The Filter^ REVIEW

Jenufa / Nabucco (Opera Holland Park)

Opera Holland Park have a new theatre - and you might think on reading their publicity material for this season that the arrival of a bigger, whiter and apparently more comfortable tent in W8 is more exciting than the business of what's scheduled for its stage. Perhaps the operas speak for themselves in the context of publicity; this year's fascinating line-up opened with two masterpieces which on the surface couldn't be more different: Janacek's baby-killing psycho-drama Jenufa, and Verdi's biblical romp Nabucco. 

The former work is so packed with piercing drama that it requires both sensitivity to maintain its essentially conciliatory dramatic point and also intense energy for those half-dozen moments where Janacek screams pain and grating human truths through his music. That's not easily done in a tent, when the cast can't rely on lighting or effects to match the often terrifyingly vivid music, and where extraneous noise (from birdsong to joggers) can puncture the moments of equally unsettling stillness and loneliness. But this production punched above its weight in that respect, even if it did save the most effective dramatic gestures for the last act (there's plenty of scintillating drama pre-interval -'Laca, you did it to her on purpose').

After the Act III revelation that the latter has drowned the former's child, Jenufa reached out to her step-mother - their hands almost touching in forgiveness, but somehow not able to make contact; an electrifying moment, perfectly conceived for the dramatically demanding Holland Park auditorium. Director Olivia Fuchs thrust the Kostelnycka and Laca into the foreground as the vulnerable villains, and she had two great talents to turn to: Tom Randle captured the somewhat pathetic Laca, a beautiful melancholy shot through his rich but delicate voice, whilst Anne Mason's driven, deranged and rapidly descending Kostelnycka was reminiscent of Kathryn Harries's performance in Glyndebourne's benchmark 2004 production by Nikolaus Lenhoff. During the twists and turns of the final act, which journeys from comedy to the most acute human pain, this production conjured something special - stemming largely from Randle and Mason - which silenced even the birds and the aeroplanes; suddenly the comfort of the tent wasn't important.    

Despite effective no-nonsense conducting from Stuart Stratford - a conductor of considerable technique - there was some sloppiness from the City of London Sinfonia in the pit (the opening xylophone passage may be perilously tricky, but it's not supposed to sound so). The ensemble seemed underpowered come some of the big moments, but Stratford dealt well with a small band in a noisy room, highlighting and emphasising wherever possible. The chorus was a delightful surprise: a disciplined and dramatically aware confection of young singers which performed with style and an ensemble quality that can prove elusive on St Martin's Lane and in Covent Garden. 

In Nabucco the Orchestra faired rather better - revealing impressive detail in the score despite some breakneck tempi from another efficient conductor, Brad Cohen. The chorus was exemplary again, but its members did have proximity to assist them; penned like sheep for most of the evening, which weakened the dramaturgy of their Part III chorus, though it was sung with extraordinary sensitivity and shape (they are OHP's crown jewells, but no chorus master was listed in the programme).

Though this was an attractive production, the dramatic ideas couldn't run the course. It opened with the classic 'twentieth-century exile' imagery of unaccompanied suitcases, and lurched into a somewhat messy view of Nabucco's forces as a tortuous circus troupe - like a nightmare vision of an Arts Council-enforced circus skills project for immigrant groups. Thus Nabucco's descent into madness had already been debased, and his repentance at the opera's conclusion seemed concurrently obvious and meaningless. There was derivative and cliched acting on offer too, from both the singing cast and the hired acrobats who seemed always in the way.

Andrew Rees as Ismaele shone above the rest of the cast, and credit is also due to Yannis Thavoris for effective and versatile designs. But overall this was a production that struggled for attention in the tent. So in a sense there was the opportunity to get excited about the extra seat padding trumpeted in the brochure - that, at least, didn't disappoint.   

Andrew Mellor   

Freiburg Baroque Orchestra / Jacobs

Much-acclaimmed baroque officionado and period-instrument-ophile Rene Jacobs brought the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra to the Barbican last week for a concert performance of Handel's masterpiece of opera seria, Giulio Cesare. Well, it was billed as a concert performance, but wasn't it more of a semi-staged affair? That was rather the trouble; the singers on stage seemed caught in something of a dramatic no-man's-land, someone obviously wanted to capitalise on the fact that the cast had performed the work in a fully staged production in Germany the week before. It was a shame: a straight concert performance would have allowed the singers to concentrate on their vocal performances (which, in some cases, they could have done with). As it was, the half-baked acting drew only a few moments of effective dramatic realisation of the work, and a whole load of awkward, confused and repetitive gestures.

