'The Ring' in a railroad freight yard

In commemoration of Richard Wagner's 200th birthday, I recently attended a performance of The Ring of the Nibelung at the Metropolitan Opera in New York.

This is the Met's relatively new production, directed by Robert Lepage, that's sometimes referred to as "The Machine Ring" because the set for the entire four-opera marathon consists of a 45-ton series of 24 aluminum planks that rotate on an axis and can be manipulated into almost any needed shape -- from the waters of the Rhine River to a rocky mountaintop to a dense, lush forest to the inside of a feudal castle. Creative use of interactive projections on the planks and effective background lighting make the Machine an amazing piece of stagecraft worthy of the Met and this monumental work of art.

Theoretically.

The main problem, to my amateur senses, is that it's very noisy! Anytime it moves, there's clanking, creaking and banging. It might have actually worked better if Lepage had changed the setting from Wagner's mythological prehistoric time to a modern-day railroad freight yard! Weirder Ring productions than that have been attempted, unfortunately.

In 2009, I saw Seattle's "Green Ring," with its naturalistic and realistic sets. That production also was set in mythological time. At one of the post-performance Q&As with Seattle Opera's knowledgeable and entertaining general director, Speight Jenkins, an unsuspecting audience member thanked Mr. Jenkins for presenting what he called a "traditional" Ring. Speight was furious!

"This is NOT a traditional Ring," he insisted. A "traditional" Ring, Speight said, would be what he saw at the Met in the early '50s, with a forest represented by trees painted on a background rather than Seattle's forest of realistic-looking onstage trees. And more important, the singers in those days simply came out and stood while singing their part -- they made little effort to act. And one of the Seattle production's many strengths was how the singers brought out and developed the characters' personalities.

In New York, the Lepage Machine, while creating marvelous images for the visual sets, too often takes us back to those days of "traditional," static opera by restricting the singers in interacting with their colleagues. The giants in Rheingold, for example, are separated and elevated by the Machine's set from each other and the gods they're bickering with, which makes their abduction of the goddess Freia look contrived. Sometimes the Machine does get out of the way and let the singers act, but their space is always limited because the area in front of the Machine, which cannot move up- or downstage, is a fraction of the Met stage's generous proportions.

Another problem with the Machine is that it occasionally malfunctions. I consider myself quite lucky that it didn't break down during the cycle I saw in late April and early May.

Lepage's Rheingold was chosen to make its much-hyped debut on opening night of the Met's 2010-11 season. At the end of the opera, the gods are supposed to cross a rainbow bridge and enter their new home, Valhalla. The effect was quite spectacular when I saw it last month. But at the end of that first performance, the bridge was nowhere to be seen, and the gods just ambled off into the wings to some of Wagner's most stirring music. Oops.

More recently, I listened to this season's radio broadcast of Rheingold shortly before my trip to New York. When the head god Wotan and the demi-god of fire, Loge, head down to the caves of Niebelheim, where they intend to steal the Ring, stunt doubles walk down a brightly lit stairway in another very cool effect. But at that point in that Saturday matinee broadcast, there was a loud thud, some clanking, then voices talking frantically, and finally someone saying something about "the conductor," although the music never stopped. Very odd. A friend in New York who attended the performance reported that a malfunction kept the stairway bit from happening, a stagehand had to walk onstage (can't be good if that happens!) to push part of the set back in place, but then a section of it was hanging down in front of the Machine as the next scene was about to begin. When someone told bass-baritone Eric Owens to go ahead with his upcoming entrance, he protested that he couldn't see the conductor. Thus the voices heard on the radio broadcast. Amazingly, conductor Fabio Luisi and the Met orchestra didn't miss a beat, Owens and tenor Gerhard Siegel made their entrances, and somehow the set snafu was resolved. But it made for some tense moments in the house.

The quality of this production was varied -- sometimes the Machine and its accompanying effects were superb, as when it showed all the creepy critters crawling through the forest where Siegfried has grown up, or the "overhead" view of Brünnhilde lying asleep surrounded by fire at the close of Die Walküre.

At other times it fell short. In the very first scene, a little more convincing theft of the Rheingold would have been nice, rather than Alberich with a sack scampering up the Machine's planks to the top of the set while the Rheinmaidens just sit and watch. One sings "Haltet den räuber!" (which pretty well translates to "Stop! Thief!") but they make no effort to actually stop him as he walks right past them.

