Berlioz The Trojans Prom 11

Berlioz The Trojans (Les Troyens) came to BBC Prom 11 barely two weeks aftere its sell-out run at the Royal Opera House. This made a difference because all involved were still so fresh that the concert performance had the energy of true theatre, but without the constraints of staging.

By the time Troy falls, Virgil tell us that the hero Aeneas (Enée), has already had many adventures, with Gods and monsters. In this painting (Tiepolo), Enée introduces his son to a very un-Mediterranean Dido (Didon). The kid's wearing wings because a goddess has turned him into Cupid to break down Didon's vow of celibacy. Antonio Pappano's approach thus captures the adventure that characterized Enée's past. The Trojans can be done as a formal studio recording, but it's much more idiomatic when imbued with this innate sense of theatre. Pappano and his orchestra have already proven themselves at the Royal Opera House. Now they can, like Enée, take more risks. If anything, this Proms performance was freer, more spontaneous and closer to the spirit of Berlioz's audacious vision.

Significantly, Berlioz eschews the full Aenied saga. The scenes in Troy have such cataclysmic drama that they almost overwhelm, but they set out the background to what Berlioz is much more focussed upon. Didon, Enée and their people are refugees from different destroyed civilizations who meet in a place of temporary refuge. With his ability to write flamboyant pictures of excess, he throws us off balance by concentrating on the relationship between the two main characters. It may seem like an anticlimax to hear Didon (Eva Maria Westbroek) sing happily with her contented subjects, but Berlioz is deliberately creating a contrast between militarist warfare and domestic peace. Having lost Tyre, the people of Carthage are grateful for what they'e achieved. Didon is not Cassandre, but almost her opposite. Anna Maria Antonacci is a more "dramatic" singer, but Westbroek's warmth is exactly what makes Carthage so alluring to the dispossessed Trojans. Performance doesn't exist in limbo but grows from interpretation.

Didon and Enée are driven from the hunt by a storm, but it's not the storm that matters but the calm haven within which they shelter and fall in love. The duet Nuit d'ivresse is at the heart of the opera in many ways. Again, intimacy and understatement mean more than showily extravagant singing. All theur lives, these two have lived for the public, so to speak. At last, under cover of night, they can be themselves. Bryan Hymel's Enée is a good counterpart to Westbroek's Didon because they create the parts with such sincerity. Empires and glory have nothing on love, so the emphasis here is on naturalness, not histrionics.  The greater spontaniety of the Proms performance caused a slight wobble in Hymel's long  Inutiles regrets, but it added to character. Enée's heart breaks at the prospect of leaving Didon, but it is the crucial, soaring climaxes that show his resolve. Hymel sang this with flawless poise, faced as heroically as Enée faces his fate. Hymel is only 32, with great potential. Most of this cast are very young indeed, and enthusiastic, which gives this production its vigour.

Berlioz writes many vignettes into The Trojans to display his virtuosic command of form. In concert performance, continuity is less important, so we can indulge in the vignettes for their own sake. Ji-min Park's O blonde Cérès was magical,  and  Ed Lyon sang Hylas's Vallon sonore so movingly that I thought of the Steersman in the Flying Dutchman. Also firmly portayed, Hanna Hipp's Anna and Jihoon Kim's Hector. In the interludes for ballet, Berlioz demonstrates how he can write exotic, pastoral and orientalist portraits. Pappano and the orchestra delineated these vividly, showing how important they are to the fabric of the opera. Having heard this Les Troyens live on stage, in film and in concert, I'm convinced that this is one to cherish. It's human scale, not bombast, its warmth and naturalism informed by its insight into the meaning of the opera. True, this is an epic tragedy, but it wouldn't be quite as poignant if we didn't empathize with the personalities. Please read my review of the ROH performance, and the film broadcast - all different. See here in Opera Today for the synopsis, libretto and a non commercial stream conducted by Sylvian Cambreling.

Prom 2 Rossini William Tell Pappano

Heard in its (almost) entirety at BBC Prom 2, Rossini's William Tell is a rousing experience. So rousing that you want to rush out singing Liberté, liberté. Thrilling ! Catch it online for seven days. A new CD too, but there's nothing quite like the buzz of live performance.

William Tell is an icon because he was an ordinary rustic who stirred things up and beat off the Austrians. To this day, the Swiss do things their own way. Perhaps geography helps. You can't easily invade the Alps or subdue a peasantry that knows the mountains. For Schiller, Wilhelm Tell  showed how ordinary people could resist tyrants. For Rossini, too, perhaps.

