Strauss – Elektra

Klytämnestra – Michaela Schuster
Elektra – Nina Stemme
Chrysothemis – Elza van den Heever
Aegisth – Wolfgang Ablinger-Sperrhacke
Orest – Johan Reuter
Der Pfleger des Orest – Anthony Robin Schneider
Die Aufseherin – Serafina Starke
1. Magd – Katharina Magiera
2. Magd – Marvic Monreal
3. Magd – Alexandra Ionis
4. Magd – Dorothea Herbert
5. Magd – Lauren Fagan
Die Vertraute – Serafina Starke
Die Schleppträgerin – Anna Denisova
Ein junger Diener – Lucas van Lierop
Ein alter Diener – Andrew Harris

Pražský filharmonický sbor, Berliner Philharmoniker / Kirill Petrenko.
Stage director – Philipp Stölzl.

Festspielhaus, Baden-Baden, Germany.  Tuesday, March 25^th, 2024.

Tonight marked my return to the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden after an absence of a number of years – a regrettable one as this is always a most agreeable place to see a show and spend some time in the heart of the Black Forest.  The central opera production of this year’s Osterfestspiele is this Elektra, with the Berliner Philharmoniker and their chief conductor, Kirill Petrenko, accompanying a luxury cast of leading Straussians.

The staging was confided to the duo of Philipp Stölzl and Philipp M Krenn – their first collaboration as a double act.  They place the action in a set that seems to live the drama as much as the characters.  The set, by Stölzl, features ten horizontal blocks that constantly move, at times trapping the characters, at others opening up to allow them to interact with each other.  At the start of the evening, Elektra is contained in her hovel, two levels below the maids interacting above.  As we move to the Klytämnestra scene, the set evolves to become a big staircase in which the evolving power relationships in that scene between mother and daughter physically come to life.  I must admit that I was filled with anxiety at several points, not least when Michaela Schuster’s double as Klytämnestra rolled down the stairs from a great height following her murder.  Similarly, I had visions of the signers hurting themselves by banging their heads on the set, while being contained within it.  Perhaps this explains why Nina Stemme’s Elektra had such a big thick wig – to protect her against a potential head injury.

The Philipps also chose to project the sung text onto the set throughout the entire evening.  It felt a bit like being at one of those PowerPoint presentations where the presenter reads their entire presentation off the slides.  It did add visual interest, especially with the combination of the set closing in and the text projected in a way redolent of the Star Wars movies.  It made me wonder if the Philipps were paying homage to the original movie.  Perhaps the point was to visually represent how Elektra’s fate was written right from the start.  On the whole, I found this an audacious piece of theatre in the way that the set manifested it.  At the same time, it left me rather cold simply because the staging felt more about the installations rather than the development of character through the principals.

The Berliners were on phenomenal form for Petrenko.  His was a relatively swift reading, one that constantly made one feel that there was a dance within the score desperate to break out – which, of course, it did with mortal consequences at the end.  There was just one moment where Petrenko pulled back on the tempo, that was as Klytämnestra described her nights, with Petrenko bringing out the strangeness of the low brass to most striking effect.  The Berlin strings had a silky sheen, while the brass was rock solid all night.  The sheer precision and unanimity of attack was staggering.  They actually succeeded in making this incredibly difficult score sound easy.  Unfortunately, the contributions of the usually excellent Pražský filharmonický sbor were inaudible from my seat in the middle of the Parkett.  I do wish they’d been placed on the side balconies instead of being piped in through speakers. 

I hope it isn’t too ungentlemanly of me to mention that Stemme is now in her sixty-first year, with decades of singing the most demanding music in the repertoire behind her.  The voice still has a peachy roundedness in the middle and she brought a tireless energy despite the all-consuming assignment.  I once compared Stemme’s singing to a Volvo – a comfortable ride you know will get you to the destination safely.  Whereas, one might argue, this role needs to live more dangerously.  It was interesting to see that when the voice didn’t react as readily, from about a B-flat upwards, Stemme let the tone rip in a thrilling way, knowing that she needed to push the voice to get there.  It may not have been a beautiful sound, but it was undeniably exciting and raised the emotional temperature of the evening.  Otherwise, Stemme was generally reliable, even if one longed for her to live the text more readily.  That said, in this role, reliability counts for a lot. 

Schuster gave us a nightmarish Klytämnestra.  She was unafraid to make an ugly sound, on ‘schlachte, schlachte’ she uttered a guttural cry that seemed to emerge from deep inside her.  She also flirted with sprechgesang, as if to demonstrate Klytämnestra’s weak grasp of reality.  Elza van den Heever sang Chrysothemis in a healthy soprano that bloomed gloriously on top, with seemingly unlimited ease.  The sound is a combination of a chalky exterior around a pearly core and, along with Schuster, she really made the text live in a most compelling way.  Johan Reuter was a tower of strength as Orest, the tone warm and full, with excellent diction.  Wolfgang Ablinger-Sperrhacke brought a light, characterful tenor to his music, also making much of the text. 

The remaining roles reflected the quality and renown of this festival.  Lucas van Lierop, sang the Junger Diener in a bright, well-placed tenor, while Andrew Harris brought a handsome bass to the Alter Diener.  We had an enthusiastic group of maids with Katharina Magiera’s plush mezzo as the Erste Magd, and Dorothea Herbert’s lyrical soprano as the Vierte Magd.  Lauren Fagan was a very committed and impassioned Fünfte Magd, although the voice had a tendency to sit around the note rather than on it. 

There was a lot to enjoy in this evening’s Elektra.  The singing was always extremely committed and Stemme was tireless in the title role.  Elza van den Heever’s Chrysothemis also soared resplendently.  The staging did what it needed to do and provided, literally in this case, a framework for the action.  What really made this evening stand out was the phenomenal playing of the Berliners, making this exceptionally challenging music sound like a walk in the park.  Other than an annoying boor who booed as soon as the music ended, breaking the spell for everyone, the audience gave the entire cast a massive ovation.  The group of teenagers there, who looked like they were on a school trip, were particularly enthusiastic in their ovations – something a lot more encouraging for the future of opera than one pretentious and entitled booer.