The end of Act II of Götterdämmerung is supposed to be one of opera's great "awkward moments." Brünnhilde, Hagen and Gunther have just sung their great trio (wait! a trio? in Wagner? yes, it's true, he broke his own "rules," and quite well, I might add) plotting Siegfried's death, each of them with a different reason for it. They are all quite serious at this moment, but who comes in at just the wrong time? Why, it's the happy Siegfried, Gutrune and the wedding party! It would have worked much better with an obvious glance or two between the characters that just hinted at "Oh, it's you. Plotting your death? Uh, no, we'd never do that!" In this production, the plotters just appear kind of grumpy as they take their places in the procession and the curtain falls. The final music of this scene is the sinister motif of the evil Hagen, played by the low strings and bassoons, but there's no acknowledgement of that onstage.

The interactive projections were quite ingenious at times. When the Rheinmaidens sing in the first scene of Rheingold -- they're supposed to be underwater -- bubbles are projected on the planks just behind them at exactly the moments and in exactly the places that they sing. And when one of the characters puts his hand in a projection of water, it realistically ripples out. All a very clever inclusion of technology that really sets the Machine apart.

An audience favorite is the eight Valkyries riding their flying horses during the "Ride of the Valkyries" music. Each sits astride one of the Machine's planks as it bobs up and down like a hobby horse, and as they "land" on the Valkyries' Rock, they slide down their plank one by one as if they were coming down a playground slide. Kind of hokey, but if any scene needs a little humor and hokeyness, it's this one.

Despite the Machine's shortcomings and a few production disappointments, this was actually a quite enjoyable Ring, and the main reason for that is that musically, it was superb (at least in the cycle.I attended).

Check back soon for a rundown of the performances. For rail yard workers, the Met's cast, orchestra and chorus did a masterful job of putting this train together.

Happy 200th birthday, Herr Wagner!

If you could invite anyone, living or dead, to your ultimate dinner party, who would it be?

It's a fun question whose answers can give a peek to a person's interests and beliefs. Historical figures, deceased family members, religious figures, current political, entertainment or business figures often make such lists.

My friends and family might be a little surprised at who most definitely would NOT be on my list: the 19th century German Romantic composer Richard Wagner. They know I have long been an ardent disciple of Wagner's music. He was undoubtedly the most influential composer of the late 19th century: For good or ill, he changed forever the way Western music was composed, played and even listened to. His operas/music dramas permanently changed how music is used in the theater and have always exerted a strong influence on music for film.

But away from the world of music, he was a thoroughly despicable little man. Today we'd call him sleazy. He'd be your dearest BFF, as long as you continued to "loan" him money, or a place to live, or your wife. Once that ended, you'd be among his legion of enemies, which included entire races of people who for whatever reason he thought were conspiring against him. He had no morals.

That dichotomy of unmatched musical genius and deeply flawed character are what have kept Wagner among the most controversial figures in history.

But today, we can set aside that controversy and celebrate the work of a man who has given many of us so many hours of musical pleasure and inspiration. On May 22, 1813, Richard Wilhelm Wagner was born into a dysfunctional theater family in Leipzig.

So I'll put on a recording of Act I of Die Walküre, or maybe the last scene of Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg or the "Liebestod" from Tristan und Isolde -- too many superb examples of his work to choose from! -- cut myself a piece of birthday cake, lift a glass of good German wine, turn toward Bayreuth and wish Herr Wagner a happy 200th birthday!

And be grateful that I won't have to put up with that asshole at my dinner party.

Getting ready ...

I have not posted on my blog for a month, and for that I apologize. During this time, I've been to New York to see a complete performance of Wagner's Ring of the Nibelung, attended a Dallas Symphony all-Wagner concert and listened to a live broadcast of the Metropolitan Opera orchestra from Carnegie Hall, which opened with a Wagner prelude.

You get the idea. Lots of Wagner, and there's a reason for it. And on Wednesday, I'll start what will likely be a flurry of posts on all of the above events and more.

In the meantime, study up on singing "Zum Geburtstag viel Glück!"

Seeking position as proofreader for Dallas Opera

A friend of mine attended the Dallas Opera's recent "simulcast" at Cowboys Stadium of a Turandot performance. She reports that she had a great time and didn't have to give a penny to Jerry Jones!

