ENO’s The Valkyrie

I saw the second installment (and therefore, confusingly “The first day … “) of Phyllida Lloyd’s _Ring_ for ENO: “The Valkyrie”:http://www.eno.org/whatson/full.php?performancekey=19 , last night. Some of it was rubbish, but other parts were truly splendid, and, as it became more and more splendid as the evening progressed, I was able to leave feeling quite satisfied.

First for the rubbish, then. Almost every unwarranted accretion to the text detracted massively from the performance. I don’t mean the fact that it is a modern-dress performance (that’s fine by me) but a rather a whole list of things happening which shouldn’t and people being in places where they are not meant to be. The production starts with a pre-recorded scream of terror and with Wotan and Brunnhilde hanging about in Sieglinde’s cottage. To have this framing the performance rather than the rhythmic tramp-tramp of the opening bars as Siegmund arrives was close to unforgivable. Siegmund and Sieglinde were pretty underpowered throught the first Act, also, which was nothing like as moving or as shocking as it should have been. Other rubbish included a reappearance at the end of Act Two of the camera-crew that Lloyd had previously foisted on us in “The Rhinegold”:http://www.eno.org/whatson/full.php?performancekey=18 , and the ridiculous innovation of a throng of mortal suitors surrounding Brunnhilde just before the deterring ring of fire is put in place in Act Three.

With all that, you are probably wondering what could be splendid. Wotan and Brunnhilde, to begin with. Robert Hayward and Katherine Broderick both gave really authoritative performances and what made the production succeed despite everything was the long separation sequence in Act Three where they successfully conveyed the pain of separation between stern father and willful favourite daughter. This was fantastic: great acting, singing and music and real emotional charge around a deeply human moment — everything that Wagner should be. Other worthwhile parts included the beginning of Act Two and, most notably the confrontation between Wotan and Fricka (Susan Parry). We are back with the Sopranos here, as Carmela, queen of her kitchen, succeeds in making Tony comply with her will. A familiar soap situation, then, but one that worked.

Not everything on the production side was a disaster. In particular the device of having some of the action projected on a giant banner was a good way of coping with the simultaneity of different layers of the drama. So, for example, Brunnhilde addressing Siegmund and explaining his fate to him was partly handled this way.

Siegfried next …..