OPERA NEWS, November, 1992
ST. LOUIS
The big news of Opera Theatre of Saint Louis' 1992 season was the installation of a false "brick" (really fiberglass) wall with entrances across the back of the LorettoHilton Theater. This permanent set was constructed so as to simplify stage design (see "Space Age," June 1992), and its look of an abandoned warehouse served well for three of the four operas, allowing room for imaginative stage design while imposing a strong visual concept.
The season's novelty, Judith Weir's The Vanishing Bridegroom, a collection of three short Scottish Gaelic nineteenth-century tales, was the only opera to obliterate the back wall with designs. Weir's music is hauntingly effective, always dramatically responsive to the story yet inventive in an eclectic, chameleonic way. Francesca Zambello's direction was similarly inventive, full of simple stage magic. Some story aspects were not highlighted enough, but the evening, aided by Alison Chitty's understated yet potent designs, seemed shorter than its ninety minutes. Of the singers, John Brandstetter as the Husband, Julia Parks as the Daughter and Andrew Wentzel as the Stranger (actually the Devil) stood out. Conductor Scott Bergeson kept the opera moving.
Director Colin Graham reset Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream in Central Park, hardly a noticeable change, for the upside-down trees could have come from anywhere. The mafiosi who infested the last scene were similarly innocuous. Britten's Shakespeare essay has marvelous music that never seems to jell. Robert Spano conducted with attention to atmosphere, bringing out much of the moonlight in the score. The Phoenix Boys Choir sang with verve, and Derek Lee Ragin (Oberon), Elizabeth Futral (Tytania) and Thomas Barrett (Bottom) led a well-matched cast.
The other two operas, both performed in English, were Madama Butterfly and Rossini's Il Turco in Italia. The Puccini was staged simply and straightforwardly by Graham, with genuine sentiment. Chinese soprano Guiping Deng made a touching, understated Cio-Cio-San, Rick Moon a loud Pinkerton. Music director Stephen Lord conducted. Ken Cazan's busy Turco, in John Conklin's lavish, similarly busy designs, had singing of a high order, especially Erie Mills' Fiorilla -- her voice pert and fresh -- and David Evitts as the Turk. Kenneth Kiesler conducted. P.J.S.
CHICAGO
Richard Pearlman's finely detailed staging of Menotti's The Medium brought Chicago Opera Theater's 1992 season to a close, on a double bill with Argento's A Water Bird Talk (June 12). Singing the title role for the first time, Mignon Dunn commanded the stage. Her cynical, cruel, finally pathetic Mme. Flora was a memorable character study, whether preying on her gullible clients (well sung by Robert Orth, Diane Ragains and Claudia Kerski-Nienow) or falling apart when the spirit world turned frighteningly real. She wielded a still-malleable mezzo, and her Norma Desmond-like smile of crazed triumph at the end added a chilling touch. Patrice Michaels Bedi, with her sweet, light soprano, convincingly caught the hesitant attraction between the adolescent Monica and the mute Toby, played by a miscast John Schroeder -- too tall, pretty and guileless to leave room for crucial dramatic ambiguity.
A Water Bird Talk, Argento's free adaptation of a Chekhov play, made an ideal companion piece. Orth, wearing a pince-nez, muttonchop whiskers and frock coat, moved from lectern to piano as a henpecked professor delivering a slide lecture on water fowl to members of a provincial club. The little opera gave Orth, a superb singing actor with a firm, clearly projected baritone, a genuine tour de force. Kurt Klippstatter conducted with vigor and authority. The dramatically functional designs were credited to John King, Jr. (sets), Frances Mattio (costumes) and Ken Bowen (lighting).
Le Comte Ory proved bright and buoyant, even if the COT cast often fell short of the score's virtuosic demands (in English, Feb. 29). Director David Gately choreographed the action adroitly, tossing in hints of slapstick but not excessively so. Designer Jeff Bauer provided the oversize storybook cutout sets, and Pier Giorgio Calabria drew appreciative playing from a reduced orchestra. As the lecherous Count, whose incognito assaults on the virtue of the Countess of Formoutiers came to naught, Mark Calking negotiated the high tessitura without flinching. Connie Dykstra's Countess Adèle revealed nice agility and spin at the top of her range, but her soprano suffered from pitch problems and a worrisome beat. Lesley Goodman, Karen Brunssen, Kurt Link and Carl Glaum had their virtues in supporting assignments. JOHN VON RHEIN
TORONTO
For its first full-length, main-stage new opera in almost two decades, Canadian Opera Company chose Mario and the Magician (May 19 in the Elgin Theatre), composed by Harry Somers to a libretto by Rod Anderson -- an adaptation, like Britten's Death in Venice, from a Thomas Mann novella about an unnerving Italian holiday. But whereas the hidden disease in Venice was cholera, the submerged ailment in Mario, set in Torre di Venere in 1928, is fascism. Cippola the magician is presented as a surrogate for Musolini, hypnotizing his vaudeville victims into yielding their free will. The three-hour opera, faithful in virtually every detail to the Mann, nevertheless lacked, in theatrical terms, a dramatic pulse. The work was awkwardly structured. A series of loose, overextended episodes made up the first part, anticipating the magician's arrival; the vaudeville act itself was the longer second part, but its repetition of effects, with one person after another hypnotized and humiliated, became tedious. The opera usefully could lose almost an hour.