From the opening bars Jacobs flicked the so-called 'Freiburgers' into something like the brisk Handelian style we've come to know in recent years, but though his opening tempi were always exquisitely paced, it seemed he relied on the orchestra to maintain them; caught himself in the maelstrom confusion of his own beat (which in Acts 2 and 3 was supplied by a biro - beware the Barbican's interval baton-thief...). And why did Jacobs insist on conducting the recitatives? They could have flowed effortlessly in the hands of the FBO's continuo players and their appointed soloists, but instead they suffered from the enforced bureaucracy of a conductor and were lumbering and cumbersome.

Though this four-hour opera with limited brass and chorus can seem like a slog, there's no doubting that it contains some of the most sublime music Handel wrote. Many of the arias are themselves mini-masterpieces, none more so than Caesar's hunting aria - though Marijana Mijanovic in the title role didn't overwhelm with her grasp of Handel's musical language, she thankfully pulled this one off, just about (though if having period instrument horns play the obbligato procludes them from playing the right notes and with an even tone, there's something of a debate to be had...). Elsewhere Mijanovic seemed off-the-mark in terms of Handelian phrasing - her runs at worst demonstrating all the finesse of a baroque technique learnt on a correspondence course. And are those painful facial expressions really either necessary or acceptable? Mijanovic did, however, cut a suitably cold and oppresive Caesar; when she was performing, you knew who was in control, and it wasn't Rene Jacobs.

Performances from Malena Ernman as Sesto and Christophe Dumaux as Tolomeo pleased more. They were vocally sensitive (qutie beautiful at times), and made the best of the confused scenario, cutting their dramatic exploits off at the limb the moment they became redundant. There were some beautiful offerings from solo string players in the orchestra - the cello continuo shone throughout - though wind solos were more dissapointing with some rather shoddy tuning. Tuning problems also contaminated some of the vocal performances - the creeping pitch of one of the FBO's harpsichords under the hot Barbican lights was noticeable and undoubtedly contributed.

Some performances can absorb rough edges because they achieve something that doesn't concern itself with detail. Not this one. Things just never seemed to come together, and the beauty of Handel's score dragged past as if viewed from the window of an uncomfortable train.

Andrew Mellor

 

Agrippina / ENO / 3.4.07

     Another week, another tale of woe from English National Opera splashed across the press, and another striking production on the company's Coliseum stage. In reviving David McVicar's 2000 La Monnaie production of Handel's Aggripina, which finished at the end of last week (the same in which ENO announced that 1 in 10 jobs would go company-wide and rumors still circulate about an Arts Council-conceived shut-down), ENO may have unwittingly highlighted their 'trouble at the top'. The centrepiece of McVicar's staging was a huge yellow staircase which provided an easy visual metaphor: the opera surrounds the intrigue as to who will be crowned emperor - each foolhardy and untrustworthy contender making it part-way up the staircase amidst a catalogue of plotting, though none save one sitting on its high throne. In this case, the poisoned chalice of Imperial rule goes to Nerone, the youth who eventually bags the realm through amiable nonchalance and, in the case of Christine Rice who played the boy king, a savvy and accomplished performance. If ever you wanted a dramatic reflection of the in-fighting, usurping and clumsy feuding at the top that have apparently led to so many of the problems faced by ENO in recent years, here it was, highlighted in bright yellow in case you could miss it - the only difference being that Nerone wasn't hurled back down the staircase after an unsatisfactory tenure.

     McVicar tackled Handel's 215-minute chorus-less work with an armory of contemporary referencing, high camp and never-ending sexuality (even the character Lesbo was mocked by an unspeakably camp Soho-ite non-singing fashion designer, who found just the mention of Lesbo's name excruciatingly hilarious and almost burst his leather trousers). Witty? Well I for one won't pretend I didn't chuckle when I read the name in the cast list, but the gyrating soldiers and constant undressing almost became too much. What’s for sure is that something of a radical approach is needed with this particular brand of Handel opera. It's beautifully nuanced and often sublime, but it can lose the attention with its arias extended by repeats and da capos, and with no chorus and only very occasional brass it can seem rather dry, even when played with such glorious period nuance as displayed by the ENO orchestra (that work with the Orchestra of the Age Enlightenment has clearly paid off). This wasn't matched on stage though; some singers struggled with their Handelian phrasing and breathing, lumbering through vocal runs and Romanticising Handel's proportioned lines. Rice in particular fudged her opening aria, though before long warmed-up and produced some accomplished vocal moments which matched her stage performance.