But what I enjoyed most about this performance wasn't revolutionary fire, but the sense of nature and wide open spaces. Antonio Pappano conducts with expansive brio, bright dynamics and sparkling tempi.  Better this spontaneity than too much studied detail, because Rossini is painting landscape into his music. Panoramic vistas, winds, storms on lakes, impenetrable forests and, again and again, the image of the sky. For the Romantic Age, Nature embodied freedom. William Tell and his peers were "pure" because they lived in tune with simple things.  Rossini's French audiences would automatically connect William Tell with the ideas of Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

Hence the extravagant scenes, which would test Hollywood. Tell and Melchtal escape across a lake and the wind blows up. Peasants gather from miles around: Gessler's surrounded by an army. Milling crowds, battle scenes, and chorus after chorus, augmented by extended dance sequences. The logistics are as hard to comprehend as rhe idea that a man can shoot an apple off his son's head. Yet Rossini writes Guillaume Tell so descriptively that your imagination supplies the visuals. Film would be far too limiting. What makes Guillaume Tell so lively is the sheer variety in the music, as if Rossini's building in multi-screen effects.

Pappano's "other" job besides the Royal Opera House has long been conducting the Academy of Santa Cecilia in Rome.  In 2007, they did a brilliant Rossini Stabat Mater. They are very different from a coventional opera house orchestra, but Pappano seems to inspire them with his enthusiasm.  This orchestra was having fun.

The singing was even more impressive. John Osborn's Arnold is wonderful. It's a bigger, trickier part than William Tell in many ways, because Rossini places so much importance on the relationship between Arnold and Princess Mathilde (Malyn Byström) which aren't the same in Schiller and history. Again, Rossini's French audiences would have thought of Paul et Virginie. The two parts are lyrical, but the part of Arnold is uncommonly demanding, stretching the tenor to the top of his range for uncomfortably long periods. John Osborn has the stamina, and makes the maddening tessitura seem natural and unforced. The rapport between Osborn and Byström in Act Two was exqusite.

Arnold's an ultra-high tenor, while William Tell himself is a baritone verging on bass. This emphasizes Tell's earthy gruffness : he's a man of relatively few words, but when he does sing he gets to the point.  He shoots straight ! Notice how the music goes eerily silent when Tell takes aim.  Michele Pertusi's firm authority creates the part well.  Rossini also pointedly creates the Tell family as a distinct unit, balancing the baritone Tell with high soprano Jemmy and rich mezzo Hedwige (Elena Xanthoudakis and Patricia Bardon). Family values - natural values.

Rossini writes many different choruses into Guillaume Tell, each very individual. This poses problems with staging because the singers can't change costumes, but is integral to the idea of the opera as panoramic vision of nature in its diversity. The men of Unterwald are not like the men of Uri, but they all come down from their distant cantons to join in a common cause. The chorus of the Academy of Santa Cecilia, Rome sing with such character that it's quite striking hiow they turn each chorus intoi a "role".

Following the performance with the BBC programme text obscures the fact that some passages have been omitted and amended, which is not unusual in an opera of this size. The Act Two trio between Arnold, Tell and Walther (Matthew Rose) is intact, but the Act Four trio between Mathilde, Hedwige and Jemmy is gone. That's odd because it draws the narrative together. If you follow the performance with a full libretto, you get thrown off course from time to time, but presumably the cuts are made for a reason. In any case, I'd rather an exuberant performance like this  than something too pedantic. Better to focus on freedom !.

Please click HERE for a full download of Rossini Guglielmo Tell from Rome 1953 and full libretto. 

Photo : Michele Pertusi (William Tell) and John Osborn (Arnold Melchthal) perform at the BBC Proms on Saturday 16 July, in a concert performance of Rossini's William Tell, with the Orchestra and Chorus of the Academy of Santa Cecilia conducted by Antonio Pappano. Copyright: BBC/Chris Christodoulou

Puccini Tosca Royal Opera House June not July

Quick note about Tosca at the Royal Opera House last night. First thoughts below. But please see HERE for the full review.

First thoughts :
It's a revival of the Jonathan Kent production of 2006 which originally has at various stages starred Bryn Terfel, Angela Gheorghiu and Jonas Kaufmann. How does it stand up without mega mega stars? Pleasant enough, but wait for the mega mega star repeat together in two performances on 14th and 17th July, which is being filmed for broadcast.

