Tristan et Isolde (Bohm/Nilsson, Vickers, Berry) A Must Have Regardless of Quality

Wagner: Tristan und Isolde (Orange 1973: Böhm/ Nilsson, Vickers, Hesse, Berry)

Although I'm not a Wagner fanatic, I must admit that when performed well, his Gaelic-myth-based opera, Tristan und Isolde, is a magnificently beautiful work. The story of the opera is based on an old myth that was likely the inspiration for the English story of King Arthur and his plight with dashing Sir Lancelot and lovely Queen Guinevere.

From the myth, upon defeating the knight Morholt, Tristan the Cornish knight brings Irish princess Isolde back to Cornwall to be the bride of his uncle, King Mark. In a bout of thirstiness while en route, however, they accidentally drink a bottle of love potion that causes them to fall uncontrollably in love with each other and to carry on an adulterous relation even after Isolde was married to King Mark. There are a few alternate endings to this tale. One has jealous King Mark making a kebab out of his amorous knight as Tristan serenades Queen Isolde on his harp. The other has Tristan mortally wounded by a poison lance as he saves a maid from rogue knights. Sensing his grave condition, Tristan sends for Isolde (who was known for her healing arts), telling his herald to sail back with white sail if he is returning with the great lady and black sail if he failed to procure her service. The herald brings Isolde, but Tristan is mistakenly told that the ship was returning on black sail. Being a gallant knight that he is, he gives up the will to live and dies of grief. Proving herself her lover's equal, Isolde then drops dead over his body... I suppose from sheer frustration... (just kidding!).

The Wagner opera follows closer to the latter version of the myth... though with a few more twists. It opens with Isolde and her maid Brängane discussing Isolde's dilemma with Tristan. He had killed her husband in the battle, and, not knowing this, she had nursed wounded him back to health. What's worse, they had fallen tragically in love, though Tristan is honor-bound to bring Isolde back to Cornwall to marry his uncle, King Mark. As they journey southward, Isolde brews up a poisonous potion and offers it to Tristan, intending on committing murder-suicide rather than having to marry a king she doesn’t love. Knowing Isolde’s intention, Tristan accepts the drink anyhow, and they both gulp down the liquid looking forward to their own demise. (Un)Fortunately, Brängane has another plan for them and switches the poison potion with a heavy-duty love potion instead. So instead of dying together, Tristan and Isolde not only survive, but spend much of the rest of the opera in a Viagra-overdosed state always looking forward to their illegal trysts. Though King Mark is insufferably benevolent toward them, Tristan is eventually betrayed by his best pal Kurwenal, setting the stage for a really supernaturally and tragically beautiful ending. How it really ends has a lot to do with what your conception of death and what happens afterward, I think. Wagner's libretto merely indicates that Isolde is transfigured... You have to listen to the music and make your own conclusion about it from there.

Tristan und Isolde is a monstrously long and beautiful opera (roughly 3½ solid hrs of music). If it is performed well, though, it’d feel half its length. If not, it’s a torture both for the ears and for your bottoms. This is ‘musical drama’ with no ‘song’ in it. The music flows from start to finish with the character declaim rather than really ‘sing.’ Listen to Wagner’s huge and colorful orchestra... the recurring themes (what we call Leitmotifs) and the instruments they’re played on are really effective at painting a vivid background scenery the story is taking place in. There is no mistaking the sea setting of the first and final acts, and if you really pay attention you will even hear the changes in wave patterns and the wind! The mournful orchestral prelude to Act III is a favorite concert piece, and you’d be hard pressed to find a more beautiful solo music for the Cor Anglais than what follows it. Even if there is no ship to be seen on the stage, the melody tells you just what is appearing on the horizon... And even if all the music that comes before it doesn’t stir you, it would take an incurable sociopath to not be moved by Isolde’s opera-ending Liebestod (love’s death). Who cares if she’s vicious and good at poisoning people if she can sing like that?

