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Cobalt Mining in the Tropics Bayreuth
Festspielhaus
07/30/2025 - & August 8, 17, 24, 26, 2025
Richard Wagner: Parsifal
Michael Volle (Amfortas), Tobias Kehrer (Titurel), Georg Zeppenfeld (Gurnemanz), Andreas Schager (Parsifal), Jordan Shanahan (Klingsor), Ekaterina Gubanova*/Elīna Garanca (Kundry), Daniel Jenz, Stijl Faveyts (Graalritter), Lavinia Dames, Margaret Plummer, Gideon Poppe, Matthew Newlin (Knappen), Evelin Novak, Catalina Bertucci, Lavinia Dames, Margaret Plummer, Victoria Randem, Marie Henriette Reinhold (Klingsor Zaubermädchen), Marie Henriette Reinhold (alto solo)
Chor der Bayreuther Festspiele, Thomas Eitler‑de Lint (Chorus master), Orchester der Bayreuther Festspiele, Pablo Heras‑Casado (Conductor)
Jay Scheib (Stage director), Mimi Lien (Sets), Meentje Nielsen (Costumes), Rainer Casper (Lighting), Joshua Higgason (Augmented Reality and Videography)
(© Enrico Nawrath)
In this production, the story of Parsifal has been deprived of its spirituality, the very essence of Wagner’s ultimate opera. American director Jay Scheib’s main take is an environmental lamentation of the deleterious effects of the mining of cobalt and other rare metals, but only by reading the programme notes can one know this. It’s a variant on James Cameron’s Avatar (2000), but without the inconvenient natives. To compensate for this elimination, the monastic order itself is given a “native” look. The batik outfits may have evoked Indonesia, but the setting is inspired by the South Pacific island nation of Nauru, where phosphate deposits had been mined for decades, leading to the near total devastation of the environment.
The monastic order, guardians of the Holy Grail, have been revised to include women, rendering the vow of celibacy rather impractical. Some progressive souls may have been disappointed to see no obvious transgendered members in this modernized congregation. The behaviour of the latter is more Evangelical than spiritual, with exalted kisses and salutations after the service.
Indeed, there is very little spirituality in Scheib’s order of Montsalvat. The ceremony they celebrate is more akin to the occult than to Christianity. In the libretto, the Ceremony of the Uncovering of the Grail involving the sacred chalice which contained Christ’s blood confers immortality on the Knights. Scheib chose a more exotic mix, with elements of Afro‑Caribbean Voodoo and Santeria. As the sacred relic is impaired due to Amfortas’s transgression and unhealing wound, it’s his own blood that is squeezed into the chalice the Knights drink from. Montsalvat’s order is now vampiric, it would seem. This is the very antithesis of Parsifal, Wagner’s most spiritual opera.
The opening is set on a beach, where the elderly knight Gurnemanz is sunbathing. He’s approached by a woman, and they fornicate. This is the director’s message, that sex is not a sin and that Amfortas’s wound is in fact due to more grave infractions. However, we never discover what these might be. We later learn the woman with whom Gurnemanz had sex on the beach is Kundry’s double. As Kundry is no saint, we don’t know why she would have a wanton double.
One of the rare good ideas in this production was the placing of the swan, which young Parsifal had shot with his arrow, for which he was reprimanded, on the bed of the ailing Titurel, the retired leader of the order and Amfortas’s father. It’s a message that all life is sacred, the swan’s as well as Titurel’s.
Act II takes place in Klingsor’s garden, inspired by the magnificent gardens of Ravello, a town perched on the mountainous Italian coast south of Amalfi. Ravello, one of the most beautiful spots on the planet (where Gore Vidal enjoyed his sprawling hillside home, “La Rondinaia,” for decades), is the spot Wagner chose to write Parsifal’s second act. However, despite this natural splendour, Scheib opted for a 1960s‑inspired psychedelic pool party setting. Instead of six flower maidens, there are some two dozen pink blond vamps, variants of Barbie, kicking back around the pool. They enjoy the company of two male cadavers, one of whom is decapitated and whose head is held by one Barbie while another embraces the headless corpse. Scheib’s vision of seduction isn’t too far‑fetched, given that the knights of the grail are apparently vampires.
The evil magician Klingsor is an anachronistic parody of a homosexual who’s a blend of effeminacy and unadulterated evil. His attempt to throw the holy spear at Parsifal was too flimsy to be credible. He conveniently falls on the mattress where the seductress Kundry was previously lying. Beyond the lack of spirituality, the demise of Klingsor and the disappearance of his enchanted garden was the most underwhelming I’ve seen.
Act III occurs years later, where an aging Gurnemanz, now a hermit, finds Kundry asleep at his doorstep. He awakens her by sprinkling water from the nearby Holy Spring. However, in order to show the devastation of cobalt mining, the spring is a disgusting green pool. Somehow Kundry survives toxic waste exposure.