Somers' music proved distinctive in its pungent scoring, vivid choral and ensemble writing -- there are thirty-six named roles -- but the central Cippola section, which needs to be the most extraordinary, had the least effective music. As the magician, David Rampy, singing almost uninterrupted for over an hour, demonstrated remarkable diction and stamina, but his tenor was unattractive, his performance labored. A few singers eloquently seized lyric opportunities -- Theodore Baerg as the narrator, Heather Thomson as a landlady infatuated with Duse, Anne McWatt as a hypnotized tourist, Benoit Boutet as Mario, the victimized waiter.
The premiere, misguidedly directed by Robert Carsen, with sets and costumes by Michael Levine and lighting by Robert Thomson, was executed brilliantly. Amid oppressive bleakness, there was no suggestion of Italian light or atmosphere as a contrast to the lurking fascism -- a given, with black-garbed automatons slowly moving their chairs, like the guests in Tommy Tune's Grand Hotel. This overstudied, overcontrolled approach left the experience claustrophobic, airless, with nothing to discover. Richard Bradshaw led a consummately prepared and committed performance. URJO KAREDA
PHILADELPHIA
Anthony Davis has become one of our more frequently produced opera composers, with three works already, the first of which, X, will be issued shortly on disc. His third opera, Tania, given its premiere June 17 by the American Music Theater Festival at the Plays & Players Theater in Philadelphia, is an expressionistic look at the Patty Hearst kidnaping in 1974 by the Symbionese Liberation Army.
Essentially, the one-act, ninety-minute work is an extended ABA aria, beginning with Patty and her husband in bed, watching television and eating crackers, and ending much the same way but with a realization of horror. Michael John LaChiusa's somewhat muddled libretto contains the piquant idea that the supposedly revolutionary terrorist group was itself the prisoner of society, as superficially empty as the meaningless middle-class lives they were combatting. An amalgam of styles, ordered into numbers, Davis' music is more engaging and closer to the quick of operatic life than his previous Under the Double Moon. His increasing comfort with the lyric form has resulted in greater expressiveness.
Christopher Alden's staging emphasized the violence and sexuality of the events, but he handled the fantasy portions (involving Betty Ford, Che Guevara and Fidel Castro) with a deftness that made them an integral part of the story. He was aided by Paul Steinberg's brilliant set, patterned after a famous cracker design and rendered abstract. Use of television monitors and the ubiquitous broadcast reporter gave the proceedings a keyhole voyeurism that lent added immediacy.
Cynthia Aaronson performed the difficult role of Patty/Tania with aplomb, but neither her voice nor her acting was commanding enough to merit the central position of the character. Mark Doss made a strong Cinque, leader of the S.L.A.; William McGlaughlin conducted an ensemble of ten. P.J.S.
ROANOKE
When Craig Fields accepted the assignment to stage Opera Roanoke's Don Giovanni, he (with set designer John Sailer and costume designer Necia Evans) decided the basic concept should be that of a chess game. Luckily, the steeply tiered auditorium of Mill Mountain Theatre allowed all the audience to view the game board clearly. According to the director, the board provided "a metaphoric backdrop to the opera" in this "attempt to intensify the thematic conflicts within the drama." It did not work, and the intermittent use of five dancers failed to score its point.
The May 21 performance had its share of problems. Carol Meyers was forced by allergies to sing only Zerlina's recitatives, while Marianne Sandborg performed the arias and ensemble numbers with style and vocal agility. As Masetto, Perry Nelson did remarkably well, despite a rib injury sustained at the hands of Jeffrey Ambrosini's Don the previous evening. After an uneasy start, Gary Harger warmed up as Ottavio. Carol Welker performed with cool correctness but lacked the proper vocal weight for Anna, while Anna Singer's Elvira emerged strong and convincing. Though he made a vocally fluent Don, Ambrosini's dramatic portrayal seemed feeble. Wayne Kompelien's impressive Commendatore evoked an unreal feeling.
Fields' staging brought out the best in Da Ponte's libretto. In "Batti, batti" and "Là ci darem," one saw what he did and how he got his singers dramatically involved, though why he had Leporello (Rod Nelman) come downstage in "Madamina" and throw his lines at the audience was not clear. And since a total blackout was not possible, it would have been better for the Commendatore's body to be carried offstage in Act I rather than have him get up and walk off. Though Victoria Bond chose tempos slower than usual, her springing rhythm never let the music sag. Her violins were scraggy. SORAB MODI
AUSTIN
Austin Lyric Opera's performances of Rossini's sparkling La Pietra del Paragone seem to have been the first ever mounted by a U.S. opera company. It was a pity that a first production's base was a corrupt, early 1960s adaptation by Günther Rennert, translated from Italian into German and back into Italian, then into English, with names changed and material switched around or omitted. Even so, it made for an enjoyable evening (April 4) at the Paramount Theatre.
