Richard Strauss - Die Frau ohne Schatten
Bayerische Staatsoper, Munich - 2013
Kirill Petrenko, Krzysztof Warlikowski, Johan Botha, Adrianne Pieczonka, Deborah Polaski, Elena Pankratova, Wolfgang Koch, Sebastian Holecek, Eri Nakamura, Hanna-Elisabeth Müller, Dean Power, Okka von der Damerau, Tim Kuypers, Christian Rieger, Matthew Peña, Laura Tatulescu, Tara Erraught, Heike Grötzinger, Andrea Borghini, RafaI Pawnuk, Leonard Bernad, Iulia Maria Dan
Staatsoper.TV Live Internet Streaming - 1st December 2013
Die Frau ohne Schatten is notoriously one of the most difficult works to stage, the fairytale setting having some directions that are near-impossible to depict conventionally, including frying fish that lament with the Voices of Unborn Children, earthquakes and magically appearing fountains. Even the most basic idea behind the opera - a woman who doesn't cast a shadow - is not an easy thing to achieve credibly on a lighted stage. Inevitably then, directors are required to be somewhat creative in their approach, without losing the necessary otherworldly quality of the work.
Directing Richard Strauss's epic work for the Bavarian State Opera, Krzysztof Warlikowski is not a director short of ideas, one who can always be relied upon for creative and unconventional approaches to opera staging, particularly for a work as rich in imagery and ideas as Die Frau ohne Schatten. Considering that much of the work's fairytale symbolism is based on Strauss and Hofmannsthal's interest in the Freudian theories and psychoanalysis it's not uncommon for productions to use a similar method to explore the underlying meanings and subtexts to be found in the opera, so it's not surprising that a director like Warlikowski finds the work to be fertile ground for a number of ideas.
The Munich production of Die Frau ohne Schatten then, unsurprisingly, doesn't take place in a fairytale world, but rather in a more modern setting that relates to the mindset of the Empress, daughter of Keikobad, the Woman without a Shadow. When they descend from the Spirit Realm down to Earth then in search of a shadow, the Nurse and the Empress seem to take an elevator from the upper level of a luxury apartment building into the basement where Barak the dyer and his wife do the laundry. It's not a literal descent however - it's certainly not enough to make the fairytale storyline "real" - but rather there's a suggestion that the Nurse is using her powers (hypnosis? psychoanalysis?) to force the Empress (who is often seen lying on a couch) to confront her deepest fears and get in touch with her inner self.
This is certainly a valid interpretation of Die Frau ohne Schatten, if somewhat unimaginative for a director like Krzysztof Warlikowski. We already know the Empress has an inner life - she's a gazelle in the form of a woman - while her lack of a shadow moreover is clearly a description of her inability to bear children. Here, as elsewhere, Warlikowski's production emphasises greatly the deep female desires and anxieties related to sexuality, childbearing and motherhood that can be read from the work. The Dyer's wife in particular, granted fulfilment of a life of luxury by the Nurse in exchange for her shadow (and thus liberated from the ability to conceive), can be seen indulging her wildest fantasies with semi-naked handsome young men, some of them wearing falcon heads.
The men in Die Frau ohne Schatten are depicted as being well-meaning but essentially one-note - the childless Emperor caught up in his obsession with his red falcon and with hunting (which you could interpret as a desire for 'death'), Barak with rather more basic urges, frustrated by the inattention of his wife and his banishment from the marital bed once the Wife has agreed to the Nurse's terms in trade for her shadow. The male perspective is an under-explored avenue of the work, but it's not one that interests Warlikowski. The director certainly finds imaginative imagery that rivals Hofmannsthal's to depict the situation of men who are unable to find fulfilment in their female partners, but the men are still mostly sidelined here.
Perhaps more surprisingly for this director is the fall-back onto one of the old familiar tricks that are commonly used when a dramatic situation appears too exaggerated to depict literally. You can either create the necessary distance by making it a play-within-a-play, or you can set it as the deranged imaginings of a character in an asylum for the insane. As becomes clear in the later part of the production - and in keeping with the psychologist's couch origin - Warlikowski goes for the asylum option, with the Nurse eventually being the one put into a straight-jacket. It's a disappointing reading of the work, particularly when we have recently had such a radical interpretation of this opera from Christoph Loy at Salzburg, seeing the 1919 work as a lament for Unborn Children of the Dead during the Great War, with those feelings reawakened through its setting during the post-WWII Karl Bohm recording sessions of the opera.
If Warlikowski's interpretation doesn't engage the mind and the imagination quite as much, the Munich production nonetheless is at least a feast for the eyes and the ears, and it's not without some bizarrely surreal imagery and a few characteristically clever touches. The sets are extravagant in terms of their being so much going on. There's a gazelle on the stage which 'gives birth' to a young child in red, all of which opens out other impressions of the nature of the Empress. Lights, colour and projections also define the divisions between reality and fantasy, with plenty of objects that serve literal and symbolic purposes - a bed, an elevator, a fish tank - and supernumeraries wearing animal and falcon heads. The director's response to the challenges of the stage directions is occasionally inspired, such as when an asylum nurse places a glass of water in front of the Empress rather than a Fountain of Life appearing.
Much of imagery can be nearly unfathomable other than for setting mood and tone (a five minute prelude of scenes from Alain Resnais' 'Last Year at Marienbad' precedes the opening and the ending has projections of Batman, Marilyn Monroe and Gandhi), but the use of the stage is nonetheless magnificent. Die Frau ohne Schatten is an extravagant work - over-indulgent perhaps, confused and confusing even - but it demands this kind of imaginative and impressive response. There is consequently never a dull moment here, always something of interest going on somewhere on the stage, in the lighting, in the projections, in the colour, in the props, in the movements. As the debut for the new house music director, Kirill Petrenko, this was also a case of rising to the occasion. There's little shimmering delicacy for Strauss's lush arrangements here, rather an emphasis on the dark undercurrents that are powerfully drawn out from the immense orchestration.
Most importantly however, the characters are well-defined in terms of personalities and the performers are well-coached by the director to respond to the situations and to each other. Warlikowski gives them context to bring these elusive characters to life, but the singers still have a considerable amount to bring to the production as well. Die Frau ohne Schatten has a (deserved) reputation for being difficult to cast five strong singers in the exceptionally demanding main roles, and the cast assembled here are terrific. As a complete performance and in how she is such a vital component of this particular production as the arch-manipulator, Deborah Polaski's Nurse injects real personality here and sings marvellously as well. Adrianne Pieczonka's Empress is luxuriously voiced and Elena Pankratova is impressive as the Dyer's Wife. Wolfgang Koch doesn't have a big voice, but again is very capable in this role. Johan Botha is also in fine voice as the Emperor. It's perhaps not as rich in timbre as it once was and he doesn't make as much of an impact here when strong acting is required, but Botha can still sing this role with ease.
