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Associated Press
13 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Associated Press
Nina Stemme says farewell to Isolde after 126 performances
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Nina Stemme tilted back her head after the final notes of her 126th and last Isolde performance, and her eyes filled with tears. She was hugged by tenor Stuart Skelton and mezzo-soprano Karen Cargill as the audience in Marian Anderson Hall stood and applauded Sunday evening. A few days earlier, Stemme thought back to April 2000, when Glyndebourne Festival general director Nicholas Snowman and opera director Nikolaus Lehnhoff walked into her dressing room in Antwerp, Belgium, asking her to sing in the English company's first-ever performance of Wagner's 'Tristan und Isolde.' 'I really did think they were joking,' she recalled. 'My colleague, Christopher Ventris, said, 'No. No. They're not joking. You have to be careful.'' Stemme went home to Sweden, considered the offer with vocal coach Richard Trimborn and made her Isolde debut on May 19, 2003, at the Glyndebourne Festival with Robert Gambill as Tristan and Jiří Bělohlávek conducting. She chose to sing her final two Isoldes 22 years later with the Philadelphia Orchestra and music director Yannick Nézet-Séguin, who conducted the opera for the first time on June 1 and coaxed a luminous rendition from a premier orchestra at its peak. 'I'm 62 now. I gave it to my 60s to sing these big roles and now I've dropped Elektra and Brünnhilde, and Isolde is the last daughter on stage that I'm singing,' Stemme said. 'I decided this years ago. This is how it works and every year that I was able to sing Isolde feels like a bonus and a privilege.' Connection to Birgit Nilsson Stemme was friends with Birgit Nilsson, one of the greatest Isoldes and Brünnhildes, who died in 2005 at age 87. 'I was on the verge to go down to her in south Sweden to study Isolde but of course me as a young singer with little kids at home, I never felt ready,' Stemme said. 'At that time when we got to know each other, I was singing mostly a lyric repertoire.' Skelton sang with Stemme in Wagner's 'Der Fliegende Holländer' at the Vienna State Opera in 2004 and his Tristan was paired with Stemme's Isolde in New York, Munich and Naples, Italy. 'It's as radiant now as it was when I first heard her sing it in Glyndebourne way back in the day,' he said. 'No one knew really who Nina Stemme was to a certain extent. Certainly I don't think anyone was ready for what she brought to Isolde even then.' A conductor learning from the singer Nézet-Séguin first worked with Stemme in a performance of Wagner's Wesendonck Lieder with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra in 2007, didn't collaborate again until performances of Strauss' 'Die Frau ohne Schatten' at the Met last fall. 'The breadth of her experience with the role is just guiding all of us, me, but also the orchestra, who is playing it for the first time in understanding the flow of the piece, understanding their shades and the colors, and that is invaluable,' Nézet-Séguin said of Stemme's Isolde. 'It was wonderful for me to benefit from it.' Singers were on a platform above and behind the orchestra, with LED lights below setting a mood: red in the first act, dark blue in the second and light blue in the third. Stemme wore a dark gown in the first and third acts and a shimmering silver dress in the second, while Skelton, baritone Brian Mulligan (Kurwenal), bass Tareq Nazmi (King Marke) and tenor Freddie Ballentine (Melot) were largely in black, and Cargill (Brangäne) in a lighter-colored costume. Showing sets and complicated directions weren't necessary, she conveyed Isolde's emptions with her eyes, smiles and nods. During the great second-act love duet, Stemme and Skelton clinked water canisters. 'Twenty-two years ago I could act the young princess that was in love or hated her love for Tristan,' she said. 'I have other colors to my voice now and I'm older so of course this interpretation will change. I feel more at home in the middle range and with age, of course, the top notes are not as gleaming as they used to be, but I can make up for that in other ways hopefully — on a good day.' Stemme's future schedule includes less-taxing roles, such as Klytämnestra in Strauss' 'Elektra' and Waltraute in Wagner's 'Götterdämmerung.' She leaves behind an outstanding recording of her Isolde, made from November 2004 through January 2005 at London's Abbey Road Studios with tenor Plácido Domingo and conductor Antonio Pappano. Lise Davidsen makes her Isolde debut next year Anticipation is building for the next great Isolde. Lise Davidsen is scheduled to make her role debut on Jan. 12 at Barcelona's Gran Teatre del Liceu and then open a new production at New York's Metropolitan Opera on March 9 with Nézet-Séguin. 'She said how happy she is to in a way symbolically pass this role, pass it on to her, in a way through me,' Nézet-Séguin said of Stemme. 'That is almost like a torch that has been carried.' After all those Isoldes, Stemme feels more a Puccini heroine than a Wagnerian star. 'At heart,' she said, 'I'm still Madama Butterfly or Mimì.'