If not much Rossini style was exhibited, casting was at least adequate, headed by the able mezzo of Melanie Sonnenberg as Clarice, the personable tenorino of Paul Austin Kelly as Giocondo. Blonde, hourglass-figured soprano Kathryn Gamberoni sang Fulvia, with bass Ryan Allen as the nimble valet Fabrizio, Eric Allen Hanson as Count Asdrubal, Nickolas Karousatos as Macrobio, David Maze as Pacuvio and Lester Senter as Aspasia. Though Walter Ducloux' orchestra sounded scrappy, Morris Beachy's chorus sang lustily and acted with animation. Michelle Ney's Edwardian costuming and Richard Isackes' fresh, bright sets might well be investigated by some other company willing to put more trust in Rossini, his Da Ponte-like librettist Luigi Romanelli and thirty years of Rossini scholarship. JOHN BRIGGS
DENVER
Nathaniel Merrill, whose staging of Die Meistersinger, with its massive set evoking medieval Germany, has been a mainstay at the Met (to be replaced in 199293), had to deal with trying to better himself, as he tackled the opera again, this time for Opera Colorado (opened May 1) at Denver's in-the-round Boettcher Concert Hall.
Merrill's solution turned on two factors. First was a bigger-than-the-Met approach, with at one point 250 singers, dancers and supers onstage (the chorus alone had 140 members), plus the entire Colorado Symphony as accompaniment. The second came with judicious casting, the most notable element of which was Stephen West. Following a stint as Hans Sachs with Seattle Opera, the bass has reclaimed a lyric technique with less forcing and more legato. Soprano Ashley Putnam sang her first-ever Eva as a bright, ardent lass. Julian Patrick has made Beckmesser his own in fussy mannerisms that define the rule-ridden man. Against this iron-lawed personage, even the nobility of Walther (tenor Richard Brunner) must quail. The latter proved the weakest link in the casting chain -- a wooden actor, though his account of the "Morgenlied" proved vocally pleasing. The secondary love story of David (Curt Peterson) and Magdalene (Julie Simson) emerged lively and touching, the tenor in particular suggesting that this is a role superbly adapted to his voice. Merrill moved his crowd scenes with block choreography; his principals, however, were better, more lovingly treated. Alexander Sander conducted with few dull spots, so that the long evening passed quickly. GLENN GIFFIN
LOS ANGELES
When properties and platforms are mismatched, as was the case with Music Center Opera's Albert Herring, playing in the 3,200-seat Chandler Pavilion, good intentions count for little. No matter that director Stephen Lawless (supervising Peter Hall's Glyndebourne production) bothered with such subtleties as the various class accents among Loxford's townspeople; the effect could have only minor impact.
The charms of Britten's opera were irrepressible, however, thanks to conductor Roderick Brydon, who deftly delineated the score's languor and wistfulness, and to the cast, which held to a noble standard. In the title role, Greg Fedderly gave an edgy, almost hard-hearted slant to the May Day King (April 15). His robust tenor complemented this unsmiling portrait, which somehow lacked requisite innocence, but the rest of the ensemble hewed to type. As Lady Billows, Lorna Haywood strained her vocal resources, less so Delia Wallis as Florence Pike, with the freshest, most agile tone belonging to Elizabeth Gale as Miss Wordsworth. Other distinguished performances came from Marvellee Cariaga, John Atkins, Paula Rasmussen and Michael Gallup. DONNA PERLMUTTER
CARMEL, CA
Bruno Weil, new, young, German-born conductor of the annual Bach Festival, awakened this sleepy seaside town with an electrifying slate of concerts devoted to Bach, Haydn (The Creation) and Handel. The latter's Chandos masque Acis and Galatea, in its original 1718 version, was this year's staged opera (July 18).
Director Albert Takazauckas seconded Weil's light, airy, speedy concept with a fey, busy picture of pastoral life in the mythic Mediterranean. Dawn Swiderski designed a charming classical set for the tiny Sunset Center stage, but Melissa Lofton's costumes were not cut to flatter the figures of ordinary mortals. Bruce Lamott's chorus and the principals entered enthusiastically into Takazauckas' scheme, but the results were rather like a clumsy high school pageant.
Excellent, alert playing from the small orchestra (eight strings, five winds and continuo), however, plus Weil's infectious energy and lift, kept the ninety-minute piece humming along. David Gordon was made up to look like a drag queen (why?) but sang Acis' music with elegant tone and genuine feeling. Maria Venuti's Galatea had the right style and musicianship, but her lemony tone seemed at odds with the innocent, radiant role she was assigned. The finest vocal performances came from tenor Douglas Johnson, who sang the two-faced shepherd Damon with wit and grace, and from bass Daniel Lichti, whose Polyphemus was both frightening and vulnerable. He negotiated the score's famous "O ruddier than the cherry" with hilarious effect. STEPHANIE VON BUCHAU
PORTLAND, OR
Beni Montresor's cartoon-background sets established the standard for Portland Opera's La Fille du Régiment (May 3), and under the comic touch of director Leon Major, Donizetti's feather-light opéra comique sprang happily to life. Major's handling of the soldiers of the "glorious Twenty-first" allotted each man two left feet, and one hoped none would ever be allowed near loaded weapons. Ruth Welting, an innocent tomboy Marie who would as soon clap her teddy-bear lover on the back as embrace him, sang her music with clarity and warmth. PO regular Marcello Giordani did his best work here, his tenor secure and soaring, his Tonio open-faced and engagingly simple. Lanky Claude Corbeil avoided buffo tricks as Sulpice to show genuine fatherly concern in a role that suited his lyric bass; his French was elegant. Others in the ensemble included Rita De Carlo as the Marquise and Ellen Faull as the Duchess of Krakentorp. Much of the success of this production may be credited to conductor Louis Salemno, who held the sparkle of Donizetti's score down to a level that allowed the singers to dominate. FRANK KINKAID
KANSAS CITY, MO
It is appropriate that Lyric Opera of Kansas City chose Siegfried as the second installment of its Ring cycle. The forging of a new sword from the fragments of an old one parallels the recent restoration of the Lyric Building. Closed since 1990 for repairs, the theater's fan shape, 1,600 seats and enlarged pit provide audiences with a spacious yet intimate ambience.