Giuseppe Verdi - La Forza del Destino
Bayerische Staatsoper, Munich 2013
Asher Fisch, Martin Kušej, Vitalij Kovalev, Anja Harteros, Ludovic Tézier, Jonas Kaufmann, Nadia Krasteva, Renato Girolami, Heike Grötzinger, Christian Rieger, Francesco Petrozzi, Rafał Pawnuk
Staatsoper.TV Live Internet Streaming - 28 December 2013
The weakness in Verdi's La Forza del Destino lies within the imperfect fractured nature of the subject itself, while the strength of the work lies in Verdi's attempt to bring those various elements together into a coherent form. Like most of Verdi's work in his mature middle period before his late masterpieces, he doesn't entirely succeed in overcoming the structural weaknesses of the plot. Sometimes a director, a conductor or a singer can bring an internal consistency to these works, but La Forza del Destino still remains a challenge. It's not one that Martin Kušej can do much about in his Bavarian State Opera production, but there's still a lot to admire in Verdi's work, particularly when it has a cast attached to it like this one.
The imperfections in La Forza del Destino are most evident in the structure. Act I (with its famous overture in the revised version) - in which the Marquese di Calatrava is accidentally killed by Don Alvaro while he is attempting to elope with the Marquese's daughter Donna Leonora - is detached by a number of years from the main body of the work. Across those intervening years, the three figures at the centre of this tragedy have each been struggling to live with the consequences. Donna Leonora has taken religious vows disguised as a man and is seeking peace living as a hermit. Don Alvaro has joined the army and in a quest for redemption. Calatrava's son Don Carlos is looking for revenge and wants to kill both Leonora and Alvaro. There's nothing to unify those characters other than the Force of Destiny that no man can escape. And a lot of coincidence.
Verdi at least attempts to hold it all together with some consistency and dramatic through composition with the unifying Fate theme acting as a connecting leitmotif that weaves throughout the work. Given the problems of the diverse characters and their diverse aims, it's an imperfect effort and Act I and II drag on with little dramatic drive and only a few standard numbers thrown in (Preziosilla's patriotic call to arms in 'Al suon del tamburo') to enliven all the moping and soul-searching. Dramatically, the work only really develops in Act III and IV when Don Carlo and Don Alvaro meet-up under assumed names and temporarily become firm friends. Verdi's advanced musical language however enables him to make much more of the complex characterisation of hatred and friendship in a time of war, as well as the mixed emotions of a man rejoicing that his injured enemy has been saved since it means that he can kill him himself.
Even with Verdi's score, this kind of characterisation can only really be made to work with a strong cast, and the Bayerische Staatsoper have a cast to die for, or a cast who will die for it, if you like. Anja Harteros is a world-renowned performer with a powerful expressive voice and fine acting ability. Whenever I've seen her however, she's been less than precise in her pitch and range, and it's tested here as Donna Leonora in La Forza del Destino. You could put any minor failings down to the exigencies of live performance, particularly when one is as passionately involved in a role as Harteros seems to be here, but it's the humanity of her situation that is key here and that's delivered with complete commitment. You expect no less from Jonas Kaufmann and he throws himself at the role of Don Alvaro. There are no surprises here just solid reliability, but when you have such meticulous control and such a voice, you can't really ask for more.
The lack of any real opportunity or appropriate circumstance for Donna Leonora and Don Alvaro to make any real connection is one of the structural problems with the work, and it prevents the audience from hearing the soprano and tenor together (although there have been other opportunities for Harteros and Kaufmann to sing Verdi together this year, most notably in Don Carlos at Salzburg). On the other hand, it's the Don Alvaro/Don Carlo situations provide plenty of opportunity for fire, and Kaufmann has a worthy adversary in baritone Ludovic Tézier. Another solid performer, Tézier really raises his game in this company and is superb in his solo arias, in his duets and in his dramatic interaction with the others.
Martin Kušej's approach to La Forza del Destino is much the same as his Macbeth for Bayerische. It's minimal, clean, modern and darkly pessimistic, the sets plain and functional for the earlier acts, although the use of a table throughout, like it was borrowed from the rehearsal room is rather odd. It distinguishes itself with one or two striking symbolic images that hit home what the work is all about (even if they do nonetheless, like Macbeth, take a little time to set up and further break the flow of the work). Whereas a killing field of skulls was the abiding image of the death and destruction under the reign of Macbeth, here in La Forza del Destino, it's the use and the image of the cross that is the dominant image for religion, for faith and for destiny here, and they result in a mass of large white crosses forming a rocky outcrop for the vital final act denouement.
Kušej also makes important note of the idea of war and how central it not only to this particular opera, but to Verdi's viewpoint and revolutionary involvement in the Risorgimento throughout his career. Act III, for example, has as a backdrop an unsettling overhead cutaway of a house tilted at 90-degrees with a hole ripped through its centre. Symbolic, you think? "Everything is upside down", Fra Melitone observes at one point, but the concept of lives violently ripped apart is in the background throughout La Forza del Destino. There can be no peace for any soul while one is at war; no true brotherhood, families destroyed, men who would in other times be friends are now enemies, even pride and honour are twisted by hatred and the desire for revenge.
If nothing else, that sentiment came across loud and clear in Martin Kušej's production, but the tragedy of this situation - beyond the pure melodrama of the plot - was also superbly enacted by Harteros, Tézier and Kaufmann. Imperfections remain, but La Forzo del Destino still proves to have a potent mix of all the vital Verdi ingredients that make great opera.
Giacomo Meyerbeer - L'Africaine
Teatro La Fenice, Venice - 2013
Emmanuel Villaume, Leo Muscato, Jessica Pratt, Veronica Simeoni, Gregory Kunde, Emanuele Giannino, Angelo Veccia, Luca dall’Amico, Davide Ruberti, Mattia Denti, Ruben Amoretti, Anna Bordignon
Medici Live Internet Streaming - November 2013
Just when it looked like no-one had the resources, the singers or the sheer nerve to take on another grand Meyerbeer opera and succeed in putting it across with any measure of success, along come La Fenice with L'Africaine. First performed posthumously in 1865, a year after Meyerbeer's death, La Fenice selected L'Africaine to mark that 150th anniversary, and it proves to be a good choice. Meyerbeer's final opera is a fascinating work that is not quite as richly elaborate in melodies and set-pieces as some of his more famous grand operas (Les Huguenots, Robert le Diable), but it retains the glamour in a number of key scenes even as it shows some influence of a more modern style elsewhere. By and large, with only some minor reservations, La Fenice mirror that approach in their new production and in the process prove that a Meyerbeer opera can still work on the modern stage on its own terms.