     At first glance, McVicar's mise-en-scene might have seemed like a confection of non-interdependent contemporary tableaus. But with thought it was deeper than that, and you felt that McVicar might have grappled with Handel's score for years before responding with his veritable 'best shot' at a decent production. What he achieved was perhaps not a perfectly conceived and executed production, but it certainly was a relevant, clean and utterly captivating one. There were moments of perfect musico-dramatic synergy, when McVicar's characters floated above the caricature they dangerously flirted with; McVicar forging constant links between the goings on in the pit - an early orchestra of complete with theorbos and harpsichords - and the on-stage dramaturgy (at its most acute a smoke-filled speak-easy which hosted the drunken, semi-naked cast, even featuring a cabaret spot from the harpsichordist, who fag-in-mouth accompanied Poppea's aria complete with drunken over-enthusiasm - fabulous). This is what made sense of the production: from sensual, linear choreography to Handelian-sequenced cocaine-sniffing, the dramatic realisation had its basis in the technicalities of the score (if not its occasional lack of character).

     As for the heroine, Sarah Connolly (who played the title role), her performance lived up to her reputation, if it didn't quite do justice to the hype. But maybe this reflected the way Connolly saw her heroine: she went from obsessive and neurotic to resolved and even disinterested. After all, the placing of her son on the throne, albeit Agrippina’s desired outcome to the quandary, was not her doing, and the character seemed increasingly impotent throughout - which Connolly reflected with an appropriate pot-pourri of eyeball-rolling, arm-crossing and moping. What's more, she matched these with the finest singing of the evening (despite a throat infection), closely followed by a remarkably agile performance from Lucy Crowe as Poppea (one to watch).

     At English National Opera the long-perceived 'boring operas' are more often than not anything but. This production may have had its faults musically, and at times come close to a seedy farce, but it was saved by its style and musical sense. And if it's accessibility you want, McVicar achieves it in this most difficult of operas without even attempting to tick the box. When arguing about arts funding, surely one must consider originality and quality of work first, and recognise ENO as a world leader. Let's hope someone from the Arts Council saw this production, maybe it would have shocked them into getting their priorities right.

Andrew Mellor

New Opera Productions in London 2006: Ranked

These are the 24 major new opera productions of 2006. The emphasis here is (on the whole) on productions, not works, which is why a great masterpiece might appear a long way down if it wasn't done justice. I'd usually use a few hundred words for one opera review, but have kept it to one or two sentences for the purposes of this rundown. Here's a key to the format:

Opera Composer (company/co-producing company) Director / Commentary [venue, if not home]

1. Peter Grimes Britten (Opera North) Phyllida Lloyd / Yes, everybody has said it, but this was the best directed performance of the year, and indeed, probably the best directed performance I've seen. Perfectly conceived, devastatingly moving, and remarkable when considering Opera North's relative resources. When it's revived, go and see it. [Sadler's Wells]

2. Orfeo Monteverdi (English National Opera/Handel and Haydn Society, Boston) Chen Shi-Zheng / Utterly, utterly beautiful - visually and aurally - from start fo finish. The perfect contemporary placing of an early masterpiece. Beautifully played by the ENO orchestra with guests from the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.

3. The Marriage of Figaro Mozart (English National Opera) Olivia Fuchs / The critics didn't like it but I did. Clean, witty, characterful and perhaps the only Figaro I've seen and effortlessly understood (in terms of plot) by the last act. Couldn't take my eyes off the stage for a minute, and no need, as you could hear every word.

4. Jenufa Janacek (English National Opera) David Alden / The Olivier winner, and a gripping, dark, and suitably claustrophobic production of Janacek's masterpiece of baby killing, relationship breakdown and mob culture. Everything made sense, but the ENO orchestra could have played with more nuance and detail under Alexander Briger.

5. Sir John in Love Vaughan Williams (English National Opera) Ian Judge / Beautifully designed, with a cast to die for and featuring some magical moments. A weak score? Not for me - sumptuous and involving.

6. Love Counts Nyman (premiere, Almeida Opera) Lindsay Posner / On a dramatic level, so well directed and involving that you could have taken away the music and still had a compelling piece of theatre. Some issues with Nyman's nevertheless attractive score though...

7. The Makropulos Case Janacek (English National Opera) Christopher Alden / Again, a production of complete sense and consistency from the twin brother of the director of the other Janacek opera, Jenufa (above). Best feature was stunning design which mirrored the relentless direction and perspective of Janacek's music.

8. Gotterdammerung Wagner (The Royal Opera) Keith Warner / One of the greatest operas ever written and with the three preceding parts of the Ring Cycle, probably the hardest to direct. This was a successful, meaningful production and a total spectacle. A little inconsistent and end-heavy though. The orchestra of the Royal Opera House played magnificently.

9. King Arthur Purcell (English National Opera/Mark Morris Dance Company) Mark Morris / An intriguing dance-based realisation of Purcell's wonderful but plot-troubled semi opera. Surely one of the most fascinating, unpredictable and original experiences in any theatre all year, if a little bizarre.

