Walkure’ as Overture to the ‘Ring’ to Come

Like Fafner the dragon reluctantly stirring to semiconsciousness in ”Siegfried,” the Metropolitan Opera production of Wagner’s four-opera cycle, ”Der Ring des Nibelungen,” raised a weary eyelid after three years of slumber with a performance of ”Die Walkure” on Thursday evening. After one more blink, another ”Walkure” on Monday, the production is to nod off for six more weeks (should that be Fafner the groundhog?), then return with ”Das Rheingold,” preparatory to three full cycles of the ”Ring.”

Alas, the ”Walkure” on Thursday, in the Otto Schenk production of 1986, had that feel: not so much of an event as of preparation, as though something were being removed from the shelf and dusted off for the big show to come.

Here was a chance, for example, to get James Levine’s orchestra ready for the long sit. It was audibly involved at times, to be sure, with the opening chase of Siegmund sounding as riveting as ever, with excellent work from the strings. But there were also moments of vagueness, of apparent limbering up, especially in the woodwinds and brasses.

Here was a chance, too, to get a returning star of past seasons, James Morris, as Wotan, in fighting trim. Mr. Morris seemed in exceptionally fine voice, even by his standards, through the second act and most of the third, though he flagged in his quiet singing to Brunnhilde at the end, with a grainy, almost broken tone: a lapse that will undoubtedly be remedied when it counts.

Deborah Voigt, in contrast, started tentatively as Sieglinde but grew in richness of tone and assurance throughout. Yet the rest of the cast will be little heard when the full cycles roll around in the spring.

Poul Elming, a well-traveled Danish tenor, made his Met debut, as Siegmund, and one wanted to be impressed. Here, after all, was a singer in marked contrast to so many hapless Wagner tenors heard on this stage in recent decades: a tall, lanky figure with real metal in the voice.

That metal, though, was not gold. There was no real luster to the tone nor much heroic stature to the stage presence. While Ms. Voigt and Philip Ens, as Hunding, tried to lay bare the tensions right below the surface in the first act, Mr. Elming seemed content to face front and belt.

As Brunnhilde, Deborah Polaski transcended the misplaced perkiness seemingly built into the early parts of the role in this production and created a truly empathetic character by the end. Although her vibrato verged uncomfortably on wobble under pressure, she generally stood up well to the role’s vocal demands.

Mr. Ens, in his Met debut, was appropriately crude and intimidating. But Hanna Schwarz, as Fricka, for all her fine stage presence, sounded worn. Only she, along with Mr. Morris and Ms. Voigt, is to be around for a complete ”Ring.”

This seemed not the sort of night calculated to win the heart of the paying subscriber any more than that of the nonpaying critic. On the other hand, cheers rang long and loud afterward. Go figure.

James R. Oestreich | Feb. 5, 2000