Better than Bayreuth

Which of Wagner’s mature dramas is the most challenging, for performers and spectators? The one you’re seeing at the moment, seems to be the answer for me. The better I know them, the more apprehensive I get about whether I can rise to their level, and whether the performers can, and whether we can pace ourselves and not flag at the prospect of the last act, in most of them the greatest and most exhausting. In the end, though, I think Tristan und Isolde takes the biscuit. It’s a matter of gratitude, almost, if the Prelude isn’t as overwhelming as it naturally tends to be. At Longborough this year it wasn’t, and I was duly grateful. The whole of Act I was a slightly slow burn, in spite of the torrents of marvellous sound produced by the passionate Isolde of Rachel Nicholls. It’s rare indeed that one even imagines complaining about a Wagner soprano being too loud, but there were moments when Nicholls would have been more at home in Covent Garden than in Longborough. For once Isolde had a Tristan who was on a level with her, in volume and in dramatic intensity. Peter Wedd is the finest Tristan I have seen and heard since Siegfried Jerusalem in his prime, and in certain respects he is clearly superior; in fact, given the chance to sing the role a few more times, he may be the most potent interpreter of the part that anyone can remember.

Neither Nicholls nor Wedd have probed the depths of these roles yet, but the thought of their continuing to sing them is very exciting. They were guided by Anthony Negus, the presiding Longborough spirit, and without question a great Wagnerian.