The Guardian
15 hours ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Saul review – probing, dark and engrossing staging of Handel's oratorio
The Glyndebourne season continues with a revival by Donna Stirrup of Barrie Kosky's 2015 staging of Handel's Saul, widely regarded as one of the festival's finest achievements and the production that cemented Kosky's reputation in the UK as a director of remarkable originality. This is the first time I've seen it, having missed both its opening run and the 2018 revival, and it strikes me as an example of Kosky's work at its finest: probing, insightful, sometimes witty, sometimes dark, always utterly engrossing. Premiered in 1739, Saul has often been compared to King Lear. There is much of Shakespeare in this portrait by Handel and his librettist, Charles Jennens, of the Old Testament king whose mind slowly disintegrates under the challenges presented to him politically and privately by David after the death of Goliath. Mindful that the work also examines the moral arguments around dethroning an anointed king – still a huge issue in the wake of the Revolution of 1688 – Kosky updates the oratorio to the time of composition, though his 18th century is a stylised, hedonistic place, reminiscent of Hogarth or Fellini's Casanova in its gaudy seediness. Garish colours give way to black in the second half when Saul's behaviour drags his country into war. Kosky underpins the Shakespearean resonances by weaving four small roles together for a single performer (tenor Liam Bonthrone), effectively a jester, who stands in relation to Saul much as the Fool does to Lear. Jonathan Cohen conducts the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment with great subtlety and dramatic weight, admirably capturing the work's sometimes unsettling urgency. Christopher Purves (Saul) and Iestyn Davies (David) are both returning to the roles they played in 2015. Purves's snarling delivery has an almost expressionist ferocity, but he is of course a superb actor and his depiction of Saul's mental breakdown is at times almost distressingly vivid. Davies is his perfect foil, always calm and psychologically centred, suggesting unswerving certainties of faith. His voice remains unearthly in its beauty, and time stands still when he sings Oh Lord, Whose Mercies Numberless. The rest of the cast are equally strong. Sarah Brady's Merab is all hauteur and adamantine coloratura, in contrast to Soraya Mafi's softer voiced Michal. Linard Vrielink makes an outstanding Jonathan, handsomely lyrical, his love for David beautifully realised, while Bonthrone is wonderfully caustic as Kosky's newly created fool. The chorus, whether sashaying through one of Otto Pichler's classy dance routines, or negotiating Handel's complex counterpoint with perfect clarity, are simply sensational. At Glyndebourne until 24 July
Telegraph
18-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Glyndebourne's overdue Parsifal is full of unusual decisions
Nothing about Wagner's Parsifal is normal. It certainly isn't a normal opera, though countless directors have tried to make it one. Richard Wagner created his final major work, first performed in 1882, as a 'stage consecration play', casting its narrative of redemption in the form of a long, unfolding ritual. 'Here, time becomes space', as one line in the libretto has it. The usual play of narrative is reworked as Parsifal, an innocent fool, arrives as an outsider in a damaged chivalric community which guards the Holy Grail; this circle is ruled by a king, Amfortas, who has not only lost their Holy Spear to the malevolent sorcerer Klingsor, but been grievously wounded in the process. It has taken Glyndebourne a long time to mount its first Parsifal, which apparently had been the ambition of its founder John Christie back when the festival started in 1934. In its old house, the piece was impossible; even in the fine new theatre, opened in 1994, it's still a tight fit. The ensemble at Wagner's premiere numbered an orchestra of 107, a chorus of 135, and 23 soloists; here, they're reduced to manageable proportions. The grandest effects, such as recorded off-stage bells, are underwhelming, but conductor Robin Ticciati achieves miracles of ever-moving textures from the London Philharmonic in the orchestra pit, never wallowing in the sound but driving it forward and giving it an edge in the act preludes. The sense of momentum and wonder he creates gives the drama its essential underpinning. Director Jetske Mijnssen, highly praised and making her UK debut, mounts a production that's not only suited to the size of the theatre but also offers some startling new takes on the narrative. The innocent Parsifal of Daniel Johansson, light-voiced and not yet fully characterised, arrives in the traditional manner with dead swan in hand, but encounters a defensive crowd of knights who interrupt their Act One finale procession to beat him savagely. They're equally intolerant of Kristina Stanek's 'wild woman' Kundry, whose initial incarnation as a maid bringing in a tea-tray is quite a novelty. But to hear her voice blossom while keeping its incisiveness is one of the great thrills of the evening. The drab marble-pillared hall of Ben Baur's design is essentially a domestic setting. It imposes a dreary uniformity on proceedings, echoed in Gideon Davey's grey costumes, which are Nordic-noir with a visual dash of Munch or Hammershoi, red hair for the maids and the flower maidens. Silent added characters – Parsifal's mother, a younger and older Kundry – stimulate some new perspectives on Wagner's story. It's a nice touch in this male-dominated drama that after Kundry has washed Parsifal's feet, he, Christ-like, washes hers. But Parsifal himself is strangely recessed in the final drama, not helped by a sacred spear no bigger than a penknife. In this reductive setting, amid all the processing, John Tomlinson's veteran ex-king Titurel (still interfering) and John Relyea's implacable elder knight Gurnemanz have to sit round a tiny altar to celebrate the Office as if they were starting a hand of bridge. Relyea doesn't grow older across the acts as he should, but he remains the heroic controlling force and vocal star of the show, a truly remarkable feat. Meanwhile, Audun Iversen's fine wounded and despairing Amfortas seeks, through compassion, a reconciliation with Klingsor, magnificently declaimed by Ryan Speedo Green; and the production ends with an unexpected twist. On this first night, there were cheers for the music, but scattered grumbles at the drama. Either way, Glyndebourne's Parsifal is a gripping evening that will stimulate continuing debate about the real meaning of Wagner's final challenge to the world.
