![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Tristan und Isolde
Mar. 23rd, 2008 01:32 pmSo yesterday I went to see the Metropolitan Opera's simulcast of Tristan und Isolde at the Regal Cinema at the west town mall here in Knoxville. It was an amazing and horrible experience at the same time.
Musically each act of the opera started off far, far too slow. I suppose I must not have a very good attention span, because I feel that the first hour of each act could have been compressed into about three lines of song, which the last half hour tacked on. There is no sin in brevity, especially not when you're staring down four and a half hours of people singing in German.
I find it interesting that Tristan is considered a killing role for a tenor: the first man to play Tristan, Ludwig Schnorr von Carolsfeld, died shortly after performing the roll from a heart attack. As I mentioned in an earlier post, the Met was having trouble with its own Tristans: Ben Heppner became ill and couldn't perform, and the second Tristan, Gary Lehman, was injured during a performance when part of the set tried to kill him. At the last minute, in a very dramatic turn of events, the Met flew tenor Robert Dean Smith from Berlin to New York to fill in as Tristan. All very dramatic. Having been involved in theatre to some extent, I can imagine the chaos and such surrounding all of this among the cast and crew. I can also imagine just how much they had to pay him: it's a lot.
In any case, the opera was a matinée, so it started at 12:30 PM and ran to about 6 PM. There were two intermissions, one between the first and second act, and one between the second and third act, that were about a half hour in length. Even given the long intermissions, that's a long time to sit in a dark room and stare at a screen.
Technical things: I don't care if the cameras involved were HD cameras, the projector in the theatre was not up to snuff. You could make out the individual 'cells' on it. It was like looking at an old LCD screen blown up to GIANT SIZE. It also projected beyond the limits of the screen, so the top, bottom, left and right of the picture fell upon the curtain and walls. It wasn't a lot lost, but it was annoying.
Tristan: Robert Dean Smith was awesome. He was animated, staggered appropriately, sang in positions where you'd imagine it was difficult to get enough breath to sustain those powerful notes. I approve.
Isolde: On the one hand, Deborah Voigt sang beautifully. On the other, I don't feel that she incorporated as much "acting" into her stage presence as the Tristan did, at least in the first act which relied heavily upon her. Still, being able to sing that well and for so long is amazing.
The rest of the cast: They don't get nearly as much face time as the title characters, but they were all really good as well.
The set: The giant cloth backdrop, which had to cost enormous amounts of money because it was woven seamless, which transmitted reflected light was a great idea. That apparently the opera is supposed to be abstract, and thus have a mostly abstract set does not appeal to me. For instance, during those thirty minute intermissions, you're telling me that you didn't have time to lay down a faux floor overtop the wooden plank one? I'd have liked to see some stone for the third act, and something other than wood for the second act. The third act set was really silly with the little statuettes rising from the stage to represent Tristan's realm. They should have just left the stage empty the entire time.
The opera itself: The music is beautiful. There's no doubt about that. The plot is silly, but that's okay. The Met provided subtitles which was awesome, but man, German is the least poetic and beautiful language around. I have to wonder if the opera is as unpoetic as the subtitles and my limited German made it out to be. And the second act totally needed to be cut down to about 30 minutes, max. I can only handle listening to two people sing about how wonderful the night is, and how horrible and confusing light is, for so long. Excerpt from memory: Tristan sings, "Oh the night is awesome, and I'm in love, because there's no light to get in the way, of my love, because the night has cleared my heart, I'm in love, with you Isolde, and Tristan dies." (To be fair, that not actually what he sings, but that's a summary of about 30 minutes of him singing...) And the first act could have been shortened quite a bit by replacing most of Isolde's singing with her telling Brangäne "MIX ME UP SOME POISON SO I CAN KILL HIM." >.> Anyway, the end of the second act, and the third act go a long way to make up for the endless love duet that composes most of the second act.
So tl;dr: I'm glad I went, but next time I'm going to pick a shorter opera to grace with my attendance.
Musically each act of the opera started off far, far too slow. I suppose I must not have a very good attention span, because I feel that the first hour of each act could have been compressed into about three lines of song, which the last half hour tacked on. There is no sin in brevity, especially not when you're staring down four and a half hours of people singing in German.
I find it interesting that Tristan is considered a killing role for a tenor: the first man to play Tristan, Ludwig Schnorr von Carolsfeld, died shortly after performing the roll from a heart attack. As I mentioned in an earlier post, the Met was having trouble with its own Tristans: Ben Heppner became ill and couldn't perform, and the second Tristan, Gary Lehman, was injured during a performance when part of the set tried to kill him. At the last minute, in a very dramatic turn of events, the Met flew tenor Robert Dean Smith from Berlin to New York to fill in as Tristan. All very dramatic. Having been involved in theatre to some extent, I can imagine the chaos and such surrounding all of this among the cast and crew. I can also imagine just how much they had to pay him: it's a lot.
In any case, the opera was a matinée, so it started at 12:30 PM and ran to about 6 PM. There were two intermissions, one between the first and second act, and one between the second and third act, that were about a half hour in length. Even given the long intermissions, that's a long time to sit in a dark room and stare at a screen.
Technical things: I don't care if the cameras involved were HD cameras, the projector in the theatre was not up to snuff. You could make out the individual 'cells' on it. It was like looking at an old LCD screen blown up to GIANT SIZE. It also projected beyond the limits of the screen, so the top, bottom, left and right of the picture fell upon the curtain and walls. It wasn't a lot lost, but it was annoying.
Tristan: Robert Dean Smith was awesome. He was animated, staggered appropriately, sang in positions where you'd imagine it was difficult to get enough breath to sustain those powerful notes. I approve.
Isolde: On the one hand, Deborah Voigt sang beautifully. On the other, I don't feel that she incorporated as much "acting" into her stage presence as the Tristan did, at least in the first act which relied heavily upon her. Still, being able to sing that well and for so long is amazing.
The rest of the cast: They don't get nearly as much face time as the title characters, but they were all really good as well.
The set: The giant cloth backdrop, which had to cost enormous amounts of money because it was woven seamless, which transmitted reflected light was a great idea. That apparently the opera is supposed to be abstract, and thus have a mostly abstract set does not appeal to me. For instance, during those thirty minute intermissions, you're telling me that you didn't have time to lay down a faux floor overtop the wooden plank one? I'd have liked to see some stone for the third act, and something other than wood for the second act. The third act set was really silly with the little statuettes rising from the stage to represent Tristan's realm. They should have just left the stage empty the entire time.
The opera itself: The music is beautiful. There's no doubt about that. The plot is silly, but that's okay. The Met provided subtitles which was awesome, but man, German is the least poetic and beautiful language around. I have to wonder if the opera is as unpoetic as the subtitles and my limited German made it out to be. And the second act totally needed to be cut down to about 30 minutes, max. I can only handle listening to two people sing about how wonderful the night is, and how horrible and confusing light is, for so long. Excerpt from memory: Tristan sings, "Oh the night is awesome, and I'm in love, because there's no light to get in the way, of my love, because the night has cleared my heart, I'm in love, with you Isolde, and Tristan dies." (To be fair, that not actually what he sings, but that's a summary of about 30 minutes of him singing...) And the first act could have been shortened quite a bit by replacing most of Isolde's singing with her telling Brangäne "MIX ME UP SOME POISON SO I CAN KILL HIM." >.> Anyway, the end of the second act, and the third act go a long way to make up for the endless love duet that composes most of the second act.
So tl;dr: I'm glad I went, but next time I'm going to pick a shorter opera to grace with my attendance.
