Judging by audience reactions, this was possibly the best premiere of the season. After each lift there was cheering, hustle and bustle and footsteps. At the end there was no holding back, even in the last notes the clapping began.
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Those who listened closely might catch a few boos for Tristan tenor Stephen Gould, but they might just have been misunderstood cheers. Is this Bayreuth Festival opening actually a sensation?
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Solid voices, smooth lyrics
Rather less. The vocal cast is, on the whole, solid. Mentioned Stephen Gould belts out impressively haunting cantilenas that often begin razor-sharp and sometimes end with a wobbly tremolo.
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Catherine Foster embodies an Isolde who is almost constantly under high voltage, both vocally and physically, with relevant trumpet tones, which unfortunately often go into the sharp or – to put it more friendly – over-accentuated. The text is practically incomprehensible, how such established artists suddenly lost their gift for clear German diction remains a mystery.
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Caught in a gyro: Isolde (Catherine Foster) and Tristan (Stephen Gould) in the video vortex.© Bayreuth Festival / Enrico Nawrath
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The small, fine roles are excellently cast, especially with Georg Zeppenfeld as König Marke and Markus Eiche as Kurwenal. What the conductor Markus Poschner, who stepped in at short notice, succeeds in is a very good dovetailing of the pit and the stage.
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It’s a Sturm und Drang concept that Poschner implements and director Roland Schwab also shows a lot of whipped up inner life of the protagonists. Unfortunately, the production often gets lost in hand wringing and desperately lying on the floor or rolling your eyes – musty standard gestures from old, bad opera days.
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waves, blood and white noise
In addition, there is an annoying stage over three elevators (Piero Vinciguerra). Above are cloud projections or a starry sky, below you can see water, waves, blood, spinning tops, white noise – depending on the mood and situation in the piece. That remains all decoration and in its pounding repetition seems uncomfortably obtrusive.
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The director has two ideas – and one hits the mark. Tristan is struck by lightning when he meets Isolde, he has a kind of burn (on his T-shirt), Melot doesn’t have to hurt him later, Eros did or is doing the work all by itself. The second thing: At the beginning, during the foreplay, you see a young dreamy couple. Later, an older one runs through the scenery and at the end of Isoldes Liebestod, an old couple slowly drags themselves towards the audience.
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Prominence show
This may be interpreted as a glimmer of hope, there are also couples whose love lasts into old age. However, and this is precisely what Wagner’s opera talks about, this does not apply to Tristan und Isolde. So this Bayreuth start remains a rather mediocre affair with a few nice moments, no potential for provocation, little to do with thinking.
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However, there was a slight tension when the Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Söder and his wife wanted to dive into the flashbulbs of the Adabei press and at that moment the Gottschalks appeared. And before you know it, the cameras were focused on the indestructible entertainer and his wife. As was later heard, all four of them enjoyed the evening extremely well. Well then!
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