Artistic director Russell Patterson eliminated nearly forty minutes of music, including some of Erda's scene in Act III. He used Andrew Porter's translation. Designer R. Keith Brumley continued his romantic realism of writhing tree forms and spiky rock formations, rather like J. R. R. Tolkien's concept of Middle Earth. Martin Ross' lighting wizardry came into its own in Act III with a succession of vibrant hues.
Edward Sooter sang three of four Siegfrieds, with David Bankston making his Lyric debut in the remaining performance. Despite too many tableaux with uplifted sword (perhaps director Vincent Liotta was to blame), Bankston brought youthful freshness to the role, his smallish tenor smooth and in tune, never barking or forced. The humor with which he saluted the forest birds on his homemade flute was imaginatively conceived, his riffs turning him into a jazzy sort of woodland Pied Piper. John Daniecki's Mime was notable for clear diction and compelling interpretation. As Brünnhilde, Mary Shearer's supple, crystalline soprano seemed hampered by inconsistent projection in the lower ranges. Other cast members included Eugenie Grunewald as Erda, John Davies as Fafner, David Small as Alberich and Eugene Green as the Wanderer. Orchestral support under Patterson was solid. JOHN C. TIBBETTS
LENOX, MA
Britten's The Rape of Lucretia was Berkshire Opera's second offering in August. As the sensuous, serpentine Male Chorus, tenor Carl Halvorson stood out in vocal expression; his enunciation carried the mannered language to the rear of Cranwell Opera House's 450-seat hall. As the Female Chorus, soprano Joanna Johnston sang accurately, but her approach seemed detached. Leading Albany's plucky St. Cecilia Chamber Orchestra, Joel Revzen, the company's new artistic director, was alert to the knotty, lyrical score's protection of the text, keeping the orchestra down while pointing up its colorful solos.
Red-headed Jane Gilbert as Lucretia, stunning on her red-satin bed, displayed a magnificent low register and a compelling upper one. Her quality and articulation suited this role, especially when the orchestra dropped away at her crucial lines.
Mary Duncan's direction pulled the listener into the story's suspense and sadness. Billowing parachute cloths with ropes (designed by George Allison) became tarps, bedcovers, portals, the Tiber. At the opening, the Choruses, on a platform above the stage, hauled the drapes from the floor to the rear of the stage, where the rape took place in silhouette. Later, Halvorson casually flicked away the cloths to reveal a scene change.
The women were clear and subtle. Saying goodnight to the unwelcome Tarquinius, Gilbert, mezzo Nan Hughes as her nurse and soprano Karen Emerson as her little servant conveyed their characters in three distinct styles and timbres. The only miscast role was boyish, good-natured baritone Mark Delavan as Tarquinius. Only when mimed by Halvorson did his lust for Lucretia become urgent and seamy. James Demier's Junius gave more point to his malevolent jealousy, and Thomas Barrett made a serviceable Collatinus. LESLIE KANDELL
ALDEBURGH
John Tavener's music is not well known outside Great Britain, and his Mary of Egypt, commissioned and given its world premiere by the Aldeburgh Festival, afforded many visitors the opportunity for a first hearing. Tavener's sinuous, repetitious vocal lines, freely sketched in a fluid tonal/modal framework, are supported by extended pedal points and drones. He punctuates dramatic peaks with loud instrumental outbursts in vigorous rhythms. Mary of Egypt treats the ancient mystical story of an early Christian harlot/saint and her several encounters with the holy man Zossima. Each is profoundly affected by the other; Mary turns from her dissolute life and, through years of denial and meditation in the Egyptian desert, attains redemption. Seeing her conversion and sacrifice, Zossima gains needed humility and a heightened awareness of the love of God. The librettist, a Russian Orthodox abbess, Mother Thekla, has shaped the work in a purposefully ambiguous manner, telling the story in an austere, contemplative way, striving to draw a moving icon rather than create an opera.
Aldeburgh's physical production did much to support her aim: designer Jeremy Herbert's set consisted of a large, hovering pyramid, whose surfaces could move and swing open, providing an interesting variety of aspects, their effect neatly heightened by the subtle lighting design of David Lovett. The bare Maltings stage floor represented the Egyptian sands, and with the aid of a few simple props, the story was limned in a clear, uncluttered way. As Tavener's musical style is reminiscent of Philip Glass, so stage director Lucy Bailey's approach reminded one of Robert Wilson, Glass' frequent collaborator. Mimes -- yellow-robed priests -- representing extensions of the major protagonists, their stylized actions, ranging from intrusive to inspired, contributed useful movement to the potentially static stage picture. There was a surfeit of symbolism in both blocking and design (cubes, pyramids, circles, a black woman dressed in white, a white man dressed in black) and an abundance of ambiguity to ponder.