Although it has a title that makes little sense to anyone with even a rudimentary knowledge of geography - the African woman of the title actually comes from India or from an Indian island - the chief attraction of L'Africaine for audiences of the day was the foreign exoticism of its setting. For modern audiences, if the work is known at all, it's for how Meyerbeer expresses that exoticism in the opera's most famous aria, 'O Paradis', sung by Portuguese explorer Vasco de Gama on his arrival at the New World of his dreams. That revelation in Act IV doesn't come as easily as it seems and there are various trials and tribulations in the first three acts that make it all worthwhile, if not unexpectedly somewhat conventionally drawn out.
Inevitably this is mainly to incorporate romantic complications. Although she has been engaged to marry Don Pédro, Inès is in love with Vasco de Gama. Awaiting his return from sea, the news arrives that her beloved has died in a shipwreck, but this proves untrue. Vasco de Gama is actually the sole survivor of the crew, and has brought news of a new world out there somewhere. If given a ship, he promises the council an empire, "new climates, rich treasures, prosperity". As proof that this new land exists, he shows the council two examples of an unknown race of copper-skinned people, Sélika and Nélusko, who have been bought as slaves in Africa. As there is nothing written of such a land and the slaves refuse to divulge where their land lies, the council reject Vasco's claims and he is rather harshly anathemised and thrown into prison.
Languishing in his cell, poor Vasco de Gama also has woman trouble to contend with. Unknown to him, Sélika, who is actually the Queen of her island kingdom, is in love with the Portuguese sailor and furious when he mentions the name Inès in his sleep. For her part, Inès is jealous of the beautiful woman that de Gama has brought back with him, even though he denies that there could possibly be anything between them and even offers her Sélika and Nélusko as slaves. That obviously doesn't go down well with Sélika either. Of more pressing concern however is rescuing her beloved from prison, and the only way Inès can do that is by agreeing to marry Don Pédro.
Strange as it might seem since they rejected Vasco de Gama's claims, the ruling council have decided to let Don Pédro lead an expedition instead. Even stranger, the released Vasco de Gama has managed to get a ship, follows them and boards Don Pédro's ship only for it to be attacked by Indian pirates, the ship burnt and all the crew killed. The only survivors are Inès, her maid and Vasco de Gama, who has been found in chains in the depths of the captured ship. A prisoner still, Vasco de Gama is nonetheless enraptured with the discovery of the land of his dreams. His delight is short-lived however, as the Brahman priest commands that a foreigner cannot be allowed to live. Now crowned Queen again, Sélika, much to Nélusko's anger, saves him by claiming that she and the explorer are married. Discovering for the first time that she loves him de Gama rejoices in their union, but only until he discovers that his beloved Inès is not dead. Rejected again, Sélika inhales the poison of the Manchineel tree and is joined in death by her ever faithful Nélusko.
Already ahead of the fashionable French love for exoticism that would be expressed later in Delibes' similarly themed Lakmé, (although it can even be seen as far back as Rameau's Les Indes Galantes), Meyerbeer's L'Africaine revels in the colour, the richness of melody and the drama suggested by the romance and the danger of the Asian setting. Surprisingly however, although it is a 5-Act grand opera, there is little of the extravagance of melody, airs and ballets in set-piece numbers that usually characterise the genre of which Meyerbeer was the master. All those elements are in place of course but to a lesser degree here, with only one Grand Air, a short ballet in Act IV and a couple of set-piece spectacles - one of the boarding of the ship and the other of splendour of the New World paradise. Showing perhaps some Wagnerian or Germanic influence, there is more through composition in this Meyerbeer work, less stop-starting for arias, and some cutting back on repetition.
Emmanuel Villaume presents a thoughtful account of the score here with the orchestra of La Fenice. Running to three-and-a-quarter hours there are evidently trims applied, but as they are mostly towards the end of the work they seem to be made out of consideration for the performers rather than really moving the drama forward. There's nothing substantial missing from the first three acts. The first ensemble of Act II is cut, but the all-important closing ensemble is there. Act III opens with the sailor's prayer, but that seems more logical than opening the act at sea with a female chorus. There are a greater number of the small trims in Act IV and there's a major cut in the removal of the confrontation between Inès and Sélika at the start of Act V, but in both cases it tightens the focus of the drama on the highlights of these acts.
Leo Muscato's stage direction and basic period setting strips the presentation for La Fenice back even further in a way that emphasises the dramatic element of the work without necessarily losing any of its musical colour. Those key scenes could certainly be a little more colourfully decorated - the New World Paradise shown for example as merely warm diffused light and some lightly floating blossom leaves, but reducing the excess works well enough in this case when you have the aria 'Pays merveilleux... O Paradis' to say all that needs to be said, particularly when it's given a fine rendition, as it is here by Gregory Kunde singing Vasco de Gama.
It's in this kind of casting then that La Fenice truly proves that it is possible to successfully stage a Meyerbeer opera. Clearly, despite weaknesses seen in this area in other productions, there actually are good Meyerbeer singers out there, and their lineage would seem to come from the more heavy dramatic Rossini operas. Gregory Kunde is certainly one of them. He handles the principal tenor role marvellously, with a strong, confident delivery and he has the stamina to maintain it right through to his Act IV Grand Aria. He makes his exit at this stage, but Sélika has to carry right through all five Acts while keeping enough in reserve to almost single-handedly deliver the whole of Act V, and Veronica Simeoni keeps the dramatic intensity there throughout. She seems to flag slightly with some pitch inconsistency at the start of Act IV, but only briefly, rallying through to a beautiful duet with Kunde and managing to bring about that essential conclusion with all the necessary feeling and impact.
The challenges of having the right type of voice to sing Meyerbeer are evident in the casting of Jessica Pratt for Inès. Pratt is a coloratura singer of immense range and ability, well-suited and even greatly impressive in those intense Rossini bel canto roles, but the dramatic force of Inès is a different challenge altogether. It's a relatively small role, cut back even further here, but the strain shows on the Australian soprano. She plays the part with considerable personality however and comes into the role well after a slightly shaky opening. The baritone roles of Nélusko and Don Pédro are handed well by Angelo Veccia and Luca dall’Amico.
