Leoš Janáček - From the House of the Dead
Bayerische Staatsoper, 2018
Simone Young, Frank Castorf, Peter Rose, Evgeniya Sotnikova, Aleš Briscein, Charles Workman, Bo Skovhus, Christian Rieger, Manuel Günther, Tim Kuypers, Ulrich Reß,
Belair Classiques - Blu-ray
Personally I'll always hold the director Frank Castorf in the highest esteem for his deeply thoughtful Bayreuth Ring that dared to upset many but explored this complex work on numerous levels with increasing but unpredictable precision across all four days of that monumental opera cycle. There's no doubt however that the German theatre director can be hard work, particularly when he tries to condense down many ideas into a much shorter work like From the House of the Dead. Although the actual circumstances of the each of the inmates in a Siberian work camp is hard, the underlying humanistic intent and meaning of Janáček's opera, and indeed Dostoevsky's original work based on his own experiences as a political prisoner, shouldn't be quite so difficult to understand.
And at the most basic level its purpose does come across clearly. From the House of the Dead is a remarkable book and opera that celebrates the diversity of life and the power of humanity to endure the most abject of situations, retain hope and even some twisted sense of brotherhood or community in their shared experience that helps face the hardships that have to be endured. It's not so simple really when you break that down and even in this concise opera Janáček gives voice to the experiences of a number of men, each with very different ways of dealing with the situation they find themselves in, not all of them noble or their stories life-affirming. Janáček's music goes a considerable way to break that down and reassemble these broken people into a common humanity but Frank Castorf obviously isn't going to let Janáček do all the work.
One of the common experiences that all of the men in the Siberian labour camp have is hardship and living constantly in the presence of death. Death is inevitably uppermost in the minds of men struggling to survive intact from the soul-destroying experience of having endured time in this House of the Dead. As a way of showing how this brings about a recognition of one's mortality, Castorf has the inmates dress up as carnival goers wearing macabre suits and masks for a Day of the Dead parade. To contrast this and to provide some light that needs to exist somewhere in all this darkness, the symbolic eagle that is captured and eventually freed is at the same time an eagle and Aljeja, the young Tartar prisoner befriended and mentored by Petrovic, dressed in another colourful carnival costume as a Bird of Paradise.
Like many of the constructions created for his Ring tetralogy, the set is a typical three-dimensional rotating construction of a concentration of a camp, if I may be allowed to describe it that way, closed in and layered upwards with guards and warders up on the upper level, the grimness of the prison camp's concrete and barbed wire below. In a way it's like all humanity at its best and worst is crammed down below, faces scarred, covered in boils and sores, others stained with blood and dirt. There is certainly an expansive look at the variety and diversity of life experiences to be found in the stories that the men tell to stand out and affirm their own sense of identity. There's also a measure of release in expressing their cynical view of the unjust cruel world outside, taking some comfort at the same time in the stories of others' experiences that are worse than their own. Even the way they amuse themselves, fighting, bickering, mistreating prostitutes, putting on an absurd theatrical entertainment, has an air of grim but necessary release from inner demons.
To extend that view and get down and dirty with it Castorf uses another device the viewer might be familiar with from his Bayreuth Ring and that's using video screens with cameramen walking around the stage gathering closeups and behind the scenes incidents. Characters speak silently to the camera with subtitles provided (not always in English), spotlights and searchlights, contribute to the intense situation and there are of course plenty of Castorf's strange touches that connect to or have contemporary associations like an illuminated Pepsi Cola sign and a movie poster of Joseph Losey's 'The Assassination of Trotsky'. What they all mean is anyone's guess, but they all add to an interesting view on an always fascinating work.
Something else that you can always count on in From the House of the Dead is the opportunity to see some fine singers put through their paces in an opera that always remains a challenge and requires exceptional singers, not least because they are sung in Czech. The Bavarian State Opera have engaged an exceptional cast here, all of them very much rising to the challenge that Janáček and Castorf have in store for them. More often a Gremin in Eugene Onegin or Daland in Der fliegende Holländer Peter Rose is a great singer but rarely gets parts as expressive as Petrovic and he makes a great impression here. Charles Workman characteristically throws himself into the madness of Skuratov and Bo Skovhus brings a more menacing edge to Šiškov, but all the variety that you expect to find is there in the excellent casting. Janáček's opera has an uneven rhythmic melodic pulse but Simone Young finds that through-line in the score that captures the different tones and adventurous instrumentation employed by the composer in his final work.