10. Die Fledermaus Johann Strauss (Glyndebourne on Tour) Stephen Lawless / A production which seemed to wholeheartedly embrace the spirit of the score - unashamedly pretentious with a concurrent awareness of its own vacuity. Great fun. [Sadler's Wells]

11. Hercules Handel (Les Arts Florissants/Aix en Provence) Luc Bondy / A striking production with two outstanding features: William Christie's chorus and Joyce DiDonato as Dejanira. Ultimately though, a long four hours. [Barbican Theatre]

12. Eugene Onegin Tchaikovsky (The Royal Opera/Finnish National Opera) Steven Pimlott / Something of a wasted opportunity given Tchaikovsky's rivetting music. The odd nice touch, but chorus underpowered, some spectacularly wooden acting (men only) and an irritating on-stage lake that controlled too much of the dramaturgy.

13. La Finta Giardiniera Mozart (The Royal Opera) Annika Haller / Not the flop that some said: a neat and relevant production, but one which never seemed to get off the ground despite a listenable-to score from the 18-year-old Mozart.

14. Tosca Puccini (The Royal Opera) Jonathan Kent / A traditional, rompy, chandelier-laden performance straight from the Royal Opera's heart. I usually detest this sort of thing, but was devastated from beginning to end and produced pints of tears. The ROH Orchestra magnificent, and the singing was first class, but really, very little new here. Must have been in a funny mood.

15. La Belle Helene Offenbach (English National Opera/La Chatelet, Paris) Laurent Pelly / It has become an classic of sorts, but this operetta is troublesome and the score, for me, too transparent. Fails to remain consistently amusing in the 21st century, despite being gifted a colourful, sexy production. Alas those qualities couldn't save it.

16. The Gondoliers Gilbert & Sulivan (English National Opera) Martin Duncan / Some wonderful moments here, and some awful cliches too. ENO chorus were not at their best, nor was the orchestra. The brilliant designs and the equally brilliant Donald Maxwell, saved the day (just about).

17. La Voix Humaine Poulenc (Opera North) Deborah Warner / A stylish production of this 45-minute one-woman opera, brilliantly performed by Joan Rodgers with some inspired playing from the Opera North orchestra. But operatically speaking, the work remains a curiosity. [Sadler's Wells]

18. Carmen Bizet (The Royal Opera/Den Norske Opera) Francesca Zambello / Very little memorable about this show - despite the fact that it's the most recent and opened in December - apart from some classic Carmen cliches. And stop playing in that well! Have the Royal Opera got a deal with an indoor water-feature supplier or something?

19. Le Nozze de Figaro Mozart (The Royal Opera) David McVicar / A real disappointment. Billed as a production that was 'destined to become a classic', but instead looked like an amalgam of every Figaro of the last decade. Not the way to celebrate Mozart's 250th birthday, despite perfect singing throughout.

20. Cosi fan Tutte Mozart (Glyndebourne on Tour) Nicholas Hytner / A very clean production, but perhaps a little too clean  - and as a result, pretty boring. Seemed like a very good student production, not a Glyndebourne/Hytner one. [Sadler's Wells]

21. Cyrano de Bergerac Alfano (The Royal Opera/Metropolitan Opera, New York) Francesca Zambello / Couldn't see the attraction in this score I'm afraid, though it finally got interesting in the last act. Production wise, just about every irritating operatic cliche in the book. Not even Placido Domingo in the title role and Mark Elder in the pit could save it.

22. The Original Chinese Conjurer Yiu (premiere, Almeida Opera) Martin Duncan / Raymond Yiu's score achieved only effective pastiche at best, and the muzak-cum-showtune style began to grind after an hour or so. Though there were some moments of quintessential 'theatre', a consistently engaging musical creation or an enlightened piece of art this aint.

23. Gadaffi Asian Dub Foundation & ENO (premiere, English National Opera) David Freeman / Much as one wanted this project to work, it didn't, on any level, and only succeeded in belittling the talent offered by both ADF and ENO. The culprits? Not necessarily music, mostly a terrible script (not libretto as it wasn't sung) and some hammy, grossly over-gestured acting.

24. La Traviata Verdi (English National Opera) Conall Morrison / With the exception of soprano Emma Bell, there was nothing of merit in this production whatsoever, and everyone in the company seemed weakened. Acting was nervous and one-dimensional, ensembles tired and repetetive, and singing of a below-mediocre standard. Not a pleasant experience to sit through.

