Stefano Landi - La Morte d'Orfeo
Dutch National Opera, 2018
Christophe Rousset, Pierre Audi, Cecilia Molinari, Renato Dolcini, Alexander Miminoshvili, Gaia Petrone, Rosina Fabius, Magdalena Pluta, Juan Francisco Gatell, Kacper Szelążek, Emiliano Gonzales Toro, Salvo Vitali
Naxos - Blu-ray
The myth of Orpheus has not only been the inspiration to some of the greatest works of opera ever written, it could even be said to have inspired the creation of opera itself. Certainly some of operas most important key works, namely Monteverdi's L'Orfeo (1607) and Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice (1774), are works that still carry every bit of their original power, beauty and meaning from several hundred years ago through to the present day. Every new production of these works seems to find endless inspiration in them and it's not difficult to see why since the story of Orpheus is about transforming life into art that lasts through the ages. The moral that there's a high price to be paid for the artist who pours his life into immortal works is however conveniently glossed over somewhat in these early opera versions of the myth. Not so in Stefano Landi's La Morte d'Orfeo.
Orpheus's journey to the Underworld to bring back his dead wife Eurydice is not the whole story, and there is certainly no happy ending of the kind that was imposed by dramatic convention on Gluck's opera, but rather there is more to be learned in the myth that makes its meaning even more tragic and illuminating. The fate of Orpheus is taken up from where Monteverdi left off in La Morte d'Orfeo composed in 1619 by Stefano Landi who, as a Papal composer, was nonetheless likewise adapting the story for his own audience. Orpheus does indeed pay a high price for his infractions against the order of the gods, and not just though his insistence on reviving the dead Eurydice, but for the sins of pride and artistic excess. For the sinning against the purity of women and the sacred bond of marriage, he is ripped apart by the women of the maenads.
Orpheus might have the power to charm the God and the spirits of the Underworld with his music, but there are other stronger forces at work on the artist and Orpheus is torn between the Apollonian and the Dionysian. Landi personifies that struggle in the first scene of La Morte d'Orfeo, and Pierre Audi directing this Dutch National Opera production (his last production after 30 years as artistic director there) depicts that simply and directly. Fate has decreed that Orpheus die on his birthday and Orpheus is shown as helpless against the coming of the dawn, Aurora, and the breezes that sidle up against him, waking him to the fate that Fate has in store for him. All of these forces have physical form and are personified, as also is Fury.
Orpheus however is oblivious to his fate, a demigod who perhaps even believes himself exempt from the fate of ordinary mortals. Follow the path of virtue, advises his father, beware of women and their wiles. "He who does not honour love is better off dead". When Orpheus slights Bacchus however, his followers, the maenads call for vengeance. There is something typically anti-women in Laudi's depiction of this situation for his Roman Catholic commissioners, but there are two ways of looking at this and Audi turns it around for the #MeToo age where it becomes a cautionary tale not for the benefit of men to beware of women leading them into sin, but that a reckoning will come for those who mistreat and abuse women.
Up to that point much of the opera is fairly dry, delivered mostly through early opera style recititative and choruses, with little in the way of arias. There's little that Pierre Audi can do to enliven the lack of conventional dramatic action. He keeps the direction simple and doesn't clutter the smaller scale stage of the Muziekgebouw theatre in Amsterdam, restricting expression to costumes of pale colours and blood red lighting for the drama. The design has a few of the familiar Audi aesthetics but nothing that distracts from the purpose of the work, an upside down flowering tree with blood red blooms the only real symbolism on the stage.
If there's a lack of expression in the dramatic action and expression, all the colour is there however in the characters and personification of the forces of nature, and that is very much brought out by Landi's musical composition and the beautiful textures and colours of the baroque instruments. It's assisted considerably in that respect by Christophe Rousset and Les Talens Lyriques interpreting the score. There's less of the usual rhythmic drive that Rousset brings to this kind of period music, but this is not music for dance as it would be in a French tragédie lyrique. As anyone who has heard William Christie's revelatory Caen production of Landi's Il Sant'Alessio will expect, this is much more in the realm of spiritual or religious music that Landi more frequently worked in.
