Estados Unidos
Santa Fe Opera 2: Captains of Industry
Jesse Simon

On a good night at the Santa Fe Opera the
elements will conspire to add a little something extra to the performance, some
well-timed lightning flashes, or a roll of thunder to underscore an ominous
pause in the score. On this particular evening the vigorous breezes from a
distant storm lent a certain authenticity to the chorus of buffeted sailors
that opens Wagner’s Der Fliegende Holländer; such elemental intrusions,
however, were decidedly less impressive than the taut dramatic sweep of Thomas
Guggeis’ musical direction or the sustained intensity of the central vocal
performances, either of which, on their own, would have been enough to
guarantee a memorable evening.
Der
Fliegende Holländer may be one of the world’s great
sea-faring operas, but the staging of David Alden dispensed quietly with the
maritime setting, situating the action instead within a stylised milieu of
early-twentieth-century industrial capitalism. The sailors in the first scene
were kept busy in an attempt to secure a giant cog – presumably part of some
larger machine – while the chorus of spinners at the beginning of the second
act were transformed into factory workers dressed in goggles and protective
plastic coats; the spinning wheels of their song were the valves attached to a
series of giant pipes. The Dutchman himself was presented as an old-school
captain of industry, a suited man at a large desk of dark, polished wood,
waited on by superannuated functionaries in suits and hats of spider webs and
dust; his ship was a forbidding construction of shipping containers, and his
cargo of treasure lay hidden in stacks of cardboard boxes that looked more
suited to paperwork than gems.
The revised setting, although visually
engaging, did little to suggest any greater argument; certainly no one familiar
with the opera would have come away with the kind of unexpected new insights
that drastic recontextualizations can sometimes bring. Nor, however, did the
staging seem overly restricted by its own concept. The series of encounters
that drive the plot – Daland and the Dutchman, Erik and Senta, Senta and the
Dutchman – succeeded through a simplicity of action that allowed the story to
emerge through the strength of the vocal performances, while the choral scenes
that open each act, especially the synchronised dance of the factory workers in
the spinning chorus, had an infectious dynamism that kept them lively and
engaging.
It was the musical performances, however,
that elevated the evening. Nicholas Brownlee, the animated Kurwenal in last
year’s Tristan, provided the evening with a Dutchman of great vitality
and charisma. With crisp phrasing and bright tone he began his first monologue
at a respectably high level of intensity before patiently building it into the
emotional summit of the first act. His other scenes were equally compelling:
his courtship of Senta had a grand, urgent manner that belied the essentially
domestic nature of their discussion, while his identity reveal in the third act
was delivered with appropriate anguish. If his solo scenes were notable for
their immediacy, he also had the agility to turn the first act duet with Daland
into a credible expression of mutual good will, and enough passion to make the
love duets sparkle.
Elza van den Heever was equally impressive
as Senta. The projective power that made her second-act song so captivating
never came at the expense of emotional nuance – the coda was especially
arresting – but the strength of her performance lay in the energy she brought
to the series of duets with Erik and the Dutchman in the final two acts. While
she responded to Erik’s vain laments with detached sympathy, her scenes with
the Dutchman conveyed all the caution, disbelief and muted excitement of
someone struggling with the realisation that their lifelong dreams might
actually be coming true.
The central lovers may have dominated the
evening, but the supporting performances were notably strong. Richard Trey
Smagur captured the futility and doubt that existed just beneath the surface of
Erik’s demanding self-absorption; if his scene with Senta in the second act
highlighted the gulf that existed between them, he approached their third act meeting
with such ardour that it was impossible not to feel some sympathy for his
doomed desire. Morris Robinson was an authoritative Daland whose robust tone
and genial presence turned the first act negotiations with the Dutchman into
one of the evening’s highlights. Even the comparably small role of Mary
received a solid reading from Gretchen Krupp, whose stern phrasing was the
practical counterweight to Senta’s dreamy yearning.
The evening’s driving force, however, was
Thomas Guggeis, who presided over a performance of orchestral dazzle and epic
narrative sweep. From the tempestuous vigour of the overture it was apparent
that Mr Guggeis had a firm grasp on the work’s capacity for sonic splendour,
but it was his exacting sense of pace and ability to instil nearly every
passage with simmering excitability that proved the evening’s greatest asset:
indeed, the expectant tension leading from the Steersman’s song into the
Dutchman’s arrival or the calm before the storm of Senta’s song were every bit
as captivating as the rousing choral scenes.
While Wagner’s subsequent operas achieved a
greater synthesis of mythology and drama – and often delve deeper into the
intertwined nature of love and death – Der Fliegende Holländer offers an
undemanding introduction to the themes and approaches that make the Wagnerian
universe so endlessly compelling. With its compact structure and its reliance
on traditional forms it comes closer to straightforward entertainment than the
more complex later works; on this evening, however, the distinction of the
performances placed the opera’s full grandeur on prominent display.
Comentarios