With this Ring ...

Last night, those words from a traditional wedding ceremony took on new meaning as Toronto’s ongoing love affair with opera was consummated, not only with a glorious new opera hall, but with the first installment of our country’s first-ever completely homegrown production of Richard Wagner’s Der Ring Des Nibelungen (more commonly known as the Ring cycle.)

Clocking in at a mere two and a half hours of the cycle’s 16-hour length, Chapter One, titled Das Rheingold, could easily be dismissed as little more than mere appetizer.

But a combination of the excitement of the new Four Seasons Centre For The Performing Arts and an almost cliched bit of casting drama — an ailing Pavlo Hunka was replaced at the last moment by baritone John Fanning in the pivotal role of Wotan — conspired to have an almost capacity audience all aflutter with anticipation nonetheless.

An international line-up of critics — the New York Times, the Washington Post, the London Spectator, the London Times Literary Supplement, Germany’s Das Opernglas and Australia’s Opera Opera, bolstered by members of the Music Critics Association of North America, currently meeting in Toronto — as well as celebrity opera lovers the likes of former Governor General Adrienne Clarkson, author Margaret Atwood, proud-as-punch architect Jack Diamond and theatre impresario David Mirvish also added to the sense of occasion.

And as the curtain rose on the premiere of this first installment, directed and designed by Michael Levine and conducted by the COC’s Richard Bradshaw, there was little to disappoint.

While Fanning fell short of the definitive Wotan in this telling of the story of the forging of a magical ring, he embarrassed neither himself, nor the production, claiming the stage with a confidence and a vocal aplomb that only flagged near the end of the show.

Happily, he was not asked to carry the show alone — and Das Rheingold boasts stand-out performances from other quarters.

Baritone Richard Paul Fink was memorably entertaining as the thieving dwarf Alberich, as was tenor Richard Berkeley-Steele as the mercurial Loge, demigod of fire, while basses Phillip Ens and Robert Pomakov did giants Fasolt and Fafner proud.

And while mezzo Judit Nemeth and soprano Julie Makerov impressed as Fricka and Freia respectively, it was in the performance of contralto Mette Ejsing, cast as Erda, that the distaff truly shone.

More renowned for his impressive design skills, Levine proves no mean hand in the directing department, keeping a strong focus on the story and underscoring the power of performance with the elements of design.

Then there is the hall itself, ringing like a bell in anticipation of the Wagnerian wonders yet to come as the magnificent COC Orchestra, swollen to over 100 musicians for the occasion and confident under Bradshaw’s baton, seemed to carry the entire cast aloft on the wings of Wagner’s glorious music.

With this Ring, one suspects, the excitement is just beginning.

The Ring cycle continues tonight with Die Walkure, Friday with Siegfried and Sunday with Gotterdammerung and then repeats twice over the next two weeks.
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