After a slow but intensive
prelude the half transparent curtain
– looking almost like a TV screen –
slowly rises. We are in a classroom
from anno dazumal, as they probably
would have said in Hamburg a decade
ago when this production had its premiere.
The ‘school children’, in school uniforms
and short trousers, are clearly pupils
who haven’t been moved up. They are
now middle aged – some even older, but
they’re still rascals, running about,
disturbing the peace, throwing paper
swallows and fighting with wooden swords.
A group of brass players is seated next
to the open window and stand up now
and then to play fanfares. The ‘King’s
Herald’ is something between form master
and class monitor. Everybody knows at
once when the King pays a visit that
he is the King. He is in short trousers,
too, and with a Royal Crown in gilt
paper on his head. In a big cupboard
a shy and nervous girl is hiding; she
answers to the name of Elsa. No, this
is neither a students’ farce nor an
amateur variety show but a production
of Richard Wagner’s romantic opera Lohengrin.
Strange, I thought it dealt with a supposed
brother-murder case somewhere in the
Middle Ages and with the arrival of
the pure knight of the Grail brotherhood
to defend and save the accused Elsa.
Do we have yet another whim of a director
who wants to clear away old conventions,
to show that he doesn’t give a damn
for tradition and that dignity and solemnity
aren’t worth a fig? Well, the director
is Peter Konwitschny, regarded as one
of the foremost in his trade and a ‘deep’
innovator, and Claus Spahn goes to some
length in the liner notes to stand up
for his cause. My reaction is: I have
read it – but I don’t buy it. I may
be conservative, conventional, intellectually
dwarfed, narrow-minded – but I don’t
buy it! I have seen – in the theatre
as well as on video and DVD – lots of
productions that have been radical,
unconventional, intellectually deep-probing
and broad-minded. Some I have liked,
some I have loved, some I have loathed
and some have left me completely indifferent
– which possibly is, for the director,
the most embarrassing state of affairs.
My reactions this time? ‘No, not again!’
‘What’s he after?’ ‘This is ridiculous!’
‘Is it a parody?’ ‘He must hate Wagner!’.
My wife uttered just the right words:
‘Where is the music? He drags Wagner’s
music through the mud!’
There are, to be honest,
places where it works – provided one
can disregard the sets and the costumes
– and that is in the more private scenes.
This means most of act 2, the Telramund–Ortrud
scene and the following meeting between
Ortrud and Elsa. Here the emotions and
the manipulations are exposed in a way
seldom encountered in more conventional
productions. The Elsa–Lohengrin scenes
also work, but here there are other
inhibiting factors, which I will come
back to.
I have already touched
on Weigle’s conducting of the overture.
Generally this is a rather taut reading
and the orchestra play well. I have
heard better opera choruses in this
music, though. I presume that it was
sometimes a hard nut for the singers
to sing properly while at the same time
being asked to perform quite complicated
actions. This is also something that
to some degree afflicts the main characters.
Starting from the top
of the social ladder, and from the bottom
voice-wise, King Henry the Fowler is
portrayed as warm and rather naïve.
Reinhard Hagen’s singing is just as
warm and steady. His herald is noisy
and rather strained. Hans-Joachim Ketelsen
is a fairly conventional menacing Telramund.
Apart from the fact that he runs about
in schoolboy clothes and lacks any scrap
of the dignity we could have expected
of this Brabantian count. He is strong-voiced
but too strained. This also goes for
his scheming wife, Ortrud. Luana DeVol
is a splendid actor, as I have noticed
in other productions, and she has an
especially expressive face. Even vocally
she is impressive for her way of colouring
the voice. One does not expect so evil
a woman to sing like an angel. After
a somewhat hesitant start Emily Magee
finds the silvery tone and the steadiness
one expects from a good Elsa. Her singing
is the best reason to hear this performance.
Unfortunately her Lohengrin has little
to recommend him. John Treleaven sounds
worn, wobbly and wooden and his acting
is little better. Perhaps he heartily
disliked the whole production, which
doesn’t let him arrive in shining white
armour. Instead he has to walk about
in a white coat, looking like a lost
district medical officer.
In my view this last
point illustrates perfectly what’s wrong
with this production. The surgeon has
– in his view – made a successful operation.
Sadly though, he has managed to kill
the patient – and Wagner is mourning
in his Heaven. For his and your own
comfort, get Götz Friedrich’s Bayreuth
production instead, with Peter Hofmann
and Karan Armstrong.
Göran Forsling
Orquestra Simfònica del Gran Teatre
del Liceu/Sebastian Weigle 
