Reviews of Katharina Wagner's "Meistersinger" at Bayreuth
Since John has brought up the latest directorial excesses from Bayreuth I thought I’d provide some links for those who want to read more. See John’s take on the situation, and his list of operas that shouldn’t be messed with. You will see that Die Meistersinger is certainly one of them.
Since John has brought up the latest directorial excesses from Bayreuth I thought I’d provide some links for those who want to read more. See John’s take on the situation, and his list of operas that shouldn’t be messed with.
Jeers, Cheers as Bayreuth `Meistersinger’ Mixes Hitler, Nudity
By Shirley Apthorp
July 26 (Bloomberg)
Hitler is briefly back in Bayreuth as Katharina’s confused staging reaches its apotheosis. Her Hans Sachs sets out as the bare-footed, chain-smoking rebel of the singers’ guild, yet he becomes increasingly conservative as the evening proceeds. He warms his hands on the flames as conductor and stage-director doubles are burned. By the end, in time for his speech on “holy German art,” he is Adolf himself, flanked by statues in the style of Nazi sculptor Arno Breker.
At Beyreuth, ‘Die Meistersinger,’ unsettles a Wagner legacy
George Loomis
July 31 (International Herald Tribune)
Picking up on an idea advanced by scholars that the gibberish of Beckmesser’s contest song anticipates Dadaism and hence is actually forward-looking, she has him undergo an epiphany after the street riot. A strong minority of the populace applauds Beckmesser’s song, and he departs, disgusted, only when Sachs starts talking about German art.
Fascinating though the ideas of Wagner and her collaborator Robert Sollich may be, the result is more a critique of “Meistersinger” - and a negative one - than a production. Nor did she achieve the kind of absorbing interaction between characters typical of the best concept-oriented directors. Of the opera’s warmly expansive spirit there was little trace. You left thinking you hadn’t really seen the opera.
Tradition, revolution and reaction in Bayreuth
Marianne Zelger-Vogt
July 30 (sightandsound)
This article originally appeared in German.
Stolzing has become part of the mainstream, and is led around by an historically dressed opera singer. He receives a golden stag as a prize and poses, surrounded by the “leading team,” with the check of an imaginary sponsor bank. But between these two applause scenes there is also the appearance of Beckmesser: the turbulent happening of a reactionary who has discovered his creative potential in the fight scene and now outs himself as a performance artist.
Sachs resigns, Stolzing conforms, Beckmesser becomes an action artist giving a new twist to the art scene - a commentary on today’s opera in general and the Bayreuth Festival in particular? Perhaps. Yet it all remains too intellectual, on the one hand filled to overflowing with ideas and props, on the other hand a void - the entire history of the ideological reception of the “Mastersingers” as “Nazi opera” is blended out, for example, while Katharina Wagner remains focussed on the performance aesthetic.
Ms Wagner jeered as great-grandad’s opera flops at Bayreuth
Kate Connolly
July 27, 2007 (The Guardian)
It was the most eagerly anticipated event in this year’s German cultural calendar, set to make or break a young woman’s career.But following a cascade of boos and the comparison of her production of Die Meistersinger to a “top-heavy pizza with a thick topping on a thin base”, things were not looking too rosy yesterday for Katharina Wagner.
Her interpretation, which turned the original plot on its head - Richard Wagner danced in his underpants and topless dancers took to the stage - proved too much for the traditionalists, who made up the bulk of the audience, at the same time as irritating the iconoclasts.
This is Insane
According to the NY Times for Tuesday, July 31, Katharina Wagner’s new production of Die Meistersinger for the Bayreuth Festival featured topless dancers, complete male nudity, plastic phalluses, and “a bizzare auto da-fe” In the third act. My wife related to me a production (this one?) that had Hans Sachs made up as Hitler. One doesn’t have to have seen the particular production to comment. We’ve all seen eurotrash productions.
For years I’ve vacillated back and forth about the validity of such productions. I’ve been reluctant to condemn this sort of thing outright out of cowardice (just like many, many critics), a reluctance to appear to be a close-minded reactionary. But enough is enough. Opera (unless you specifically set out to make a film, such as H.J. Syberberg’s Parsifal) is not a director’s medium. There is a huge dissonance between 1860s music and 2007 post deconstructionist neurotic infantilism. You don’t have to bring the bearskins, metal brassieres and horned helmets back, but Hans Sachs needs to be a grounded, humane figure, Wotan better be missing an eye (this has deep plot relevance) and Sigmund better pull a weapon from the tree, even if it needs must be a submachine gun rather than a sword.
Some operas may potentially benefit from deconstructionst treatment, and some you should leave strictly alone. Here’s a partial list. Feel free to add to it.
Works that may potentially benefit from radical directors:
1. Die Zauberflote
2. Cosi fan Tutte
3. Tristan und Isolde
4. Parsifal
5. Lulu
6. Any of the Orfeo operas; any opera seria (this stuff is so dramatically inert that any dramatic reconsideration is an improvement)
Works to be left strictly alone:
1. La Traviata
2. Die Meistersinger
3. Tosca
4. Peter Grimes
5. Der Rosenkavalier
6-7 Eugene Onegin and The Queen of Spades
When in doubt, leave it alone. Mozart, Verdi and Wagner knew more than you do. And think long and hard about putting sex and violence in…We’ve had too much of that already. In “City Journal” Heather McDonald has an excellent article on the topic. I know nothing of Ms. McDonald, except that my wife finds her politics unsavory, but the article is indeed an excellent one.
Palate-Cleansing Meistersinger DVDs