The greatness of the work then only really becomes evident with the death of Orpheus. Incredibly the dramatic scene of him being ripped apart by the maenads takes place off-stage and is instead recounted vividly in the music and singing of Fileno, who tells Calliope, the mother of Orpheus, how he witnessed her son destroyed even as he tried to appease the furies with his music and singing. It's by far the longest scene in the opera, the centrepiece, the emotional heart of the work and it's particularly impressive here for the lyrical singing and heartfelt delivery of Renato Dolcini. That tone is maintained for the remainder of the work, with organ music piping in behind Orpheus's funeral lament. It truly elevates the work to a thing of great beauty.
The structure and arrangement of the drama is not conventional then, and it doesn't put Orpheus at the centre of the opera - he actually has a lesser role in a small cast that play multiple roles - but rather as the title of the opera makes evident, it puts the death of Orpheus at the centre. Even the idea of Orpheus having some consolation that he might be reunited in death with his lost love Eurydice is taken from him. Charon and Mercury have bad news for him on that score, as Eurydice has taken the waters of Lethe, the river of forgetfulness. If the artist is to live on it is through his legacy and Orpheus urged to drink the same waters, leave behind his earthly desires and become a star in the heavenly firmament.
The 2018 DNO production of Stefano Landi's La Morte d'Orfeo is released on Blu-ray and DVD by Naxos. It's a fine production and a good recording that really serves this beautiful rare work well, particularly on the High Definition Blu-ray release with its lossless High Resolution stereo and surround soundtracks. The DTS HD-Master Audio 5.1 surround in particular gives space to that beautiful open percussive sound of the period instruments. The booklet included contains a full tracklist, a brief synopsis and an informative and insightful commentary on the work by Pierre Audi, who clearly understands the intentions of the work and brings those across wonderfully in this production. The disc includes subtitles in Italian, English, German, French, Japanese and Korean.
Links: Dutch National Opera
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Così Fan Tutte
Teatro Real, Madrid, 2013
Sylvain Cambrelling, Michael Haneke, Anett Fritsch, Paola Gardina, Juan Francisco Gatell, Andreas Wolf, Kerstin Avemo, William Shimell
ARTE Live Web Internet Streaming - June 2013
After attending a performance of Michael Haneke's only previous opera production, a terrific account of Mozart's Don Giovanni for the Paris Opera for composer's 250th anniversary in 2006, I observed that it would be hard to imagine the director finding any other Mozart work with a subject suitable for his particular worldview. It was a matter of interest then to see what Haneke had in mind for what is perhaps the least substantial of Mozart's mature operas, or at least the lesser of the composer's collaborations with librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte. A light amusement at the School for Lovers? Surely not with Michael Haneke?
It doesn't take too long however to recognise a familiar Haneke spin on events in his direction of Così Fan Tutte (viewed via ARTE Live Web Streaming from its Madrid production, but also available for viewing for a limited period via the La Monnaie streaming service) in how the director recognises or places a distinctive twist on the discord between the two couples in the work. Two couples? There would appear to be three couples in Haneke's version, the other one being made up of Don Alfonso and Despina. This unconventional couple don't so much dispense a lesson in love here as exhibit a cruel streak that pits the comfortable middle-class attitudes of complacency towards gender politics in both of the couples against one another. Some 'Funny Games' here perhaps?
Or perhaps 'Les Liaisons Dangereuses'? Haneke sets the production in what looks at first glance like a soirée at a French chateau, where some of the guests wear modern-day formal dinner-party dresses while others wear 18th century costumes. Is it a fancy dress party where costumes are optional, or is the director attempting to make a distinction between modern and rather older-fashioned attitudes towards love and affairs? Whatever the reason for the disparity, the dress, the corrupting behaviour and the attitudes expressed by this Don Alfonso in his assessment that women are not capable of being faithful is far from playful. There's a suggestion rather that he has more sinister motives for setting the couples of Dorabella and Ferrando and Flordiligi and Gugliemo against each other. His partner in crime Despina likewise seems to have a point to prove through her complicity in the events that ensue.
