[Met Performance] CID:132960
Götterdämmerung {147}
Ring Cycle [71] Uncut. Matinee ed. Metropolitan Opera House: 02/12/1942.
(Review)
Metropolitan Opera House
February 12, 1942 Matinee
GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG {147}
Der Ring des Nibelungen: Cycle [71] Uncut
Wagner-Wagner
Brünnhilde..............Helen Traubel
Siegfried...............Lauritz Melchior
Gunther.................Herbert Janssen
Gutrune.................Irene Jessner
Hagen...................Emanuel List
Waltraute...............Kerstin Thorborg
Alberich................Walter Olitzki
First Norn..............Mary Van Kirk
Second Norn.............Lucielle Browning
Third Norn..............Maria Van Delden
Woglinde................Eleanor Steber
Wellgunde...............Irra Petina
Flosshilde..............Helen Olheim
Vassal..................John Dudley
Vassal..................Wilfred Engelman
Conductor...............Erich Leinsdorf
Director................Désiré Defrère
Set designer............Hans Kautsky
Götterdämmerung received three performances this season.
The program states the sets for this production had been repainted by J. Novak.]
Review of Oscar Thompson in the New York Sun
With the completion yesterday afternoon of the Metropolitan's annual matinee presentation of "Der Ring des Nibelugen" those who are responsible for the casting of the operas in this season may be breathing a little easier. For "Goetterdaemmerung" has come and gone along with "Rheingold, "Walkuere" and "Siegfried," and the problem of the three Bruennhildes has been met. Yesterday it was the American soprano Helen Traubel, who shouldered for the first time the heavy burdens that in recent seasons have been carried either by Kirsten Flagstad or Marjorie Lawrence the one a virtual prisoner abroad, the other still incapacitated by paralysis of the limbs.
After a tame and tentative beginning in the Prologue where the farewell scene with Siegfried was almost bereft of the usual excitement and where Bruennhilde's final high C was bodiless and insecure, Miss Traubel made steady progress. It was in the "Immolation" at the close of long afternoon that her singing was most opulent and most vital. The long threnody that has served her triumphantly in concert performances did not fail her on the stage. She got it. The great show of enthusiasm it evoked after the curtains closed was just recognition of a superb achievement.
Earlier, in the denunciatory passages preceding the swearing on the spear and again in those that led into the conspiracy trio with Gunther and Hagen, the soprano gave to her music a like beauty and stir. Her part in the Waltraute scene though vocally admirable, shared with the Prologue a lack of tension. Here she was overshadowed by Kerstin Thorborg. Though badly costumed-conceding, of course, that this Bruennhilde's physical proportions were not such as to make good costuming a simple matter-Miss Traubel met the more routine requirements of the stage action and sometimes did better than that, though it can scarcely be said that her embodiment of the character was one either of illusion or conviction. She had gained in details of facial expression. But it was her voice that won her way for her. That voice, if not of the weight of Mme. Flagstad's or the color of Miss Lawrence's, had at its best a brilliant thrust.
The principals otherwise were familiar in the roles. Lauritz Melchior had his usual wealth of ringing tones for Siegfried. He sounded baritonal in the scene where Siegfried ought to be mistaken for Gunther and there was even something of a broad-quite broad - resemblance to Herbert Janssen's able embodiment of that character. Emanuel List's conception of Hagen is still his own, but he sang reasonably well. The Alberich of Walter Olitzki barked in a long-familiar way. Irene Jessner's Gutrune had its fair measure of appeal. Mme. Thorborg's success as Waltraute already has been mentioned. The Nyxies of Eleanor Steber, Irra Petina and Helen Olhelm, chimed their voices together rather more successfully than did the Horns of Mary Van Kirk, Lucielle Browning and Maria Van Delden. Mr. Leinsdorf was again an exponent of fast tempi, but the orchestral performance was one well above average. Various changes in the stage groupings, though not so credited on the program, were understood to be the work of Lothar Wallerstein.