Birmingham Symphony Hall, 6 April 2012
During the Prelude to Act 1 I found myself wondering whether Wagner would ever have covered in the pit at Bayreuth if he had experienced his scores with the immaculate clarity which comes from the Birmingham acoustic. The piercing intensity of the first trumpet line, so beautifully mirrored in the closing bars, some five and a half hours later, was, by this time mellowed and refined – a sensitivity which, from my experience, Bayreuth cannot match.
With an opening as good as this we were obviously in for something special and Valery Gergiev did not disappoint – though after the Cardiff Ring I have to admit to some hesitancy about his approach. The orchestra was the key to this interpretation, with extended paragraphs of the score opening seamlessly before us, never drowning out the singers, yet able to extend the dynamic range from the point of near inaudibility to shattering climaxes. There is nothing sentimental about the reading either. The second act opened with a furious intensity which arched over to the point where Kundry cursed Parsifal to wander forever. By contrast the Flower Maidens waltz seemed almost Straussian, an unexpected thought which linked in with the Good Friday music, where Gergiev also brought out the dancelike quality.
If the work can too often seem a piece for older singers, this was not the case with the Mariinsky soloists. Yury Vorobiev and Yevgeny Nikitin, as Gurnemanz and Amfortas respectively, brought fresh virile projection and a more youthful characterisation to both parts. Their genuine bass voices easily carried across the orchestra and their diction was exemplary. Larisa Gogolevskaya made an impassioned Kundry, again with weight at the bottom of the voice but still able to match the high tessitura for Act Two. Only August Amonov, as Parsifal, failed to reach this level of quality. Though the voice was certainly up the part there was little sense of intelligent involvement with the character and the quality of diction often left something to be desired.
The chorus produced an authority and precision which belied their small number, and Ex Cathedra proved to be an unexpected bonus for the off-stage chorus. It is unusual to be able to pick out the solo flower maidens but here their position as soloists on stage drew attention not only to the quality of voices but the individuality of the writing, which is too often lost in production. I also can’t recall ever hearing the harp as clearly during the Flower Maidens chorus!
If it is always a difficult choice between Wagner and Bach at Easter, Wagner certainly won this year – and we still have Die Walkure to come. BH