La Fenice's 2013 production of Meyerbeer's L'Africaine can be viewed free for a limited period via internet streaming on the Medici web site. The work is performed in the original French without subtitles.
Giuseppe Verdi - Attila
Opéra Royal de Wallonie, Liège, 2013
Renato Palumbo, Ruggero Raimondi, Michele Pertusi, Makvala Aspanidze, Giovanni Meoni, Giuseppe Gipali, Papuna Tchuradze, Pierre Gathier
France TV Culturebox, Internet Steaming, 24 September 2013
In the bicentennial year that saw new productions of many rarely performed early Verdi operas, the unlikely popular success of Attila is perhaps the most surprising, if not downright baffling. There are many other neglected Verdi operas - I Due Foscari, I Masnadieri, Joan of Arc and Stiffelio, for example - that are surely more deserving of exploration and re-examination than Attila. Popularity is no sure indicator of quality but it can't be ignored either, and there's no question that Attila is a quintessential and entertaining Verdi work. It is filled with nationalistic sentiments, tragic romantic situations and family complications which have that recognisable melodic and dramatic Verdian touch, even if none of the melodies can compare to Verdi's best and the drama here is fairly static.
Musically, Attila is also fairly conventional, Verdi matching the situation with appropriate music that isn't terribly imaginative, but more often resorts to basic see-sawing, plucking and shimmering strings to accompany situations of stormy tension. The break-down into static numbers doesn't allow for a great deal of fluidity either, containing the requisite religious scene (Bishop Leone), that is preceded by a ghost scene (maidens in white appearing in a dream to Attila), and patriotic hymns ('Cara patria' - 'Dear homeland'). The problem with Attila however is not so much that it's a number opera, since Verdi can do wonders with such material (Macbeth, Joan of Arc), as much as the fact that Temistocle Solera's libretto provides little room for the composer to explore any deeper subtext to the situation or any personality in the characters.
The problem is highlighted in Act 1 after the lengthy prologue. Odabella sings a lament for her missing father and Foresto who she believes is dead ('Oh! Nel fuggente nuvolo'), but as lovely as it is, it's rendered immediately pointless when Foresto turns up at the end of the number not dead after all, and the sentiments evaporate as the chugging strings work up the tension yet again for their charged encounter. Like everything else in the opera, that's all pitched at a level of near hysterical declamation. Here Odabella furiously challenges his faithfulness, while Foresto just as furiously denies it. "Strike me with your sword, but not your words", Odabella declaims, and Verdi's music is that sword, wielded as defiantly as the fervent expressions of determined ambition to destroy and defeat Attila and his forces elsewhere. It's all rather tiresome, I find.
The lack of any real dynamic or more subtle exploration of character and situation means that there's not a great deal a director can do with it either. Conducting the orchestra of the Opéra Royal de Wallonie, Renato Palumbo doesn't find any unexpected depths or lyricism in Attila, but there's no doubt it's a very good performance of a mediocre opera. The production too, directed by Ruggero Raimondi - a man familiar with the role of Attila as a singer - is as well-staged as any of the fine productions at the very underrated Liège company, but there's similarly not much a director can do with this material. Raimondi's production designs are traditional, well-designed (the arrival of Leone descending from above is most impressive) and beautifully lit, with backdrops of thunder clouds and imposing columns closing down space, but you could just as easily use the same set for Ernani or Oberto.
The main roles in Attila are challenging then not only from a singing viewpoint, but they require some personality and creative acting ability if the opera is not to be just static declamation. All of the performers here do as well as could be expected, the tenor and soprano roles of Foresto and Odabella in particular being well filled by Giuseppe Gipali and Makvala Aspanidze. Aspanidze is a high soprano, which can make Odabella's fervour a little bit shrill at length and the Georgian's Italian enunciation is also heavily accented, but she tackles the demands of the role valiantly and has no problem reaching its high notes. Much of what is enjoyable and memorable about Verdi's writing for this work comes from the dramatic bass/baritone stand-offs between Attila and the Roman commander Ezio, and those are also capably met by Michele Pertusi and Giovanni Meoni.
The Opéra Royal de Wallonie's 2013 production of Verdi's Attila can be viewed via internet streaming from France Television's Culturebox website. Subtitles are in French only.
Sébastian Rivas - Aliados
Festival Musica, Théâtre de Hautepierre de Strasbourg, 2013
Léo Warynski, Antoine Gindt, Nora Petročenko, Lionel Peintre, Mélanie Boisvert, Thill Mantero, Richard Dubelski
ARTE Live Web Internet Streaming, 4th October 2013
Presented at the 2013 Festival Musica in Strasbourg (and streamed live via ARTE Live Web on 4th October), Aliados is a somewhat experimental opera work from Sébastian Rivas that mixes avant-garde Ircam electronics with acoustic instruments and voices. There's also a modern approach taken to the staging of the work with the use of live cameras projecting, highlighting and enhancing the dramatic action. Perhaps most interesting aspect of Aliados however is the subject matter of the work which sets out in real-time a 75-minute meeting on 26th March 1999 between the Chilean President in exile Augusto Pinochet and the former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who had only recently been forced to step down from her position.
More than just a two-person dialogue, there are actually more people involved, and the work does successfully extend outside the room to the outside world where the actions of these two people once had a much wider impact. This aspect is indeed so vital that it the opera even opens with an Argentinian soldier, shell-shocked and tormented by the Falklands war, writhing on the stage, who reappears at a later stage to emphasise in barked delivery that he was "conscripted into the theatre of operations ...for nothing", by "generals, assassins and pirates".
There's definitely a sense of confusion as to what it was all for, but a determined sense of self-justification as the work progresses on the part of Pinochet and Thatcher. Pinochet is clearly ill, slumped in a wheelchair, his memory failing, making confused and fragmentary comments about a "beautiful ship", "The Phoenix", "Pearl Harbour" and the Second World War. An aide, who is preparing his medication and keeping a register of the Senator's "achievements" (lists of deaths, arrests and the disappeared) tells him that he's thinking of the Belgrano, sunk by British forces during the Falklands War. Pinochet, longing for the "blood-covered streets of Santiago", has no regrets for the deaths caused by his regime, raving that it necessary for "national unity" and that it was Allende and the Communists who are really to blame for the problems in Chile.
