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Limelight, May 2013 |
By Clive Paget |
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Wagner - Die Walküre |
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Gergiev’s 21st-century Ring
dream team take off in full Valkyrian flight. |
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Anyone
passionate about Wagner’s Ring Cycle knows that every generation has its own
prospective dream team. Cruel twists of fate, aging and contracts have
frequently meant that key players never came together on one recording
and/or in good voice. Given the paucity of new opera recordings around
nowadays, it seems even more remarkable, therefore, that our current
generation’s dream team should have coincided on this new Die Walküre from
Mariinsky Opera.
Valery Gergiev is solid in Wagner – his 2010
Parsifal proved that he has an ear for Wagner’s orchestral sonorities and is
able to sensitively support a vocal line. Given his reputation for being
driven, what is surprising here is his breadth of pacing throughout. What he
occasionally lacks in climactic payoffs he makes up for with revelatory
touches of instrumental colour and meaningfully shaped instrumental phrases.
It’s generally very well recorded too, on SACD, with plenty of air around
the sound and singers well caught.
His cast, as mentioned, is
exemplary. Jonas Kaufmann and Anja Kampe are the Wälsung twins, drawing you
inexorably into the drama from the word go. Vocally Kaufmann is unmatched on
record, a heroically dark tenor with ringing top notes. Kampe gives him a
run for his money with full, rich tone and beautiful text work. Nina Stemme
is a fine Brünnhilde, projecting the character’s emotional journey better
than any of her current contemporaries. The top is just a little under
pressure but she compensates with perfect diction and considerable passion.
René Pape is equally fine as Wotan, warmly resonant and powerfully
inside the drama.
This recording is part of a projected Ring Cycle to
be released over the next two years (Das Rheingold is due out in September).
On this hearing, I for one can’t wait.
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