Metropolitan Opera Archives

"Parsifal,"' the only opera whose protagonists go to their dressing rooms at the end of its performance without the customary clatter of applause ringing in their ears, was given by the Metropolitan Opera last Tuesday with a cast that had Gertrude Kappel as Kundry, Lauritz Melchior as the "guileless fool," Friedrich Schorr as the afflicted Amfortas, Ludwig Hofmann as Gurnemanz, Gustav Schuetzendorf as Klingsor and Editha Fleischer as one of the flower maidens.

As in previous presentations, the reverential spirit prevailed. Some of the music of Wagner's consecrational play and the scene depicting the assembly of the knights about the Holy Grail combine to cast a religious spell over the auditors of "Parsital." Either this reason or the management's exhortation not to applaud after the first and last acts prompted quite a few "Parsifalites" to discourage with vigorous "sh-sh's" the scattered applause that feebly followed the mentioned acts.

Of the leading figures in the drama, Mme. Kappel's Kundry was the most arresting despite the difficulty she had in summoning voice to give proper expression in the duet with Parsifal in the first scene of the second act. Melchior's embodiment of the Fool was sung and acted with no apparent excellence in either voice or histrionics. Schorr's Amfortas, while convincing dramatically, suffered through the poverty of the voice with which the baritone endowed his rôle. The good points of Hofmann's Gurnemanz confined themselves to effective make-up and acting, but the voice was dry and throaty.

If Klingsor must emit awkward and unmusical sounds, then Schutzendorf is an able magician; but it would be interesting to hear a Klingsor who can sing. Mr. Bodanzky conducted without rising to unusual artistic heights.

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