Baroness Thatcher arrives with her personal secretary and the two former world leaders exchange gifts of their own biographies, in mutual admiration for themselves and each other. Grateful for his aid during the Falklands conflict, Thatcher offers Pinochet political asylum and talks about needing to "keep her head" for a statue that is being cast to stand in Westminster, but her speech is marked by gaps and it seems clear that her mind is also failing. Eventually, both slump into their chairs in defeat, only to be revived by troubling memories resurfacing, Pinochet preoccupied over descriptions of himself as a dictator, the Iron Lady recalling the miners and the Belgrano, slipping into refrain of "it was a danger to our ships... that is fact" on an electronic loop that forms a mournful chorus of self-justification.
Both the music and the staging are vital in establishing this very particular mood and make some effort to get beneath the surface of these larger-than-life characters towards some semblance of personality if not exactly humanity. Stage director Antoine Gindt manages to give a sense of the encounter taking place in real-time by using multiple cameras that project details and close-ups. He also captures something of the closed room mentality of the protagonists within the limits that mark out the square room, but also gives a wider sense of who they are and how their actions have had a wider impact beyond the walls of the room by having the floor made up of a collage of photographs and newspaper articles related to the Falklands War, with additional images and footage projected on the screen behind.
Rivas' score works in a similar fashion, the music - played out mainly on solo violin with trombone, piano and saxophone - has percussive elements that are insistent in a militaristic way when referring to the wars and deaths. Through some computer manipulation and electronic effects - applied to the voices as much as the instruments - the score also manages to reflect the wavering, distorted mentalities of Pinochet and Thatcher, the sound haunting and twisted, backed by drones and random noises.
In some respects the subject matter of Aliados is similar to John Adams' Nixon in China in as much as it touches on the god-like delusions of the powerful and the reality of the frailty of the human mind and personality. Aliados however is much more chamber-like and intimate in its observations, the libretto free from the poetical observations and abstractions of Nixon in China, avoiding making any specific political or social observations that the meeting between Thatcher and Pinochet might signify. It's much more a sonic exploration of two personalities of common accord in their common discord.
It seems appropriate that the two even dance a tango of a somewhat disturbing if tender nature, a dance over the dead by two former "Defenders of the the Atlantic", two allies ("aliados") confined now to the smallness of a room and the terrors of their own disintegrating minds. A sad account of the endgame of leaders who abuse power and wage war - particularly on their own people - Aliados is unquestionably a work of extraordinary intensity that has relevance to many other contemporary world situations.
Aliados is currently still available for viewing on-line via the ARTE Live Web site. The opera is sung in English and Spanish, with only French subtitles provided.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - La Clemenza di Tito
La Monnaie - De Munt, Brussels, 2013
Ludovic Morlot, Ivo van Hove, Kurt Streit, Véronique Gens, Simona Šaturová, Anna Bonitatibus, Anna Grevelius, Alex Esposito
La Monnaie Internet Streaming, November 2013
Mozart's final opera, written only months before his death, represents what seems like a backward step for the composer back to the old opera seria form, but the mature Mozart's approach is considerably different from earlier works written in this style. Ludovic Morlot's Baroque approach to the orchestration in this production of La Clemenza di Tito for La Monnaie in Brussels would also seem to lack the warmth and character that should perhaps be found in the work, while Ivo van Hove's modern staging would seem to be working against both the subject and the musical interpretation. Ultimately however, by giving due emphasis to the motivations and expression of the actual characters, all the necessary elements work remarkably well together to highlight the qualities that are rarely recognised in La Clemenza di Tito or presented as well as they are here.
Based on an old libretto by Metastasio which had previously been set to works by Caldara, Gluck, and Myslivicek - principally on account of Mozart accepting the commission to mark the coronation of Leopold II at short notice - the opera seria structure of the opera can be rather restrictive. Like all Metastasio's libretti however, the situations are rich enough to provide opportunity for the skilled composer to expand upon. The opening encounters between Vitellia and Sesto in Act I for example could be played as tedious scene-setting exposition for the melodramatic incidents that follow, so it is vital that they appear fully formed characters with strong, credible motivations. In the hands of Mozart - particularly at this stage in his career - that's exactly what you get, and it's really what sets La Clemenza di Tito apart from other settings and indeed, from many other examples of opera seria.
La Monnaie's production is superbly directed by Ivo van Hove in this respect, but it's also impressively realised by Véronique Gens as Vitellia and Anna Bonitatibus as Sesto. It's been noted that a successfully interpreted Sesto is half the battle with La Clemenza di Tito, but if that is so then Véronique Gens makes a good case that a credible and well-sung Vitellia for Sesto to work off is just as vital a component. The setting would appear to be given the same consideration since the whole work takes place here in what looks like a Presidential suite with a bed, a lamp and a desk, but it does nonetheless create a strong environment for the bedroom intrigue and the naked ambitions that are laid bare in the opening scenes. You can feel the simmering resentment on both sides, Vitellia over Tito's apparent choice of Berenice as his consort, Sesto over Vitellia's ambitions and how she is using him, but yet he still loves her.
This is the vital root of the conflict that drives the work, and it needs to be made real. It also needs to be built upon when Tito abandons Berenice and decides to marry Servilia instead. Mozart makes you feel Annio's despair at this decision, but any Baroque composer worth his salt can spin off an aria of torment and betrayal at the unjust whims of fate, the Gods and rulers insensitive to the feelings of their subjects. More than that, Mozart allows you through his music to understand why Annio accepts this unjust situation and bows to the will of his Emperor and it's vital to understanding the other vital component that contributes to a successful interpretation of this opera and what it is all about - the clemency of Tito.
The reason why Annio accepts Tito's choice of bride without complaint is covered in the libretto. He is unused to an Emperor who is open and just wants to hear plain speaking and the truth. Again, the conflict between duty and one's personal feelings is standard fare for the baroque composer, but in the hands of Mozart it's much more than this. With Mozart it's an expression of characters who are more fully rounded people with different aspects to their personality, where their true feelings aren't always visible. In line with Mozart's egalitarian views and humanistic beliefs, and reflecting the changing times, there's a real trust and belief in La Clemenza di Tito that people are essentially good. They make mistakes, they sometimes misunderstand intentions and inevitably conflict with the sensibilities of other people, but essentially, they want to do the right thing.
So while people do terrible things, Sesto setting fire to the Capitol and attempting to kill the Emperor, you should nonetheless be able to understand both where those motivations come from. You should, in the above case, also get a real sense of the horror and the self-disgust that such actions engender in Sesto ('Oh Dei, che smania è questa') and the others ('Oh nero tradimento') at the injury that that been unjustly inflicted upon the person of such a good ruler. That's what La Clemenza di Tito is all about and Mozart's generosity of spirit and his belief in the nobility and the better nature of man warmly suffuses even the rather sterile nature of the opera seria.
