The Best of All Possible Rings
by Igor Keller

Wagner’s four-opera Ring Cycle is at once magnificent and ridiculous.It is 16-plus hours of – among other things – greed, betrayal, vengeance, incest, defiance and love set in the framework of Germanic myths.As operatic works go, the Ring is the most serious of all.It requires a great deal from the audience, crew, singers and musicians alike.Staging it requires a major time commitment from all those involved, so naturally a production of this magnitude deserves a great deal of gravity.Of course, that approach has left Wagner open for parody for the last 140 years.Those pickings are easy; just give a portly guy a spear and an ample woman a horned helmet and you’ve got instant comedy, right?Up until the past few years I would have been right there laughing at the pretend histrionics.But lately, I’ve come to appreciate Wagner on a different level.Perhaps it’s that my attention span can handle the immense running time or maybe the introduction of supertitles has increased my understanding of the action.Although the music hasn’t changed at all, I was witnessing a different Ring than I’d first heard some 25 years ago.Previously, I’d viewed the cycle as a challenge to my stamina and delighted in its more absurd moments.It was important for me just to get through the blasted thing for the sheer experience points.Although I enjoyed being there, hearing the music, watching the story unfold, etc., it was by far the most vital to finish the marathon.Now I see it as something much deeper; as a meditation on the human condition with musical accompaniment.On the technical side, I listen closely to Wagner’s orchestration, his masterful use of tone color and his choice of leitmotifs.I am also greatly impressed by the sheer scope and grandeur of these four remarkable works, which were, like all of Wagner’s operas, expressions of resurgent German nationalism.Although we all know where those errant feelings led, these operas have become something else entirely.They show us characters in a slow decline of their own making in a world that barely notices their existence.The strange thing is that most of these characters don’t care that they’re doomed.But each time I see the cycle again, I understand their predicament just that much better.I’ve seen five Ring Cycles so far, and this is the best to date.

Except for a few singers making their Seattle debuts, there is nothing new about this production – both in the sense that it reprises the 2005 production and that its concept is rigorously traditional.Neither of these is a bad thing by any means.Sometimes the time-honored approach is best.Thinking back to the ridiculous Israel-Rochaix Ring of the early nineties makes me grateful that they went this way.Save for a few 21^st-century technical elements, this production could have been staged a century ago.It’s worth mentioning that traditional productions dominated Seattle Opera’s 2008-09 season, and, whether by accident or intent, this has been the best season in decades.I have absolutely no objection to their choice of concept for this Ring Cycle.

In Das Rheingold, events go wrong from the very start.In comparison to the rest of the cycle, the action moves quickly.We start out with the Rhine Daughters in acrobatic harnesses tormenting Alberich. This was a very nice touch, as it puts them out of Alberich’s grasp as they were meant to be.He renounces love, steals their gold, things quickly spin out of control and a fatal predicament is born that will play out over the course of the next three operas.This comes off in very intense fashion thanks to some very good performances by Wotan (the awesome Greer Grimsley), Fricka (Stephanie Blythe) and Alberich (Richard Paul Fink).Fink as Alberich was especially good; his voice and acting were exceptional.He made the greedy, tormented and evil character come alive.The more I see the cycle, the more I realize how much hinges on his character, because much of what Wotan does, good or bad, is to counter Alberich’s nefarious aims.So many of Das Rheingold’s performances were quite excellent, but there were several that were not.Kobie van Rensburg as Loge and Dennis Peteren as Mime were disappointing.Rensburg’s voice was thin and his acting was sub-par.He’s supposed to be vain, mischievous and funny, and he came off as solemn and non-reactive as all the rest of the gods.Petersen just never lived the character.He only sang words.He didn’t fit the role.I blame the Ring Cycles of the eighties for spoiling me.Back then, the part was sung by a fellow named Paul Crook, who was probably the best Mime in the world at the time.He was short, spiteful and nasty.Petersen was none of these things.As long as we’re on the subject of dwarfs, was I the only one to notice that the giants and dwarfs were the same size?And that their costumes were almost identical?I was hoping for something that would differentiate them a little more.And lastly, most of the action in Das Rheingold flowed smoothly, but as the stage filled up with more gods and conversation grew more solemn, things began to drag.This was because everyone’s attention was focused elsewhere; each character would face in a different direction as Wotan intoned about the fate of the world.There was no dramatic focal point and the pacing suffered because of it.

