Franz Welser-Möst begins his Ring farewell with a rousing Rheingold at the Staatsoper

Richard Wagner may have voiced a paradox when he described himself as a composer “who wrote music which is better than it sounds.” But a rousing revival of Das Rheingold at the Wiener Staatsoper may have come as close as possible to proving him right. Franz Welser-Möst’s powerful rendering of the score and his masterful guidance of the voices on stage whets the appetite for the rest of the Ring Cycle under his baton. It is the start of a fitting swan song to his decades of performing the trilogy and its Vorabend that has made him one of The Ring's leading interpreters.

While shorter than any of the operas of the Ring Cycle that it sets up, Das Rheingold has plenty of music – about two and a half hours without interruption, including the scene-changing interludes. Welser-Möst mentioned his age (63) in his recent decision to make this Ring his last, and some may have expected him to kick back some after so many performances. But his interpretation shone as brightly as the gold of the Nibelungs. The Wiener Staatsopernorchester was as nimble as Loge, as sinister as Alberich, as majestic as Wotan and as positively ponderous as Fasolt and Fafner. Welser-Möst did honors to each bar of Wagner's rich and complex score, from the primordial E flat as the curtain rose on the Rhinemaidens in the depths of their river to the final chords of the stately Valhalla motif as the gods stake their claim to their new home.

Eric Owens was announced as somewhat indisposed because of the current heatwave in Vienna. There was no sign of it. As Wotan, the bass-baritone was godly in appearance and voice, his deepest notes resonant, his outbursts passionate, his chagrin convincing on realizing that, in trying to resist fate, even a chief god has his limits. 

Michael Nagy’s singing was as malice-laden as his stage presence as Alberich, the evil Nibelung dwarf who shapes the ring to rule the world only to be robbed of it by Wotan and Loge, the demi-god of fire. Even real giants could not have sung and acted the roles of the lumbering Fasolt and Fafner more convincingly than Ilja Kazakov and Ain Anger, both in costumes resembling the Marvel Comic character The Thing. Tanja Ariane Baumgartner had the mien and mezzo of the ideal Fricka, Wotan’s nagging wife who tries to keep her philandering husband by the fireside. 

With her mastery of high notes, Regine Hangler was a perfectly panicked Freia, the goddess fearing her handover to the giants in exchange for them building Valhalla. Good to very good in ascending order: Daniel Lenz (Froh), Martin Häßler (Donner), Daria Sushkova, Alma Neuhaus and Ileana Tonca (Rhinemaidens), Noa Beinart (Erda), and Matthäus Schmidlechner (Mime).

Special mention goes to Michael Laurenz, an exceptional Loge, who serves Wotan while despising him and the other goods as fools. Red-maned and eel-slippery, Laurenz was as vocally and physically limber as the serpent Alberich turns himself into to demonstrate the ring’s power. He was nowhere and everywhere, as unpredictable as a flickering tongue of flame rising in one instant to disappear in the next, only to pop up somewhere else.

Sven-Erich Bechtolf's staging is restrained, working mostly with light and backdrops; a swirling green background for the Rhine, red for Alberich’s underground lair, blue in the gods’ abode, and a rainbow as Wotan prepares to take ownership of Valhalla. Marianne Glittenberg's costuming is nondescript except for the giants and Alberich, who is ratty, as befits his malicious character, with long unkempt hair and his upper body naked. Undulating fabric mimic waves as the Rhinemaidens mock the love-crazed Alberich, unaware that their rejection of his advances will lead him to foreswear all love and steal their gold, setting into motion the events that will lead to Götterdämmerung, the Twilight of the Gods. 

Gold mined by Alberich’s slaves turns up on stage, smelted into heads and human limbs in the only real visual surprise. Bechtolf's lack of imagination may have harmed previous outings, but this evening’s inspiring musical and vocal performances limited the pain of the absent directorial creativity.