Billy Budd

English National Opera 12.12.05

Britten's dark and terrifying masterpiece Billy Budd is a work full of suggestion and provocation. ENO's memorable previous production focused on the plight of Captain Vere - the self-proclaimed king of the 'floating monarchy' HMS Indomitable - forced to execute his most loyal and popular crewman resulting in ensuing mental torture. But in this production originally from Welsh National Opera and directed here by Neil Armfield, Vere was shadowed by an animated Master-at-Arms, brought dangerously to life by John Tomlinson.

Like the sinister, brooding expanse of ocean which Britten so skillfully depicts in his orchestra (and yet so differently from in Peter Grimes), Claggart is often understated; his destruction of the young sailor bearing a tidal inevitability. But Tomlinson's Claggart was characterised and animated; treading a dangerous line (containing even a degree of self-doubt) that could at worse have resulted in pantomime. It didn't, but for a performer of Tomlinson's respectable caliber, a little more subtlety would have been welcome musically and dramatically.

Strong performances were forthcoming from the whole cast. Timothy Robinson's Vere was in the Philip Langridge mould - self control grappling with total personal devastation - and vocally represented the best performance of the evening. Simon Keenlyside in the title role was playful, likeable and vulnerable - a portrayal sexually suggestive in its innocence (Keenlyside is a fine stage performer and a UK operatic gem). You need a technically accurate, well directed and powerful chorus for Bill Budd, and the ENO chorus didn't disappoint - though their sheer size occasionally threw up timing problems. When it came to the crunch, they delivered with vocal broadsides of raw emotion and the effect was nothing short of gob-smacking.

If there was any disappointment in this Budd, it was in the lost potential. A hydraulic platform formed the pivotal centre of the set, its oceanic rise and fall a masterstroke in design and movement. But it needed framing - and the blacked stage bore too many functional theatrical clues, including coloured positioning tape and chalk blocking marks which didn’t add a gritty self-aware feel, just looked shabby. And when the platform reached its most acute tilt, you almost felt you wanted some drama played out on it to manifest real discomfort, but it always retracted as the characters approached. In the pit Andrew Litton, another fine musician who has fallen victim to ENO’s occasional lack of decisiveness and agreement (he apparently wanted the job of Music Director that so many others have steered clear of) drew some extraordinary sounds from his orchestra. In the succession of major chords that links Budd’s sentencing to his final soliloquy, the strings were terrifyingly transparent – this was a moment of almost unbearable tension.

Perhaps most telling was Captain Vere’s final silent walk off stage. The Coliseum – London’s largest theatre - was full to capacity, and whilst the performance was seasoned with coughs and extraneous noises, in those final seconds of agony there was a silence the likes of which rarely resounds in one’s life.

Andrew Mellor

The Copenhagen Opera - Das Rheingold (24.11.05)

Copenhagen's new opera house is a beautiful building that seems to have missed a trick. Its centrepiece is a hugely impressive auditorium in which there are no bad seats, an acoustic of undisputable quality for the operatic repertoire, and a witty horseshoe design that combines Scandinavian chique with West End kitsch. But opera houses are about more than auditoria. Foyer space for the 'main stage' is confined to shallow galleries that surround the maple 'pod' in which the auditorium hangs – and there’s a similar feel when you look across the water at the new building from the royal palace - the auditorium wins the day through the glass frontage. So, if you allowed yourself an hour or so to mill around the new building as you could, say, in the newly refurbished Covent Garden, then you might be disappointed (and alone).

Views from the foyers are beautiful, but there's nothing to get your pulse going and point towards the high drama that you might expect from a performance. Perhaps that's the point - have a drink in a trendy city-centre bar and then make your way to the opera house ten minutes before curtain-up, but then, you do have to walk through a building site to get there, so maybe there's some work in progress. As Serge Dorny has proved in Lyon, if there’s one way to put your opera company at the centre of your city’s cultural discourse it’s to ensure that people are welcome to wander into your building as if it’s there to be wandered into – and to welcome people above and beyond the ‘opera crowd’. It’s not all that easy to find yourself meandering into Copenhagen's new opera house unless you happen to be a seal or a building site laborer or a member of the check-out staff at the nearby Netto supermarket.

The first part of Wagner's Ring, Das Rheingold, which forms part of the opening celebrations for the new venue seemed to suffer from a similar lack of atmosphere, despite the presence of all the necessary constituent parts. This was a brilliantly directed, effectively and intelligently designed production which was musically pretty flawless despite some disjointed offerings from the Royal Danish Orchestra. What was missing? Well this isn't the best opera of the four in Wagner's Ring, but one wonders whether the audience were partly to blame for the lack of atmosphere (maybe they would have preferred a lecture from the architect Henning Larsen). This apathy might just represent the Scandinavian way of taking in the arts - accept great beauty and design as if nothing less is expected.

