[Met Concert or Gala] CID:275580



Rysanek Gala
Metropolitan Opera House, Sun, February 26, 1984


In celebration of Leonie Rysanek's twenty-fifth anniversary with the company



Rysanek Gala



Metropolitan Opera House
February 26, 1984

In celebration of Leonie Rysanek's twenty-fifth anniversary with the company


LEONIE RYSANEK GALA

Parsifal: Act II

Parsifal................Peter Hofmann
Kundry..................Leonie Rysanek
Klingsor................Franz Mazura
Flowermaidens: Gail Robinson, Cynthia Barnett,
Eleanor Bergquist, Betsy Norden, Loretta Di Franco, Isola Jones


Presentation to Leonie Rysanek by Frank E. Taplin,
President, Metropolitan Opera Association.


Die Walk?re: Act I

Siegmund................Peter Hofmann
Sieglinde...............Leonie Rysanek
Hunding.................John Macurdy

Conductor...............James Levine







Review 1:

Andrew Porter in the New Yorker

Last week, Leonie Rysanek's twenty-five-year association with the Metropolitan Opera was celebrated by concert performances of Act II of "Parsifal" and Act I of "Die Wallk?re," with Miss Rysanek as Kundry and as Sieglinde. Born in Vienna in 1926, she made her debut in Innsbruck, in 1949. She sang at the first postwar Bayreuth festival, in 1951; at Covent Garden in 1953; and at the Met six years later. (Her American d?but was made in San Francisco in 1956, as Senta, Sieglinde, and Aida; the next season there she sang Turandot, Amelia in "Ballo," Ariadne, Lady Macbeth, and Aida again.) For the first decade of her career, she was an uneven singer ? very exciting when the voice poured out truly, with warm, ample radiance, but sometimes squally and wild. The terse comment of "The Record Year" on her Bayreuth d?but (Act III of "Die Walk?re" was recorded) is "Rysanek as Sieglinde shows promise, but also a tendency to scream.? When she reached New York, she had become a more disciplined and accurate vocalist, without losing the spontaneity, the womanly impetuousness, the dramatic directness that make people love her rather as Lotte Lehmann was loved.


The silver-jubilee concert was an occasion both moving and artistically rewarding. Miss Rysanek's Kundry ? she first sang the role in Hamburg in 1976, did it at Bayreuth in 1982 and 1983, and brings it to the Met next season ? is a serious, voluptuous, and stirring portrayal. When I heard the 1982 broadcast, I thought her voice could not do justice to her intentions. Last year, in the theatre, my reservations largely disappeared; her vivid presence made a difference, but she also seemed to have gained new force and freshness. The Met Act II was largely a Bayreuth reconstruction, with the same Parsifal (Peter Hofmann), Klingsor (Franz Mazura), and conductor (James Levine). The singers acted ? with timbres, words, glances, gestures, and demeanor. And because Klingsor was not asked to cry his commands through a public-address system, because Kundry was not put through elaborate routines with maypole ribbons, the sense of Wagner's dramatic confrontations was actually clearer than it had been at Bayreuth.


The "Walk?re" was also acted. Tensions between the three characters ? Mr. Hofmann was the Siegmund, John Macurdy the Hunding ? ran across the platform. The "decor"? the Met stage walled and ceilinged in abstract, Ap- piesque manner, with constructions pleasing in form and color; the orchestra on- stage ? was hardly further from Wagner's scenic directions than that of many a contemporary "Ring" production. Sieglinde and ? Hunding wore the costumes -- modern dress ? that they often wear nowadays. The presentation was Wieland Wagneresque in its dependence on glance, posture, and a few clearly placed, potent gestures; details of realistic action were left to the spectators' imagination, not contradicted by some director's newly invented business. Since the orchestra plays so large a part in painting Wagner's scenes, there was no distraction in seeing it do so; it suggested, rather, a new, audacious "design concept" that invites the audience to interpret sound as colors, forms, and light. If the Met chose to stage its next "Ring" in this bold way, it could save a good deal of money on designer, sets, and stage crew. Mr. Levine had ranged his strings in almost the traditional fashion: second violins on his right, and therefore properly prominent in the [first] pages; cellos facing out (and wonderfully eloquent throughout the evening); violas excellently audible. Only the double-basses, clumped to one side, let us down by not providing a balanced central foundation. There were some rough brass passages (had sectional rehearsals for the brass been skimped?), and the kettledrummer banged away with deplorable loudness. Otherwise, the orchestral sound ? rich and stirring, detailed in solos and glowing in tutti ? made one eager for the Levine-conducted "Ring" long overdue at the Met.


Mr. Hofmann's Siegmund was less successful than his earnest, sharply-focussed Parsifal. He lacked quick, generous reactions and charm of personality. During narratives, he fell into the pose of a handsome singing butl er. But his line was clear and firmly molded. Mr. Macurdy's Hunding was dark, formidable, and incisive. Miss Rysanek's Sieglinde remains irresistible rather in the way that Hilde Konetzni's was ? so warm, honest, and lovable. Sometimes she overdoes things. I wish she wouldn't scream with excitement when Siegmund draws the sword from the tree; if Wagner had wanted a scream he'd have asked for it. (And at each performance the scream gets louder and longer.) But one readily forgives her. In an age when some Sieglindes are Miss Mouse and others a Br?nnhilde manqu?e, she fearlessly projects feeling and character. There was much beautiful sound ? phrases that shone and soared, luminous soft notes that floated through the house. She was a Sieglinde ? as she had been a Kundry ? intent on each turn of the score, whether she was singing or listening. Toward the end of the evening, her voice tired: small wonder, given her assignment. (Act II of "Parsifal" is a taxing warm-up for Sieglinde.) Besides, "Die Walk?re" had been preceded by an affecting presentation, of a silver tray, with repeated plaudits from an adoring house as Frank Taplin, the president of the Metropolitan Opera Association, recalled her achievements, role by role, over the years. The performance was charged with high emotion. The act ? and the evening ? came to a thrilling climax.



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