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."
This year’s Jette Parker Young Artists Summer Performance offered a veritable operatic smörgåsbord, presenting sizable excerpts from operas ranging from Gluck to Saint-Saëns, from Mozart to Debussy, by way of some Italian masterpieces, courtesy of Rossini and Verdi.
One only has to hear the first few notes of the fiddlers’ wriggle which opens the overture to Le nozze di Figaro for one’s toes to start tapping and one’s ears to jump to attention, so beginning the programme with the overture and first three numbers from Mozart’s opera was a sensible choice which got proceedings underway slickly. Thomas Payne - the first of the performance’s four conductors - led the ROH Orchestra through a light-footed rendition of the opera which, with the pianissimo strings tingling and buzzing, whipped up some energy for the entrance of Michael Mofidian’s Figaro, confidently surveying his domain and energetically waggling a tape-measure.
Michael Mofidian (Figaro) and Yaritza Véliz (Susanna) (C) ROH 2019. Photo by Clive Barda.
The Scottish-Iranian bass-baritone and Yaritza Véliz developed a good rapport during ‘Se a caso madama’, as the Chilean soprano used her sparkling tone - and a shocking-pink frock - to distract the self-absorbed Figaro from his bed-measuring chores, though given the cavernous nature of the soon-to-be-weds’ baroque ‘garret’ it didn’t seem likely that the removers would have any difficulty squeezing in the Count’s nuptial gift. A little of the momentum built up was diffused by the rather slow tempo of Figaro’s ensuing ‘Se vuol ballare’ though Mofidian sang with characteristic precision and control.
The lovely richness of his bass-baritone was showed off to better effect, though, in the closing moments of the Tower Scene from Pelléas and Mélisande, when Golaud entered to scold his wife for behaving so childishly with Pelléas. Golaud’s reflectiveness resonated beautifully - there was a hint of menace, but also vulnerability - and it was good to hear a more youthful voice in the role than is often the case, bringing the half-brothers closer together in age. I had had my doubts about the wisdom of selecting this scene to end the first half of the programme: Figaro may start ‘in media res’, but I feared that it would be a challenge to establish a credible and absorbing theatrical and music ‘ambience’ by extracting a ‘slice’ from Debussy’s dreamy, otherworldly opera. But, I was proved wrong by Noa Naamat’s thoughtful direction of Hongni Wu, and by the freshness and anticipation which the Chinese mezzo-soprano conjured as she draped herself across the window ledge of the ‘tower’ and stretched down to the garden below. The soprano’s initial unaccompanied phrases were as silken as her long tresses confirming that impressive vocal presence that she displayed in Naamat’s recent production of Henze’s Phaedra in the Linbury Theatre. Wu conveyed fairytale-like mystery while never over-gesticulating, while the lightness of British baritone Dominic Sedgewick’s upper range helped to evoke Pelléas’s earnest naivety and fascination. As Sedgewick wrapped himself in Mélisande’s hair, conductor Patrick Milne summoned exquisite nocturnal glitterings and surges from the ROH Orchestra, but the enveloping sensuousness of the moment remained innocent, almost playful. Billy Slocombe’s lighting of this scene contributed enormously to its enchantment, magenta and blue softly darkening to highlight the dusky pink moon.
Hongni Wu (Mélisande) and Dominic Sedgwick (Pelléas) (C) ROH 2019. Photo by Clive Barda.
The Act 2 aria and duet from Saint-Saëns’s Samson et Dalila was lit with similarly striking effect, though here monochrome chiaroscuro effects splashed with red were the order of the day, creating a tense locale. Russian mezzo-soprano Aigul Akhmetshina relished the long melismatic legato lines of Dalila’s ‘Amour! viens aider ma faiblesse’, easily encompassing the extensive range as she luxuriated on a black leather couch and wallowed in the seductiveness which she knows will overcome Samson’s strength, richly supported by the ROH Orchestra under James Hendry.
As the High Priest of Dagon, who urges Dalila to use her charms to destroy Samson whose Hebrew followers have just conquered the Philistines, Argentinean baritone Germán E. Alcántara sang confidently but was a little overshadowed by Akhemtshina’s vibrant and luscious-voiced femme fatale. I found Naamat’s direction a little too stylised in this scene - did the High Priest really need to whip out a gun from beneath his black jacket, like a stock-villain? Similarly, in the Act II temporale and trio from Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia the singers seemed to be working too hard to engender some comedy; as Almaviva and Rosina relished their planned elopement, urged on by the impatient Figaro, the gestures were as lacking in subtlety as the primary colour costumes. Undoubtedly, the exaggerated quasi-farce effect was intended, but if you’re trying hard to be funny then you probably won’t be. Wu and Sedgwick were pleasingly reunited as Rosina and Figaro, though, while Thando Mjandana, a South African tenor participating in the Link Artist Scheme , was a suave Count.
Aigul Akhmetshina (Dalila) (C) ROH 2019. Photo by Clive Barda.
An excerpt from Act 1 of Verdi’s Rigoletto was considerably elevated by South Korean soprano Haegee Lee’s terrific rendition of Gilda’s ‘Caro nome’. This was a measured and confidently crafted performance which communicated character and feeling most impressively. Her compatriot Konu Kim was an animated and lithe-voiced Duke of Mantua, Akhmetshina returned to imbue Giovanna’s melodies with warmth, while Mjandana (Borsa) was joined by fellow South African Chuma Sijeqa, also a Link Artist, whose appearance as Rigoletto may have been brief but who made an immediate and strong mark. Verdi rounded things off when the full complement of 2018-19 JPYAs joined together for a rather confusing front-of-curtain performance of the fugal finale of Act 3 of Falstaff, which made up for any lack of theatrical clarity with a generous helping of obvious, and engaging, joie de vivre.
The best singing of the night, for this listener at least, came earlier in the evening when the first JPYA countertenor, Patrick Terry, and American soprano Jacquelyn Stucker performed Orfeo’s tragic submission to Euridice’s desperate pleas, as depicted by Gluck in Act 3 of Orfeo ed Euridice. Again, I found Naamat’s direction a little stylised - too much hand-wringing, head-clutching, tree-hugging for my liking - but the establishment of the scene’s emotional tenor was accomplished, and again aided by Slocombe’s lighting designs which turn soft grey to blood red and then, when Véliz’s Amore had restored life, love and liberty, returned through orange to a golden glow of joy. Stucker communicated every atom of Euridice’s confusion, anger, passion and despair, in ‘Che fiero momento … Fortune ennemie’, and so fiercely emotive and vocally compelling was this grand lament that it was no wonder that Terry could resist her pleading no longer before giving in to his own outpouring of grief, ‘Che farò senza Euridice?’, which was no less powerful.
Claire Seymour
Conductors: James Hendry, Patrick Milne, Thomas Payne, Edmund Whitehead; Sopranos: Haegee Lee, Jacquelyn Stucker, Yaritza Véliz; Mezzo-sopranos: Aigul Akhmetshina, Hongni Wu: Counter-tenor: Patrick Terry; Tenors: Konu Kim, Thando Mjandana: Baritones: Germán E. Alcántara, Dominic Sedgwick, Chuma Sijeqa: Bass baritone: Michael Mofidian; Orchestra of the Royal Opera House.
Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London; Sunday 21st July 2019.