Computer problems have slowed my progress a bit this week, but now that I'm happily conjugating with a new HP Pavilion laptop, I'm prepared to move forward with my cycle of reviews for the four segments of Richard Wagner's Ring of the Nibelungs. This second installment, Die Walküre, was a good deal more to my liking than the prelude, Das Rheingold.
Historical Background: When Richard Wagner (1813-1883) was 18 years of age, he began serious musical study with Theodor Weinlig, the Cantor at the Thomasschule. It was under the guidance of this earnest tutor that Wagner produced his Symphony in C Major, which is now lost. In November of 1832, Wagner wrote his first opera text, Die Hochzeit, but its gory content so upset his sister, Rosalie, that Wagner ultimately destroyed the piece. In 1833, he began his professional career with an appointment as choral director at Würzburg, under the auspices of his brother, Albert. In Würzburg, Wagner wrote his first complete opera, Die Feen, basing the libretto on a fairy-tale by Gozzi. During the summer of 1834, Wagner gained his first experience as an orchestral conductor, at a small theatre in Lauchstädt. There, he met Minna Planer, who he married in 1836. The newlyweds then moved to Riga, in the summer of 1837, where Wagner worked under Karl von Hotley as an opera conductor and began work on Rienzi. In March of 1839, after losing his position through intrigue, Wagner made the cataclysmic and life-shaping decision to plunge into an entirely new career. He and Minna slipped across the Russian border with their huge Newfoundland dog and boarded a small sailboat by which they traveled from Pillau to London. In September of 1839, the Wagners arrived in Paris, where Richard hoped to be able to fulfill his aspirations as an artist.
Instead, Wagner's two-and-a-half years in Paris were a time of great hardship and disappointment. During this time of travail, Richard and Minna found their only psychological support from a small community of fellow German immigrants in Paris and it was by this experience that Wagner discovered his essential German nature. His epiphany was further reinforced when Wagner heard a powerful performance of Beethoven's Ninth played at the Paris Conservatoire. Wagner also renewed and intensified his previous interest in the music of Carl Maria von Weber. As a result of these experiences, Wagner would henceforth write vocal music exclusively on Germanic texts. The immediate consequence was Der Fliegende Holländer, which he completed in November of 1840. I mention this phase of Wagner's life, here, because it triggered his interest in his ethnicity, which would ultimately progress into notions of racial purity, a theme implicit in Die Walküre.
The Story: Act I takes place in the forest dwelling of Hunding (Matti Salminen), which is built around the trunk of a vast ash tree. A storm is raging and a young man, Siegmund (Peter Hofmann), staggers in, obviously exhausted. As he collapses on the ground, Hunding's wife, Sieglinde (Jeannine Altmeyer), emerges from a door. She is surprised and intrigued by the stranger on the hearth. The two have similar color (hair and skin) and matching facial features and are immediately attracted to one another. Sieglinde brings her guest a glass of water. When Hunding arrives home, he looks suspiciously upon Siegfried, noting the similarity to his wife. At Hunding's request, Siegmund reveals his lifes story. As a young boy, he and his father had returned home from a hunting expedition and found their home destroyed and his mother and twin sister missing. Later, they had found his mother dead. Then, the boy had become separated from his father and later found only his father's wolf-skin coat. Siegmund isn't even certain as to his real name, but calls himself Wehwalt (German for woeful), because his life has been beset by bad luck. Later, Siegmund had gone to the rescue of a girl who was being forced to marry against her will, but in the ensuing battle had slain many of her kinsmen. Hunding now realizes that Siegmund belongs to the race of Volsungs (Wälsungs) and is his mortal enemy. Hunding had just been summoned out to help take revenge on the Volsungs and has returned home to find one in his home. Hunding is bound by the rules of hospitality, however, and must extend Siegmund the courtesy of his household for the night, but at dawn the two must fight.
Hunding orders Sieglinde to await him in their bedchamber. Alone, by the fire, Siegmund spots a glittering light emanating from the ash tree. It is the handle of a sword, stuck fast in the tree. His father had promised him that he would find a sword in his hour of greatest need. Sieglinde reenters, having slipped a sleeping potion into her husband's drink. She tells Siegmund of her wedding and how a stranger had plunged a sword into the ash tree, declaring that it would someday be claimed by the hero destined to save her. So far, no one had been able to withdraw the sword from the tree's hold. Siegmund declares that it is he who is destined to extract the sword. A gap suddenly appears in the wall of the courtyard, revealing a beautiful spring moonlit evening. The two now declare their love for one another in a stirring duet. Sieglinde suddenly recalls having seen Siegmund in the past and asks if his father's name is really "Wolfe." He replies that it was actually "Wälse." Sieglinde now realizes that Siegmund is indeed the hero meant for the sword and her rescuer. She names him Siegmund ("Victor") and he duly yanks the sword from the tree and names it Nothung ("Needful"). Sieglinde excitedly explains that she is his long lost sister! He replies, "Sister and lover." They run off together.
