THIS is the sixth new production of Parsifal that
Covent Garden has mounted since the war. I saw all its predecessors
except the first, and remember many superlative performances: the
warm, dark tones of Gottlob Frick and Kurt Moll as Gurnemanz,
Norman Bailey in agony as the wounded Amfortas; above all, the
riveting intensity of Jon Vickers's Parsifal, and Rudolf Kempe's
perfectly shaped, unexaggerated conducting. But none of the
previous stagings was as strange, thought-provoking, and memorable
as this one, which opened on 30 November. (I attended the third
performance, on 5 December.)
Like Tristan und Isolde, Parsifal embodies the
philosophical ideas of Schopenhauer. But, whereas Tristan
is about yearning, Parsifal is concerned with compassion:
more specifically, with compassion as the means of redemption. The
redeemer is Parsifal himself, who restores the spear that wounded
Christ to the brotherhood of the Knights of the Grail, thereby
healing the wound inflicted on Amfortas with that very spear by
Klingsor, the Lucifer figure of the opera.
The Grail of the medieval poem on which Wagner drew for his
libretto was not a chalice but a magic stone. The biggest surprise
in Stephen Langridge's production is the revelation of the Grail
first as a youth in a loin-cloth, later as a Christ-like adult.
This perhaps harks back to Amfortas's reference to "the Grail's
command" - cups and stones can't issue orders - but one wonders
what will happen when the mortal character dies. If the implication
is that the brotherhood will die out, Parsifal's regenerative role
is nullified.
Alison Chitty's simple set is dominated by a large glazed cube
in the centre, furnished with a hospital bed. In it we see,
inter alia, Amfortas being tended to by medical staff and,
in flashback and in a different sense, by Kundry. And from it
emerge the Grail figures; finally, only the bed remains.
There are many images that linger in the memory, including the
embrace - fraternal or fatal? - that Parsifal gives to Klingsor,
and his slow exit as, temporarily blinded, he embarks on his search
for the way back to the Knights' domain. The previous scene,
though, put me in mind of the Hot Box Club in Guys and
Dolls, and I half-expected Kundry to join the Flowermaidens in
"A bushel and a peck". At the end, Kundry neither dies (Wagner's
stage directions) nor walks off with Parsifal (ENO in 1999), but
makes her exit with Amfortas.
Baffling, maddening, enlightening: if you have the chance to see
the cinema relay, I urge you to take it. The musical rewards are
great. Sir Antonio Pappano takes his time, but the evening never
drags. The chorus and orchestra were magnificent at both ends of
the dynamic scale: to take one example, the string phrases that
accompany Kundry's longing for sleep were of a rare beauty. Simon
O'Neill looks unprepossessing as Parsifal, but sings with both
power and tenderness. Angela Denoke - now shorn, now with
shoulder-length red tresses - is equally powerful, but tended to
shriek on her top notes.
Gerald Finley acts and sings superbly as the tormented Amfortas,
and the septuagenarian Robert Lloyd sings strongly as his aged
father. René Pape as Gurnemanz delivered his Act 1 narration freely
and easily, and produced floods of golden tone for the Good Friday
Music: utterly ravishing.
Parsifal will be relayed "live" to cinemas on 18 December at
5.45 p.m. roh.org.uk/cinema.