Power of ambitious 'Siegfried' rings true

Building an empire can be a dirty business. Staging an opera depicting the empire-building, and demise, of gods requires ambition and stamina. Without the latter, decline is inevitable.

The Houston Grand Opera's production of "Siegfried," the third of Richard Wagner's epic, four-opera Ring Cycle, shows no sign of flagging ambition, although there were a few indications of decline in a performance that is, at moments, so stellar that its nearly five hours or running time raced by.

"Siegfried," which runs through May 1, continues unfolding the tragedy of the Norse gods as the deities' king, Wotan, covets the power of a golden ring fashioned by the evil dwarf Alberich. In his pursuit of power, Wotan's daughter, the Valkyrie Brünnhilde, becomes collateral damage - punished for disobedience, stripped of her powers, imprisoned in sleep and surrounded by flames.

Brünnhilde can only to be freed by a fearless hero. This is where the opera's titular character comes into play. But before Siegfried can save her, he must first re-forge a magical sword, slay a giant in the form of a dragon, take possession of Alberich's ring, avoid being poisoned by his foster father Mime and render the great god Wotan powerless.

"Siegfried" highlights heroic endeavor, and men dominate this production. But no man dominates more than the resplendent Iain Paterson, who reprises the role of Wotan. When he enters midway through the first act, it is as if the performance has finally begun. Richard Paul Fink, as Alberich, offered a similarly immediate potency at the start of the second act.

"Siegfried" frequently deploys the drama between duos - whether it's between Mime and Siegfried, Alberich and Wotan or Siegfried and Wotan. Thus, while Rodell Rosel makes a wickedly effective Mime and Jay Hunter Morris an adept Siegfried, the two lacked sufficient chemistry together in the opening scene. Both also struggled not to be covered by the orchestra. For although HGO artistic and musical director Patrick Summers coaxed an exquisite performance of a glorious score from the HGO orchestra, in their zeal they frequently overplayed the singers, especially and most distractingly in the final act.

Morris was at his best as the night wore in, particularly in contemplative moments - singing poignantly of his lost mother, a pastoral bird song or the painful nature of love.

Though, in an opera dominated by men, the real standouts were three show-stealing women.

A diva should sing like she could stop the world on its axis, which is just what Meredith Arwady did as Erda - sometimes with the shimmering image of the globe as her appropriate backdrop.

Elsewhere, Mane Galoyan pierced the sky as the unforgettable forest bird who guides Siegfried.

And when Siegfried finally awakens Brünnhilde, she greets the world, singing, "Hail heaven, hail resplendent earth." We could add, "Hail Christine Goerke." Even after so much excellent singing, it felt is as if we had been waiting all these hours to hear Goerke bring light and life back to the world. Brava!

For Houston audiences, the story of HGO's first Ring Cycle has also been the wonderful work of Catalonian theater group La Fura dels Baus, whose innovative production blends astonishing CGI with acrobatic assemblages of bodies. Who can forget the Rhine maidens mounted in tanks above the stage or the walls of Valhalla formed by chains of bodies in the first of the four Ring Cycles, "Das Rheingold"? Or the slowly lit torches encircling the sharply raked steel dais on which Brünnhilde sleeps in its sequel, "Die Walküre"?

La Fura dels Baus continues to make exquisite magic in "Siegfried," from cascading images of dark post-industrial wastelands to shimmering skies and mountains. The power here is life force. The ring is pictured as a golden fetus, Valhalla as interlinked bodies, rivers as platelets. In "Siegfried" the hero mounts a small treadmill with surrounding screens offering MRI imagery and biometric readouts to track his bodily responses in a conversation about the nature of fear.

Other imagery seemed overly literal - a glowing sword or ring appeared at their mention, snapshots of Wotan and Mime's heads on a portable tablet when they wagered their heads. A projection of clouds in the shape of naked women (with cascading daisies) seemed creepy, not surreal. As in last year's "Die Walküre," projections on the outer scrim were barely visible. The greatest disappointment was an oddly underwhelming dragon, which looked assembled from Ikea and wouldn't scare a forest bird, no less a hero destined to destroy gods.

It's as if La Fura dels Baus got distracted by their own bag of tricks.

"Siegfried" lacks the keen self-editing of "Das Rheingold." To be fair, the score and libretto are dense, layered and frequently refer back to themselves, which encouraged too much recycling of images, props and effects from previous operas. Continuity was the goal but clutter was sometimes the result.

Everything in "Siegfried" moves slowly - forging a sword, killing a dragon, kissing a girl. But there's no wasted time here. This powerful production witnesses Wagner ringing glorious music from each precious second.