The allusions to a work that is close to contemporary with Mozart might be coincidental (or just in my own mind), but they are certainly in the spirit of the method that Haneke employs here. We might believe that our attitudes are more modern, sophisticated and enlightened than those expressed in the period of Mozart, Da Ponte and Choderlos de Laclos, but are we really all that different? Haneke seems to be suggesting that beneath the surface we are really no different and we just hide better those deeper, darker, less acceptable sentiments and desires that we'd rather not openly acknowledge ('Hidden'). It's significant that Haneke makes no real effort to put Ferrando and Gugliemo into convincing disguises that would fool their partners. Their real feelings and baser impulses in the nature of their seduction of each other's partner is undisguised, and perhaps even the women know it and are complicit on some level too. It's a rather mean-spirited view of the characters in Così Fan Tutte and of humanity in general, but what else would you expect from Michael Haneke?
If there's a characteristic cruelty in Haneke's reading of the work, there is however no violence expressed at all in the musical performance. Sylvain Cambrelling's conducting of the Madrid orchestra is soft, delicate and as beautiful as the score is capable of being. Rather than work against Haneke's intentions, the director uses the gentility of the performance here to complement or enhance the cool cynicism of his Don Alfonso. The delicate musical arrangement and lightheartedness of the libretto create an unsettling and somewhat sinister contrast then with the Master's actual expressions, his gestures and the viciousness of his behaviour. There's a similar dichotomy present in all of the characters and it's in the expression of this - as opposed to a concept that is somewhat questionable - that Haneke makes his own particular outlook on Così Fan Tutte work to some extent.
William Shimell, a baritone who has worked as an actor for Haneke (in the Oscar winning 'Amour') and for Abbas Kiarostami in 'Certified Copy' (and as it happens also played Don Alfonso in a Così for Aix-en-Provence directed by Kiarostami) is really the key player here. He sings well and his acting is strong enough to make this kind of twist in his persona credible. All of the cast however have clearly been well-directed and give strong performances. Haneke however is careful that any 'modifications' should not be at the expense of Mozart's writing and is very respectful of the vocal line. The singers are allowed to sing the roles then with full expression and let the direction carry the concept. The performances are all exceptionally good, with Anett Fritsch in particular standing out in the role of Flordiligi.
In a very interesting interview on the La Monnaie site, Haneke says that he is unlikely to extend his Mozart stagings to the third Mozart/Da Ponte collaboration, The Marriage of Figaro, since he finds its perfection intimidating and couldn't think of a way to adapt it to his worldview without destroying the delicate fabric of its construction. After viewing his imperfect Così Fan Tutte for the Teatro Real in Madrid and La Monnaie in Brussels, I would agree with that and think that my initial assessment on his ability to work with any other Mozart opera was also correct. Le Nozze di Figaro however could very well sustain a bit of a reworking and I'd actually be very interested to see what Haneke could make of it, should he ever put his mind to it. On the other hand, in the same interview he also expresses great admiration for Monteverdi's delightfully salacious L' Incoronazione di Poppea, and that now would be something worth seeing!
Giovanni Battista Pergolesi - Il Flaminio
Teatro Valeria Moricone, Jesi, 2010
Ottavio Dantone, Accademia Bizantina, Michal Znaniecki, Juan Francisco Gatell, Laura Polverelli, Marina De Liso, Sonia Yoncheva, Serena Malfi, Laura Cherici, Vito Priante
Arthaus
So far we've had two excellent productions from the Fondazione Pergolesi Spontini at Jesi that have extended appreciation of Pergolesi's opera seria work - Adriano in Siria and Il Prigionier Superbo - and in the process shed a little light upon the practices of 18th century Neapolitan opera with their Intermezzo comedies. For anyone who has enjoyed the lighter side of Pergolesi's work seen in these shorter pieces, Il Flaminio is a real treat. A full length 3-act commedia per musica, first performed in 1735, it's every bit as delightful as the great Intermezzos seen so far - Livietta e Tracollo and La Serva Padrona - and, in its own way, quite sophisticated and just as revelatory as the composer's more serious works.