In Act II, in a rock mountain pass, Wotan (Donald McIntyre) meets with his beloved daughter, Brünnhilde (Gwyneth Jones), leader of the Valkyries, to ask her to protect Siegmund, who is Wotan's mortal son, in his coming fight with Hunding. Fricka (Hanna Schwarz), Wotan's wife, is seen approaching in the distance and Brünnhilde, anticipating a marital squabble, decides to cut out. When Fricka arrives, Wotan discovers that her views are quite in opposition to his own. Fricka is the Goddess of Wedlock and declares the relationship between Siegmund and Sieglinde an abomination. Besides, Siegmund was begot as a result of Wotan's own infidelity to Fricka (as was Brünnhilde, who is actually daughter of Erda, the earth-mother). Wotan hopes that Siegmund is the prophesized hero who will recover the golden ring from the giant, Fafner. Fricka duly reminds her husband that the deed in question can only be accomplished by a hero who has not been aided or instructed in any way by Wotan. It must be an act of the hero's own will. Wotan's ruse, having Brünnhilde provide the aid, is certainly not going to fool the fates. Besides, Fricka's responsibility as a goddess is to protect the sanctity of marriage, so in her eyes, Hunding is the aggrieved party. She also doesn't much like that Siegmund is the wild fruit of Wotan's infidelity.
After Fricka departs, Brünnhilde returns. Wotan reluctantly withdraws his earlier request that she defend Siegmund and now demands that she protect Hunding instead. Brünnhilde realizes that this new request has been forced upon Wotan by Fricka and that he actually loves Siegmund. When the exhausted fugitives, Siegmund and Sieglinde, arrive at the fateful rocky pass, the twin sister collapses and falls asleep. Brünnhilde arrives and is moved by Siegmund's heroic devotion to his sister/lover. Appearing to Siegmund, Brünnhilde warns him about his impending death and invites him to follow her to Valhalla. He is prepared to do so until he discovers that Sieglinde would be left behind. He declares his determination to die defending her. He'll even kill both her and himself, if necessary, so they can remain together. Brünnhilde is so affected that she decides to disobey her father's will and protect Siegmund after all. When Hunding and his fellow hunters arrive, Brünnhilde interferes on Siegmund's behalf, but Wotan then appears and shatters Nothung, so that Siegmund is rendered defenseless and is run through by Hunding from the front and Wotan from behind. There's nothing left for Brünnhilde to do but gather up the pieces of the broken sword and rush Sieglinde away to safety. Wotan is furious at his daughter's disobedience and pursues her.
Act III opens on the summit of a rocky mountain where the Valkyries are gathering up fallen heroes for transfer to Valhalla. They shriek "Ho-yo-to-ho" as they scurry about to the famous music, "The Ride of the Valkyries." Brünnhilde's sisters are dumbfounded at her impertinence in defying their father. They can do nothing to save her. Brünnhilde sends Sieglinde off into a forest where she will be able to give birth to Siegmund's child who stirs within her womb. That child will some day reforge the shattered pieces of Nothung and become a great hero. When Wotan approaches as a great storm cloud, the Valkyries try vainly to hide Brünnhilde. Wotan declares that Brünnhilde must be punished for her transgression. She will no longer ride with the Valkyries and no longer be a goddess. She will be rendered helpless in a deep sleep, to be claimed as wife by the first man who finds her. Brünnhilde is mortified and begs Wotan at least to place a great ring of fire around the rock precipice so that the man who finally reaches her will at least be a hero. Wotan agrees, puts her to sleep with a kiss, and places her on the rock. Striking the rock with his staff, Wotan summons Loge, the god of fire, and ignites a great flame that engulfs Brünnhilde's resting place.
Themes: As Wagner developed interest in his Germanic heritage and the setting of subjects from the German saga literature, he acquired an uncommonly deep sense of his ethnicity. He began to feel the presence of his German forefathers within his own self. Wagner once declared himself "the most German of Germans." He made it his life's work to give expression to his innate Germanic nature. In appealing for amnesty to the crown prince of Saxony in 1858, Wagner argued, "No musician was ever so closely restricted to his lingual fatherland as I am, since I could create my music only to my texts and since both text and music in an unprecedented sense are based only on the German language and the German spirit." We see here the beginnings of what would evolve into Wagner's preoccupation with "racial purity," which would later be co-opted as rationale for "ethnic cleansing" by the Nazis.
There's a thin line between healthy pride in one's ethnic heritage and ethnic bigotry. The difference is in how one views one's own heritage in relation to other ethnic groups. To take pride in one's own heritage can and should be a positive force in one's life, provided that it doesn't lead to a corollary assumption of the inferiority of alternative cultures. Ethnic pride should be part of an "I'm o.k., you're o.k." approach to life, but not carried to the point of "I'm o.k. but you're trash."
