape
brought an interesting aural tapestry, all the richer for its inclusion of light.

Making her company debut, Evelyn Herlitzius offered a wonderfully drawn Kundry. Bolder than many, more wild than some in her delivery. When she wanted sleep, you just know that no one in the world has ever been more exhausted than this lady. She took interesting liberties with her laugh at Klingsor – beginning it earlier and lasting longer and less “measured” than one is generally accustomed to. She was sensational and different than my other favorite Kundries who offered more plush to their sound (think Ludwig, Troyanos, et. al.) and more in the Modl and Meier vein. Whatever she did, it all boiled down to making me believe she really was Wagner's most fascinating character.

Of Klingsor, all one can say of Evgeny Nikitin is that he sings the role as though born to it. Too often for my taste has Klingsor had a wiry sound, more “Merlin the Magician” not enough menace. Not so Nikitin who roars through the part like a beautiful, sexy howling beast. There was evil, snarling beautifully through and, for some folks who like the darker side, there is a sinister, sensuality in the terror he offers with no apology. Brilliant.

His Blumenmädchen sounded sexier than usual, girly and wild (“Girls Gone Wild,” I remarked to friends last night on FB). They definitely didn’t sound like middle-aged matrons in caftans beckoning a hefty tenor in boy’s clothing. There was definite “snap” going on in their sound which somehow managed to be both luscious and lean. Delightful.

When Peter Mattei first took on Amfortas everyone (including me) thought why? Well, he showed us all why when this production first appeared here, and, as though we could possibly forget, reminded us again last night. The elegiac quality of his suffering is exquisitely portrayed, the sound, focused, unforced, open with a raw beauty so exposed it almost feels “raw.”

Rene Pape has, from the beginning, been one of the most beautifully sung, sonorous Gurnemanz in my experience. He belongs up there with the best interpreters of the role. While at this stage of the game a singer could just offer what he knows would “sell” – Pape goes beyond this. One can hear some age in his voice, softening the old knight’s sternness, and, if at all possible, deepening the intensity, whilst balancing it with gentleness. Nowhere was this more evident than in the Good Friday music, where he evokes nature itself and spins out such tenderness in:

"Nun freut sich alle Kreatur
auf des Erlösers holder Spur,
will sein Gebet ihm weihen."

Just his mere utterance of “Kreatur” is a model of exquisite word painting.

Everything about this performance lifted my heart up last night, made me glad to be alive right now regardless of what else is happening in this crazy world. For six hours last night we had the opportunity to be lost in the time space continuum on our way to Monsalvat.

I can hardly wait to experience this live in a few weeks – and that, friends, is an understatement.

Photo Credits: Ken Howard/Metropolitan Opera

Thinking 'bout Parsifal . . . again (and again)

I’ve been in some interesting discussions, thoughts and reactions to Parsifal - perhaps my favorite opera of all (in actuality it’s a permanent “toss up” between this Grail story, Elektra, Wozzeck, Pelleas & Traviata . . . an odd mix, yes?) but it’s definitely my favorite work from Herr Wagner. From the moment I first heard the opening Vorspiel (I was, I believe 14) I've been under its spell (Good Friday or otherwise!) ever since.

One of the comments was that the work is too sad – unrelievedly so. I have to agree; few operas other outside of Parsifal (Don Carlos and Wozzeck come to mind) possess such an ineffable sadness and this fact seems to disturb and even alienate many. As a child surrounded by a lot of death, I long ago discovered sadness to perhaps be the most complete and honest realization of "beauty.” Sadness isn’t necessarily “hopeless” (though some would see it only this way); it doesn't scrimp or pretend the ugliness and pain away but rather shows it is inherent in all truth and beauty. In sadness one tends to recall things – to hearken back and reflect on more than mere joy – but on everything. I find this to be one of the chief strengths of Parsifal’s magic.