The quality of the picture and sound on the BelAir Blu-ray release is excellent, the image clear and free from any issues, the relatively short work comfortably fitting on a BD25 disc. The detail of the score comes across well on both the lossless PCM stereo and DTS HD Master Audio 5.1 surround audio tracks. There are no extra features on the disc and the booklet only includes a synopsis and tracklist, with no information on the intentions of the production.
Links: Bayerische Staatsoper
Gaetano Donizetti - L’elisir d’amore
Bayerische Staastsoper, 2015
Asher Fisch, David Bösch, Ailyn Pérez, Matthew Polenzani, Mario Cassi, Ambrogio Maestri, Evgeniya Sotnikova
Staatsoper.tv - 12 April 2015
L'elisir d'amore is not the most romantic romantic-comedy ever written, nor is the most comic romantic-comedy either, but what it does have that stands in its favour above all else is the delightful exuberance of Donizetti's sparkling score. David Bösch's 2015 production for the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, broadcast live via their web streaming service on 12 April, doesn't do much for either the romance or the comedy, but - particularly under the baton of Asher Fisch - it is definitely Donizetti at his most exuberant.
So, where are we this time? You can take nothing for granted in a production at the Bayerische Staatsoper, except that an opera almost certainly won't be in its original setting, and probably not even in any familiar or naturalistic setting either. And so it is with the post-apocalyptic wasteland of David Bösch's L'elisir d'amore. That hardly sounds like the ideal place for a romantic-comedy - Love is a battlefield? - but perhaps there's no need to look too deeply into the production design or Donizetti's opera for any deep conceptual meaning, other than the need to present it in a bright, dynamic and eye-catching fashion.
And it most certainly is that. There are only one or two big effects, which have great impact, but mostly the staging is kept simple on a single set. It's a desert wasteland on a well lit stage, the inhabitants all brightly dressed, but slightly shabby and looking rather the worse for wear. They look like they could well do with some of Professor Dulcamara's miracle elixir to cure every ill when he rolls up into town not so much a wagon as a huge space-age globe vehicle. Dulcamara's arrival should be an something of a wondrous occasion, and rather than looking like an obvious snake-oil hustler, here he arrives with the kind of entrance that is going to have an impact on the willingly credulous populace.
Impact is what it's all about, and exuberance with it. For L'elisir d'amore to work it ought to sweep you up into its world, and Bösch certainly creates a world to get lost in. It never gets dull, it never gets too silly, but rather creates little moments of wonder and magic, particularly in relation to Nemorino in his idealised love for the cruelly dismissive Adina. Balloons form a (rough) heart in the sky (leading up to Adina's hastily arranged wedding with the soldier Belcore), and there is an amusing scene when the young ladies of the town all chase Nemorino in wedding dresses upon news of him receiving his uncle's inheritance. It all builds nicely towards the big finale, which hits home exactly as it should.
So the romance and the comedy is there, after a fashion, albeit in a slightly off-centre and non-obvious way. The soldiers in this Elisir, for example, are desert rats, and the magic potion given to Nemorino comes in a fire-extinguisher looking like an IED, which is I suppose the impact it inadvertently has, but I don't think there's any point in reading much more into it than that. This is a fantasy land setting with real-world pointers, making it somewhat familiar but also poking fun at the absurdity of it all. And absurdity is what we get, particularly in the brilliant comic turn here from Matthew Polenzani as Nemorino.
Polenzani is the stand-out performer here, although the rest of the cast are all perfectly complementary to the tone of the production and in terms of vocal delivery, which in this work is quite challenging. Polenzani is particularly good in this repertoire and sings Nemorino wonderfully, giving him real character, throwing himself wholly into the proceedings with... well, yes... exuberance. He's a lively figure here, and it's just what the work and the production needs. Ailyn Pérez isn't quite as charismatic and the singing challenges of Adina stretch her on one or two occasions, but it's still an impressive performance. Mario Cassi's Belcore is rather underplayed, reflecting the soldier's rough lack of personality. Ambrogio Maestri's Dulcamara isn't overplayed either, and there's a nice turn from Evgeniya Sotnikova as Gianetta.
