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Saturday night's performance of "G?tterd?mmerung" was a sort of preview of the postlude of The Ring cycle which will begin in chronological order next week. No matter. "G?tterd?mmerung" can stand by herself without her slim sisters and is apparently quite popular. The performance took from 7;30 to after midnight, the equivalent of three and a half Bruckner symphonies, or a couple of volumes of Gibbon, but with the kind of ending it has no one begrudges the longueurs, least of all Erich Leinsdorf who erased all the cuts from the twenty-five pound score.

But if the immensity of the opera seems forbidding, it none the less deserves a closer contemplation than the book warrants. For the literal-minded long-windedness of the dramatizer of the Nordic saga was also a musician who can give us marvelous mood pictures of sudden decisive power or, by contrast, exhibit a sensibility on the edge of tears against a background of grandeur charged with doom. `The cast contained one extraordinary singer, several very good ones, and some who, while lacking in sufficient vocal power, did fairly well under trying conditions.

Birgit Nilsson's Br?nnhilde had many glorious moments - also some intermittent difficulties with just intonation. But what was so affecting about her performance was her womanliness. She was not just a dismounted cavalry girl, but a woman, torn between love, humiliation, pride and resignation. The other ladies, Irene Dalis, Rosalind Elias, Mignon Dunn and Martina Arroyo all had the voices to stand up to Wagnerian demands, but it seemed to me that Ingrid Bjoner, a good lyric soprano, was miscast as Gutrune.

Hans Hopf, working valiantly, does not have the heroic voice needed for Siegfried and he is somewhat less than an actor, but then heroic tenors are a vanished breed. When volume was not called for, his delivery was refined and musicianly. Norman Mittelmann's Gunther was a fine character portrayal and he sings well despite a lack of power in his low tones. Ernst Wiemann, though his light voice did not sound very sinister, was a credible Hagen. All in all, the cast made an acceptable, if uneven, team.

The chief protagonist, the orchestra, was in very good hands. After a little initial reserve (the endless Boh?mes and Butterflies have made them forget what involved symphonic music is like), they warmed under the energetic and precise guidance of Mr. Leinsdorf. By the time that magnificent tone poem, "The Break of Day," was reached, they glowed and cast a spell which fully compensated for the less stirring digressions.

But the rest of the production was near appalling. The old sets are ready for the Smithsonian. The Hall of the Gibichungs featured the biggest picture window in existence with a fine view of a craggy rise. Imagine what a real estate broker could do with this, for the view changes in the third act even though we are still looking through the same window. The king-sized window was flanked by two enormous closets with curtains where everything, living and dying heroes and heroines, and even horses, seemed to be stored. One of the truly magnificent and dramatic moments came when Grane, the Central Park steed, parted the curtains and trotted into the middle of the living room. The final scene with ectoplasmic emanations fluttering on a screen was fortunately drowned by the overwhelming music.

I suppose Nathaniel Merrill, the stage director, was considerably handicapped by this gaslight era set-up, but it does not altogether exonerate him. Surely the Rhinemaidens, luscious enchantresses, do not dance Ring-Around-the-Rosy when they want to tempt a warrior. And speaking about warriors, while I'm not familiar with the manual of arms of the Gibichungs' army, the shenanigans they carried out with their pikes when not running aimlessly hither and yon were spectacularly ludicrous.

If Wagner is to be reinstated, the Met is duty-bound completely to restudy and refurbish The Ring; if "Martha" is what rates a new production, our values are upside down. Well, while this is a pretty sad situation, don't miss The Ring - and try to be on time. The Rhinemaidens never saw such dense traffic on their riverbank passing in the aisles for a good half-hour after the beginning. But it was a faithful crowd that stayed to the bitter end. Some neophytes tried to applaud at the wrong places, but the older members of the sect silenced their blasphemous manners.

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