Ring Cycles are a little like London buses at the moment - you wait for one for ten years and then a few come along at once. Phyllida Lloyd's production at ENO was evocative but perhaps a little immature in its broader construction, whilst Covent Garden purveyed live pyrotechnics and huge colourful landscapes in its own inimitable way. But this production from the hands of the Royal Opera Copenhagen successfully addressed the biggest problem with directing the Ring - how do you match Wagner's epic, churning score and mythological subject matter with a relevant and yet similarly intelligent, well constructed and heavyweight and simultaneously contemporary production? It clearly takes a lot of thought, almost as much as you might need to, say, design a new opera house with its own specially built island.

Alberich's antics at the bottom of a disused swimming pool in Act 1 and his Act 2 lair (which suggested sinister undertones of human biological experimentation) were two masterstrokes of design from Marie i Dali and Steffen Aarfing. These workable, beautiful and sinister scenarios drew nothing but confident and non-clichéd acting from the cast, and also provided genuine dramatic line and belief - usually the first casualties of a badly directed Ring. In a dramatic sense large Wagnerian gestures were present but were seasoned with some moments of intimate and genuine human anguish and joy, the likes of which you can't always achieve in larger houses. Outstanding were James Johnson's Wotan and Sten Byriel's Alberich - both vocally up to Wagner's huge challenges and effectively acted. Not many in the auditorium could have been expecting Wotan to cut off Alberich's arm with a kitchen knife in Act 2, but this was a production charged with evil, and such a shocking gesture fitted the dramatic contours established by the terrifying ‘empty swimming pool effect’ of the opening. Michael Schønwandt is a conductor who understands the ebb and flow of this music, and his reading was at one with the cast, the concept, and with Wagner, though more searing excitement would have been welcome as the gods entered Valhala, and the string sound of the orchestra seemed at times too weak.

The bosses at Copenhagen's Opera should be very pleased with themselves for taking delivery of a new building that has made them a major player in the opera world, and for providing an equally world-class production for its stage. One hopes that the rather strange ambience which seemed to ensure that this evening of entertainment never really took off doesn’t prove a recurring feature of the venue. I doubt it will, but do see for yourself - a swift visit to the Danish capital has just acquired a whole new excuse, as if you needed one anyway.

http://www.kgl-teater.dk/

Andrew Mellor

La Cenerentola

Glyndebourne Festival Opera 16/5/05

'We don't want to scare the horses' commented Glyndebourne's Music Director Vladimir Jurowski recently, interviewed at the beginning of his third season at the helm of the Sussex opera festival. If there are any equines meandering the lawns at Glyndebourne this summer, they certainly won't be perturbed by Peter Hall's La Cenerentola - a production of Rossini's opera which though new, you get the impression you've seen before.

There can be few more 'set-piece' operatic experiences that Cenerentola, and this production had you visualising the triumph of the floor-scrubbing Angelina from the outset - perhaps this was the reaction Hall intended from his audience, thought the result was a feeling that everything in between was somewhat routine. Sets that seemed to reflect every middle-of-the-road production of a repertory 'opera buffa' seemed only to channel this inevitability; but come the grand finale there wasn't the glitz that the Glyndebourne audience probably thought it was going to get.

They lapped up the comedy of the piece though - brought to life by skilful characterisation (both musically and dramatically) from Luciano Di Pasquale as Don Magnifico. Momentary enlightenment came from some great ensemble singing and acting - effectively choreographed but, it seemed, placed rather out of context and under-exploited. Raquella Sheeran and Lucia Cirillo as sisters Clorinda and Tisbe performed with confidence and acute vocal ability, though at times were caught between pantomime and poignancy, and failed to concede to their on-stage father when Hall had deliberately placed him centre-stage.

If there was one triumph in this production, it was the seriousness with which Jurowski tackled the score. His choosing of an opera of this nature may seem in the first instance surprising - but you could see what he was trying to do; Jurowski presided over an orchestral performance from the London Philharmonic Orchestra that bore all the hallmarks of his Russian sincerity and his acute attention to musical detail. He pushed the tempi to their limits (occasionally leaving one or two singers behind), whilst keeping indulgent crescendos at bay. With skilfully played intricate woodwind contributions and a firm hold on his strings, Jurowski highlighted any irony and poignancy that seemed to be lacking on the stage – and looked far beyond the prettiness of the notes.

Ruxandra Donose struck an interesting chord as Angelina (La Cenerentola). Her purple and sombre mezzo voices comes from a different pallet to those of the rest of the cast - perhaps the ideal choice for the central character who seemed, in Hall's production, aloof from the action so much of the time and understandably rather confused as to what was going on around her. Hers wasn't a glistening girly 'Cinderella', rather a disturbed but resolute individual - though a touch of the former would have been welcome to accompany the pageantry of the closing scenes.

