Category: Performances

NO BETTER time than Easter to plead the cause of Benjamin Britten’s chamber opera. Forged in the same white fire of creative energy as Peter Grimes, Lucretia can remain problematic because of the apparent moralising of the framing Chorus. But watching this play of passion in a week of Passions certainly put things into context.

When opera singers reach a certain level of fame and stature, they almost invariably express the desire to present song recitals as well. Often the problem is that they have little training in this specialized art and too much practice in their own stylistic niche. As a result, many highly publicized evenings at Carnegie or Alice Tully turn out to be woeful disappointments, proving only the lack of adaptability of many of our best singers.

Mit noblem Herrschergestus rückt der feine junge Herr im weissen Anzug fürs Schlusstableau die Opernwirklichkeit zurecht. Unvermittelt angeschmachtet von der Liebsten und scheinbar ohne Rücksicht auf den eben ausgefochtenen tragischen Höhepunkt des Familienzwists, von dem hier im Heldenton einer Opera Seria drei Stunden lang die Rede war, darf Fernando alias Sosarme die Totgeglaubten wieder aufrichten und dann, ganz cleverer Familientherapeut, die Sache mit einer zeitgeistigen Aufstellung zu Ende bringen.

A controversial new production of Wagner’s “punk” Parsifal, by Bernd Eichinger, film-maker and writer of Downfall, provoked outrage when it was premiered in Berlin last Saturday. Here he defends his production.
A lot of critics complained that it was staged too close to the orchestra. But that is not a failure – that is exactly what I wanted to do. In a Wagner opera, you have to understand that there are more than 100 musicians; it is a big orchestra, big music. In order that the singers can really be appreciated you have to bring the action forward, closer to the audience. If you put them too far away in the distance of the stage you hear less.

The Marschallin in Der Rosenkavalier is supposed to be no older than 32 – sensitive, sensual and emphatically sensible. Richard Strauss told us so. She is seldom played that way. Over the decades, the role has become the specialty of well-upholstered divas of a certain age who stress regal pathos at the expense of erotic allure. It wasn’t like that, however, on Friday at the Met, where Angela Denoke basked in revisionist revelation.

Handel’s opera “Orlando” is a seductive broadside against love, and New York City Opera’s new production makes this distaste for romance seem irresistible for a while.
When the titular knight goes soft, the magician Zoroastro intervenes to warn him away from the vagaries of passion. Better, he counsels, to stick to such sensible, manly stuff as vengeance, mayhem and murder: Make war, not love.

IT’S STRANGE that such a basically fine performance can leave so many question marks, but that is perhaps the peculiarity of Madama Butterfly. Puccini’s shabby little shogun shocker contains some of the composer’s greatest music, yet it is put to such shallow, manipulative ends that anyone who likes their opera to be more than a high-class musical is likely to come away feeling unsatisfied. At least the Royal Opera’s latest revival is musically rewarding, and boasts one of today’s leading interpreters of the title role, but the picture-book production shows little willingness to tackle the problem.

To this day, many sophisticated music lovers dismiss Puccini as a panderer or even a hack. But his supreme craftsmanship is the best refutation of this position. So dedicated was he to creating just the right effect for “Tosca” that he came before dawn one morning to the Castel Sant’Angelo in Rome and faithfully recorded the actual pitches of all of the church bells that can be heard there throughout the early hours, including those of the Basilica of Saint Peter’s.

The words of Symphonic Fairytales are not by a musician, but by one of the 19th century’s most extraordinary writers: Hans Christian Andersen. The Danish fairy-tale author’s bicentenary falls on 2 April this year and a worldwide project is under way to celebrate him in music. Ten Danish composers have been commissioned to write pieces based on his stories; as part of this, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (CBSO), Chorus and Youth Chorus has achieved quite a coup with a new work from Per Norgard, Denmark’s musical éminence grise, which they will premiere on Andersen’s birthday at Symphony Hall.

THE curtain rises on Black-adder-land — epicene monarch, black-clad baddie, hooped ladies and preening hero — and you think, hmm, three hours of trying to turn opera seria into comedy could be a bit wearing. Worst fears aren’t entirely realised, but if you don’t trust Handel to hold an audience with a serious exploration of relationship and motivation, why bother?
The London Handel Festival has brought us some notable rarities from among the man’s operas, and this one too has seldom been seen; but if the performance falls short, it’s not because the piece is rubbish.