Word: wotan
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...human beings. Rocky (and Stallone), I think, is no longer "da bum from Philly who don't talk too good." The audience really believes this cartoon of men named after Greek myths who have superhuman strengths and superhuman purposes. Stallone/Rocky no longer plays the aspiring Sigfried. He is no Wotan himself entering the Valhalla of mass popularity...
...brash, confident Wotan of Das Rheingold and Die Walkure, the splendid American bass James Morris served notice that he will be a Teutonic god of vocal power and majesty for years to come. Proud, haughty and resolutely amoral, Morris dominated the drama as he must to give depth to the tragedy that is, ultimately, Wotan's doing. Equally impressive was the Hungarian-born soprano Eva Marton, a legitimate contender for the mantle of Birgit Nilsson with impassioned performances of Brunnhilde in Siegfried and Gotterdammerung. Awakened by Siegfried on the Valkyrie rock, Marton sang Brunnhilde's Heil dir, Sonne greeting...
DIED. George London, 64, commanding bass-baritone with a rich, dark-hued voice and the dramatic presence to convey the menace of Scarpia in La Tosca, the majesty of Wotan in The Ring and the elegance of Count Almaviva in The Marriage of Figaro; after a long illness; in Armonk, N.Y. He found success quickly, with critically praised debuts at Europe's leading opera houses and New York City's Metropolitan. In 1960 he became the first American to sing Boris Godunov at Moscow's Bolshoi Theater. In 1967 a paralyzed vocal cord cut short his career; he turned...
...strong, consistent guidance if a production is not to degenerate into a series of pretty stage pictures. Characters must be sharply focused, their complex relationships made clear. They cannot be allowed to wander aimlessly across the stage, as Hall lets them do in Rheingold, or strike arbitrary, stylized postures: Wotan singing to Brünnhilde while lying flat on his back in Die Walküre, for example...
Some of the singing, too, came in for heavy criticism. Bass-Baritone Siegmund Nimsgern has a rich resonant voice but brought little sense of Wotan's majestic agony to his portrayal. After Das Rheingold and Die Walküre, he canceled his appearance in Siegfried and was replaced by a weak Bent Norup. Poor Manfred Jung, the substitute Siegfried, is physically unprepossessing and vocally inadequate to this most heroic of heldentenor roles, which demands both strength and stamina. Although he gave it a game effort, especially in Götterdammerung, Jung put one in mind of Scholar-Critic Ernest...