CAST:
Isolde ::: Birgit Nilsson (soprano)
Brangäne ::: Ruth Hesse (soprano)
Tristan ::: Jon Vickers (tenor)
Kurwenal ::: Walter Berry (baritone)
King Marke ::: Bengt Rundgren (bass)
Melot ::: Stan Unruh
Seeman/Hirt ::: Horst Laubenthal
Karl Böhm/ Orchestre National de RTF and Choeurs New-Philharmonia de Londres (Walter Hagen-Groll)
Directed by ::: Nikolaus Lehnhoff
Filmed by ::: Pierre Jourdan

Samples:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MpOy1ujOYo (Act II love duet)
www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6vtug-fTHc (Isoldes Liebestod)

Filmed live at the open air auditorium of Théâtre Antique d'Orange on 7 July 1973 by Pierre Jourdan, the video quality of this DVD is quite problematic. I can't object more to the practice of cutting from live footage of the orchestra during the prelude to static title credits when it is obvious from elsewhere in the film that they knew how to run credit on film background! Even when keeping in mind the difficulties of getting good camera angles in this big old open-air amphitheater, the choice of coverage still gets to be quite annoying at times when the camera zooms out and stays out during intimate or climatic scenes. He used a single audio recording of the performance and spliced videos from different angles to match it.... but the synchronization between the video and audio is at times downright amateurish (it is most obvious in various places during the famous Liebestod that he spliced wrong video sequence to what’s being sung ). Though the lighting is atrociously dim, video and sound quality are not that bad considering that this was from 1973 (though the CD of this performance sounds consistently better balanced than in this DVD version), it’s the badly synchronization of the film editing (with a few skipped/missed beats added to the woes) that is responsible for much of the aggravation.

Nikolaus Lehnhoff's staging is very static and minimalistic (with some really weird choices of costume... it's like watching an episode of Star Trek set in ancient Greece at times), focusing the attention on the performers. It's great when the close up is on either Nilsson or Böhm in the orchestra pit (he's quite a fascinating conductor to watch), but I'm afraid the others aren't that loved by the camera. If you think of it as a spiced up concert performance, this isn't a bad show at all (thanks in large part to the pretty good English subtitle).

On the actual performance front, though, having the likes of Birgit Nilsson and Jon Vickers in the title roles practically makes this DVD legendary and a must have for any serious lover of Wagner opera. Jon Vickers is vocally a most ardent and chivalric hot-bloodedly knightly Tristan imaginable... if visually less so. Much of his acting is done with his truly one of a kind Heldentenor voice! Not only is it heroic and expressive, it is also the kind of voice that sticks in your head for days after you heard it. One note from Jon Vickers and you know exactly who is singing.

It is clear from this DVD why Nilsson’s Isolde is legendary. Even though she doesn't get to move around much, she makes the most of her visible time on the stage. It is doubtlessly aided by her powerful and silvery soprano that actually sings every note of this long and arduous role. It is hard to believe that those phosphorus incendiary tones are being so effortlessly emitted by a 55 yrs old woman! It is a cold laser of a voice and I would still prefer a 'hotter' passionately dramatic reading of this role, but when you can sound and sing like La Nilsson could even after 3 hrs of riding the out-sized Wagner orchestra, you can make it work your own way!

In supporting roles, Bengt Rundgren is a vocally kingly King Mark, though with a rather prominent vibrato that some (me included) could find distracting at times. Very tall and thin in his black robe, he is a solemn column on the stage that I could only wish director Lehnhoff had found some more use for. The loyal Brängane is well sung by Ruth Hesse, though I'd have loved to hear more dramatic urgency during her key warning. Walter Berry's (surprisingly only) sufficiently treacherous Kurwenal rounds off a good cast.

The musical performance of this show is rightfully legendary. I have many recordings of Karl Böhm and had never heard him in this fiery a mood before. With the Orchestre National de RTF delivering his orchestral read, Böhm speeds to finish by at least 15 minutes faster than most other performances of Tristan und Isolde I've heard, though it doesn't feel rush... A beautiful chromatic flame that actually both burns and melts you (there's a good reason the cor anglais soloist, Paul Taillefer, is named in the ending credits) as it rushes into the endless water that swallows whole our singing mythical pair of heroes.

So... never mind the bad video, the CD is a must buy for all fans of German opera. For those who are more ambivalent toward Wagner's long-windedness and only want 1 recording of this opera, however, I would recommend the DVD from Bayreuth Festival with Daniel Barenboim conducting Waltraud Meier and Siegfried Jerusalem in the title roles instead. They don't sound as glorious as Nilsson and Vickers do, but the staging is more engaging and the video and audio quality is much much better!

2 DVDs (Act III on 2nd disc). Run-time: 215 minutes. Sung in German with subtitle in: English.

Since the performance was done in France, this is my round-about entry to ifif1938's French & English Write-Off.

Reviews of some other Wagner operas:
Lohengrin (Met 1986), Great Wagnerian Scenes (Flagstad, Nilsson, Rysanek, S Björling)