Three soloists carried the vocal burden. On June 24, soprano Patricia Rozario sang Mary, richly fulfilling all the role's demands for vocal flexibility and dramatic intensity. Baritone Stephen Varcoe brought clear lyric tone and wide range to Zossima, while Chloe Goodchild served as narrator, with a technique that alternated Western vocal production with the exotically heightened overtones of Mongolian-style hoomi singing. (It is unclear, given the exquisite acoustics of the hall, why she was electronically amplified.) The contributions of a chorus seated at the sides of the stage consisted of drones and commentary. Conductor Lionel Friend controlled his forces admirably. JOHN KOOPMAN
BIRMINGHAM, ENGLAND
The concentrated strength of Gluck's score dominated Welsh National Opera's Iphigénie en Tauride, seen at Birmingham Hippodrome on June 16. Secure, well-toned singing was matched by stylish, taut playing under Charles Mackerras. Tragic intensity pervaded, but the musical shape of this lyric masterpiece was maintained.
Co-directors Patrice Caurier and Moshe Leiser opted for simplicity and timelessness. The setting was no more than two irregularly shaped flats, moved against each other to punctuate the drama, and the costumes had a drab, vaguely contemporary quality. Acting verged incongruously on the melodramatic, with agonized stooping and diagramatic chorus gestures too much in evidence, though the denouement had an overwhelming reality. The happy ending was muted, suggesting further horrors to come in the House of Atreus.
In the title role, Diana Montague characterized with deep conviction, using her vibrant mezzo with ringing authority to convey both her early forebodings about having to sacrifice Oreste and her later harrowing preparation for the deed. Simon Keenlyside's well articulated Oreste, hapless but dignified, was also a major portrayal. Firm supporting performances included Peter Bronder's noble, warmly sung Pylade, Peter Sidhom's worried, brutal Thoas and Alwyn Mellor's lofty Diane. The French text made for communication difficulties in this unfamiliar opera, as enunciation was not crisp. MAURICE DUNMORE
BRUSSELS
Théâtre de la Monnaie's attempt at Berlioz' Les Troyens (June 22) projected a musical assurance that one wished might have extended to the histrionics. Sylvain Cambreling's conducting demonstrated love for the work, performed uncut: the music flowed seamlessly from start to finish, with well-chosen tempos. Leading ladies Françoise Pollet (Cassandre) and Kathryn Harries (Didon) made the most of every opportunity offered by the music while never stepping out of character. Pollet's extraordinary diction matched her expressive timbre. Harries responded to her role's many demands, and vocal problems (unmatched registers, strained top) became irrelevant. Ronald Hamilton's Énée did not achieve the same level, occasionally ringing out heroically but often swallowed back to inaudibility. William Stone hit his mark as Chorèbe, and lesser cast members made positive contributions. One could quibble about the omission of the voices from the Nubian dance, but since the ballets were choreographically ignored, the singers may not have been part of director Peter Mussbach's "vision" either. Lucio Fanti's framed set design made the small Monnaie stage even more constricted. JOEL KASOW
SCHWETZINGEN
Opera has never had it so good at this small-scale festival as in 1992, when Rossini received major attention. His L'Occasione Fa il Ladro was paired with Sergio Rendine's Un Segreto d'Importanza, oder der Barbier von Salzburg. The first emerged as another coproduction with Cologne, directed by Michael Hampe, with Gianluigi Gelmetti conducting the Stuttgart Radio Symphony. Natale de Carolis as Don Parmenione easily dwarfed the other cast members (Stuart Kale as Don Eusebio, Susan Patterson as Berenice, Robert Gambill as Conte Alberto, Monica Bacelli as Ernestina and Alessandro Corbelli as Martino).
More amusing was the Rendine, a farce whose point of departure is that Mozart did not die in 1791 but fled from his creditors to Italy, where he ghost-wrote Rossini's operas. Biographical and musical quotations, plus some topical references through a group of tourists visiting Rossini memorials, abound in Un Segreto. It even includes the messenger who ordered the Requiem from Mozart, as well as Isabella Colbran. Coproduced with Monte Carlo and Treviso, Un Segreto was directed wittily by Lorenza Codignola and designed by Francesco Calcagnini, with Gelmetti again at the helm of the Stuttgart Radio Symphony. Francesco Piccoli appeared as Mozart, José Fardilha as Rossini, with Sara Mingardo, Barbara Frittoli, Donato de Stefano and Giacomo Prestia in supporting roles.
Director-designer Pier Luigi Pizzi's taste and picturesque arrangements killed all dramatic fervor in the name of beauty in Tancredi. Its romantic nineteenth-century plushness looked as lovely as it sounded, though Gelmetti needed time to adjust to the seria ambitions of the score. Bernadette Manca di Nissa made an astonishingly accomplished Tancredi, Maria Bayo a highly attractive Amenaide. As Argirio, Raúl Giménez conquered fearlessly the mind-boggling obstacles of his tessitura, and Ildebrando d'Arcangelo proved not unsympathetic as Orbazzano.