I'm not convinced that Ludovic Morlot's conducting and arrangement of the score for the La Monnaie orchestra really gets across the sensitivity of Mozart's writing. It does seem fairly mechanical and reflective more of the Baroque opera seria than Mozart's rather warmer interpretation of it. On the other hand, the quality of the writing itself still comes through here. The contrast of the modern setting however probably works well to counteract any impression of a creaky old-fashioned plot played out on period instruments. The bedroom setting of Act I, with all its implications of bedroom power games, gives way to a crime scene, with forensic investigators in white protective suits trying to get solve the puzzle. Video cameras feature heavily throughout, projecting close-ups on a screen behind to capture the idea that these are important figures, but also revealing the telling details that make them human in this drama.
The magnificent singing and acting performances contribute to this and bear up well to the closer scrutiny. It's here that one gets much more effectively get to the heart of who the characters are and what the work is about. Kurt Streit has precisely the right kind of sweet tenor voice that convinces you that this is a ruler that it is easy to love and hard to refuse. His 'Ah, se fosse intorno al trono' is at least warmly accompanied by the orchestra to fully get his nature across. Véronique Gens is of course one of the finest singers in this repertoire with a beautiful voice that has real power, but it's how she controls it that makes all the difference to her artistry. Anna Bonitatibus is as credible in her acting performance as she is expressive in her singing the vital role of Sesto, giving real heart to the work and its expressions. Annio's role is also critical to the work as a whole and Anna Grevelius makes a real impression. La Monnaie don't stint on any aspect of this production however and there are also good contributions from Simona Šaturová as Servilia and Alex Esposito as Publio.
La Monnaie/De Munt's production of La Clemenza di Tito was broadcast on the internet via their web streaming service. Subtitles are in French and Dutch only. The next broadcast of the 2013-14 season, Ambroise Thomas' Hamlet will be available to view for free from 31 December 2013.
Zoran Juranić - The Last Flower of Summer
Serbian National Theatre, Novi Sad, Serbia - 2013
Zoran Juranić, Christophe Poncet, Jelena Končar, Miodrag Petrović, Miljenko Đuran, Violeta Srećković, Goran Krneta, Vasa Stajkić, Igor Ksionžik, Ivan Dajić, Darija Olajoš Čizmič
Armel Opera Festival - Szeged - ARTE Live Web - 7th October 2013
The question of musical precedents and references must undoubtedly come up in any modern opera that draws from the historical operatic tradition. The principal influences on the musical language of any modern work that operates in a form that is largely tonal and is not of the minimalist school can often be found in the impressionistic touches of Debussy, with something of the freer form and dissonance of Alban Berg. You might find some musical influence of those composers in Croatian composer Zoran Juranić's The Last Flower of Summer, but the influence and their significance perhaps extends beyond the musical to the actual drama itself.
Pelléas et Mélisande inevitably comes to mind for example at the start of The Last Flower of the Summer when a man, Mr Bert, on his way home one night discovers a mystery woman lying on the street, with no name and uncertain where she has come from. It seems clear however that she has been abducted and has escaped from the clutches of two shadowy figures seen in the background. It's not the only thing shadowy about the story, the characters or the world they live in. From the watchful policeman, to the inquisitive lady walking the street and the interfering landlady of his apartment block, Mr Bert has some difficulty in bring the mystery woman back to his room in order to offer her some help.
Or is there a deeper attraction and motive at work here, perhaps without Mr Bert even realising it? Certainly he doesn't resist when Miss No-Name strips down and seduces him using her obvious charms, but Bert is also undoubtedly attracted by the romantic allure of the exotic and mysterious background she relates to him, particularly the line of poetry that she claims to have improvised at the moment - "If I fall at your feet, pick me up like the last flower of Summer". It soon transpires however that the poem was not improvised and that there are further lines, just as there are many other mysterious figures and men in the troubled journey that has taken her to Mr Bert.
With a crazed and distraught armed Russian soldier called Vladimir on the streets looking for a missing woman, and a story that has taken NN from Monte Carlo to Venice and beyond, first with a wealthy industrialist Carlo and then with Lorenzo, a knife thrower, it seems that we could be dealing with a Lulu here rather than a Mélisande. There are even discussions between Mr Bert and the woman about opera and the elaborate love stories that they construct, suggesting further that there is some self-referentiality about all this. When it is revealed that NN's story is itself largely fictional and that even the poem is derived from a woman's magazine, this does suggest that the opera works on a meta-level that acknowledges outside influences. On the other hand, the opera can be seen as dealing with the nature of love itself, of meeting a stranger, getting to know them and falling in love, then finding out that you can never know the whole person or the whole story as it falls apart and one's certainties start to unravel.
The Last Flower of Summer was premiered in March 2013 at the Serbian National Theatre of Novi Sad, and the production - directed and conducted by the composer Zoran Juranić himself - is presented here at the 2013 Armel Opera Festival. The staging is necessarily basic, needing to be all-purpose and simplified to not require any major scene changes for the purposes of the opera festival. The entire work is presented in the form of a related story that takes place behind a mesh screen, narrated by an older Mr Bert (in a non-singing role) sitting reflecting on the events in the past at a table with a typewriter. Other than a bed and some portable open-doors, there's not much in the way of set decoration, but Juranić's set employs a see-saw platform at the back of the stage that fulfils most additional dramatic requirements.
The main purpose of the staging here at the Armel Opera Festival is to provide an opportunity to judge the performances of two of the competition singers. Having previously performed in Latin in Stravinsky's Oedipus Rex, the French tenor Christophe Poncet demonstrates his versatility here by singing in Croatian, and he seems to manage it exceptionally well. Serbian soprano Jelena Končar's role as NN is however rather more challenging vocally, dramatically and for the fact that she's singing constantly for a large part of the 90 minutes of the opera. If there was a prize for most daring performance Končar would walk away with it, stripping down and singing before a passionate love scene, baking a lasagne, and even working as an assistant for a knife-thrower (it looked like it was done for real), but her singing ability is impressive on its own and she really took command of the role. Her performance deservedly won her the Best Female Performer at the Festival.
The Armel Opera Festival performance of The Last Flower of Summer can be viewed for free for six months after the performance on the ARTE Live Web streaming service. Subtitles are French only.