Nemorino is at the heart of this production, and Matthew Polenzani's entertaining performance carries it off, but it's conductor Asher Fisch who really leads the dance. This is a warm, vigorous and, I'll say it again, exuberant account of Donizetti's score from the Bayerisches Staastorchester, supporting the singers, getting right behind them, finding all the dynamic that is required here, getting it across with a flourish at the big moments, and taking us out with a real bang at the finale. Terrific.
May is a ballet month in Munich with a live broadcast of Der gelbe Klang / Spiral Pass / Konzert für Violine und Orchester. The next opera broadcast from the Bayerische Staastsoper is Alban Berg's LULU, conducted by Kirill Petrenko and directed by Dmitri Tcherniakov with Marlis Petersen in the title role. It will be streamed live for free from the Staatsoper.tv site on 6 June.
Links: Staatsoper.tv
Gioachino Rossini - Guillaume Tell
Bayerische Staatsoper, Munich - 2014
Dan Ettinger, Antú Romero Nunes, Michael Volle, Bryan Hymel, Marina Rebeka, Evgeniya Sotnikova, Günther Groissböck, Jennifer Johnston, Goran Jurić, Christoph Stephinger, Kevin Conners, Enea Scala, Christian Rieger
Staatsoper.tv Live Web streaming - 28 June 2014
The qualities of Rossini's musical composition and the measure of how advanced his dramatic writing is in comparison to his earlier works, is clearly evident in his prematurely final work for the Paris Opera, Guillaume Tell. In part, that's much to do with the quality of the orchestra that Rossini had at his disposal, but there's clearly ambition on the part of the composer to move away from the standard number opera towards a more dramatic musical expression. In many ways, even though it is largely through-composed, Guillaume Tell points the way towards the grand opéra tradition, even as it looks back and retains a sense of the opera seria.
In both respects, whether it adheres towards one style or other, Rossini's final opera is a virtuoso work that requires performers of an extremely high calibre. It's a long work, almost four hours without cuts, with challenging vocal lines that push one tenor role to deliver fifteen high-Cs, many of them late in the second Act. The challenges extend to the staging of the dramatic action. Other than providing a sense of location for the Swiss Lake Lucerne setting, there aren't any conventionally difficult scenes to stage (other than an archer shooting an apple off a boy's head evidently!), but the real challenge lies rather in finding a way to make the staging visually and dramatically interesting. Without proper direction there can be a lot of opera seria-like standing around singing out one's emotional conflict to the audience.
Consequently, Guillaume Tell is not a work that is performed very often, but if the considerable musical and dramatic challenges can be overcome, there are great rewards to be found in this remarkable opera. Set during the Swiss revolt against the Austrian Hapsburg occupation in the thirteenth century and even managing to tie a doomed love affair into the storyline, there is at least a strong dramatic situation in Guillaume Tell. It's the kind of scenario that Verdi would come to specialise in, and Rossini's writing here sets a high bar for his successor to aspire to and eventually surpass. An oppressed nation under a hated foreign rule, stirrings of revolution and expressions of patriotic fervour, there's even a romantic situation of lovers torn in a conflict of love and duty to one's country.
The sense of the kind of passions that underlie Guillaume Tell are exemplified by the action that opens the opera. Leuthold, angry at an assault committed by Austria troops in his village, brutally attacks and kills the soldier responsible for the abduction of his daughter. This scene is shown silently before the opera starts, but rather than choose to follow this with the traditional overture, Act I of this production launches straight into the action with the village wedding celebrations that are soon to be interrupted by news of the Austrian governor Gessler's reprisals. The dropping the overture (or moving it, as it transpires, since cutting it would be unforgivable), and even the tone of the wedding celebrations indicate that this is going to be a production that emphasises the darker side of Guillaume Tell. And, being Munich, it's an abstract and modernised staging as well, looking like it is set sometime in the 1970s.
Instead of anything like traditional backdrops or even a sense of the setting even being anywhere in Switzerland, the production relies mainly on a layered series of columns on a darkened stage, the long tubular shapes rising and falling, symbolising or at least effectively evoking a sense of crushing oppression. In other scenes, the pillars float, revolve and strike angular positions, always matching the tone of the scene, whether it's a love scene or one of conflict. Or both, as is the case with Arnold Melcthal and his love for Mathilde, a Hapsburg princess whose life he once saved from an avalanche. On hearing that his father has been executed by Gessler, Arnold however has no choice but to join the call to arms that the intrepid archer William Tell is advocating against the oppressors.