A lively, accurate and well blended performance from the chorus and adequate singing from the rest of the cast ensured that this piece was musically pretty flawless, but still the fireplaces, windows and curtains nagged at your dramatic conscience. You have to keep in mind the many artistic triumphs from Glyndebourne when you're experiencing a performance like this one; Lehnhoff’s Janacek cycle and Peter Sellars' Theodora have done much to dispel the myth that its all about champagne and hearty laughter - but however much Jurowski urged his audience to recognise the inner turmoil of some of Rossini's characters, it was all the fun of the fair that put the smiles on the faces.

Andrew Mellor

Jephtha

English National Opera, 14/5/05

There’s been something of a trend for staging oratorios emerging in the opera world, almost as if the bosses of UK opera companies are struggling to discover inspiring and revivable operatic scores in their music libraries – which is odd given the host of dramatic treats from recent and not-so-recent years languishing unperformed in dusty corners of colonnaded opera houses (and those with revolving balls on the roof).

But there have been inspired ventures into staging Handel’s oratorios, notably Peter Sellars’ production of Theodora at Glyndebourne some years ago. This offering from English National Opera (produced in association with Welsh National Opera) which saw Handel’s post-Messiah oratorio Jephtha realised in what seemed like 1930s fascist Italy, owed something to Glyndebourne’s precedent.

This was another casting success from ENO, the most comfortable dramatic performances coming from the betrothed Sarah Tynan as Iphis and Robin Blaze as Hamor. Though Mark Padmore shone as Jephtha, it was Blaze and Tynan who characterised their roles, seasoning them with great musical skill, projection and accuracy. The on-stage lovers seemed the only performers able to cope with the occasional lack of musical momentum in this piece, which isn’t the most dramatic of Handel’s concert-conceived oratorios. With few musical exchanges in Handel’s concert arias and recitative, some performances suffered from unnecessary over-acting; Mark Padmore was on occasion caught trying to ‘liven things up’ on stage. A more effective alternative would have been to tone things down; achieving a stillness that would have reflected the significance of the music and the poignancy of the situations encountered in this tragic tale.

This would also have worked in the context of the most effective aspect of this production – stunning design. Skilful recognition of the ‘picture book’ nature of the musical structure of the score came from director Katie Mitchell and designer Vicki Mortimer’s literal framing of the drama. The outward opening of the curtains at the beginning of each scene which gave the illusion of a picture appearing on a television set, and the framing of each scene with stage blacks (on one occasion achieving a cinematic ‘wide screen’ effect) were effective in conceding to the lack of dramatic realism seen in the score (in the established style an aria of many minutes may only employ a single fragment of text), and offering a series of illustrations rather than a traditional operatic romp.

Nicholas Kraemer in the pit approached this work with his typical desire to shape the music in his image; clean and forthright, but without some of the thrusting tempi which have become fashionable in music of the period. He succeeded, though there were, on occasions, problems with the ENO orchestra’s baroque technique which lead to tuning inaccuracies; maybe that’s what happens when you’re playing Wagner, Berg and Handel in the same week. Kraemer is something of a musicians’ musician, and his honest approach to works which he fully understands is always a pleasure to experience.

There’s definitely something attractive too about hearing this music in a theatrical acoustic. Without a large echo it automatically seems less devotional and somehow more ‘ready’. In this long score highlights are undoubtedly found in the choruses, which were performed poorly by the ENO chorus who lost time and consonants, and failed to adapt to the baroque techniques achieved by their colleagues in the orchestra. There’s no doubting the quality of beauty of the music; but there may have been a few in the audience mulling over just how they managed that trick with the curtains during some of Handel’s extended soliloquies.

Andrew Mellor

Lulu

English National Opera 29/4/05

Second time around for this Richard Jones production of Lulu from English National Opera first seen in 2002, and a treat for those of us who missed it three years ago.

What seemed to be at the centre of the success of this Lulu was Richard Jones’ understanding of the piece – from its dramatic roots in Wedekind’s plays to Berg’s conception of the work as a musical commentary on the playwright’s musings surrounding the force of Eros. Whilst many intellectualise about the irrepressible force of desire and love, Jones reminded us here that it manifests itself down many a backstreet, as the prologue revealed Lisa Saffer’s Lulu striking a foxy pose in the window of a parlour emblazoned ‘Adult Entertainment’.

