English Touring Opera are delighted to announce a season of lyric monodramas to tour nationally from October to December. The season features music for solo singer and piano by Argento, Britten, Tippett and Shostakovich with a bold and inventive approach to making opera during social distancing.
This tenth of ten Live from London concerts was in fact a recorded live performance from California. It was no less enjoyable for that, and it was also uplifting to learn that this wasn’t in fact the ‘last’ LfL event that we will be able to enjoy, courtesy of VOCES8 and their fellow vocal ensembles (more below …).
Ever since Wigmore Hall announced their superb series of autumn concerts, all streamed live and available free of charge, I’d been looking forward to this song recital by Ian Bostridge and Imogen Cooper.
The Sixteen continues its exploration of Henry Purcell’s Welcome Songs for Charles II. As with Robert King’s pioneering Purcell series begun over thirty years ago for Hyperion, Harry Christophers is recording two Welcome Songs per disc.
Although Stile Antico’s programme article for their Live from London recital introduced their selection from the many treasures of the English Renaissance in the context of the theological debates and upheavals of the Tudor and Elizabethan years, their performance was more evocative of private chamber music than of public liturgy.
In February this year, Albanian soprano Ermonela Jaho made a highly lauded debut recital at Wigmore Hall - a concert which both celebrated Opera Rara’s 50th anniversary and honoured the career of the Italian soprano Rosina Storchio (1872-1945), the star of verismo who created the title roles in Leoncavallo’s La bohème and Zazà, Mascagni’s Lodoletta and Puccini’s Madama Butterfly.
Evidently, face masks don’t stifle appreciative “Bravo!”s. And, reducing audience numbers doesn’t lower the volume of such acclamations. For, the audience at Wigmore Hall gave soprano Elizabeth Llewellyn and pianist Simon Lepper a greatly deserved warm reception and hearty response following this lunchtime recital of late-Romantic song.
Collapsology. Or, perhaps we should use the French word ‘Collapsologie’ because this is a transdisciplinary idea pretty much advocated by a series of French theorists - and apparently, mostly French theorists. It in essence focuses on the imminent collapse of modern society and all its layers - a series of escalating crises on a global scale: environmental, economic, geopolitical, governmental; the list is extensive.
For this week’s Live from London vocal recital we moved from the home of VOCES8, St Anne and St Agnes in the City of London, to Kings Place, where The Sixteen - who have been associate artists at the venue for some time - presented a programme of music and words bound together by the theme of ‘reflection’.
'Such is your divine Disposation that both you excellently understand, and royally entertaine the Exercise of Musicke.’
Amongst an avalanche of new Mahler recordings appearing at the moment (Das Lied von der Erde seems to be the most favoured, with three) this 1991 Mahler Second from the 2nd Kassel MahlerFest is one of the more interesting releases.
‘And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven … that old serpent … Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.’
If there is one myth, it seems believed by some people today, that probably needs shattering it is that post-war recordings or performances of Wagner operas were always of exceptional quality. This 1949 Hamburg Tristan und Isolde is one of those recordings - though quite who is to blame for its many problems takes quite some unearthing.
There was never any doubt that the fifth of the twelve Met Stars Live in Concert broadcasts was going to be a palpably intense and vivid event, as well as a musically stunning and theatrically enervating experience.
‘Love’ was the theme for this Live from London performance by Apollo5. Given the complexity and diversity of that human emotion, and Apollo5’s reputation for versatility and diverse repertoire, ranging from Renaissance choral music to jazz, from contemporary classical works to popular song, it was no surprise that their programme spanned 500 years and several musical styles.
The Academy of St Martin in the Fields have titled their autumn series of eight concerts - which are taking place at 5pm and 7.30pm on two Saturdays each month at their home venue in Trafalgar Square, and being filmed for streaming the following Thursday - ‘re:connect’.
The London Symphony Orchestra opened their Autumn 2020 season with a homage to Oliver Knussen, who died at the age of 66 in July 2018. The programme traced a national musical lineage through the twentieth century, from Britten to Knussen, on to Mark-Anthony Turnage, and entwining the LSO and Rattle too.
With the Live from London digital vocal festival entering the second half of the series, the festival’s host, VOCES8, returned to their home at St Annes and St Agnes in the City of London to present a sequence of ‘Choral Dances’ - vocal music inspired by dance, embracing diverse genres from the Renaissance madrigal to swing jazz.
Just a few unison string wriggles from the opening of Mozart’s overture to Le nozze di Figaro are enough to make any opera-lover perch on the edge of their seat, in excited anticipation of the drama in music to come, so there could be no other curtain-raiser for this Gala Concert at the Royal Opera House, the latest instalment from ‘their House’ to ‘our houses’.
"Before the ending of the day, creator of all things, we pray that, with your accustomed mercy, you may watch over us."
Offenbach's Fantasio is one of the works where, replacing the mad-cap satire of his earlier operettas with a more romantic melancholy, he paved the way for Les contes d'Hoffmann. Unpopular during his lifetime, Fantasio disappeared and only work by the musicologist Jean-Christophe Keck brought the score together again.
Opera Rara's recording of the work was released in in 2014 [see my review ], and there was an associated concert performance. At the time, I wondered quite how this transitional piece would work on the stage, and now Garsington Opera has given us the opportunity to find out.
Staged at Garsington by Martin Duncan (seen Sunday 16 June 2019), Offenbach's Fantasio featured Hanna Hipp as Fantasio, Jennifer France as Princess Elsbeth, Timothy Robinson as Marinoni, Huw Montague Rendall as the Prince of Mantua, Graeme Broadbent as the King of Bavaria and Bianca Andrew was Flamel. Justin Doyle conducted the Garsington Opera Orchestra and Garsington Opera Chorus. The work was performed in a new English translation by Jeremy Sams .