Advocating, that is, with a gun rather than a traditional bow and arrow. Following the absence of the overture, this could lead the audience to wonder whether the director hasn't gone too far in taking Guillaume Tell away from the crowd-pleasing elements that contribute to its musical and dramatic greatness. That proves not to actually be the case. The shooting of the apple from Jemmy's head it staged with a crossbow and has full dramatic impact at the end of Act I, while the overture is reinstated after the interval before the start of the second act, a place where - arguably of course - it fits in well. It's not so much delayed gratification as using the melancholy tone of the solo viola to reflect Jemmy's sense of impending death - one that is populated it seems by fantasy figures from 'Where The Wild Things Are' - exploding into the famous march as the success of Tell's shot is seen to be sure and his turning on Gessler provokes the people to rise up in rebellion.
The Bayerische Staatsoper are of course well-known for taking on challenging works as well as for the experimental stylisations they take in their approach to opera stagings. For a work that is rarely staged which and has as many challenges as Guillaume Tell, the obvious approach would be stick with a familiar traditional period production, but playing it safe is never an option for the Munich opera company. Not that they get any thanks for it. The mindless booing that greeted Antú Romero Nunes and his team at the curtain call was inevitable then, but Munich should continue to pursue this kind of approach undaunted. It might infuriate a small section of the audience, but Nunes' approach succeeded in projecting a suitable tone for Rossini's opera, the measure of its success being plainly that the force of the work and the sentiments it expresses were fully achieved. I'm not sure why anyone would think the wearing of lederhosen and a few painted backdrops of the Alps would have improved it greatly.
There could however be little anyone would find lacking in the musical performance or the singing. Dan Ettinger finds a lush romanticism in the score, quite different from the familiar Rossinian romp, that drives the sweep of the drama wonderfully. The structure of the work is likewise tied more to dramatic requirements than to providing tailor-made roles to either showcase the performers' talents or spare their energies. It's a good hour and a half for example before the arch-villain Gessler even makes an appearance. Günther Groissböck doesn't quite have the depth of bass for a commanding governor, but donning a bull's head mask he presents a fearsome enough figure for Tell to defy. It was Marina Rebeka however who won most of the applause at the end of Act I for her Mathilde, and deservedly so.
Michael Volle and Bryan Hymel's Act I contributions were also acknowledged, but they really came into their own in Act II. Volle was as solid and reliable as ever as Tell, but it was Hymel who really impressed here. You have to give credit to any tenor who can hit all Arnold's high-Cs, but Hymel took them all effortlessly through a smooth vocal line and timbre that now seems more natural for Rossini than the heavy dramatic requirements of Verdi and Grand Opera. Evgeniya Sotnikova made the role of Jemmy count with a clear and expressive delivery, as did Jennifer Johnston as Hedwige.
Links: Bayerische Staatsoper.tv
Giuseppe Verdi - Macbeth
Bayerische Staatsoper, 2013
Massimo Zanetti, Martin Kušej, Željko Lučić, Goran Jurić, Nadja Michael, Evgeniya Sotnikova, Wookyung Kim, Emanuele D'Aguanno, Christoph Stephinger, Andrea Borghini, Rafał Pawnuk, Iulia Maria Dan, Tölzer Knabenchor
Live Internet Streaming, 11 May 2013
I've seen enough serial-killer horror films to know what it means when a room is "decorated" in plastic sheeting. I've also seen enough Martin Kušej stage productions to know he likes to mess up the stage with splashes of blood around the place. I also know Verdi's Macbeth well enough (better than Shakespeare's original work admittedly) to know that there's ample opportunity then for the red stuff to flow liberally in the Bayerische Staatsoper's new production. With promotional images showing a stage filled with 16,000 skulls, it looked like someone was going to have quite a job hosing down the sheeting at the end of this one. So how come this production never quite lived up to its potential?
