Christoph Willibald Gluck - Orfeo ed Euridice
NorrlandsOperan, Armel Opera Festival 2018
Olof Boman, Åsa Kalmér, Susanna Levonen, Henriikka Gröndahl, Jeanne Gérard
ARTE Concert - 1 July 2018
You can always find ways of bringing a conceptual or modern-day reworking to the Orpheus myth, but what is more important in any performance of Orfeo ed Euridice is that it responds to the beauty, purity and simplicity of Gluck's reformist agenda for opera. The fact that it can easily sustain both modern conceptual (Romeo Castellucci) and more elaborate theatricality (La Fura dels Baus) and that it even has the flexibility to cast Orfeo as a mezzo-soprano, countertenor or even a bass! (Lyon 2015) is testament not only to the robustness of the framework that supports the opera, but that the principles behind it are also enduring.
It's one of the key works of all opera, one that any composer can look back on and learn from, and many of them did. The same goes for any jaded opera-goer (does such a thing exist?) or even anyone who has over-indulged in Strauss, Puccini and Wagner and wants to return right back to the basics. Whether it's the original Italian version Orfeo ed Euridice, Gluck's even more austere stripped back French version Orphée et Eurydice or even Berlioz's edition of the best of both worlds, it's an opera of exquisite beauty that demonstrates what opera is capable of in its blending of music and drama, in its use of myth and in the Orpheus-like magic of breathing new life into it that performance can bring.
The most important aspect then, and it's one that the Swedish NorrlandsOperan company do very well in their production, is that most basic of opera requirements - bringing the drama and the music together perfectly to highlight its essential purpose. Orfeo ed Eurydice is a work that celebrates love and music in its mythological subject, but it also considers death, grief and new beginnings as a necessary part of human existence.
I don't know if you can find any conceptual reading within the NorrlandsOperan production, performed here at the 2018 Armel Opera Festival, but the tilted mirror looking down on the stage somehow opens up the space while at the same time closing it down. The idea of division is important in Orfeo ed Euridice, most evidently in the demarcation between the living and the dead, and this is as effective a way as any of making that idea visual and ever-present. The main difference or unique point of this particular production is that Orpheus is a woman as well as Eurydice.
It's common enough for a woman to sing the role of Orpheus, the role often better suited to the more robust mezzo-soprano voice than the lyrical countertenor (although both have their own distinct qualities), but in the NorrlandsOperan production there is no attempt to make Orpheus look like a man. There's no need to either and it's not just to a concession to modern notions of diversity in relationships. The perfect simplicity of Orfeo ed Euridice and the myth itself is that the idea of love doesn't need to be defined in male/female terms. It's a human experience common to everyone and a woman is quite capable as a man of feeling the same love, grief and feelings for a loved one that takes Orpheus to such depths and yet rise above them.
Sung by Susanna Levonen and brilliantly directed by Åsa Kalmér, the depth of those feelings are beautifully expressed and never more apparent than in the glorious scene where Orpheus finally discovers Eurydice in Elysium with the Blessed Spirits ('Torna, o bella'). For this scene, as elsewhere, the set is simply dressed, kept down to essentials. A snowy veil lifts away from the floor as the lovers are reunited, the ancient pillars that were standing in Thrace now fallen in the Underworld. It's as simple and effective as that, and as simple and effective as Gluck's wondrous scoring of the opera.
It's given a fine musical reading as well, Olof Boman conducting the Armel orchestra through a full account of the work that includes all the dance pieces. I can't say that the dancing is great, but it's good to have these pieces included, particularly in the epilogue scenes. The chorus - a vital character in this work - is outstanding. Henriikka Gröndahl's Eurydice gives her character an equal footing with Orpheus, which is something you don't always get. It's an impressive performance with purity and sincerity of expression that takes into consideration the extreme suffering and exquisite joy that humans are capable of experiencing. Sung by Jeanne Gérard, Amore also has an extended role to play as a punkish - or perhaps Puck-ish - figure in red who observes the journey of Orpheus and permits a breaking of the usual rules.
Links: Armel Opera Festival, ARTE Concert
