Review: Wagner: Das Rheingold *****

Those who had misgivings at Opera North’s decision to bring Wagner’s Ring Cycle into the concert hall will have had them swept aside by this remarkably successful presentation of Das Rheingold.

Fully costumed, and with the help of scene setting back-projections, Peter Mumford’s staging stopped little short of a fully dramatised opera house performance.

Sung in German, the scene was set by Nicholas Folwell’s trenchantly powerful voice as the scheming Alberich, there to steal the gold from the Rhinemaidens. He was to be vocally matched by two outstanding American singers, James Creswell and Gregory Frank, as Fasolt and Fafner, here dressed as businessmen who had just built the home of the Gods.

Yet the performance hinges on the character acting of the Austrian tenor, Wolfgang Ablinger-Sperrhacke, as Loge. the god of fire whose guile is to orchestrate the eventual downfall of the gods.

Michael Druiett is a visually imposing Wotan surrounded by the vocally beautiful Yvonne Howard and Giselle Allen as the sisters, Fricka and Freia, and the superbly sung Erda from Andrea Baker who warns him of impending doom. To bring on stage the immense orchestra that Wagner envisaged was Opera North’s objective, and their much enlarged forces, conducted by Richard Farnes, was truly awesome, though the ability to hear so much inner detail was to be the major benefactor.

Further performances on July 1 and September 8.