Thread by @david_m_wagner

1/ PARSIFAL: Wagner’s last opera, a Grail story. Source material: medieval Arthurian poem “Parzival” by Wolfram von Eschenbach. Wolfram appears as a character in an earlier Wagner opera, TANNHÄUSER. He liked to do that: Wolfram’s irl colleague Walther von der Vogelweide is a

https://twitter.com/metopera/status/1334271347648831488

2/ minor character in TANNHÄUSER, then gets a big posthumous shout-out in DIE MEISTERSINGER.

So in PARSIFAL the Grail subsists in two pieces, the Cup and the Spear. The order of Knights called to guard both is missing the Spear: it was taken from them by Klingsor, a rejected

3/ applicant to their order. Since that rejection Klingsor has turned bad and set up as a sorcerer nearby (stage directions say: “south side of the Pyrenees, facing Muslim Spain”) His opportunity to get the Spear was handed to him when the new Grail King, Amfortas, imprudently

4/ set out to defeat him. He made it past Klingsor’s Flower Maidens (as they’re always called: the script suggests “maidens” is 2b taken seriously but not literally) but not past Klingsor’s main temptress (whom we will meet). Klingsor nicked the Spear, and with it gave Amfortas

5/ a wound in the side that will not heal until, acc to prophecy, a “guileless fool” comes to heal him and save the Order. “Seite” is the term used in the script for the location of the wound, but commentators speculate it may be lower, which wd only be appropriate given the

6/ sacrifice Klingsor had to make to learn sorcery, and also the circs that diverted Amfortas from the task of giving Klingsor a drubbing.

So yes, there’s more backstory than story to PARSIFAL. It’s about how the “guileless fool” 1st encountered the Grail knights but didn’t

7/ understand anything, then later resisted Klingsor’s temptresses, grabbed back the Spear, causing Klingsor and his Magic Kingdom to implode; and how he then returned to the Grail Order, healed Amfortas, and became the new King of the Grail.

8/ The female lead is Kundry, who deal is that, bc she laughed at “Him” on the cross (the libretto avoids saying “Jesus” or “Christ,” which may be the way Wagner wanted it or may just reflect a 19thc convention: making Jesus too holy to mention was a step towards making him

9/ too holy to believe in) she is unable to die, seeks to expiate by being the diligent super-messenger of the Grail Order, but is somehow subject to being called into Klingsor’s service - at which times she looks a whole lot better than in her ragged Grail-service togs. But

10/ Klingsor’s fall and Parsifal’s elevation to Grail King fall are her liberation, from both sin and life.

So these are our characters: Parsifal (clearly a folkloric cousin of chaste Sir Percival), tenor; Amfortas, “Heldenbariton” (heroic baritone); Kundry (so ambitious that

11/ that there’s no dogma on whether it’s a dramatic soprano or dramatic mezzo-soprano role: ours tonight, Katarina Dalayman, is a soprano); Klingsor, bass-baritone- played tonight by Evgeny Nikitin, who has also sung and recorded Amfortas but who, since it was discovered that

12/ that he has some offensive tats bc of his side-hustle as a metal band member in Russia, has been confined to bad-guy roles, at least @MetOpera.

Doing more singing than any of these, however, is the Grail Knight Gurnemanz - bass René Pape - who provides backstory and

13/ guides Parsifal to his 1st view of the Grail.

Jonas Kaufmann brings his lovely “tenore-baritonale” sound to Parsifal; Peter Mattei, undertaking Amfortas for the 1st time in these 2013 performances, hits it out of the park in this anguish-filled role.

14/ The production? Ngl, I’d ideally like a more 10thc vibe. But “post-apocalyptic,” tho by now almost a cliché, is not a bad fit for this story of deliverance long hoped-for a d finally obtained.

Less clear in François Girard’s conception is why the Act I Grail scene ends with

14/ Parsifal staring into a red crevice that has suddenly opened in the middle of the stage; and this leads into the set for Act 2 - Klingsor’s castle and magic garden - where the red crevice is now upright and the stage floor is flooded with, um, deeply red-dyed water

15/ that the stage crew had to keep warm lest the many, many shift-clad long-brown-haired Flower Maidens get, literally, cold feet....

And yeah, those Flower Maidens...

15/ In tweet 10 supra, for “ambitious” please read “ambiguous,” which Kundry is, dramatically and musically. DYAC.