Rag Time was advertised as an opera fantasy after Treemonisha by Scott Joplin, with a new libretto by Gerhard Müller and arrangements by Hartmut Behrsing, who also conducted the band of seven, plus Matthias Hessel as the ragtime pianist. Coproduced with a free East Berlin theater cooperative, Rag Time looked like some high school entertainment, in spite of its Brechtian staging and some social pepping up of the naive story, a sort of Aunt Tom's Cabin, in which the dominating role of the Stepmother was sung by Catherine Gayer. HORST KOEGLER
* As a signal of German artistic unity, Berlin's Komische Oper (composer, conductor, designer and two singers) joined forces with the Deutsche Oper (director and the remaining five singers) and the Stuttgart Radio Symphony (seventeen players) to produce the festival's world premiere, Siegfried Matthus' Desdemona and Her Sisters, on May 12. Matthus, his own librettist, continued his series of female portraits (Omphale, Judith) with a triple threat derived from Christine Brückner's novel Furious Speeches by Furious Women.
Megara, celebrated hetaira of ancient Athens, the Desdemona of Shakespearean fame and a modern Judith (Judy, in prison for murdering her lover) were sung with fulminating conviction by Karan Armstrong, Lucy Peacock and Yvonne Wiedstruck. Each rebels against the tyranny of men, represented by an anonymous, beer-swilling, sports-loving, rock-and-rolling male quartet (strikingly sung by Clemens Bieber, Uwe Peper, Peter Edelmann and Josef Becker), mouthing male-chauvinist quotes from the Old Testament.
Matthus calls his new ninety-minute work "Opera Monologues," but though all three women have longish solo scenas, during which they present their cases (Desdemona fights back with words, furiously rejecting Othello's evident assumption that she simply will let herself be strangled), they soon react to one another's situations as a trio. After Judy's violent outburst of hate at being father-dominated, followed by an ear-shattering percussion climax at "Nothing is going to change!," a tender Biblical verse praising female beauty is shaped into an exquisite seven-part madrigal of reconciliation.
The scoring is dominated by the sound of four clarinets, complex percussion effects for three players (piano, celesta and harp) and the all-pervading twang of electric bass guitar. Despite demanding writing, the music never degenerates into gray sound effects but supports each woman with colors peculiar to her character.
Designer Reinhardt Zimmermann followed suit by giving each woman red,
green or blue neon poles to identify her ambience against a mirror background
reflecting modern furnishing (Matthus had wanted each historical period).
Götz Friedrich's direction nevertheless characterized each fury individually.
Rolf Reuter's nervous conducting exposed the muscle in the score.
JAMES HELME SUTCLIFFE
BERLIN
On his return to the Staatsoper pit after intermission, conductor Wolfgang Rennert was greeted with boos, and in truth the twice-postponed L'Africaine (May 8), sung in an abominable translation, should have stayed in limbo. Designer Wilfried Werz provided his standard football-bleacher sets on a revolving stage (from the side it looked as though the Act III ship was half-sunk already) for all five acts, drawing it upstage only to make way for a graphic-arts manzanilla tree that looked like crow's feathers under a microscope.
Dry, unloving orchestral playing, designed to expose Meyerbeer as a terrible
orchestrator, withdrew all support from the singers. This made even Susan
Anthony (Inez) sound as if she had pitch problems, which Uta Priew (Selika)
actually did have. George Gray's stiff heldentenor Vasco da Gama lacked
any vocal seductiveness, and Jürgen Freier hectored violently as Nelusko,
the rest of the cast singing without any cantabile. From Ruth Berghaus'
Pelléas one knows that the Staats-oper ensemble can sing superb
French if it wants to. What a disgrace that the 200th birthday of the Berlin-born
composer should have been celebrated in this way.
JAMES HELME SUTCLIFFE
KIEV
Ensemble and tradition catalyzed Khovanshchina into an evening (May 28) of power and passion at Ukrainian National Opera's Taras Schevchenko Theater. The male chorus was worthy of every favorable cliché about the effect of massed Slavic male voices. In the West we have forgotten how effectively sets of flats, hangings and props can facilitate crowd movements and switch the mood quickly from glitter to gloom, as necessary in this episodic opera. The big coups du théâtre were there when needed, especially the fire that destroyed the Old Believers.
Kiev's soloists almost matched the chorus. Casting produced three basses
with voices like small cannon -- Ivan Bodkho (of the Odessa company) as
Ivan Khovansky, Ivan Ponomarenko as Shaklovity and especially Oleksandr
Zagrebelniy as the fanatical Dosifei -- and two fine tenors, in Volodimir
Fedotov as Andrei Khovansky and Oleksandr Dyanchenko as Golitsin. Tetyana
Kuzminova proved a mean Marfa with a knife, and her mezzo plumbed the depths
of this spooky character. Emma has little to do but look blond and sound
persecuted, and Oksana Yashenko did both just fine. Of the others, one must
single out Mikola Khorukhy, a fine character tenor, as the Scrivener. Director
Ivan Gamkalo moved his huge forces with skill and grace.
JOHN BRIGGS
LINZ
The Linz Landestheater production of Egon Wellesz' Die Bakchantinnen on May 3 (attended 6) was the first in Austria since the Viennese premiere sixty years ago. The immensely powerful work has a libretto by the composer that remains close to Euripedes but strengthens the position of Pentheus' mother, Agave, and makes the tragedy more personal. The chorus, central to the drama, sings some of Wellesz' best music.
