Royal Albert Hall
Tristan – Robert Dean Smith
Isolde – Violeta Urmana
King Marke – Kwangchul Youn
Kurwenal – Boaz Daniel
Brangäne – Mihoko Fujimura
Melot – David Wilson-Johnson
Steersman – Edward Price
Young Sailor/Shepherd –
Andrew Staples
BBC Singers
BBC Symphony Chorus (chorus
master: Stephen Jackson)
BBC Symphony Orchestra
Semyon Bychkov (conductor)
For those whose Wagnerian
thirst had not yet been quenched by three parts of the Ring, the Proms now offered Tristan
und Isolde. Semyon Bychkov, whom
I heard conduct the work in Paris in 2008, once again proved a sure guiding
presence, though perhaps without the final ounce or two of delirium that is
required to elevate the work to the deserved status of Nietzsche’s opus metaphysicum. The opening Prelude
underlined the crucial importance of the bass line, even in – arguably
particularly in – this work, straining as it does at the bounds of tonality,
without ever quite transgressing them. As Theodor Adorno wrote, in his Versuch über Wagner, ‘‘It is with good
reason that the bars in the Tristan
score following the words “der furchtbare Trank” stand upon the threshold of
new music, in whose first canonical work, Schoenberg’s F-sharp minor Quartet,
the words appear: “Take love from me, grant me your happiness!”’ I never felt
that quite so much was at stake, but this remained a distinguished reading in a
more conventionally dramatic sense. Part of that, perhaps, was to be attributed
to the orchestra. Whilst on fine form, the BBC Symphony Orchestra could not,
with the best will in the world, be said to have conjured up the tonal,
metaphysical depth of Daniel Barenboim’s Staatskapelle Berlin, especially when
it came to the all-important string section.
That said, Bychkov worked
wonders at times. The orchestral swaying at the beginning of the first time
managed to convey just the right mixture of physical and metaphysical
turbulence. Sinuous woodwind as Isolde told of her ‘art’ looked forward to the
Flowermaidens. The orchestra as a whole, even if it sometimes lacked true
depth, still assumed its role as Greek Chorus, or, in Wagner’s later terms,
representation of the Will. As Isolde instructed Kurwenal to have Tristan come
to her, there was a true sense of tragic inevitability both from orchestra and
singer. Bychkov, here and elsewhere, understood and communicated both musical
structure and its interaction with the external ‘drama’. (In this of all Wagner’s
works, the drama lies more in the orchestra than anywhere else; indeed, more
than once, I found myself thinking how much I should love to hear him conduct
Schoenberg’s avowedly post-Tristan
symphonic poem, Pelleas und Melisande.
The stillness of Hell, as much as Nietzsche’s ‘voluptuousness’, truly
registered as Isolde drank the potion; moreover, the shimmering sound Bychkov
drew from the BBC SO violins had them play to a level I have rarely heard –
certainly not under their recently-departed absentee conductor.
The Prelude to Act II was
unusually fleet, but not harried: probably wise given that one was not dealing
with the traditional ‘dark’ German sound of an orchestra such as Barenboim’s
Staatskapelle. Offstage brass, conducted by Andrew Griffiths, were excellent. Again,
the BBC SO often surpassed itself, its scream at the opening of the second
scene – responding to Isolde’s ‘Tristan – Geliebter!’ – offering a somewhat
embarrassing contrast with the puny sounds heard from Tristan himself. Woodwind
again excelled, at times, for instance after Isolde’s ‘O eitler Tagesknecht!’,
evoking Baudelaire’s Fleurs du mal. As
Tristan – just about – harangued the spite and envy of day, we heard an apt
orchestral sardonicism, mid-way between Loge and Schoenberg. (I thought in
particular of the First Chamber Symphony.) And the deadly slowing of the
heartbeat – Karajan truly worried about this Act II music, fearing it might
literally take the lives of conductors – was well conveyed. I liked the idea –
and practice – of having the Shepherd’s English horn solo piped from above, as
if from the ramparts. The spotlighting of the (very good) soloist put me in
mind of Stockhausen’s later practice of blurring the boundaries between
instruments and ‘characters’. If the level of orchestral playing was not so
impressive during much of the third act, most obviously earlier on, that may
have been part of a doomed attempt to enable Robert Dean Smith’s Tristan to be
heard. There was, though, also a problem with balance at times, the brass
tending to overpower in a way never heard in Barenboim’s Ring performances. Dramatic urgency was regained, however, after
Tristan’s death.
Violeta Urmana opened in somewhat
shrill fashion, her words often indistinct. She improved quickly, though, and
as early as the second scene, was both more sensitive in terms of tonal
variegation and far more comprehensible. There were times, especially during
the first act – for instance, on the ‘preis’ of ‘mit ihr gab er es pries!’ –
when her climaxes were a little too conventionally operatic, but hers remained
a committed performance. She had no difficulty in riding the orchestral wave in
her transfiguration: impressive, if not necessarily moving. Mihoko Fujimura
excelled as Brangäne; indeed, it seems to be more her role than Kundry.
There was true musical satisfaction to
be gained from the ‘rightness’ of her phrasing, as well as dramatic truth from
the honesty of her character portrayal. Her second-act Watch was radiant,
euphonious, somehow sounding as if from a greater distance than the RAH organ,
as if carried to us by an opportune, clement breeze. Andrew Staples put in
excellent performances as both the Shepherd and the Young Sailor. The latter
role, sung from above, was very nicely shaded, and with diction of an
excellence that put many other cast members to shame. As Shepherd, his voice
was audibly, somewhat awkwardly, more virile than that of the lamentable
Tristan.
Robert Dean Smith was, alas,
a grave disappointment as Tristan. From his ‘Fragt die Sitte!’ to Isolde,
matter of fact in the wrong way, there was little dramatic involvement to be
gleaned. He often sounded more like Isolde’s grandfather, about to expire, even
in the first act, than her lover. The
orchestra, as guided by Bychkov, often compensated
for him, but it should not have had to do so.. When Tristan sang that he and
Isolde were ‘ungetrennt’ (undivided), the division was all too glaringly
apparent. It was not just that he lacked charisma and volume, though he
certainly did, but that his performance throughout seemed entirely unaware of
the deadly eroticism in which it should have been soaked; he often sounded more
like an attempt, a couple of sizes too small, at Beckmesser, than Tristan. Boaz
Daniel proved an ardent Kurwenal, his ‘Heil Tristan!’ a proper reminder of a
doomed attempt to return to the chivalric mores of Lohengrin, of the day. David Wilson-Johnson’s Melot was
unpleasantly blustering, the only other real disappointment in the cast. Kwangchul
Youn gave an excellent performance too. I have often found him a little dull in
the past, but here his tenderness and passion showed King Marke to be a true
human being, not a mere saint. Had I been Isolde, I should certainly have stuck
with him on this occasion.
The combined male forces of
the BBC Singers and BBC Symphony Orchestra made for a goodlier crew than I can
recall, a veritable male voice choir. There was no compromise between heft and
diction; the former quality had the excellent consequence of already
emphasising the threatening nature of the external, phenomenal world of the
day. If not necessarily a Tristan for
the ages, then, there remained much to admire.