My correspondent also brought me a souvenir of the evening: the single-sheet program that was given to all of the casual opera patrons at the football stadium. It's not the booklet that's handed out at the Winspear Opera House, but it has everything you need to know about the cast, the characters, the production team and the performance.

And on the back is a handy synopsis of the plot, with the title, Turandot, in big letters at the top, and right next to that the words "By Giuseppe Verdi"!

Oops.

Of course, all but the last couple of scenes of Turandot was composed by Giacomo Puccini some 23 years after Verdi's death.

Now, I've been in the media biz for many more years than I care to admit, and I certainly understand that mistakes happen. And while those of us who proffer the written word to the public make every effort not to make mistakes, a typo here and there will not bring the world to an end.

But I know from experience how embarrassing an error in "display type" is. And while I'm sure the good folks at the Dallas Opera are embarrassed, they run the worse risk of losing credibility among the audience they're so prominently going after: younger, more casual than your average opening-night-at-the-Winspear crowd, smart and aware but who may not know precisely the difference between Verdi and Puccini, and are likely to be confused by a program sheet that lists two different composers for what they're watching.

So I'm offering my services to the Dallas Opera as a proofreader for anything they want to put before the public. I may not find every error, but I'd scream louder than Antonello Palombi if I saw something attributing Turandot to anyone other than Signor Puccini!

My salary requirements? A couple of tickets to the opera.

What's in a name?

This week, the Dallas Opera opens one of its two spring productions, Puccini's Turandot, which runs April 5-21. 

For those not all that familiar with this magnificent work, one of the first questions is, "How do you pronounce it?" Well, it's either TOUR-an-doe or -dot or -dote, but the debate has gone on for years, with all sides claiming their way is how Puccini said it.

Perhaps the most convincing argument is a 1962 interview given by Rosa Raisa, the very first Turandot in 1926, who insisted that Puccini and Toscanini (who conducted that famous premiere) said -doe. Others insist Puccini would have pronounced the T because his opera was based on a play by Carlo Gozzi called Turandotte, pronounced -dot-eh. The most common pronunciation today is -dot, so you can't go wrong calling it that.

But no matter how you say it, Turandot is a great night of escapist fantasy with some fine drama and the music of Puccini at the top of his game. 

Puccini composed the first 2-1/2 acts before he died of throat cancer in 1924. A composer who had studied with Puccini, Franco Alfano, was chosen to complete it based on the maestro's sketches. It's still the most popular ending for the work, despite some dramatic and musical problems, although others have tried. 

In fact, the last time the Dallas Opera performed Turandot, 10 years ago, it was done with a new ending by Luciano Berio. That ending did a little better job of explaining how Turandot, the ice princess, had such a profound change of heart and fell in love with the unknown prince, Calaf. But for me, the very quiet duet between the two failed to explain this change of heart to her subjects, the people of Peking. They are a big part of the whole drama, from their initial bloodthirstiness over Turandot's suitors, through their observation of the riddle scene, to their background introduction to Calaf's "Nessun dorma," as they roam the streets of Peking searching for the Unknown Prince's name. Seems like they should have some part in the final disposition of the whole thing. Alfano's ending does that, but Turandot's change of heart just seems to happen during the last scene change. Oh well, it IS fantasy-drama, after all, and it's still fun to watch and hear.

Of course, one of the highlights of any Turandot performance is the tenor's aria at the beginning of the third act (and thus, the last aria that Puccini composed), "Nessun dorma," which gained unrivaled popularity outside the opera house a few years ago when it became the signature of the Three Tenors. The triumphant cry of "Vincero! Vincero! Vincero!" at the end is about as thrilling an experience as you'll ever have in the opera house.

That ending translates as "I will win!" It has occurred to me that if you just read the words to this aria by themselves, you could come away thinking that this fellow is an obnoxious Don Juan, minus the charm. But, as always in the best passages of opera, it's the music that lets you know that Calaf is crying out "Vincero!" only because he is so confident of reaching his goal -- to win the heart of Princess Turandot. After all, he's already answered the three riddles that she poses to all of her suitors, which his predecessors invariably stumbled on, leaving them with the consolation prize -- a visit to the executioner. And he's certain that she'll never find out the answer to the challenge he posed to her -- to guess his name.