The next night’s performance of Die Walküre was superb.The singers and the orchestra were both in fine form.In fact, the orchestra (under the baton of Robert Spano) hasn’t sounded this good since the days of Henry Holt.Spano seemed to possess a very deep understanding of the music and was able to evoke subtler aspects of the score that others miss.Whether it was Spano’s doing or not, my hat is off to the trombone section.You know, people make fun of trombones a lot.I do it all the time.But when you have a section this good, it makes you want to eat your words – until, of course, you hear lesser lights trying to coax music out of the blasted instrument.The trombones were particularly effective in “The Ride of the Valkyries,” the piece that everybody has to wait three hours to hear.That evening, there were other performances that were nearly as good.Once again, Greer Grimsley’s Wotan was outstanding and Janice Baird’s Brünnhilde was excellent, but to me, the vocal performance of the evening belonged to Andrea Silvestrelli as Hunding.His rich bass-baritone and terse, brutish acting made you almost forget about the incest brewing between Siegmund and Sieglinde, who were themselves quite good.After he kills Siegmund, it was a real shame to see him die.The rest of the action plays out quite nicely, the Valkyries ride, Wotan catches up with them, doles out his punishment and sets fire to a mountain.It was really a wonderful performance.The only critique that I have is that once more, while Wotan is kicking Brünnhilde out of the Valkyries, each of her sisters is facing a different direction.They should be reacting to this, but they merely stand like statues and listen to Wotan while, without that dramatic focal point, the scene’s flow seems to slacken and drag.

I have long had problems with Siegfried, particularly with Siegfried himself.Here we have this fearless idiot manchild who is supposed to set things right for everybody in the world.I can never accept it.He’s far too stupid and impulsive.I was wondering whether anybody could ever play a Siegfried who wasn’t, you know, such a repulsive bully.Well, it’s finally happened. Tenor Stig Andersen has done it; he’s fashioned a mellower and more contemplative Siegfried who is far more appealing than any other that I’ve seen.The only drawback is that when he really needs to sing with gusto, as in the sword-forging scene, he falls a bit short.Otherwise, he comes off as good-natured, a bit clownish, but capable of learning things.I really enjoyed his performance, although I still have problems with the opera.On the one hand, you have all this action – swords getting forged, anvils being split, dragons getting killed, spears being shattered – with never more than three people onstage at any given time.On the other hand, there are many, many moments when nothing is happening; I feel as if we’re merely marking time between action sequences.And then there’s the third act, which I’ve always regarded as the longest-seeming act in all of opera, especially during the final scene between Siegfried and Brünnhilde.Wagner’s romantic dialogue is just dreadful and the action is completely stagnant.It seems to go on for days.I don’t think there’s anything that anyone can do about these elements short of a complete rewrite.It is by far the weakest part of the cycle.But before that, you do get treated to a very nice dragon.He was all tusks and wings.Other than that, Dennis Petersen’s Mime didn’t get any better, but that problem solves itself when Siegfried kills him at the end of act two.Try as I might, I can’t seem to shake my mixed feelings toward this opera.

In contrast, Götterdämmerung is Wagner at his best.It is the longest of the four operas and the most satisfying.It contains music that is so sublime that it sounds almost otherworldly.I’m glad to say that this was the best of the four.There were so many things good about it that they’re too numerous to mention – the singing, the staging, the orchestra and the fact that they used a real horse during the performance.Götterdämmerung doesn’t have Siegfried’s gimmicks; it merely embraces the inevitable.Wotan’s proxy of Siegfried faces off against Alberich’s proxy, Hagen, and Siegfried doesn’t deliver, because, well, he’s just not very smart.So much for the fate of the gods!Following Siegfried’s death, three things need to happen for a proper finale: Brünnhilde has to throw herself onto Siegfried’s funeral pyre, the Rhine Daughters have to drown Hagen and Valhalla needs to go up in flames.In previous cycles, I’ve been very disappointed.Either one happens so prominently that you don’t notice the others going on, or the stage is simply drenched with flame lighting effects to let us know that everything is burning.But this time around, they actually made a halfway decent stab at all three.Even though it was a bit reminiscent of Disney movies of the thirties and forties, it was effective.Once again, Stig Andersen and Janice Baird shone in their roles.I was also very impressed with Daniel Sumegi as Hagen.Richard Paul Fink’s Alberich makes an appearance that I wished would last a lot longer.He was just perfect in that role and I wish that Seattle Opera will get wise and bring him back to sing other parts in the future.

This was a very impressive production indeed.It is the finest one I’ve seen.Clearly the traditional approach was the best for this production.For those who are looking for more contemporary adaptations, Los Angeles Opera is putting on a Ring Cycle that looks pretty freaky.As for myself, I can’t wait until they put on this great production again.It was very impressive and I commend Seattle Opera for undertaking it.Every time I see the Ring Cycle, it becomes a different and more profound experience for me.Although I still see the limitless potential for parody, it is more important to look at this as a serious work of art.