Kurt Pint's two-tiered, semicircular set used rope constructions, a sort of drawbridge and a low central platform with understage lighting to distinguish the locations. The prevailing dark gray, including Pint's costumes, was varied only by the rainbow rags of the Bacchae. Alfred Stögmüller's direction appeared straightforward, but neither he nor choreographer Virgil Stanciu managed to raise the temperature with Bacchic frenzy. Pentheus was not torn apart but fell (in puppet form) to his death from the upper level, an adequate but tame solution.
John Hurst lent Pentheus stentorian tones -- true, he is arrogant and
usually angry, but variety of dynamics would have made the figure more sympathetic.
As his mother, Maria Russo did her best with a role requiring the most dramatic
of sopranos. Yu Chen muffled his massive baritone as Dionysus, while Klaus-Dieter
Lerche and William Mason covered the bass roles of Tiresias and Kadmos attractively.
The Linz pit hasn't room for all of Wellesz' orchestra, but the essential
instruments were covered, and Manfred Mayrhofer displayed fine command of
the score. The final word must be of praise for the sterling work of the
chorus.
CHRISTOPHER NORTON-WELSH
BOLOGNA
At the first night of the new La Cenerentola (May 28) at the Teatro Comunale, the performance was preceded by a minute's silence in memory of Giovanni Falcone, the anti-mafia judge assassinated a few days earlier. Rossini's dramma giocoso was not perhaps an ideal follow-up in such a moment of grief, yet its underlying themes of suffering and forgiveness, and the idea of penitence suggested by the heroine's name, made it less inappropriate than one might think. Cecilia Bartoli, however, making her debut in the title role, underplayed pathos in order to emphasize the character's youthful opportunism -- an interpretation in some ways reminiscent of Conchita Supervia's recordings, but without the latter's irony and strong theatrical personality. Bartoli outdid Supervia in the accuracy and fluency of her coloratura, the final rondo brilliant if unmoving.
Her conception of Cenerentola no doubt owed much to the director, Roberto De Simone. The production, designed by Mauro Carosi with costumes by Odette Nicoletti, was typical of his work in its constant allusions to Neapolitan culture. It was visually attractive, with much of the comic business inventive, but the timing was seldom perfect, and certain ideas were overexploited. The two sisters (Fernanda Costa and Gloria Banditelli), Dandini (Lucio Gallo) and Alidoro (Pietro Spagnoli) were well characterized, but Claudio Desderi's Don Magnifico was vocally coarse, verbally unsubtle. He did have excellent diction, unlike William Matteuzzi (Don Ramiro), whose singing was pretty but underprojected. Both his and Bartoli's voices were sometimes inaudible in ensembles.
Conductor Riccardo Chailly was perhaps partly to blame, for his accompaniment seemed rhythmically inflexible at times, though the orchestra responded more eloquently than Bartoli to the score's touching humanity. A critical edition was used, with stylish embellishments and continuo (fortepiano, cello, double bass) prepared by De Simone. STEPHEN HASTINGS
GENOA
The devil was alive and singing and stealing the show in The Black Rider, a musical first presented by Hamburg's Thalia Theater in 1990 and recently revived by the same company at the Teatro Carlo Felice. The story is that of Weber's (and August Apel's) Der Freischütz, reinterpreted by two twentieth-century American romantics, writer William Burroughs and composer-songwriter Tom Waits, and transformed into pure theater (if such a thing exists) by a third American, Robert Wilson.
The work startled and delighted the audience on opening night (June 23), demonstrating the eternal vitality of the Faustian theme of the pact with the devil, which can be exploited as tragedy, comedy or spectacle. The Black Rider incorporates and transcends all three. The twelve songs by Waits (sung in English, while Burroughs' text was performed in German) -- a bewitching mixture of jazzy rhythms and sentimental ballads laden with Nordic sadness -- are about the delights of giving in to the devil and the sense of loss that such a choice creates. Yet the devil himself appears in this musical as a sort of theater director or entrepreneur -- a symbol not of evil but of the way in which theatrical experience rejects moral categories and imposes its own rules. Wilson's production avoided deep identification with character or situation to concentrate on communicating the almost physical sense of excitement that can derive from a perfect, infinitely daring, synchronization of live music, words, movement and scenic effects. The Thalia company performed dazzlingly, as did the band, coordinated by Hans Jörn Brandeburg at the keyboard. STEPHEN HASTINGS
TURIN
Few contemporary Italian composers, however musically inventive, have written memorable works for the opera house. The very strength of this country's opera tradition seems to have had an inhibiting effect on them. Azio Corghi, born in Turin in 1937, is no exception. His second opera, Blimunda, revived in June at the Teatro Regio, is intellectually refined but theatrically insipid, rarely corresponding to Joseph Kerman's definition of drama ("the revelation of the quality of human response to actions and events, in the context of those actions and events"), optimistically quoted by the composer in the program.