The Guardian
18-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Parsifal review – reconciliation rather than redemption as Wagner staging focuses on family over faith
Even before Monty Python clip-clopped two coconuts together, it was never easy to put Wagner's Parsifal, with its heady combination of Catholic religiosity and Arthurian legend, on stage. Glyndebourne's first ever production of the opera, staged by Jetske Mijnssen, takes a dour approach, bypassing almost all the religious mysticism, and laces the rest of the story firmly into the stays of a Chekhovian family relationship drama. Ben Baur's sombre sets and Gideon Davey's buttoned-up costumes place us in a Catholic community around the time of the opera's premiere, 1882. A quote from the Cain and Abel story, projected during the orchestral prelude, sets the tone. Mijnssen makes Amfortas and Klingsor into long-lost brothers, separated during a previously idyllic childhood when a fit of teenage jealousy over Kundry's affections and his brother's regard made Klingsor lash out with a whittling knife. We see this being acted out by the characters' younger selves while Gurnemanz tells us the backstory in his mammoth Act 1 narration – a velvet-toned tour de force from the bass John Relyea. The knights seem like lesser priests, wearing surplices to take communion before beating up the outsider Parsifal. Kundry is less a wild spirit than a glorified housemaid; the holy spear is a whittling knife, the grail an ordinary chalice – and, as much as the physical hole in his side, Amfortas's rift with his brother is the real wound that refuses to heal. Parsifal's dawning understanding of all this, helped by the vision of his dead mother that Kundry conjures for him, is what passes for heroism here. So there's no faith in this production, and little magic too, save for the inspired touch of having Klingsor's flower maidens as a sinister multitude of Kundrys. It's no longer an opera about redemption – a big, abstract concept – but one about reconciliation, and that's somehow a more slender story than the one Wagner wrote four hours of music for. And yet the production is redeemed by the fact that those hours of listening are so well spent. The conductor Robin Ticciati elicits a gleaming, flowing orchestral performance from the London Philharmonic, one that is supportive of an excellent cast – and hearing them in such an intimate theatre as this is special. Relyea's tireless Gurnemanz is the outstanding performance, but Audun Iversen's Amfortas is profoundly affecting too, alongside Kristina Stanek's rich-toned, lithe-voiced Kundry, Ryan Speedo Green's energised Klingsor and Daniel Johansson's innocent but incisive Parsifal. John Tomlinson is as magnetic as ever as Titurel, a major figure in this production – he's on stage for 80 minutes before he sings a word, and he's riveting. Would Wagner have recognised this as his Parsifal? Maybe not. But it's moving on its own terms, and it sounds wonderful. Until 24 June
Times
18-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Times
Parsifal review — potent singing brings Glyndebourne's Wagner to life
In the programme for Glyndebourne's new Wagner production its director, Jetske Mijnssen, says she 'needs characters who are rounded human beings'. Oh dear, she's come to the wrong opera. Parsifal is where you get a king eternally tormented by a wound that won't heal, or a bunch of religious zealots obsessed with the Holy Grail, or a magician who has castrated himself, or a woman tormented through centuries because she laughed at Jesus Christ. Rounded human beings these are not. So Mijnssen rounds them out anyway, turning Wagner's last and most enigmatically mystical opera into a protracted family deathbed drama, set in 1882 (the year of Parsifal's premiere), with Ben Baur's sets evoking the panelled walls and heavy drapes of a Victorian drawing