This is one of the most challenging operatic scores ever written, for singers and instrumentalists alike, and ENO had taken no risks with the cast which was a roll call of seasoned and trustworthy artists. Though the orchestra at times wained at the mercy of this weighty score, Jones’ production seemed to instill a sense of confidence in the singers, who were energetic and acted with huge skill without exception. Paul Daniel, in his last production as Music Director at ENO, was broad-gestured in the pit; seeing the unfolding of the thematic episodes more as musical landscapes than interlocking instrumental studies. Maybe he’s still got all that Wagner in his head – the result though was a moving and gregarious reading, though a touch disparate at times. Pat Collins’ schizophrenic lighting effects were a masterstroke – a continuation of Jones’ concept of unashamedly highlighting the theatre of the piece (manifested in the closing bars as the Animal Tamer demonstrated Jack the Ripper’s knife to be a phoney).

This was a particularly well-played Animal Tamer and Acrobat from Robert Poulton, whose complete embodiment of the latter role almost disguised his vocal brilliance – it’s an old cliché, but he made it look so easy. Together with the star of the show Lisa Saffer, you would be hard pushed to find better acted stage performances in all but the most respected of repertory London theatres. Saffer gave a performance the likes of which is exceptionally rare on the opera stage. You almost felt that Berg’s score and Jones’ production had been crafted around her - her musical and dramatic embracing of the role demonstrating total understanding. She achieved a genuine sensuality that so often highlights the cumbersome nature of opera when attempted, but which here increased a few heart-rates in the auditorium one suspects.

Lulu is a work which reflects the tragedy of the blind pursuit of desire – its bleak and pitiful ending here played against a stage of blacks and scaffolding; the glitz of the opening scenes a distant memory. Somehow though you were engaged more than ever in these closing bars – not because of the imminent demise of the anti-heroine, but more because the dramatic and musical journey had made such perfect sense, and that’s where you really give your audience a chance to empathise.

Richard Jones is still at the top of his game, and in this piece, he, Daniel and Saffer continue to hit it off. Big time.

Andrew Mellor

Twilight of the Gods

English National Opera 23/4/05

So here it was – the grand finale of one of the most talked about Ring Cycles in history, and there was certainly some anticipation at the Coliseum, even on this the sixth performance of the Twilight of the Gods. It’s difficult not to enjoy at least the sizeable orchestral parts of a performance of Götterdammerung, one of Wagner’s supreme achievements, unless you’re faced with a poor band. Thankfully the quality of the Orchestra of English National Opera’s performance was one of the evening’s more consistent features. 

Though this production flippantly teased some old Wagnerian curiosities, and flirted with boundary-pushing, it wasn’t the ideas that proved the problem; more their lack of unity. I speak as something of a realist; someone who has long struggled to reconcile this beautiful and ultimately human music with the unfathomable myths it’s composed around. So there was some solace immediately in the eerie and clinical minimalism of Hagen’s castle and the teen-flic girliness of Brünnhilde.

But where did we go from there? Through a succession of episodes which were original and resonant in the context of the plot and the music, but which didn’t seem to form, alongside one another, a derivative realisation of the piece as a whole. The invasion of light and colour complete with game show irony at the wedding scene in Act Two, and the funeral of Siegfried (which was here an immensely moving moment - devastating) are two examples. These moments sat on a similar axis of effectiveness, but didn’t seem to draw from the same pallet of dramatic techniques.

In the design and direction of this major work ENO typically gambled and won, but only just. They didn’t fare so well on the singing front – presenting a cast which struggled with Wagner’s marathon score. Gidon Saks’s Hagen was the most accomplished operatically, controlling the stage, displaying a good understanding of Wagnerian phrasing and musicality, and triumphing at times over the churning orchestra. Richard Berkeley-Steele struggled vocally with heroism of Siegfried, whilst dramatically faring slightly better with Lloyd’s anti-heroic puppyish vision. A fine operatic performer; but no Siegfried.

Kathleen Broderick has been the phenomenon of this Ring. She cut a mean figure on stage as Brünnhilde. She was watchable, endearing, and full of character, but like her on-stage lover her voice seemed at times as a small yacht struggling at the mercy of a searing orchestral ocean. Broderick’s uneven but often beautiful voice captured something of her overall depiction of the role – petite, honest but fearsome. There will be a clutch of London opera and theatre fans looking out for her next appearance. Admirable vocal and dramatic technique was displayed by all three Rhine-daughters who deserve credit for their unfussy singing and their sassy performances as pole-dancers which avoided cliché and were entirely sinister – their disturbing foreplay unfortunately and unnecessarily cut up with a Benny Hill bear-chase moment.

This Ring has constantly provoked discussion and brought contemporary issues to the forefront of the opera stage, and for achieving this without contrariety and conceit, ENO can be proud. But opera boils down to music, and here inadequacies prevent this Ring from coming near to being hailed as one of the greats – the finale firmly driving this point home.

Andrew Mellor