Parsifal, not clad in knightly armour as called for in the libretto, but rather in a hoodie, arrives at the pool. Kundry washes his feet (with chemical waste) and Gurnemanz anoints him, recognizing that the “pure fool” had gained compassion, and was now free of guilt through suffering, and ready to join the knights of the Grail.
The knights’ castle is no more and they mourn the now deceased Titurel by the toxic pool. Amfortas refuses to uncover the Grail, despite the crowd’s beseeching him to. He wants to end his own suffering by dying. Contrary to the libretto, the knights violently erupt and attack both Amfortas and Gurnemanz, which is both nonsensical and antithetical. Parsifal arrives with the Holy Spear, and with its touch heals Amfortas’s wound.
Scheib’s “improvement” on Wagner is twofold. Parsifal smashes the Holy Grail, made of blue cobalt, into smithereens. This signifies the end of the extraction of the precious metal, as well as a new beginning. Since Christianity has become offensive in much of the West, poor Kundry gains no salvation, at least in the Christian sense. After two millennia erring and deprived of respite for having mocked Christ at the crucifixion, Kundry doesn’t earn the privilege of sinking into the ground and dying; she simply continues to live. Maybe she can join the knights of the Grail.
Andreas Schager is today’s leading Wagnerian tenor. Heard last month in Vienna in Die Walküre, Siegfried and Götterdämmerung, he impressed here too, with his inexhaustible stamina. I had some apprehension regarding his Parsifal as it requires much more subtlety than Siegmund or Siegfried. However, the Austrian tenor proved that he can be subtle, and showed nuance in his interpretation.
German bass Georg Zeppenfeld was an impressive Gurnemanz, who served as narrator for the opera’s first act. Admired last season as Daland in Der fliegende Holländer in Dresden, Zeppenfeld is as brilliant an actor as he is a singer. He beautifully conveyed the poise and gravitas necessary to play Gurnemanz. In this work, with four of the principal roles sung by basses and baritones, his was distinct. His deep basso cantante contrasted well with baritone Michael Volle’s Amfortas.
Volle is today’s leading Wagnerian baritone. Heard in La Scala’s Ring, as Wotan in Das Rheingold and Die Walküre and as the Wanderer in Siegfried, Volle is endowed with a warm, virile voice. He was an affecting Amfortas, caringly conveying the afflicted knight’s suffering. As with Zeppenfeld, Volle’s diction was so clear that one easily understood his every utterance.
American bass-baritone Jordan Shanahan was a brilliant Klingsor, despite the idiotic staging. He diligently played his role as a demented television host, a hybrid of Mephistopheles and Liberace. Heard a few months earlier as Barak in Die Frau ohne Schatten in Berlin, Shanahan is an astounding actor as well as singer. His ability to excel as the kind and generous Barak as well as the demonic sorcerer Klingsor attests to his great versatility.
Tobias Kehrer sang the small role of Titurel. Despite the retired leader’s debilitated condition, he was able to convey Titurel’s dignity and gravitas. Kehrer is another versatile singer who was Fafner in this summer’s Das Rheingold and Siegfried in Bayreuth, as well as an impressive Orest in Elektra, in Berlin. In addition to his warm basso, he’s a remarkable actor, convincing as the Ancient Greek hero, a menacing Fafner days earlier in Das Rheingold, and a dignified old man in this performance.
Russian mezzo Ekaterina Gubanova was an outstanding Kundry, whose tessitura perfectly fit the role. She was also able to convey the ambiguity and tormented nature of the character. Admired a few years ago as Brangäne in Tristan und Isolde in Bologna, and recently as Princess Eboli in Don Carlos in Paris, Gubanova must be a brilliant polyglot, as her diction in these roles was crystal clear.
The famed Chor der Bayreuther Festspiele excelled in the Act I chorus, but seemed uninspired in the pivotal final choir, possibly the fault of the conductor. Spain’s Pablo Heras‑Casado had the benefit of recently conducting a Ring cycle at Madrid’s Teatro Real. I was fortunate enough to attend that cycle’s Das Rheingold and Die Walküre. But for this Parsifal, Heras‑Casado had mixed results: riveting in Act II, but uneven in Act III. The strongest musical moments failed to transcend their structure and soar into profound, otherworldly emotion. This is what separates mere adequate Wagner from the truly celestial.
Thankfully, the glorious voices and interpretations of the cast saved the production from artistic oblivion, as Wagner’s final work is infinitely durable. But the fact remains, this was the most inane staging of Parsifal imaginable – and believe me, I’ve seen some real clunkers. Beyond superimposing an environmentalist message, the true outrage here is a Parsifal without a shred of spirituality. Ironically, this production involved a technology requiring special glasses, enabling concertgoers to experience augmented reality. After consulting with friends who’d used them previously, I chose not to. They apparently provided special effects as psychedelic as Act II’s staging. Ironically, this technology involves some of the very same decried heavy metals.
Ossama el Naggar
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