Blimunda, first performed at Milan's Teatro Lirico in 1990, is based on Portuguese writer José Saramago's novel Memorial do Convento. Set in early eighteenth-century Portugal, it tells of collective and individual suffering in a time of religious and political oppression. Corghi employs a multiplicity of expressive forms, techniques and instruments, yet this variety fails to compensate for a contrived artificiality of character and situation, too lacking in genuine interaction to be emotionally involving. He does, however, create some striking effects in the choral scene in Act II, where the workers building the convent of Mafra voice their desperation, and in the intense final scene, which focuses on Blimunda.
The title role was performed by mezzo Katia Lytting, who had created the part in Milan. On June 19 her singing was one of the main attractions of the evening, together with the eerie madrigal commentary of the New Swingle Singers. The other soloists were overtaxed by jagged vocal writing, while the five actors were stilted in their delivery of a pretentious text. Conductor Will Hamburg coordinated the performance efficiently. The production, directed by Jérôme Savary and designed by Michele Lebois (sets) and Jacques Schmidt (costumes), was inventive but conveyed little sense of place and could not make up for the lack of musical and dramatic tension. STEPHEN HASTINGS
MILAN
Andrea Tottola, who wrote the libretto for Rossini's La Donna del Lago (based on Walter Scott's poem), set the lake of the opera's title in a broad valley surrounded by green peaks. Werner Herzog and Maurizio Balò, director and designer of the recent revival at La Scala (the first there since 1838), transferred it to the depths of a forbidding gorge, casting an excessively gloomy shadow over this delicately shaded work. The evocative, functional sets seemed to belong to another opera.
There was a lack of poetic delicacy in the musical performance, too. Riccardo Muti had assembled alternating casts of Rossini specialists, yet he failed to scale down the orchestra to suit the modest volume of most of their voices, and on opening night (June 27) in particular, his conducting proved tiresomely demonstrative (though impressive in its illumination of orchestral detail). The opening choral episode, for example, was taken so fast as to render the words incomprehensible -- perhaps just as well, since they contradicted the scenery.
The most powerful impression in Act I was made by Chris Merritt, with his strong, occasionally uneven tenor and presence, convincingly cast as the bluff Rodrigo. In Act II, Rockwell Blake (Giacomo) was awarded an ovation for his superbly controlled aria, but elsewhere his ungrateful timbre contrasted with the mood of the music. Martine Dupuy's Malcolm also was much applauded (like Blake, she was making a belated company debut), though her stylistic command and impressive range have emerged more incisively on other occasions. June Anderson's voice, appearance and technique seem ideal for Elena, though she must tread carefully in the lower reaches of this Colbran role. Perhaps this very caution made her character seem coolly remote.
The Elena of the second cast, Cecilia Gasdia, though a less immaculate singer, breathed life into every vocal and verbal inflection in a performance (July 2) in which Muti too seemed more willing to give and take. Gregory Kunde offered a convincing Rodrigo, less weighty but more precise in pitch than Merritt. Bruce Ford could not match Blake's virtuosity, but his Giacomo was sweeter-toned. Patricia Spence sang Malcolm with impressive coloratura. At both performances, Giorgio Surjan was an ideal Douglas. STEPHEN HASTINGS
GENEVA
Jérôme Savary's Attila, booed at La Scala, was received warmly at Geneva (June 12), where it had undergone some changes. Michel Lebois' sets, ravishingly lit by Alain Poisson, looked impressive on the large stage of the Grand Théâtre, their color schemes subtly matched by Jacques Schmidt's costumes for the Hun invaders and the bronze shields of the Romans. While there was much movement in the background -- soldiers chasing girls, for instance -- the principals, including two well-behaved white horses, were stationary or revolved around the protagonist, center-stage throughout the performance.
In Verdi's most fascinating bass role, Samuel Ramey's magnificent world conqueror proved sympathetic, in contrast to the other chief characters. Elizabeth Connell, in tremendous form, sang with intense passion as the odious Odabella; Michael Sylvester, though he sometimes found the equally unpleasant Foresto heavy going for his lyric tenor, phrased warmly; baritone Paolo Coni as Ezio lacked the aggression needed for the treacherous Roman general, but he too shaped his vocal line with dexterity. Bass Leonard Graus made an imposing, sonorous Pope Leo. The chorus, supported by a Bulgarian vocal ensemble, sang their splendid music enthusiastically, while the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande reveled in Verdi's youthfully melodious score. Conductor Gabriele Ferro insured balance between pit and stage. ELIZABETH FORBES
ORANGE
Director-designer Yannis Kokkos brilliantly met the challenge of staging Carmen, originally intended for the small Opéra Comique, in the vast Roman Theatre in Orange. A single set -- an empty semicircular arena under crude lighting, topped by an enormous bull's head in the place of the Emperor's statue -- drew attention to the CarmenJosé relationship until the ecstatic finale, in which love and death were united like Eros and Thanatos.
Kathryn Harries made an explosive local and role debut as Carmen, portraying a thrilling, elegant seductress, void of vulgarity. Gino Quilico's powerful baritone and remarkable phrasing filled Escamillo admirably. Barbara Hendricks' mellifluous timbre and placid deportment suited Micaela. Neil Shicoff's José ranks among the best heard in Europe for a long time. The choruses of Avignon, Nancy and Marseilles were assembled as a giant village mob. Meanwhile, Michel Plasson achieved glowing playing from the Radio-France National Orchestra. DIANA SINCLAIR