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by Richard Wagner, directed by Atom Egoyan

Canadian Opera Company, Four Seasons Centre, Toronto

January 31, February 4, 7, 10, 13, 19 & 22, 2015

“All Hail a New Brünnhilde”

The Canadian Opera Company is currently reviving its production of Wagner’s Die Walküre (1870) for the second time.  The production directed by filmmaker Atom Egoyan premiered in 2004 and has not been seen since 2006 when it was presented as part of the entire Ring Cycle to inaugurate the Four Seasons Centre.  The highlights of the remount are extraordinary performances of Christine Goerke and Johan Reuter as Brünnhilde and Wotan and the stupendous playing of the COC Orchestra under Johannes Debus. 

Designer Michael Levine’s vision of the world outside the massive neoclassical doors of Valhalla seems even more relevant than it did nine years ago.  As we know from Levine’s own production of Das Rheingold, the opera that precedes Walküre in the Ring Cycle, the playing area was once pristine showroom for the model of Valhalla, the palace Wotan had built by the giants to house his army of warrior heroes.  That showroom has now been destroyed.  Catwalks and the lighting grid have collapsed onto the floor uprooting its tiles.  In this makeshift shelter the unhappily married couple Hunding and Sieglinde make their home by the mighty ash that has already been felled and sectioned.  What seemed like metatheatrical set before, now feels like an image of a world torn apart by strife.

Director Atom Egoyan seems to have simplified his blocking to add clarity to the storytelling.  His more detailed focus on the father-daughter relationship of Wotan and Brünnhilde only adds to its impact, and in Goerke and Reuter he finally has two singers who are also actors masterful enough to convey his emphasis on the opera as story about family.  The characters may be heroes and immortals, but their personal relationships and fallings out are exactly like those of any family.  It is by emphasizing what we have in common with Wagner’s larger-than-life figures that Egoyan draws us into the drama.   

American soprano Christine Goerke makes a triumphant role debut as Brünnhilde.  With her gorgeous voice and highly nuanced characterization, Goerke completely shatters the stereotype of the Valkyrie as a proud, stentorian warrior maiden.  She effortlessly tosses off her first “Hojotohos” like the natural celebratory cries they are meant to be.  Her voice maintains a creamy richness and roundness of tone from her very lowest notes to the highest without a sign of strain or shouting.  To find such lyricism and warmth in Wagner’s lines humanizes the character and makes us empathize fully with her story.

Brünnhilde, of course, travels a wide dramatic arc through her three operas in the Ring Cycle, but I never have seen a singer detail so clearly the enormous changes Brünnhilde undergoes within Die Walküre itself.  Through her subtle shifts of intonation and natural gift for acting, Goerke demonstrates how the joyful, innocent Brünnhilde we first meet at the start of Act II is profoundly shaken by the strife between Wotan and Fricka and by Wotan’s bitter accession to Fricka’s demand not to protect his hero Siegmund.  Brünnhilde’s protection of Sieglinde and the shards of the sword Nothung mark the Valkyrie’s sudden insight as a means to salvage Wotan’s plan in a way he had not considered.  Goerke’s Brünnhilde sinks into ever deeper levels of shame when Wotan unleashes his storm of curses against her, embarrassed not just for herself but for the rashness and harshness of her father’s judgment.  In doing so, Goerke prepares us for the profoundly moving scene of reconciliation at the end.  Vocally and dramatically, Goerke raises the standard of excellence in performing Brünnhilde to a higher level that others will now have to strive to equal.   

Key to helping Goerke achieve greatness is playing her role opposite the magnificent Wotan of the Danish baritone Johan Reuter.  In command of heroic voice which he could color in myriad ways, Reuter creates a god as complex and human as Goerke’s Brünnhilde.  Wotan’s long narrative of Act II “Als junger Liebe Lust mir verblich,” explaining his ignoble past and now-failed plan for the future, has never been so riveting.  Reuter’s singing is impressive not just for its

naturalness but for the range of conflicting feelings of pride, humiliation, anger and bitterness he conveys.  With great emotion Reuter shows us how abandoning his best-loved daughter leaves Wotan irreparably broken. 

Ideally, in this opera the parting and love of father and daughter in Act III should balance the meeting and love brother and sister in Act I.  Unfortunately, this does not occur in this production.  An announcement told us that American tenor Clifton Forbis would sing Siegmund despite an illness.  Indeed, his voice sounds more weatherbeaten than in 2004 or 2006 when he previously sang the role here.  Yet, it is still powerful enough to make such extremely extended notes as Siegmund’s cries of “Wälse! Wälse!” chillingly effective.  As Sieglinde, American soprano Heidi Melton has an impressively large voice of glassy purity and smoothness.  Yet, she sometimes has to shout out her highest notes and strain to reach the lowest.  In contrast to the rest of the cast, including the chorus of Valkyries, Melton displays only rudimentary acting skills.  This seriously undermines the effectiveness of Act I since there is no chemistry at all between the lovers.  In the great “Lenz” duet, the couple might as well be singing about a change in weather rather than the ecstatic burgeoning of love.

As Hunding, Russian bass Dimitry Ivashchenko wields a massive voice of sepulchral depths and generates an unsettling atmosphere of menace whenever he takes the stage.  As Fricka, German mezzo Janina Baechle has a forceful voice but is never able to remove the tone of schoolmarmish censure from her long tirade against Wotan.  In 2004 Judit Németh was able to dominate Wotan as the firm voice of implacable logic.  With a volume not matching that of Reuter’s Wotan, the peevishness of Baechle’s Fricka undercuts the force of her argument.

Under Johannes Debus, conducting his first-ever Walküre, the COC Orchestra produces a magnificent sound.  Debus maintains an ideal balance within the orchestra and between the orchestra and stage.  The orchestra creates a fullness of sound that never obscures inner detail and plays with such immaculate precision, the musicians and Debus seem to breathe as one.  Before Die Walküre opened, the COC announced it would present Siegfried with Goerke as part of its 2015/16 season.  Now knowing what artistry she possesses immediately elevates Siegfried, as it does this Walküre, to must-see status.

©Christopher Hoile

Note: A version of this review will appear later this year in Opera News.

Photos: Johan Reuter as Wotan with the Valkyries surrounding Christine Goerke as Bruunnhilde; Christine Goerke as Bruunnhilde; Clifton Forbis as Siegmund and Heidi melton as Sieglinde.  ©2015 Michael Cooper.

For tickets, visit www.coc.ca.