Richard STRAUSS (1864-1949)
Salome (1909)
Herod – Kim Begley (tenor)
Herodias – Doris Soffel (mezzo)
Jokanaan – Alan Held (bass-baritone)
Salome – Angela Denoke (soprano)
Narraboth – Marcel Reijans (tenor)
Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin/Stefan Soltesz
Stage director: Nikolaus Lehnhoff
Stage design: Hans-Martin Scholder
Video director: Thomas Grimm
Picture: 16:9/1080i Full HD
Sound: PCM stereo, dts-HD Master Audio 5.0
Region: worldwide
Subtitles: English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Japanese, Korean
Menu language: English
rec. live, Festspielhaus Baden-Baden, 2011
ARTHAUS MUSIK BLU-RAY 108 037 [112:00]
In my review
of the 2010 Salzburg Elektra
I remarked that the growing list of Strauss operas on Blu-ray was a cause
for celebration, especially when they sport the kind of singers and ensembles
you’d pay exorbitant sums to hear in the flesh. Blu-ray – with its fine pictures
and superior sound – is the next best thing to being there, but it’s also
a very unforgiving medium that highlights visual and sonic shortcomings. There
were no major issues with that Elektra which, like this Salome,
gets an angular, minimalist staging and a mish-mash of dress codes. Curiously,
both productions – directed by Nikolaus Lehnhoff – banish the orchestra and
audience. This can – and often does – have a strangely alienating effect when
viewed on video.
That said, there’s something so defiantly ‘other’ about the events of both
operas that such an approach can actually intensify the emotional impact of
what we see and hear. The unremitting horror to which Elektra is an unwilling
spectator and the chilling depravity that attends Herod’s court aren’t really
that different. One looks to these supremely dramatic scores – now ugly, now
ravishing – and to robust, fearless singers to make these operas deliver their
dark magic. Daniele Gatti and the Wiener Philharmoniker are superb in Elektra,
big, bold and all-embracing, and the principals are very strong indeed.
In this Salome the boyish Angela Denoke takes the name part, as she
did in David McVicar’s Royal Opera production in 2010; it's a strangely androgynous
look, quite at odds with her role as a sulky temptress. No qualms about the
palace guards in their ill-fitting uniforms – vaguely suggestive of a Middle
Eastern dictatorship, perhaps – but why is Herodias’s page dressed like a
bell-hop from a B movie? And given the potent sexual imagery associated with
his hair, rendering Jokanaan bald but for a strange topknot seems rather perverse.
These are the first of many visual/dramatic mismatches, the like of which
are all too familiar in the opera house these days. Fortunately Denoke has
the range and control necessary for her taxing role. As for Marcel Reijans’
Narraboth – a gormless but impassioned voyeur and victim – it's also well
sung. The American bass-baritone Alan Held cuts an anguished figure as the
Baptist; his is a strong, steady voice dramatically undermined by all that
unnecessary gurning. One might also be tempted to wonder why, when Salome
fixates on his eyes, he keeps them tight shut most of the time. Small points,
perhaps, but when opera depends so much on a willing suspension of disbelief
such oddities don't help.
Granted, both Elektra and Salome are very static operas,
and devising new and innovative routines for the singers must be a trial indeed.
The camera roams restlessly from left to right and back again, emphasising
the claustrophobia of the court and underlining the dances of love, ecstasy
and death that alternately attract and repel the protagonists. In that sense
the striking triangular backdrop with its angled walkway and changing colours
is an apt visual correlative for the central triangle of Salome, Herod and
Jokanaan. As for the polished obsidian floor it’s both a mirror and a void;
as with Wilde’s Dorian Gray it reflects moral and sexual corruption,
while also functioning as an abyss over which Salome skates and skitters towards
derangement and death.
The all-too-intrusive close-ups of Denoke – vocally superb throughout – reveal
too much eye movement, while Narraboth is condemned to pacing the stage and
gnawing at his knuckles. Try as I might, I just could not settle on anyone
or anything; as soon as I managed to do so it was whisked out of shot. It's
all very 'bitty' and unsettling, not to say mildly irritating. Otherwise the
picture is good and colours are reasonably vivid; the sound – in stereo at
least – is merely adequate, and certainly not as dynamic or as immersive as
that provided for Elektra.
Doris Soffel makes a splendidly sour Herodias, her voice and mien as imperious
as one could hope for. Kim Begley’s fawning, rather pathetic Herod comes across
as an overweight office worker on a lecherous night out. Herod’s isn’t a particularly
demanding part – it's all too easy to overplay as well – but vocally Begley
is just too small and wont to whine. And while his acting is so grotesque
it’s laughable there are some illuminating touches. For instance, when faced
with Salome’s gruesome final demand he catches sight of himself in the silver
charger – his Dorian Gray moment – and is pole-axed by what he sees
there.
What about that dance? Always a problem to bring off successfully,
Lehnhoff gets Denoke to lie, squirm and pirouette for her drooling dad; it
really is a most peculiar routine, quite devoid of sexual charge. And then
there's the near-naked, muscle-bound gaoler/executioner Naaman, played by
one Patrick Büttner; his skimpy S&M gear and awkward gait – the latter
to stop him from popping his pouch, perhaps – is yet another example of the
rank silliness that blights this production.
In the pit Stefan Soltesz delivers a workmanlike reading of the score, and
although the sound is somewhat veiled it’s still reasonably detailed. What
I miss most is the sheer amplitude of Strauss’s music, especially at nodal
points such as the Dance of the Seven Veils. There just isn’t that sense of
a wick being turned up, the flame growing fierce as the drama peaks and flares.
Granted, the flesh does creep when the demented Denoke cuddles the Baptist’s
bloody head. Her extraordinary, bleached tone is simply hair-raising. What
a shame the final production doesn’t build on these moments of great music
and – potentially – great theatre.
Oh dear, not a pleasant experience – and all for the wrong reasons. At least
an audience reaction could bring a degree of catharsis, but instead the visuals
are snatched away and replaced with the closing credits. So very dispiriting,
especially when Denoke and Held deliver vocally. I can only speculate as to
what the good burghers of Baden-Baden made of this mess; perhaps it was just
as well they were kept out of the picture after all.
Some fine singing; pity the production is so perverse.
Dan Morgan
http://twitter.com/mahlerei
Some fine singing; pity the production is so perverse.