United States R. Strauss, Die Frau ohne Schatten: Soloists, Chorus & Orchestra of the Metropolitan Opera / Yannick Nézet-Séguin (conductor). Metropolitan Opera, New York, 29.11.2024. (RP)
Production:
Original director – Herbert Wernicke
Revival stage director – J. Knighten Smit
Sets, Costumes and Lighting – Herbert Wernicke
Chorus director – Tilman Michael
Cast included:
Nurse – Nina Stemme
Spirit Messenger – Ryan Speedo Green
Emperor – Russell Thomas
Empress – Elza van den Heever
Falcon – Jessica Faselt
Barak the Dyer – Michael Volle
Dyer’s Wife – Lise Lindstrom
Herbert Wernicke staged only one opera for the Metropolitan Opera: Richard Strauss’s Die Frau ohne Schatten in 2001. The German opera director, who died unexpectedly the following year at 56, conceived the entire production, including sets, costumes and lighting. A triumph at its premiere, the current revival is magnificent in every way.
The chief challenges in mounting the opera come in the casting and the size of the orchestra. Strauss calls for five singers with dramatic voices of Wagnerian heft and a 164-piece orchestra. An augmented brass section with eight horns, four doubling on Wagner tubas and ten trumpets on stage and off give some idea of the orchestral forces required and of the splendor of Strauss’s score. The plot is also complex, although no more so than that of Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte, which it resembles in many ways.
Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Strauss’s longtime collaborator, crafted the libretto from a variety of sources to create a fairy tale involving two couples: the Emperor of the Southeastern Islands and the Empress, who come from a mystical realm, and the Dyer and his Wife, who belong to the everyday world. When out hunting, the Emperor had snared a gazelle, who magically turned into a woman whom he married. She is the daughter of Keikobad, King of the Spirits – a woman bereft of a shadow and unable to bear children.
Keikobad has decreed that unless the Empress gains a shadow by the end of the twelfth moon, she will be reclaimed by her father, and the Emperor will be turned to stone. With only three days remaining to accomplish the task, the Empress is guided by her Nurse to an earthly couple with hopes of obtaining the woman’s shadow.
The Dyer and his Wife have a troubled marriage. She is put upon by the endless round of chores and the harassment of his three brothers. He is charitable to a fault and befuddled as to his wife’s moods and unwillingness to have children. The Nurse coaxes her to sell her shadow to the Empress with glittering jewels and promises of sensual delights in the form of an alluring young man. Although troubled by the voices of unborn children that emerge as she cooks fish on an open fire, the Dyer’s Wife yields to temptation and announces to her husband that she has sold her shadow. However, the Empress is drawn to the Dyer’s innate humanity and decency, and rather than deprive them of future happiness, she refuses to take the woman’s shadow. Her selflessness frees her from Keikobad’s terrible command.
Wernicke contrasts the workaday world of the Dyer and his Wife with the mythical realm of the Emperor and Empress by creating a magical visual experience. The imperial sphere is a brilliant space of mirrors, pierced by the royal blue of their robes and the intense scarlet plumage of the Emperor’s falcon. The mirrors create the perception of endless depth and never-ending vistas of dazzling light, while the Dyer’s home is a place of mundane toil and completely devoid of comfort, let alone luxury. Travel between the two worlds is seamless due to the Met’s stage elevators.
The Met has assembled a superb cast, with all the principal singers making their role debuts in this performance. Nina Stemme, who has sung the Dyer’s Wife to great acclaim, was phenomenal as the Nurse. The middle of her voice, where much of the role lies, was molten and beautiful, while the top notes thrilled with their power and intensity. It is a role tailor-made for the superb singer at this stage of her career and a portrayal that should not be missed.
The roles of Dyer’s Wife and Empress carry equal vocal demands, with even more psychologically complex motivations to depict musically and dramatically. Strauss conveyed the Dyer’s Wife’s frustrations and dreams in extraordinarily difficult vocal writing sung over heavy orchestral textures. The rage and vulnerability of Lise Lindstrom’s characterization were painful to watch, with her voice expressing those same emotions in an amazing array of vocal colors.
The humanity of Elza van den Heever’s Empress, which the singer captured with exceptional detail and depth of feeling, was equaled by her singing. Her voice has the size and slice to carry through the thickest of Strauss’s orchestration, but the flexibility and delicacy to sing the role’s rapid coloratura passages and trills. The power and beauty of its upper range –including a high D – were staggering.
Michael Volle’s voice has warmth and conveys wisdom, and he expressed the bewilderment and rage of the Dyer, whose natural urges and desires are repeatedly thwarted by a wife whom he loves and struggles to understand with decency and tenderness. The baritone sang with the clarity of a Lieder singer, with a sound that was unforced and natural yet carried effortlessly into the house.
As the Emperor, Russell Thomas’s tenor had the requisite thrust and brilliance for the role’s demanding high tessitura. Even when Thomas was not singing, he commanded attention encased in glittering mirrors when the Emperor appeared to be doomed. Ryan Speedo Green also impressed as the Spirit Messenger, his bass-baritone as commanding as his stature.
Strauss’s sumptuous score is tailor-made for Nézet-Séguin and the Met Orchestra. Whether playing the most shimmering, softest passages or the loudest, most impassioned outbursts, the music they made was glorious. Nézet-Séguin’s mastery of detail and dynamics was exemplary. The solos of violinist David Chan and cellist Rafael Figuero were mesmerizing, and both were acknowledged by solo onstage bows.
This spectacular production of this Strauss rarity runs for five performances through 19 December. Catch it, if you can.
Rick Perdian
Featured Image: Lise Lindstrom (Dyer’s Wife) and Michael Volle (Dyer) © Evan Zimmerman / MO