Here's an English translation of "Nessun dorma":

No one must sleep! No one must sleep... You, too, o Princess, in your cold room look at the stars, that tremble with love and with hope! But my mystery is shut within me; no one will know my name!

No, I will say it on your mouth when the daylight shines! And my kiss will break the silence that makes you mine! ... Vanish, o night! Set, you stars! At dawn I will win! I will win! I will win!

Baseball in Europe?

On Easter Sunday, March 31, a little after 7 p.m. local time, at a former railroad station in downtown Houston, a great annual ritual will begin. 

Less than 20 people -- mostly professional athletes but also umpires, base coaches, batboys, ball girls, etc. -- will assemble on a large field, with several thousand baseball fans in surrounding seats and a few million more watching on television. 

At 7:05, the home plate umpire will signal for play to begin, and Bud Norris will throw the first pitch to Texas Rangers second-baseman Ian Kinsler. With that, the Houston Astros will officially enter the American League, and the 2013 major league baseball season will begin. 

I apologize that this long, flowery windup is only to set up a bad joke, but here goes. 

I am a lifelong baseball fan and an unabashed Wagnerian. Richard, not Honus, although I greatly admire the work of both these men, who more than excelled in their chosen fields. They're connected, by the way, because Richard wrote an opera based on the legend of the Flying Dutchman, which also was the nickname of the speedy, German-descended Honus.

If a professional baseball league is ever established in Europe, my dream is to buy the team in Nuremberg (or to the Germans, Nürnberg).

I would have a couple of good choices for a team name, the most obvious of which is Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (or the Mastersingers of Nuremberg), after Wagner's great comic opera of the same name, which has as one of its main characters a fellow named Hans Sachs, the wise and avuncular cobbler. Although the uniform makers might have some trouble getting the entire team name on the jerseys, one would assume the players on a team with that name could sing "Deutschland Über Alles" before taking the field for each game, so I could save money on an organist. 

But my primary reason for buying the Nuremberg nine would be so I could call it:

The Nürnberg Hans Sox!

I warned you.

Ball spielen!

Now let's go to Eric down on the stage...

When athletes are interviewed after a game, how many times do you hear the same stock answers (usually to the same stock questions) about how we all worked so hard, and we just take this one game at a time, what a great team this is and what great fans we have, etc., etc.? Almost every time? And generally, they never say anything interesting or that you didn't already know.

Well, the same thing has become true in the "interviews" during the intermissions of the Metropolitan Opera's HD transmissions of Saturday matinee performances. They're all very happy and positive and effusive and excited. They all worked so hard, and they all just love every minute they're working together (that's when you start to wonder), and what a great cast and production team this is, etc., etc. And generally, they never say anything interesting or that you didn't already know.

Then there's the frequent problem of the jarring mood change, as in the recent Parsifal transmission. The first act of Wagner's final masterpiece is nearly two hours of gloomy, almost crushing depression (the fantastic music makes it bearable, even uplifting). But after the music ends and the emotionally exhausted audience watches the camera switch backstage, there's the broadcast's happy, effusive "host," baritone Eric Owens, with a big smile on his face as he stops the exhausted lead tenor, Jonas Kaufmann, for a bit of inane banter. This isn't Mr. Owens' fault -- he's just doing what he was hired to do.

And add to that the fact that, due to the international nature of casting almost any opera, but especially at the Met, many of those interviewed have accents that make them practically unintelligible. Perhaps the most interesting thing that happens in the interviews is when one of the singers commandeers the microphone and delivers a message to friends and family back home in their native tongue (as both Kaufmann and bass Rene Pape did during their Parsifal interviews). It's nice to see them speaking confidently, even if you don't know what they're saying, instead of having to watch their sometimes painful struggle to find the right words in English.

Surely the brains who came up with this incredible idea of broadcasting live opera into movie theaters can come up with a better way to fill the intermission time. Why not an expert (not too stuffy, of course) to talk about that day's opera? The radio broadcasts did that for years, but apparently that's too passe now, and they've switched to mostly interviews, too, although their questioners are a little more insightful than the singers who conduct the video "interviews."

I wouldn't mind seeing a broadcast version of the famous Opera Quiz, which has been a staple of the radio broadcasts for longer than most of us have been alive. Even just the backstage cameras showing the incredible Met stagehands changing the sets between acts, which the producers already show between the interviews, would be better.

Back to you, Mel.