Igor Stravinsky - Oedipus Rex
Poznan Opera House, Poland - 2013
Jacek Przybylowicz, Grzegorz Weirus, Christophe Poncet, Joëlle Charlier, Jerzy Mechlinski, Andrzej Ogorkiewicz, Piotr Friebe, Jaromir Trafankowski, Aleksander Machlaica
Armel Opera Festival, Szeged - ARTE Live Web - 5th October 2013
Stravinsky's Oedipus Rex, "an opera-oratorio after Sophocles", is one of the most fascinating works of the composer's neoclassical period. One of the more interesting elements of the Stravinsky's approach here, for example, is the use of older traditional styles that isn't so much a homage as an exploration of different musical archetypes, aligning them appropriately (or inappropriately for effect according to some commentators) to specific characters. Stravinsky's measure of the subject, the dramatic content and its mythological subject is moreover just about perfect. In its formal construction and declarative nature - with a libretto written by Jean Cocteau - it's hard to imagine the work being anything but an oratorio, but there are inevitably grand and tragic elements that are drawn out, and this Poznan Opera House production captures them well.
In as far as the opera-oratorio's relating of the events of Sophocles' Greek tragedy go, the work is divided into two parts. The sequence of events is related by a narrator (in the original language of the audience, which for the purposes of this production is Polish), while the drama is conducted in Latin. Act I concerns the fate of Thebes, which the narrator tells us has already been rescued from the terror of the Sphinx and now faces devastation from the Plague. The chorus beg Oedipus to once again come to their rescue, but the oracle at Delphi has told Creon that the curse can only be lifted when it is discovered who is the murderer of King Laius. Act II presents the unravelling of Oedipus as he comes to the realisation that he is the son of Laius and Jocasta, and that the old man he once killed at a crossroads was therefore his own father and the woman he is married to is his mother.
Staged for the 2013 Armel Opera Festival, the oratorio nature of the work does pose some challenges with staging, but director and choreographer Jacek Przybylowicz finds a way of retaining and supporting the relative simplicity of the related events by having dancers perform the expanded role of the chorus. There's nothing too experimental attempted, the dancers meaningfully integrating with the content of the work while keeping the stage active and the giving the audience something to focus on. The stage itself is otherwise rather minimally decorated, with a gallery at the back for the chorus and the use of blocky thrones to indicate the regal positions of Oedipus and Jocasta. There is some opening out of the story, with a child used during the relating of how Oedipus is discovered by a shepherd, while the dramatic conclusion of Jocasta's death and Oedipus's blinding is effectively staged with the wrapping of Oedipus in a scarf.
Presented for the Armel Opera Festival, this rare production of Oedipus Rex is staged as an opportunity to judge the performances of two competition singers in the main roles. Tenor Christophe Poncet, possessing a lively high timbre that would suit a bel canto or a Verdi role, sang Oedpius with exactly the right kind of Italian character that Stravinsky created for the role. He is a little shaky in places, but gets a good balance between the declarative projecting of the role and making it dramatically meaningful, which is by no means easy to achieve. Joëlle Charlier's Jocasta commands attention and sings the role well, but doesn't have the strong lower end that the dramatic side of the mezzo-soprano role requires. The supporting roles are well sung and the production also benefits from a powerful musical account of the work with Grzegorz Weirus conducting the Szeged Symphony Orchestra.
The Armel Opera Festival performance of Oedipus Rex can be viewed for free for six months after the performance on the ARTE Live Web streaming service. Subtitles are French only.
Alban Berg - Wozzeck
Bayerische Staatsoper, 2013
Lothar Koenigs, Andreas Kriegenburg, Simon Keenlyside, Angela Denoke, Roman Sadnik, Kevin Conners, Wolfgang Ablinger-Sperrhacke, Wolfgang Bankl, Scott Wilde, Matthew Grills, Dean Power, Heike Grötzinger
Staatsoper.TV Internet steaming - 6th October 2013
It's hard to know how you should feel or quite by what criteria you judge the performance of any Alban Berg opera. Wozzeck, Berg's only completed opera (Lulu's third act remained unfinished at the time of his death), should I suppose be a painful experience and should gradually beat you down much in the same way that life does for its protagonist. The music too is by no means comforting or easy to listen to, but neither is it inaccessible or "difficult" in the way that Lulu's 12-tone serialism can often be. As a reflection of the drama, it's dark and unrelenting, and so too is the Bayerische's 2013 production directed by Andreas Kriegenburg and conducted by Lothar Koenigs.
Part of the problem with knowing quite what to make of Wozzeck and its protagonist undoubtedly stems from the fragmentary nature of the episodes in Georg Büchner's original unfinished manuscript. Wozzeck, we are told in the introduction to the Bayerische's production, is a good man who is ground down by the system, by the brutality, ignorance and hypocrisy of other people, by poverty, misery and illness, by life in general. But is he a good man, is he an innocent or is he simply a disturbed individual? It's difficult to tell, since he reacts angrily to Marie's infidelity but remains outwardly impassive to what goes on in relation to the abuse and exploitation of his nature and character by the Captain, the Doctor and the Drum Major. Until obviously, it all becomes too much and he finally cracks...
If there's any indication then just what the inner nature of Wozzeck is, it must be found in Berg's music. Here you have his personality, his confusion and his building anger, all in a way that makes rather more sense of the eventual violent release of his frustrations. And, yes, it tells you that Wozzeck is at heart a good man. Berg's music is a rich combination of sounds, melodies and voices, a genuinely free experimental attempt to redefine the structures of operatic language outside of the constrictions of the traditional or indeed the atonal language. There are no restrictions, old is mixed with new, the three acts of five scenes are each described as 'Character Pieces' (Act I), a 'Symphony in Five Movements' (Act II) and 'Six Inventions' (Act III) that employ a variety of musical forms and styles to cover the whole range of the subject. It truly is music in service of drama and character, not in service of music itself.
If a production engages with it in the way that it ought to, it should achieve the full impact of Wozzeck's terrible sequence of dramatic events. The three acts played straight through without intermission Andreas Kriegenburg's production and Harald B. Thor's sets unquestionably achieve that. Under predominately monochrome lighting the locations are almost invariably within damp, dank and misty and silver-blue moonlit settings capture the utter darkness and misery of the situation. They also give some indication of Wozzeck's mindset and even give premonitory hints of his eventual fate - Wozzeck spending most of the time with his feet soaking as he plods across the waterlogged stage. There's practically no colour, the production team resisting the urge even to splash some red around. There's a brief flame at one stage, but no sunsets and no blood.
You would however expect the stage and lighting to depict a rather dark and grim picture, so what is notable about the Bayerische's production is its division between interiors and exteriors that don't so much coincide with Wozzeck's actual location as to whether his mind is locked-in or outwardly expressive (and even then, his outward expressions are still somewhat dissociative). There is also a slightly greater role given over to Wozzeck and Marie's son, who remains mostly within the boxed room detached from the watery floor space that the others occupy. He is mostly silent but paints words on the wall on occasion ("Papa, Geld!, Hure" - Father, Money! and Slut) that heighten the sordidness of the situations and indicate that the child is not untouched by them.
