Metropolitan Opera Archives

Tannhäuser received eight performances this season.
Traubel's costumes were designed by Adrian.

Review 1:

Review of Mark Schubart in The New York Times

Miss Lawrence's Touch of Venus

Despite two last-minute cast changes and a new conductor for the opera, the season's first performance of Wagner's "Tannhäuser" at the Metropolitan Saturday evening showed little improvement - or deterioration from last season.

Paul Breisach, conducting his first Met "Tannhäuser," brought little that was new or exciting to the job, managing only intermittently to whip the company into anything like a spirited interpretation. The second and third act choruses were well sung, but the orchestra responded only half-heartedly to Mr. Breisach's entreaties. The two replacements - Marita Farell for Maxine Stellman as the shepherd, and Herbert Janssen for Julius Huehn as Wolfram - acquitted themselves with honor.

In the leads Helen Traubel and Lauritz Melchior, that sturdy combination, carried the performance mostly on their shoulders. Miss Traubel's voice, after a shaky start, sounded as beautiful as I've ever heard it, though it lacked variety of dramatic expression. For sheer beauty of sound, and ease of production, however, it is unsurpassed.

The role of Venus was once more again sung by Marjorie Lawrence and was the high spot of the evening. At the end of Act I, Venus's dais was wheeled out onto the Thuringian forest so that Miss Lawrence who is still incapacitated from her illness, could acknowledge the applause. She looked radiant, though the ballet's version of the Bacchanal did its utmost to spoil the impression. May we suggest some new choreography, or maybe a rehearsal or two?

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