Bayreuth Festival - Tristan Und Isolde

Published Friday 29 August 2008 at 13:35 by Penelope Turing

Christopher Marthaler’s 2005 production comes back, virtually unchanged - a presentation which is basically true to Wagner’s story but adds a lot of problems, such as modern dress, which remain unsolved.

The first act at this performance is near to a disaster. The permanent set here represents the deck of a large pleasure steamer and is dotted with chairs. When Isolde is angry or frustrated, she throws the chairs about. Brangane picks them up, tidily. The new Isolde, Irene Theorin, has a handsome voice, but almost throughout this act presses it in a hard, narrow vibrato which sounds harsh, sometimes actually ugly. Brangane, played by Michelle Breedt, is not allowed much character and remains a troubled attendant.

The second act is miraculously changed, thanks to two people - Peter Schneider, who conducts with real loving understanding of Wagner’s score, and Robert Dean Smith, who now sings Tristan with the true art of greatness. He seems to inspire Theorin, who sings the love duet with great beauty. Robert Holl sings King Marke with a noble tone but little emotion.

In the third act, Tristan’s home in Brittany appears to be a hospital, and he is found on an adjustable bed on a small railed dais. This act is Tristan’s, and Dean Smith sings and acts it magnificently. When Isolde comes in, she looks rounds carelessly, sees Tristan dead on the floor and comes to him. When she has sung the Liebestod, she covers herself with a sheet.

Did Marthaler really intend the story to end with this comic touch when the orchestra claims heart and mind with love’s death?