While the work is of course illusory, it presents no illusions, and in its artifice not a false moment shows. Wagner, gives us a handful of truly remarkable characters – almost the entire panoply of humanity. Parsifal, Kundry, Gurnemanz, and Amfortas are all immensely flawed, yet all good people trying to find their way. Even the “evil” Klingsor coveted membership to the Grail Knights, and his sin – egregious and ultimately damning as it was – was done to help him achieve this. Interestingly, Amfortas' own wound was a direct result of his own dalliance and broken vow, (and fraught with symbolism that STILL can confound one’s reason!) It’s always been fascinating to me how Amfortas remains Grail royalty, while the same “sin” keeps ol’ Klingsor out of Ye Ol’ Boys’ Club.

All of these characters seem to be wandering endlessly (in Kundry’s case, literally), almost as though spirits of one realm endlessly longing to belong to another.

As I moved through my teens and young adulthood, Parsifal was always (always!) made fun of, e.g., “I just got the best seats for Parsifal – they’re at Fiorello’s” (restaurant across the street from the Met”), etc., always dismissed as too static – “five hours of nothingness,” etc., etc. I never got that (even when I didn’t understand the opera) having always been fascinated by totality of Wagner’s achievement, his application of its music to his own borrowings of various Grail legends. Nonetheless, I accept that this is an opera more of ideas than one of action, and those who need love scenes, sword fights, crossed-identities, etc., and other (perfectly desirable) operatic trappings, simply will never cotton to it, and I’m okay with that. (I, years ago, gave up my juvenile and slightly creepy mission to make everyone adore it as I do; you’re welcome!)

Wade mentioned how there seems to be no relief or release in Parsifal but I find that Wagner DOES offer it – particularly (and repeatedly) through the outer acts.

I find this the perfect opera (for me) for so many reasons because while it is an entertainment, it also offers what I desire most: a great ol’ brain scrambling allegory mixing variations of ancient legends, elements of spirituality both primeval and modern, and music that is frequently beautiful beyond adequate verbal description.

Yes, this is an opera that demands to be paid attention to and those who find it boring are merely torturing themselves unless willing to pay that attention. Doing so, reveals Wagner at a level of text setting that, though frequently achieved in other works is rarely sustained as well as it is in Parsifal (at least in my estimation – which of course means nothing to anyone else – nor should it).

Wagner is accused of bastardizing the grail legends, and that is a little, if not entirely correct. Wagner of course changes Amfortas’ parentage (Titurel is actually his grandfather, not his daddy), and while Herr Wagner does acknowledge Parsifal’s mother to be Herzeleide, he obfuscates completely the fact she is also Amfortas’s sister – and therefore Parsifal his nephew! (I told you I was a grail nerd!)

Still, if we accuse Wagner of bastardizing the legend, so then must we also damn Wolfram von Eschenbach, Chretien de Troyes, De Boron, Malory, et al., for their doing the same with these ancient legends (and who is “right? in such matters? The first? I don’t’ think so.) In changing up the story, Wagner gave us libretto that perfectly fits the drama he bestowed us with, just as his raiding of various Norse and other myths suited his purposes for his “Ring of the Nibelung,” and just WHO is going to dare complain about THAT?

Parsifal will always hold a special place in my heart. While others of my favorite operas offer catharsis (Elektra) or tragic romance (Traviata) in no other opera does the music bring me back so completely to the innocence purity and ultimate tragedy that is childhood. In this score Wagner paints amazing life-sized murals filled with shadows and fog lifting from countryside streams, scenes in which one can all but smell spices from the far and near east; view misty shafts of light beaming throughout a hidden, secret mountain temple, ceremonial martial music that itself seems bathed in mystical, celestial light, brings hope out of sorrow and ends with the possibility of redemption for all.

Of course when can cite Klingsor as “irredeemable” – in the sense he plays the “devil’s role” in this drama. Nonetheless, one can have (as I discovered as a child) a genuine “sympathy for the devil” – even this devil. Still, Klingsor needs no redemption since Wagner sees fit to conveniently dispose of him once he’s served his purpose and moved the story forward. But what is so marvelous about Parsifal is – that outside of Klingsor – everyone is redeemed, including (as the text tells us) “The Redeemer,” - \Oh, how those words when sung in that final chorus, stir and move me.

When people speak of the power of art (in all its guises) and its ability to move us, nothing comes to my mind more instantly than Wagner’s glorious Grail legend.