That said, Martina Serafin's Tosca delighted, and Juha Uusitalo's Scarpia was better than expected. He's done the role many times, it's one of his signature roles. The confidence showed, as he showed an interesting, almost sympathetic side of Scarpia. Toscas are usually so overwhelmingly diva that you don't really take in the hysterical, megalomaniac side of her personality. She's a bit of a fantasist. Scarpia is a realist, he does realpolitik. Maybe Tosca's attractive because she is a challenge. Anyway, the joke is on both of them.  Generally, Uusitalo hasn't overwhelmed me in the past, but here he was convincing enough.

Contrary to popular opinion, Scarpia doesn't have to be a boorish buffoon.  He's powerful because he's risen by stealth. He's the opposite of Tosca who wears her heart on her sleeve. In connection with the 2007 revival of this production, I interviewed Paolo Gavanelli about interpreting the role. He had plenty of perceptive things to say. Please use the search box on this blog search on Gavanelli Scarpia.

Sheer volume goes a long way in the potboiler that is Tosca, and audiences come to be blown away by the tunes, climaxes and very loud singing.  Had Verdi written Tosca, things might be different, but Puccini works fine when he's over the top. Serafin's Tosca wasn't refined or particularly deep psychologically. You can hear the orchestra welling up after the attempted rape so you know something shocking is about to happen. But when Serafin stabs Uusitalo, it's so polite and underwhelming that she might as well have been adjusting his tie. If he had one, that is.  Generally very buttoned up performance, dutifully presented.  Even Anthony Pappano seemed on formal best behaviour.  Puccini and Verdi are composers Pappano can do extremely well.  Except here. The orchestra were playing the right notes nicely, but the music didn't catch fire. Maybe this was a rehearsal for July, when chances are that Pappano will really show what he can do when he's fully charged and inspired.

Marcello Giordano started off as if this was a rehearsal, too, and later had some good moments. Then in the all-important Act 3 arias, his voice cracked badly. Volume at the expense of feeling and modulation. not a good idea. He's done this part inn this production before, so maybe he thought he had it pat. He didn't.  I winced, but most of the audience didn't seem to mind.  Tosca is wonderful theatre, so if the singing goes awry, it's still a good enough night out.

One unexpected bonus of this performance was that it was an opportunity to pay much more attention to the set. Can't do that when Terfel, Gheorghiu and Kaufmann are about. Although the designs (Paul Brown) are  only five years old, the first two acts seem dated already. They'll pass muster for a few years yet and look good on film. The Third Act is brilliant, though. The music gets to work its sinister magic without distraction. Yet the set's contributing, too. The soldiers wear colourful hats - there's a name for them which I can't remember. But soldiers kill.  Fancy hats and costumes are part of the theatre of power. So Jonathan Kent (original director) has a man slowly getting dressed, alone. First, he's a man in his underwear.  On goes the uniform and he's a killing machine.

Scarpia conned Tosca into thinking she could save Cavaradossi. Tosca's deluded because killing Scarpia will unleash mayhem even if Cavaradossi does escape. Poor Cavaradossi hasn't a chance either way. Tosca ends up off the wall, in more ways than one. The set in this final act is eloquent, because it depicts the stark nightmare of the situation, shrouded in murky darkness.

Currently I don't have proper internet access, but a full review will shortly appear in Opera Today.

Bizet Pearl Fishers in concert ROH

Bizet's Les Pêcheurs de Perles is notoriously hard to stage. Because the plot's so grandiose, the imagination works overtime, dwarfing the music, making it seem puny in comparison. There's a lot to be said in favour of concert performances because they shift the balance back to Bizet.

What was striking in this performance of Les Pêcheurs de Perles (Pearl Fishers) at the Royal Opera House was how delicate much of Bizet's writing really is. It doesn't jump up and grab you like the tunes from Carmen. Bizet knows zilch about Indian music but in his imagination it's delicate and refined - Le petit Trianon India, as authentic as 18th century "oriental" wallpaper. Since nowadays we think of India with more realism, we're not conditioned to Bizet's watercolours.

Dispense with the "orientalism" and think of Les Pêcheurs de Perles as French countryside, and the opera falls into perspective. Kings and Priests dominate because peasants are superstitious, and think holy Virgins will protect them.  When the chorus sings of Brahma they could as easily be singing of Jesus. Get away from extreme exotic images and the music makes sense on its own terms.