All of this works with the nature of the work itself and doesn't over-complicate the character of the music or the singing performances which are just as vital an aspect. Again you can hardly judge the singing performances for their beauty of expression, but there are nonetheless great demands placed on all the performers and they cope well. Simon Keenlyside has considerable experience in the role of Wozzeck and is performing the role in several other productions this season. His performance here is, not unexpectedly, deeply intense, conveying as much through his posture and bearing as he does through his expressive singing. Angela Denoke is just as impressive as Marie, a thankless role of a character that is scarcely any less put-upon than Wozzeck, but this is a strong production all round, with the Bayerische's regular company singers all putting in solid performances as the work's gallery of grotesques.
André-Modest Grétry - Guillaume Tell
Opéra Royal de Wallonie, Liège, 2013
Claudio Scimone, Stefano Mazzonis di Pralafera, Marc Laho, Anne-Catherine Gillet, Lionel Lhote, Liesbeth Devos, Patrick Delcour, Stefan Cifolelli
ARTE Live Web, Internet Steaming, June 2013
I've been very impressed with the work that Stefano Mazzonis di Pralafera has achieved over the last couple of years as director in charge of the Opéra Royal de Wallonie in Liège. There's been a good mix of standard repertoire done with some originality and flair, and there's also been some more adventurous programming of lesser-known but wholly accessible works deserving of rather more exposure (Haydn, Galuppi, early Rossini). This year has been no exception, but to celebrate the opera company's return to their restored home at the Théâtre Royal the 2012-13 season significantly opened and closed with rarely performed works by two composers born in Liège - César Franck (whose early work Stradella opened the new season) and André-Modeste Grétry.
Grétry is another of those composers who were wildly popular in their time but whose work is now considered somewhat unfashionable and unlikely to click with a modern audience. It's true that the spoken dialogue, comic diversions and pleasant melodies of the French opéra-comique operetta form is far removed from the serious Italian or German opera styles prevalent in the standard opera repertoire, and that the humour and musicianship is far from the sophistication of Grétry's contemporary Mozart. Written in 1791 (the year Mozart died) for Paris audiences by a composer who came through the French Revolution, the timing of his version of the William Tell story at least gives it some historical interest. It gives much more than that however in this terrific production from Liège, which goes to great lengths to reproduce the authentic nature and the spirit of the work, and manages to do so to great effect.
Running to only 85 minutes in length, Grétry's version of Guillaume Tell is considerably more concise in its treatment of the historical drama than Rossini's final masterpiece, but by and large the main points are the same. The composer even finds plenty of opportunity within this short running time to introduce all those little colourful interludes and songs that seem to have little relevance to the actual drama but are so much a part of the opéra-comique style. Here, at the opening of Act I it's all to do with the wedding of Melktal, the son of the chief of the canton, to Marie, the daughter of William Tell. Despite his father being away on business, discussing the question of the high taxes that are being demanded by the Austrian governor Gessler, the wedding is going ahead, and there is inevitably much singing and dancing.
The celebrations are however abruptly halted by the news of the elder Melktal's unfortunate run-in with Gessler. A dispute has arisen over the correct form to show respect to a representative of the Emperor and as a lesson, Gessler has demanded that his hat be displayed prominently in the town square, and that respects should be paid to it by everyone who passes. Melktal's father - it is reported rather than actually acted out - indignantly responds that he would never see such a thing, and promptly has his eyes burned out by the cruel governor. William Tell nevertheless also defies the ruling - and similarly we are told this rather than shown it - and is arrested, but is given the chance to save himself from execution if he can demonstrate his ability as the greatest archer in Switzerland by shooting an apple set on the head of his son. That bit we most definitely don't miss out on.
Despite the unusual approach to the development of the drama, with many diversions of local colour and humour, Grétry's Guillaume Tell is nonetheless wonderfully constructed, hitting all the necessary dramatic points with plenty of entertainment and colour. It's also performed that way in this charming production of the work by the Opéra Royal de Wallonie. Quite why there's so much comic exaggeration in the long drawn out phrases and curious intonations of the spoken dialogue, I'm not sure. Is this an historically accurate way of performing an opéra-comique, or is it just making fun of the Swiss Alpine accent in this particular work? It takes a little getting used to, but it does add something to what might otherwise sound silly - even if that is just more silliness. Most disconcertingly, it's even used during the grave account of the elder Melktal's blinding, which makes it curiously funny and disturbing at the same time.
Elsewhere there's a similar approach to the staging, which on the one hand looks cheesy with its old-fashioned Swiss country village setting and painted backdrops (including a wheeled on cow that leaves behind a bit of a mess), but it also captures the contradictory nature of this Guillaume Tell (and perhaps Grétry's ambivalent response to the Revolution which did him little favour as a composer and citizen of Paris) and gets across the spirit of the work in a way that feels authentic, or at least appropriate. Still allowing time for diversions as the drama escalates with William Tell's actions, this tone and its effectiveness is best exemplified in the battle scene which is played out with cardboard cut-out soldiers operated by puppet strings. A little more modern technical wizardry is called for in the critical apple shooting archery scene - a neon-lit arrow flying with slow-motion sureness on the darkened stage towards its goal - but again it all fits marvellously with the tone adopted.
The acting and singing performances are all also very much on the same page. The performances never pretend to be anything other than fully theatrical, but they are taken seriously within this context and never resort to tongue-in-cheek making fun of the work or its stylisations. This has been typical of Opéra Royal de Wallonie productions under Stefano Mazzonis di Pralafera, and once again it proves to be the best possible way of presenting this kind of material.
Also typical of the Liège company is the use of a strong regular cast of Belgian singers (with occasional imported Italians and other nationalities in works that require a more authentic touch). Accordingly, we have the usual solid performances from Marc Laho as Tell, although his character is somewhat surprisingly not tested with any arias in this work, Anne-Catherine Gillet as his wife (taking most of the main arias and singing them wonderfully), with Lionel Lhote as Gessler and Liesbeth Devos as the Tell's daughter Marie. With this kind of presentation, Grétry's Guillaume Tell becomes more than just a fascinating historical curiosity and comes fully to life once again as a marvellous entertainment.
The Opéra Royal de Wallonie's production of Grétry's Guillaume Tell is available for viewing for free via Internet Streaming on the ARTE Live Web site. There are no subtitles for the broadcast.