There is, it has to be said, nothing that appears to be exceptional about the plotting of Il Flaminio. The widow Giustina has been set on an engagement to the noble but rather frivolously-minded Polidoro, but has fallen instead for his friend Giulio, who she recognises as Flaminio, a Roman gentleman she once knew before she met her husband. Back then however, she despised Flaminio, which may account for why "Giulio" is reluctant to accept that her feelings might have changed in any way. To complicate matters - always essential in such a situation - Polidoro's sister Agata is in love with Giulio and cruelly rejects her intended Ferdinando, but her feelings are not reciprocated by Giulio. On the sidelines, watching and intervening in the situation - not disinterestedly, since the possibility of their union depends to some extent on a resolution of these issues - are Checca and Vastiano, the maidservant of Gustino and the manservant of Polidoro.
Il Flaminio therefore still adheres very much to the Metastasian baroque opera seria situation - one not dissimilar to the one played out in Pergolesi's Adriano in Siria - where various incompatible couples have to find their right arrangement over the course of the opera, usually on a wise ruler coming to his senses (it's a nobleman Polidoro here), but only after a great deal of emotional soul-searching and pouring one's heart out through anguished, repetitive arias. The difference here in Il Flaminio is that this time the situation is explored for its comic potential, playing the situation for laughs certainly and with a lightness of touch, but not to the exclusion of the finer sentiments that lie within it either. That in itself is a significant development and influential in terms of the impact the Neapolitan style would have on opera buffa, but in Pergolesi's hands, one can also see a significant development of the writing and the scoring that goes way beyond the Baroque conventions.
The comic elements may be partly based around class issues, but the comedy in Il Flaminio proves to be rather more sophisticated than La Serva Padrona (as important to the history of opera as that work remains). Much of the humour is tied to the use of Neapolitan dialect and customs on the part of the lower classes, with obscure satirical references and musical allusions to popular songs of the time, to puppet shows and commedia dell' arte traditions that are impossible to translate or even fully appreciate. One can at least - having been in a position to see similar situations played out in the Baroque works of Handel and Vivaldi - appreciate how the complex relationship drama is satirised by the comedy. "I forsee suffering and misery for me", Guistina observes at the start of Act I - "Why worry?" responds her maidservant Checca, "Everything will turn out fine in the end".
There's only so much humour to be derived from this really though, particularly over a three-hour opera. To be honest, I lost interest in following the plot by the middle of the second act, but thankfully there's more to Il Flaminio than mild comedy and satire, and Pergolesi's beautiful music makes such light work of the situations and is filled with such playful invention and sophistication that there is never a dull moment. It's way ahead of its time, Pergolesi's handling of material we are familiar with from Handel and Vivaldi only highlighting just how much more musically advanced and innovative the composer really is above his contemporaries. It's not just the stormy accompaniment to Giulio's vigorous Act I aria 'Scuote e fa guerra' ("May shake and make war the ruthless wind"), or even that Pergolesi imitates the mewling of a cat in Bastiano's Act II aria - delightful though those kinds of little touches are - but there's such a lightness and brilliance of sophistication throughout Il Flaminio that it could easily pass for a Haydn or an early Mozart opera. It really is extraordinary.
It's even more delightful then that we have Ottavio Dantone and the Accademia Bizantina to bring out the sparkling brilliance and delicate beauty of music that is so full of life, vigour, wit and sensitivity. The wonderful set design moreover places the orchestra behind the performers on the stage in a venue that has been reconfigured with extensions that take balcony scenes down the sides of the hall to make it even more intimate and involving. It looks great and it evidently works marvellously since the singing and acting performances are also highly engaging and entertaining. Although there are pieces written to give each of the singers the opportunity to shine, Il Flaminio is very much an ensemble piece that gives equal value to almost all the roles and - as with each of the Jesi Pergolesi releases so far - the casting and singing is perfect. Recognising that the strength of the opera is in its ensemble arrangement, the production also attempts to keep all the main figures around on the stage - along with the orchestra - even when they are not called upon to sing.
As with the previous Pergolesi releases - from both Opus Arte and Arthaus - the recording quality is superb, with a beautiful High Definition image and remarkably good sound quality. Really, it's hard to imagine how you could improve on the performance or presentation of this rare work, a work that fully merits such a wonderful interpretation. There are no extra features on this release however, which is a little disappointing, but there is some useful background information on the work in the booklet that comes with the release. The Blu-ray is all region compatible with subtitles in English, German, French, Italian, Spanish and Korean.