Antonio Pappano is wise to let this delicacy breathe: over-expansive gestures are best left to the histrionic narrative. Bizet imagines India in delicate, refined string textures, flute trills and gently beaten cymbals.  Crescendi build up like swells in the ocean, diminuendos evoking gracious submission. Lovely bell-like miniatures throughout evoking an idea of the East as perfumed and flower strewn as a church in France on a holy day. There's more drama in this music than the opera is given credit for, and Pappano elucidates what's there, without pushing it past its limits.The delicacy of the playing let themes, such as those from the "big number",  resurface elusively throughout the opera, sometimes so subtle they can be overpowered by being made too obvious.

The Royal Opera House orchestra deserve more appreciation than they get, so it was good to see them on stage rather than hidden in the pit. Seeing the bare structure of the stage was instructive, too, a reminder of just how much art goes into making the fantasy of opera.

Leila is a part almost tailor-made for Nicole Cabell. She's exquisite, and swathed in sapphire satin creates a character even before she sings. Pretty singing too., but the role, despite its charm doesn't lend itself to great displays of passion. John Osborne's Nadir was assertive and lucidly clear in the true French manner. His aria Je crois entendre encore, was beautifully shaped and balanced, the orchestra poised around it well, so it did feel caché sous les palmiers.
 
The duet Au fond du temple saint was very well realized by Osborne and Gerald Finley. Finley was by far the biggest name in the ensemble, however good Osborne, Cabell and Raymond Aceto's Nourabad could be. More darkness would work well with Zurga, who is a very troubled man, but Finley's singing is so well modulated that he creates authenticity without apparent effort.

I loved the ENO Pearl Fishers because the staging (Penny Woolcock) really made sense of the plot and its undertones, infinitely more so than Bizet.  That's why it was an artistic triumph, despite the poverty of the singing (with the exception of excellent Quinn Kelsey). This ROH Les Pêcheurs de Perles is a triumph for the music. Surprisingly sensitive orchestral playing, good singing and enough drama in the music to compensate for the lack of visuals.A longer and better version of this will appear soon in Opera Today.

The postman knocks....

The other day, my postman delivered a parcel from a big European opera house, complete with fancy logo and wrapping.  "Fantastic stuff, opera!" he said, "I'm hooked!". He told me he'd been watching Tony Pappano's series Opera Italia on BBC TV4 which can be watched online, on demand, everywhere for 2 more weeks, and a new one coming up soon. With a recommendation like that, how could anyone resist? So I hurried to watch. Yes, my postman is right!  This really is wonderful. Pappano's a natural communicator, he makes you feel how he feels, draws you in and makes you care almost as passionately as he does. He communicates. So what if "clever folk" already know the material. Pappano's enthusiasm makes you want to delve further into the subject. In the long term that's much more important. Recommended!

In complete contrast, steer clear of the Wagner show also on offer. I watched that because there was a publicity shot of Alice Sommer Herz, but didn't get that far as I switched it off, thoroughly sickened by Stephen Fry.  Here, the presenter is the subject, which itself is irrelevant except as it promotes the presenter's ego. "Oooh" says Fry, "I can't believe it, they're letting me play Wagner's piano" Honey, it's high profile BBC TV, of course they'll let you. But that can be excused.

Far worse is the crass exploitation of the Holocaust. Everyone's interested in that subject, so as long as you create a connection, you get viewers, even if the actual product has marginal connection. Sorry, but to me it's immoral to use the dead for personal gain. Maybe to others this is OK, but to me it's not.

If this had been a serious look at how Wagner connects to Hitler, it would have been reasonable, but this was just cynical exploitation.  Barely above the level of dirty minded Nudge nudge, wink, wink, count the money as it rolls in. I've long admired Alice Sommer Herz, so I couldn't bear to see her used like this. Perhaps what she really said was heavily edited.  A friend watched to the bitter end and said that Alice had said things like "I wouldn't sit thru 5 hours of Wagner",  and "You listen, I won't". Alice is 106 years old, she's heard it all before. She's still sharp as a tack, and has no time to waste. Most revealingly, when asked if they'd played Wagner in Theresienstadt, she snapped, "We didn't have a Wagner sized orchestra". At one stroke, Fry's pander is punctured.