Fantasio was written for the Opera Comique in Paris in 1870, but the premiere was delayed owing to the Franco-Prussian war. It debuted in 1872 with Celestine Galli-Marie (the first Carmen) in the title role. Based on a relatively unsuccessful play by Alfred de Musset, Fantasio was a somewhat daring choice and the piece failed, much to Offenbach's distress. There may be an element of identification, many commentators see Offenbach himself in the role of the melancholy clown Fantasio.
A poor student, Fantasio (Hanna Hipp) takes advantage of the death of the King's jester to take up that role and in this position gets close to the Princess Elsbeth (Jennifer France), whom he has serenaded unseen. Elsbeth is due to be married to the Prince of Mantua (Huw Montague-Rendall) but wants to marry for love. The prince is keen to be loved for himself and swaps clothes with his aide-de-camp, Marinoni (Timothy Robinson). Fantasio gets close to the Princess, and disrupts the wedding plans by revealing the Prince's disguise. Thrown into prison, he reveals his true self to the Princess who helps him escape, and he persuades the Prince to sign a peace treaty. The marriage however, is off, and the work ends with the Princess letting Fantasio keep the key to her 'secret garden'.
And whilst there is a vein of lyric melancholy, there are mad-cap elements too, both the Prince and Marinoni are closer to stock characters as are the students, Facio (Joel Williams), Harmann (Joseph Padfield) and Sparck (Benjamin Lewis) who pop up as a commentary complementary to the townsfolk (the chorus). But the core of the work is the pair of scenes for Fantasio and the Princess, one in her garden (in Act Two) and one in prison (Act Three), and you wish that this relationship had been developed more. Act One is rather slow, taking its time to establish characters and the piece spends rather too long with the Prince, Marinoni and their 'cunning plan' (Jeremy Sams' singing translation seemed to enjoy the hints of Blackadder).
The overall tone is slightly uncertain, is this a comic operetta or is it a romantic opera and this mixed tone made me think of Gilbert and Sullivan's The Yeomen of the Guard (1888) where they produced an operetta with a far more serious vein than their earlier work. Martin Duncan and his designer Francis O'Connor had the added complication of having to stage Act One (which is set at dusk and in the twilight) in a theatre flooded with light. Their solution was to create a surreal world with a set inspired by De Chirico and costumes which evoked the 18th century ommedia dell'arte but were securely modern. The result highlighted the more comic elements of the plot, but I rather missed a vein of lyric romance in the staging.
Luckily this was supplied by Hanna Hipp and Jennifer France. Hipp made an engaging and intriguing Fantasio, a melancholy dreamer with a strong personality. Hipp's song to the moon in Act One (sung in broad daylight) was entrancing and set the scene, whilst France wonderfully combined the Princess' pin-sharp coloratura with a vein of melancholy at her impending marriage. Hipp and France really made a connection in their wonderfully romantic scene in Act Two, disguise and darkness meaning that each reveals something of their private self to the other. The prison scene was similarly touching, and the unresolved resolution at the end of the opera made you long to know what happened to these characters.
Huw Montague Rendall managed to be delightfully engaging as the Prince of Mantua, rather more 'Tim nice but dim' than Blackadder and revealed a supple lyric baritone which deserves a more serious vehicle. Timothy Robinson was alarmingly foppish as Marinoni, entering with a will into the charades yet, when he stops pretending to be 'The Prince' reveals his own vein of melancholy too.
Graeme Broadbent did his best with the King of Bavaria, who is very much a cipher, whilst Bianca Andrew flexibly slipped in and out of the action as the Princess' page. The three students, Joel Williams, Joseph Padfield and Benjamin Lewis made the best of their scenes but you felt that Offenbach's heart wasn't quite in it and he had done this sort of thing better earlier in his career.
The chorus entered into the piece with a will, and with no separate dance troupe, they entertained us royally with Ewan Jones' elaborately choreographed choruses, bringing the work to life.
The work was sung of Jeremy Sams' English version and the cast's diction was excellent, so we barely needed the surtitles. Whilst I can understand the reasoning behind doing it in English, I did miss the sound of the sung French language and feel that this would have brought an added layer to the piece. Sams did not entirely avoid that major pitfall of translating Offenbach into English, the proximity of G&S, and there were numbers which would almost have fitted into a Savoy Opera. That some of Offenbach's melodies could be described as Sullivanesque indicates quite how much influence Offenbach had on his younger English contemporary.
In the pit, Justin Doyle and the orchestra successfully created a sense of Offenbach's journey from Orpheus to Hoffmann.
This was a performance which both intrigued and engaged, making us realise the complexity of Offenbach's later works. The fine performances from the central two characters ensured that the lyric melancholy of the piece was finely served, surrounded by the more classic Offenbach operetta of the lesser characters.
Robert Hugill
Offenbach: Fantasio
Fantasio - Hanna Hipp, Princess Elsbeth - Jennifer France, Prince of Mantua - Huw Montague Rendall, Marinoni - Timothy Robinson, King of Bavaria - Graeme Broadbent, Flamel - Bianca Andrea, Sparck - Benjamin Lewis, Hartmann - Joseph Padfield, Facio - Joel Williams; Director - Martin Duncan, Conductor - Justin Doyle, Designer - Francis O’Connor, Lighting Designer - Howard Hudson, Movement Director - Ewan Jones, Garsington Opera Orchestra & Chorus.
Garsington Opera, Wormsley; Sunday 16th June 2019.