Mark Elder and the Hallé came pretty near, at the weekend, to Wagner’s ideal of “invisible theatre”: a theatre of the mind in which the imagination could expand beyond the physical limitations of any staging. In their first concert performance of a complete Wagner opera, they achieved, over two evenings, what will surely go down in history as one of the Hallé’s finest hours — indeed, six of them.

This is, after all, the orchestra that played Siegfried’s Funeral March only a year after the first performance in Bayreuth. And, under Bayreuth’s and the Hallé’s own Hans Richter, a tradition of Manchester Wagner evenings was soon well established.

This, though, was something else besides. Elder has taken a long, long road of his own towards Wagner, and a lifetime of operatic experience is now close-focused in his orchestral work at the Hallé. As soon as the Prologue began, with its fine weave of texture and motif, we knew we were in safe hands.

But they were far more than safe. A springing energy set Siegfried on his way, just as a dark, pulsating power, outstandingly paced and balanced, would accompany him on his final journey. Pacing and tempos were everywhere as purposeful and instinctive as the flow of the Rhine itself — and silence was as potent as sound.

Elder’s Brünnhilde was the Swedish soprano Katarina Dalayman, and her darkly dignified and broodingly inward way with the role was the perfect partner for the aching sadness that Elder drew from the score. Her presence conveyed an elusive fusion of vulnerability and wisdom that was deeply moving in her scene with Susan Bickley’s outstanding Waltraute, and which reached its apotheosis in her magnificent Immolation Scene.

Her Siegfried was her compatriot, Lars Cleveman, replacing Ben Heppner, and singing with a focus and rhythmic clarity that more than compensated for an occasional lack of expansive ease. Attila Jun’s Hagen was transfixing in its depths of inscrutable menace, and Andrew Shore’s Alberich compelling in every brief moment.

Peter Coleman-Wright and Nancy Gustafson were a dapper and carefully detailed Gunther and Gutrune, and pleasingly cast Norns and Rhinemaidens framed two very special evenings.

Broadcast on Radio 3, June 8-9

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