On paper - and in promotional images - it all looks good. There's a strong, dark concept here to match the darkness of Shakespeare's vision and Verdi's brooding 1847 account of it. "If we can't make something great out it", Verdi wrote to his librettist Piave, "let's at least try to make it something out of the ordinary". Verdi's Macbeth is indeed a pale shadow of the original work, but in its own way it is something extraordinary. Martin Kušej likewise looks well placed to bring something extraordinary out if the work, if not indeed something great. His productions, as I've noted in the past (in Die Fliegende Höllander, in Genoveva, in Rusalka) are often concerned with elements of class, and there's plenty of social climbing ambition to be found in Verdi's Macbeth.
Verdi's choruses, his placing of the voices of the people up there on the stage, provide a clear dividing line between the machinations of the royal titled nobility and the common people. Kušej acknowledges those divisions, but also recognises that in Verdi's work the voice of the people is a rather more complex one. They're the driving force that celebrates the victories of Macbeth and Banquo, are sincere in their outpouring of unrestrained grief at the death of Duncan and, most obviously, are the motivating force that overthrows their country from the repressive regime that it descends into under Macbeth's bloody reign.
The masses also represent a certain fantastic element in Verdi's version of Shakespeare's play, since the witches here are not three weird sisters, but a chorus who determine the direction of fate and the destiny of the major players. There's a level of complicity then in their actions that endorses, idolises (lighters aloft) and encourages the ambitions of the ruling classes, even turning a blind eye (wearing hoods here) to Macbeth's crimes. They are no mere background chorus then in Kušej's production, and it's hard not to notice their presence and their hand in the playing out of the drama here.
The foreground characters are however rather less well defined. Partly that's Verdi's fault in his reduction of the complexity of Shakespeare's play and his breakdown of the work into four acts that really never flow in a convincingly dramatic way. Within each of those four acts however there is a wealth of characterisation that can be brought out when attention is paid to the score and the vocal writing, but there was something lacking on that front in this production. Željko Lučić, as he demonstrated recently in the Metropolitan Opera's Rigoletto, has a lovely lyrical Verdian baritone, but he doesn't have the presence, the steel or the personality to bring something greater to the character of Macbeth.
Nadja Michael, it must be said, is not lacking in personality or presence. Even if her singing performances can lack discipline and attention to detail, that's not so much of an issue with her character here. Verdi didn't want a beautiful voice for Lady Macbeth, but someone with indeed the kind of personality to bring dramatic expression to the role. Nadja Michael would seem to fit the bill perfectly then and she was indeed quite formidable in aspect, pacing the stage with determination, her face bathed in dark shadows. Her vocal delivery however left something to be desired. She seemed rather restrained in her 'La luce langue' (1865 revised version of the opera performed here), but her deficiencies became more pronounced in the later acts when she really ought to dominate proceedings.
Without the necessary personality and singing ability in these critical roles, it's difficult to make Macbeth work, no matter how strong the concept, but particularly when they are meant to represent a "killing machine" force. Visually, with the performers and the chorus often balanced on top of a mount of 16,000 skulls, the 'killing fields' concept was strong and it would be hard to imagine a darker account of 'Patria oppressa!' than the one that takes place here in a slaughterhouse with naked bodies suspended upside-down from meathooks. There were inevitably some curiosities in the actions of the chorus and in the symbolism of a tent on the stage that seemed representative of royalty or just death, but they did have an unsettling character that worked, particularly when the dying bloody Duncan is seen crawling out of the opening of the tent. Overall however, it all felt very detached from the musical drama, with neither the chorus or the principals ever managing to match the force and darkness of the actual work.
The disjointed approach of the staging perhaps reflects Verdi's piecemeal approach to the work, but it can be overcome with the right production and casting. Unfortunately, the frequent fades to black with brief pauses for scene changes drain all the energy out of the performances and stall the flow of a work that at least has a strong thematic consistency in the musical composition. Some of the work's potential was realised at the conclusion, which benefitted also from a beautifully sung Macduff (Wookyung Kim), but it was definitely too little and too late. The score was at least given a very powerful account from the Bayerisches orchestra under Massimo Zanetti, but the production never allowed those essential characteristics that make Verdi's Macbeth a powerful if flawed work to assert themselves and hold all the various elements together.
This performance of Macbeth was broadcast live on 11th May 2013 via the Bayerische Staatsoper's own Live Internet Streaming service.