At the college campus where I work, there are various associations that exist based on ethnic identity. There's a Hillel Society, for example, an "Arab Association," and an organization supporting black students. There are no such associations for Americans of English, German, Italian, or Irish ancestry, even though they are present at the University in larger numbers than the Jewish, Arab, or Afro-American students. The more a group is integrated into the mainstream culture, the less need it feels to maintain links to an old world culture and identity. For minorities, especially those who feel the sting of bigotry, ethnically-based support groups play a significant role in maintaining good self-esteem during trying times of adjustment and accommodation. It was in this manner that Wagner's pervasive sense of his Germanic heritage evolved during the years in which he found himself in Paris as an unappreciated German immigrant.
So long as pride in German (or any other ethnic) culture takes the positive form of treasuring one's own cultural traditions while respecting those of other groups, it is commendable, but when transformed into hatred for other groups, xenophobia, or ethnic cleansing, it becomes deplorable. Wagner failed to see the distinction and allowed his pro-Germanic stance to take on a quality of exclusivity and ethnic purity. That, in turn, is what allowed Wagner's philosophy to be later co-opted by the Nazis for their political purposes. Wagner's ideas in relation to ethnic purity reach a climax in Act I of Die Walküre in which the twins, Siegmund and Sieglinde, become sexually involved and conceive an offspring, who will later become the title character of Siegfried. Although the degree of incestuous relationship is no greater for fraternal twins than other siblings, it clearly exceeds what most societies tolerate or view as heroic.
Production Values: The script for Die Walküre is a good deal more powerful than that for Das Rheingold, which was, after all, a mere prelude to the main action. Die Walküre skillfully builds on its predecessor, initiates the main story, and ends with what television now refers to as a "cliffhanger," certain to draw audiences back for the sequel.
I previous discussed, in my review of Das Rheingold, the distinctive features of the Boulez production of Wagner's Ring trilogy. Briefly, the Boulez production, filmed in Bayreuth in 1980, used Patrice Chéreau's fantastic modernized sets, which I and many others find intriguing but which some Wagnerites dislike. The main alternative is a set directed by James Levine, performed in 1990 at the Metropolitan Opera, which uses more traditional sets. The lighting effects for this particular segment of the Boulez cycle are outstanding. The sound quality is excellent, as it is for the entire set. The soundtracks for these films were originally recorded in digital, which helps, and they've been fully remastered for surround sound. I listened to this segment on my stereo system and watched it as a video projection eight feet wide. That combination made for a powerful impact.
The character Brünnhilde is one of the great characters in all of opera. Here, the role is sung and acted by Gwyneth Jones with wonderful power and intensity. Jones is probably the best recent Brünnhilde and one of the greatest of the twentieth century. Though Jones was a shade past her prime in 1980, she nevertheless had all the vocal power the part requires and her acting is terrific as well.
Donald McIntyre sings and acts the part of Wotan. His acting is above average for an opera singer. Vocally, he is excellent in loud passages but is not very musical for soft passages. It sounds like he's speaking the sotto voce segments more than singing them. Nevertheless, he imbues his performance with an impressive degree of stature. Hanna Schwarz is also very impressive in this episode. She sings with strength and good tone and presents a dignified, elegant, and impervious Fricka.
The revelation in this episode, in addition to Jones, is the outstanding casting of the twins, with Peter Hofmann and Jeannine Altmeyer. I was very impressed, first off, that these two performers actually could pass for brother and sister. Both their features and their coloration were well-matched. Hofmann makes for an exceptionally handsome Siegmund, with or without his shirt on. The twins dominate Act I and instill it with powerful emotionality. They are vocally satisfying, physically perfect for the roles, and their acting is strong. It's not too difficult to overlook the incestuous nature of their relationship because the two have never known one another as siblings. These roles are significantly better cast in the Boulez version than in the Met version of the cycle.
Bottom-Line: This is the most popular segment of Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen and it's not hard to see why. Although there are a few segments that drag on too long, this movie adaptation of the great opera is both emotionally powerful and visually splendid. If this were a standard movie rather than an opera, the one complaint that I and other critics would likely register is that the film should have been pared down by some thoughtful editing. Otherwise, it's a thrilling ride. I give this segment five stars.
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You can easily access my other opera reviews using the following lists:
Top-Twelve Film Versions of Operas
Metalluk's Twenty Best Pre-Romantic (Baroque & Classicism) Operas, on DVD
Metalluk's Twenty-five Best Italian Romantic Period Operas, on DVD
Metalluk's Twenty Best Non-Italian Romantic Period Operas, on DVD
Metalluk's Thirty Best Operas of the 20th-Century, on DVD
Metalluk's Best Opera from Each Decade of the 20th-Century, on DVD
Recommended:
