Verdi - Rigoletto (Berlin, 2019)

Giuseppe Verdi - Rigoletto

Deutsche Oper Berlin, 2019

Michele Gamba, Jan Bosse, Yijie Shi, Stefano Meo, Siobhan Stagg, Samuel Dale Johnson, Byung Gil Kim, Cornelia Kim, Bryan Murray, James Kryshak, Gianluca Buratto, Maiju Vaahtoluoto, Paull-Anthony Keightley, Amber Fasquelle

Deutsche Oper Berlin - 30th April 2019

First performed at the Deutsche Oper in Berlin in 2013, theatre director Jan Bosse's first venture into opera has a similar look, feel and approach to Verdi's Rigoletto as other productions of this period. There's the all the variety of life as a circus theme of Robert Carsen's 2013 Aix-en-Provence production, there's something of the 60s' Las Vegas glamour of the Met's 2013 production, but perhaps more evidently with the seating of the Deutsche Oper house looking back at you from the stage, it at first looks close to the Bayerische Staastoper's 2012 meta-theatrical production of the opera as staged drama.

One thing that all these diverse productions have in common is the way they use each of these situations to look a little more deeply behind what at times appears to be an improbable melodrama and find the underlying themes of the work. Of course, as is often the case with Verdi, if you get the musical performance and the singing right the hard work is done for you, and happily that was the case at the Deutsche Oper's final performance of Rigoletto in its 2018/19 season. That doesn't mean that the stage production and direction only have to provide an attractive show for the narrative, but it should work with the music to bring out those more universal themes and morals.

The main moral of Rigoletto isn't hard to identify and it doesn't need an elaborate analysis; actions have consequences, sometimes unintended and unexpected consequences when they are the result of an act of bad faith, whether that is mocking someone less fortunate than you, plotting revenge, or simply hiding the truth. To the unfortunate Rigoletto, the hunchbacked court jester who thinks he has regal protection to do as he likes and wants to strike back at a world because of his affliction, the resulting comeback from his acts of bad faith feels like a curse; la maledizione.

Jan Bosse's production design initially seems appropriate then but limiting, the wooden panelled walls and banks of yellow seating that fill the stage reflecting the amphitheatre and balcony of the Deutsche Oper house back at the audience. The good-time partying of the court of the Duke of Mantua is like a stage, where whatever actions that take place are merely play-acting, viewed as if they have no consequences in the real world. All manner of license is permitted, and if someone doesn't like it, they are ejected from the theatre.

The set however proves to be surprisingly adaptive to the progression of where those actions ultimately lead. A raised platform and some veils create rooms and staircases to represent Gilda hidden away in her father's home, while at the same time maintaining the idea - for the moment anyway from Rigoletto's viewpoint - that they remain spectators to what goes on in the Duke's world, in the audience applauding his performance, immune to any real-world consequences.

One of the other main themes of Rigoletto that Bosse's production successfully highlights is that the idea of there being two worlds is not so much an illusion as naivety for not realising that there are different laws in the world for the rich and the poor, for those in power and those who follow them. Actions have consequences, but they have a different impact depending on where you stand in the social order. All men are not treated as equals in the eyes of the world. It's the realisation of this that Rigoletto recognises as the real curse at the conclusion of the opera.

Bosse's production then becomes a gradual process of stripping Rigoletto of his illusion that the world will work in his favour and not in favour of the Duke. And, quite literally, that is achieved in Stéphane Laimé's impressive set designs by a breaking down and stripping away of the stage props and backdrops. The on-stage seating turns around as the behind-the-scenes machinations of the Duke and the court are revealed to Rigoletto and Gilda, the stage finally stripped bare revealing the backstage area by the final heart-rending scene.

Viewed as pure melodrama the actions of Gilda leading up to the final scene have their own romantic logic, but here in Bosse's production they could be seen as having a different meaning without lessening the dramatic impact of the scene. Rigoletto is left with nothing but anger for the revelation of the injustice of the world - raging against la maladizione - but Gilda's sacrifice in this context is that of someone who still believes in truth and love, and cannot live in a world where that no longer exists; a human rather than a heroic response.

That still comes across effectively in the Deutsche Oper's production, but it has to work with the musical performances and requires strong consistent singing across the challenging principal roles. It's hard to fault the performances here. The musical direction under Michele Gamba seemed initially a little too smooth, but in reality it was simply matching the glamour of the Rigoletto's illusion, becoming rather more sinister around the storm as the mood changes and thundering home with the hard-hitting conclusion. Rigoletto's particular structural arrangements are all about mood and pacing and this was just perfect.

The singing was also exceptionally good. Yijie Shi is making the transition from lighter Rossini bel canto to the heavier Verdi repertoire quite successfully in such roles as the Duke of Mantua, carrying the dramatic weight and romantic lyricism superbly. Siobhan Stagg can carry heavier repertoire like Reimann's Lear, but is apparently also capable of singing the sweetly romantic side of Gilda. She is of course dramatically capable then of making this character a little more than just an innocent fool. Her 'Caro nome' was impressive, and she fared well in Gilda's duets/duels with her father. Stefano Meo was a strong Rigoletto, the ideal kind of Verdi baritone for this role, taking us through those variety of moods of bluster and incomprehension to devastation. There were notable performances also from Gianluca Buratto as Sparafucile and Maiju Vaahtoluoto as Maddalena and Giovanna.

Links: Deutsche Oper Berlin

Donizetti - La Favorite (Toulouse, 2014 - Blu-ray)

Gaetano Donizetti - La Favorite

Théâtre du Capitole de Toulouse, 2014

Antonello Allemandi, Vincent Boussard, Kate Aldrich, Yijie Shi, Ludovic Tézier, Giovanni Furlanetto, Alain Gabriel, Marie-Bénédicte Souquet

Opus Arte - Blu-ray

There are any number of Donizetti operas to choose from that deal with similar sentiments, but for sheer overwhelming swooning romanticism, La Favorite - the composer's 1840 four act French Grand Opéra - is hard to beat. Performed in its original French version at the Théâtre du Capitole in Toulouse - it's more often played in the Italian translation when it's played at all - it's given a simply gorgeous production here under the direction of Vincent Boussard that matches the warmth and the sweeping beauty of Donizetti's score and arrangements.

The subject of La Favorite has all the necessary qualities that enable such a deep, romantic treatment. It's an epic romance and an impossible love with a historical context increasing the stakes that involves the king, threatens the very fate of the nation and even has the Pope getting involved. The nature of those sentiments are fully laid out and explored in the first Act. Highlighting the fact that religious matters underlie and add to the complications that arise, Act I takes place in 14th century Spain in the monastery of St James (and to complete the construction Act IV also returns to the monastery), where a young monk, Fernand, has fallen in love with a mysterious woman. Fernand ignores the advice of his Superior Balthazar and prepares to leave his office. If he doesn't act, he knows that he might otherwise never know true happiness. All of this is accompanied by lush arrangements that capture the sweep of the cruel injustice of fate, accompanied by fervent prayers to the heavens. Giuseppe Verdi, take note.

The reason why Fernand's love is an impossible one, is that the enigmatic lady is Léonor, the "favourite", mistress of King Alfonse XI of Castille. This is also an impossible love that threatens the nation, since the King wants to divorce the Queen and thereby risk the displeasure of the Pope. Unaware of the identity of the mysterious woman he has fallen for, Fernand is taken blindfolded after leaving the monastery to meet her secretly on the island of Leon in the second scene of Act I. Warned by Léonor that cruel fate means their love can never be and that he should forget her, Fernand joins Alfonse's army where he distinguishes himself during the battles with the Moorish invaders. Fernand - still unaware of Léonor's identity and position - asks the king for her hand as a reward for his bravery. It's then that Alfonse becomes aware that his mistress has a lover. 

The subject of La Favorite has all the necessary qualities that enable Donizetti to explore familiar subjects in a deeper way with a more romantic treatment. Donizetti had of course already written a number of royal historical intrigues in his Tudor trilogy of Anna Bolena, Maria Stuarda and Roberto Devereux, but the tone of La Favorite is quite different. There's less of the wild contrivance and heightened emotions of bel canto singing here, the French grand opéra giving Donizetti the opportunity to adopt a more sombre tone that explores the fatalistic nature of the drama. The subject and the treatment of it here mean that the opera works almost in abstraction as a study of guilt and betrayal, but the vivid score is tied closely to the drama, which is similarly well-constructed and developed even as it elevates the highly romantic situations and fervent declarations.

Whether it's a reflection of the composer writing specifically for a French audience to a French libretto, or whether it's evidence of a growing maturity in his writing, La Favorite is indeed a more substantial work from Donizetti in this respect. There's a stronger dramatic inclination shown in the writing that is closer to Bellini and it's not hard to see that the work would form a model for many of Verdi's historical romances, even bearing comparison to Don Carlos (not coincidentally also a work written for a French audience) or at least La Forza del Destino. It's also worth noting that Wagner was a fan of La Favorite and transcribed an arrangement of the work for piano, and one also, I believe, for two violins. Echoes of the themes from Donizetti's La Favorite can even be heard in Der fliegende Höllander.

Philippe Boussard's direction of this extraordinarily beautiful production of La Favorite for the Théâtre du Capitole in Toulouse matches the sentiments of the work well, the simple elegance of the designs, costumes and lighting also reflecting the near-abstraction of the themes explored in the work. The sets and the stage are left fairly bare, with only really a few silhouetted arches in the background, yet much is done with light, colour and with elegant costumes designed by Christian Lacroix. With reflective surfaces and shimmering costumes, the stage is awash with crepuscular colours and luminous light. As well as looking terrific, the stage setting gives all the space and ambience required to set the essential mood and character of the piece. The melodrama practically demands that the characters in La Favorite express their feelings as if their lives depended on it, and the cast here sing it much the same way.

Although he doesn't speak the language, Yijie Shi handles Donizetti in French just as well as he does for the Rossini Italian repertoire, his lovely light lyrical tone just perfect for this work. Kate Aldrich gives an intense account of the opera's mezzo-soprano leading role as Léonor, again with good facility for the French language and with great dramatic impact. Ludovic Tézier's baritone is as smooth as ever as Alfonse, sounding very comfortable in the role, even as he exudes the menace or at least the threat to the happiness of the unfortunate couple, but Tézier ensures that there is sympathy too for his regal dilemma. This is just ideal casting. Conducting the Toulouse orchestra, Antonello Allemandi weaves purposefully through the rich and varied moods of the score, with a lightness of touch that belies the force of the dramatic tone.

The Théâtre du Capitole de Toulouse production of La Favorite is released on Blu-ray by Opus Arte, and it is an absolute joy that this splendid production has been recorded so well and presented so impressively in High Definition. Visually, the production is a wash of subtle colouration, and it's handled marvellously in the transfer with terrific detail, clarity and definition in the low-lit scenes. The audio tracks are also fine, allowing you to hear the detail in Donizetti's scoring for this work. The BD includes a 38-minute collection of interviews with the main cast, Allemandi, Boussard and Christian Lacroix. The BD is all-region, subtitles are in English, French, German, Japanese and Korean.

Rossini - L'Italiana in Algeri (Pesaro 2013 - Blu-ray)

Gioachino Rossini - L'Italiana in Algeri

Rossini Opera Festival, Pesaro - 2013

José Ramón Encinar, Davide Livermore, Anna Goryachova, Yijie Shi, Alex Esposito, Mariangela Sicillia, Raffaella Lupinacci, Davide Luciano, Mario Cassi

Opus Arte - Blu-ray

Their productions might not be to everyone's taste, but every year the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro consistently show that they have the composer's best interests at heart and, better than anyone else, they really understand how to get great neglected works by Rossini across to a modern audience. Director Davide Livermore has come up with several innovative productions for the festival over the years, including a Hollywood silent movie epic for Ciro in Babilonia and a backstage haunting of the ghosts of Demetrio e Polibio. As the groovy 60s Austin Powers styled the cover of the DVD for his 2013 L'Italiana in Algeri indicates, the approach taken here is again playful and imaginative but also completely faithful to the intentions and the spirit of the work.

Livermore's argument for this approach is that a work like L'Italiana in Algeri was never meant to be treated with po-faced classical opera seriousness, but was meant to raise huge laughs from its audience. There's no attempt in this opera to make any serious points about social and cultural differences, or even culinary tastes (Pappataci!) - it's just a broad farce, albeit one with a gifted composer at the helm. Livermore's point of reference for translating the work to a modern context - exactly 200 years after the work was first performed - is found in the films of Blake Edwards. (The Austin Powers movies are also clearly an influence, but they themselves are heavily indebted to Blake Edwards' Pink Panther movies). In theory this is a brilliant concept, in practice, it's not as much fun as it really ought to be.

Livermore's concept is definitely appropriate in its tone and workable in the context of the opera. It sees Lindoro as a secret-agent super-spy on a special mission, who is inadvertently caught by the henchmen of the nasty foreign evil-villain Mustafà and, perhaps unaware of his secret identity, is put into the Bey's service as one of his underlings. Just before he is captured however, Lindoro Powers manages to send off an SOS to his super-sexy sixties-styled sidekick Isabella, who comes to Algeria to his rescue. Arriving there (in a more modern fashion than on a shipwrecked ship, although a downed flight is a little bit of a sensitive issue at the moment), she finds herself embroiled in Mustafà's power games as he attempts to offload his wife Elvira in favour of this groovy chick who has just arrived from Italy. She's going to need to play clever to get out of this one without causing a major international incident.

The idea is a great one, and there's a lot to enjoy in the fun production, but the execution unfortunately doesn't entirely live up to the promise. Davide Livermore is a good opera director, but it seems he's not such a good comedy director. He's no Blake Edwards and he doesn't have a Peter Sellers or even a Mike Myers to work with here and everyone just seems to be trying just too hard to have fun. The opening sequence during the overture is much too busy, using intentionally cheap-looking cut-outs for opening-credits with 60s Batman TV-series sound-effects (Crash! Pow! Aaaaggh!).

Having set the scene, it would be enough to let the comic situation of L'Italiana in Algeri play out mostly for itself with all the terrific 60s and 70s styles and haircuts and all the psychedelic effects and colouration, but Livermore insists on trying to make it even funnier. Mustafà/Dr Evil's inability to make an entrance without accidentally firing a gun and killing a hapless henchman becomes a little tiring after a while. A pointless gag with Lindoro being dangled over a swimming-pool of sharks is a good Bond spoof, but it's more typical of how much visual effort and elaboration is put into making a gag look cheap, but in a way that is disproportionate to how funny it actually is. The stage is often cluttered, with too much going on and too many people mugging in an effort to be funny.

It's still a colourful and an entertaining production, just never quite as funny as it thinks it is (although you could probably say the same about L'Italiana in Algeri). The performance itself is likewise good, but not outstanding. The singing is fine and musically the performance is in safe hands with José Ramón Encinar conducting, but the work is missing a spark somewhere. The singing is all good, with Yijie Shi a capable Lindoro, Anna Goryachova a sassy Isabella wearing jaw-dropping outfits and Alex Esposito a spirited Mustafà with a tendency to overact, but no-one here has a personality big enough to really bring the roles to life.

The quality of the Blu-ray is good, showing off the bold colours of the production well enough, but it doesn't look quite as pinpoint sharp this time. The audio too I found a little bit low in volume, but the sound is well-recorded and all the detail is there, particularly if listened to on headphones. There's a ten-minute extra feature on the making of the production, and a cast gallery. The disc is all-region, BD50, with subtitles in English, French, German and Korean.

Rossini - Le Comte Ory

Giacomo Rossini - Le Comte Ory

Rossini Opera Festival, Pesaro 2009

Paolo Carignani, Lluís Pasqual, Yijie Shi, Laura Polverelli, Lorenzo Regazzo, Roberto De Candia, María José Moreno, Natalia Gavrilan, Rinnat Moriah 

Opus Arte - Blu-ray

There are two ways you can treat some of Rossini's more outrageous comedies. You can either play up the absurdity of the situations or you can attempt to make up for the silliness of the libretto by creating a distancing construct around it. I know which I would prefer, but in the case of this 2009 Rossini Opera Festival production, the director Lluís Pasqual unfortunately feels the need to impose a structure on the work that is neither meaningful nor sympathetic to the comedy. Fortunately, there is another way to get the most out of Le Comte Ory and that is to let some good singers loose on it. Despite the casting here not being as stellar as you might expect for such demanding roles, the Pesaro production at least works very well on that front.

It is very hard to take Le Comte Ory seriously, even though there is no reason why you should. Written in the composer's French period, much of the reasoning for the creation of the work was to find an alternative use for the music of Il Viaggio a Reims. Written for a specific event, the coronation of Charles X, it must have seemed a pity to let such good compositions (Rossini at his finest) go to waste, so the composer spun them together with some new music into the racy comedy of Le Comte Ory. The entertainment of the work relies primarily on that old staple of a licentious noble, in this case a Count who takes advantage of the susceptible and probably desperate women of the village while their husbands are away fighting in the crusades.

It's not a subject that is terribly elevated or even clever, nor are the means of the Count Ory's seductions all that credible - disguising himself as a hermit dispensing wise advice, or dressing up as a nun seeking shelter on a stormy night. It's hard to imagine anyone being fooled by such exploits unless they really want to play along with the game and be seduced, and it usually with such an idea that a diector will attempt to either find some credible underlying motivations or create a knowing distance between the drama and its presentation. Lluís Pasqual attempts to do all these things, but seems to forget that the work is actually supposed to be a comedy.

Evidently then, the 2009 Rossini Opera Festival production isn't set during the time of the Crusades but rather, for no apparent reason, takes place in the Grand Hotel Rossini during the Belle Epoque. Looking more like a set for La Traviata, the action of the opening scenes takes place amidst hanging velvet curtains and chandeliers, with the hermit dispensing his sage advice and sexual favours to the credulous women from atop an antique billiard table. The ultimate object of his licentious desires, the Countess Adèle, meanwhile mounts a nearby table across from him. It's hard to believe that the Count's own page, Isolier, wouldn't recognise his master in such a thin disguise (the trousers role moreover transformed here into a female character), but any semblance of disguises being convincing are dismissed when the Countess and her maid Ragone actually dress Ory up as a nun at the start of the second act.

According to the booklet that comes with the DVD/BD release, the director's concept is that it's an opera-within-an-opera (or a play-within-an-opera), the explanation for this is that the story of Le Comte Ory is being put on as a parlour game by a theatre group in order to explore their own erotic fantasies. You wouldn't know this otherwise, but even when you do know it, it still seems like a pointless conceit and scarcely any less ridiculous than the original comic story that it is attempting to make credible. What the Belle Epoque setting does however, perhaps inadvertently, is actually emphasise the elegance and sophistication of Rossini's brilliant compositional skills.

The score is sympathetically conducted in this respect by Paolo Carignani. Unsurprisingly, since it is mostly derived from Il Viaggio a Reims (a delightful work that was until relatively recently believed entirely lost), Le Comte Ory is a typically well-constructed piece, with entertaining numbers and a variety of characters who have arrangements to match and display their individual singing strengths. It all takes place moreover at a spirited pace with a musical style that is indeed sparkling with elegance, cleverness and wit. That much comes through, even if the stage direction isn't able to take advantage of it, or play to the strengths of work, which is in how it matches the singing performances to the comic situations.

Although they aren't given much support from the director, the singing nonetheless is very good. The Rossini Opera Festival doesn't seem to give the same care and attention in their casting for French Rossini as they do to the composer's Italian works, but the relatively inexperienced cast do perform rather well. Chinese tenor Yijie Shi - who can be seen in several other Pesaro productions - has the right kind of voice for high and lyrical Rossini roles like this and he meets all the challenges and demands that are required for Le Comte Ory. If you close your eyes, at times you could swear you're listening to Juan Diego Flórez, albeit not with the same force. Laura Polverelli is a fine Isolier and María José Moreno brings the necessary elegance and charm to her Comtesse Adèle, even when the stage concept seems contrived to work against her.

True, this cast are no match for the New York Metropolitan Opera's production with the stellar trio of Juan Diego Flórez, Joyce DiDonato and Diana Damrau, but who could possibly measure up to that level of presence, stature and vocal ability in a work like this? Ultimately however, since the actual performances are fine here, it's less a question of singing ability than whether the production as a whole gives the right kind of platform for those voices to shine. Bartlett Sher's production at the Met went for a similar play-within-a-play construction that didn't bring anything great out of the work, but it didn't detract either from the comic situations or the performances. The Pesaro Le Comte Ory also works well in spite of a production design that doesn't really help it, which is all the more to the credit of the singers and, undoubtedly, the strength of Rossini's writing.

The BD includes a 26-minute Making of made up of interviews and behind-the-scenes rehearsals. As usual the irrepressible Alberto Zedda, the artistic director of the Rossini Opera Festival, provides some insightful comments on the work and its place among Rossini's operas. Subtitles on the BD are in French, English, German, Spanish, Italian and Korean.

Rossini - Mosè in Egitto

Gioachino Rossini - Mosè in Egitto

Rossini Opera Festival, Pesaro, 2011

Graham Vick, Roberto Abbado, Riccardo Zanellato, Alex Esposito, Olga Senderskaya, Dmitri Korchak, Sonia Ganassi, Yijie Shi, Enea Scala, Chiara Amarù

Opus Arte - Blu-ray

Director Graham Vick and set designer Stuart Nunn, as well as the administration team of the Pesaro Rossini Opera Festival, go to great pains in interviews on the ‘Making Of’ extra feature included on this release to emphasise that their 2011 production of Rossini’s Mosè in Egitto doesn’t take sides and offers no solutions, but rather strives to present a balanced account of the impact of conflict and oppression on a population, specifically in a modern-day Middle East context. Balanced it may be, but that doesn’t mean that this production plays it safe in any way. Far from it. Vick depicts Rossini’s Biblical epic in terms of suicide bombers, terrorists, torture, self-immolation and - perhaps most controversially - styling Moses as an Osama Bin Laden figure, wielding a Kalashnikov and stirring up a Holy War against their oppressors through inflammatory video recordings.

Many people who take a very traditional view of opera would argue that Moses in Egypt should reflect the original period of its Biblical subject and that a director has no right to update it or impose a modern-day concept onto a work that it wasn’t written to express. It’s true that works can often be twisted from their original context into something that they were never meant to be, which if less than faithful can nonetheless produce interesting results. Without contradicting the intent of a single word of the original libretto here however, Graham Vick shows that there is a case for opera not to be entirely subservient to the words alone, but that it should also take into account an interpretation of what the music is expressing. Rossini’s score isn’t set in any specific period, but is abstractly aligned rather to timeless human feelings and emotions. As a director, Vick clearly wants the production of Rossini’s great work to express those sentiments in a meaningful way to a modern-day audience, and the extraordinarily powerful nature of its presentation here clearly justifies that approach.

Graham Vick - admirably in my view - is noted for taking a “community” approach to opera. It’s not an elite entertainment for a selected few, it’s not a museum for the historical representation of works that are hundreds of years old, nor is it about putting on a so-called definitive performance to demonstrate the vocal techniques of singing stars and divas, but rather it’s about viewing opera as a living artform that has something meaningful to communicate to a broad range of people in the present day. That requires the involvement and participation of the audience, and even if that’s just engagement with the issues presented, then that’s an achievement alone. In order to shake the audience out of passive reception however, Vick and set designer Stuart Nunn strive to break down the barriers between the stage and the audience in other ways. Here at the Rossini Opera Festival for Mosè in Egitto, that involves using a venue in Pesaro that isn’t a traditional opera theatre - it’s a basketball arena - and dressing it in a way (like a refugee camp side by side with a modern palace) that feels more recognisable to what an audience would be familiar with from recent events in television news reports.

Vick’s approach the 2011 Pesaro Mosè in Egitto is borne out by the nature of the work itself as an ‘azione tragico-sacra‘ in three acts. Written for the Teatro San Carlo in Naples in 1818, Moses in Egypt saw Rossini move away from his comic operas into a new period of mature works that were to some extent constrained by specific structural conventions and the demands of certain singers, but the composer managed nonetheless to attune these mannerisms brilliantly to serve the nature of the dramatic content. That’s immediately apparent from the lack of Overture in the opera and the fact that it opens instead with the ‘Plague of Darkness’ choral lament, which the director stages powerfully by having blood-stained Arabs walking through the audience, holding out photographs of friends and relatives lost in the latest bombardment/plague carried out on the word of Moses in retribution for the enslavement of the Hebrew people by the Egyptian Pharaoh, plastering the pictures and messages on walls in front of the orchestra pit. It’s a meaningful image that brings the power of Rossini’s writing home, and the same approach is used throughout, consistently and often to quite striking effect, the final scenes in particular making a unforgettable impression that underlines the relevance and importance of making the work say something about the world today.

I say “orchestra pit”, but it’s clear - and not just from the informal dress of the musicians - that the orchestra are also very much a part of the action - particularly in this production were the music carries much more than the libretto does alone. If there are any doubts about the efficacy of the treatment, the powerhouse performance of the Orchestra Teatro Comunale di Bologna will quickly put any doubts to rest. Directed by Roberto Abbado this is a sparkling, sensitive performance that captures the verve, rhythm and lyrical lightness of Rossini’s versatile arrangements. The singers in most of the principal roles on the Egyptian side aren’t heavy-weights by any means, but singers like Alex Esposito, Dmitri Korchak and Olga Senderskaya are all lyrically qualified and well-suited to the roles of Faraone, Osiride and Amaltea. There’s a little more personality and weight required however for the parts of Mosè and Elcia, both in terms of their vocal demands and the necessity of having the strength of personality to bring together the political and human elements that combine in the drama, and those demands are more than capably met by Riccardo Zanellato and Sonia Ganassi. Excellent and noteworthy performances from Yijie Shi (Aronne/Aaron), Enea Scala (High Priest Mambre) and Chiara Amarù (Amenofi) really contribute to the overall power and quality of the work and the performance as a whole.

The 2011 Pesaro Mosè in Egitto isn’t pretty to look at, but it’s not meant to be. It does make some controversial references, but there’s nothing here that can’t be justified as a genuine reflection of human nature and how people live in the world today. That might not be what you expect to see in an opera performance of Moses in Egypt, but the brilliance of the production here is that it works both ways, drawing inspiration from Rossini’s remarkable score, finding a meaningful modern way to bring its themes to life, while the same time injecting its ancient Biblical story with a heavy dose of reality. It’s a testimony to Rossini’s brilliant writing and Andrea Leone Tottola’s poetic libretto that, musically and dramatically, Mosè in Egitto is more than capable of bearing it. If it’s the intention of the Rossini Opera Festival to look afresh are both familiar and rarely performed works by the composer in order to reevaluate qualities and strengths that are clearly there but which have been buried under decades of operatic mannerisms, then this kind of production achieves that most impressively. Stripped right back to its expressive power, this 2011 production of Mosè in Egitto is consequently something of a revelation.

As with all the recent Pesaro Rossini releases, that revelation extends to being able to see and hear these performance presented so well in High Definition on Blu-ray. Outstanding image quality in full-HD 1080/60i, detailed and beautifully toned high resolution audio mixes only enhance the efforts of the performers. Mainly due to the unconventional nature of the venue, radio mics are used, presumably only for recording purposes, but the mixing is well done and comes across naturally here. As well as a booklet that covers the production and gives a synopsis, there is a Cast Gallery and a 25-minute long behind-the-scenes ‘Making Of’ with interviews that explain the intentions behind the concept very well. The BD is region-free, with subtitles in English, French and German.

Rossini - Demetrio e Polibio

Gioachino Rossini - Demetrio e Polibio

Rossini Opera Festival, Pesaro, 2010

Corrado Rovaris, Davide Livermore, María José Moreno, Victoria Zaytseva, Yijie Shi, Mirco Palazzi

Arthaus Musik

There’s a wonderful double-take moment at the start of this 2010 Rossini Opera Festival production of Rossini’s Demetrio e Polibio, which turns out to be a thoughtful way to present the work and at the same time manages to strike the perfect balance between the traditional performance and more modern conceptual. The stage curtain draws back at the opening to reveal a final curtain call of a performer for an unseen audience out the back of the stage. His self-congratulations out of the way, the stage hands having moved the sets to the wings, the scene is set for some ancient ‘ghosts of opera past’ to arise out of the packing cases to re-enact a historic performance of the drama of Rossini’s Demetrio e Polibio.

It’s a clever and effective compromise between traditional and conceptual that works well for this one particular Rossini opera that needs a thoughtful and considered approach. Demetrio e Polibio, a ‘dramma serio‘ in two acts, is Rossini’s first opera, which he started to compose when he was only 14 years old. It was composed piecemeal in individual sections as a commission for the Mombelli family’s quartet of singers - some parts perhaps written by the Mombelli father - customised to meet the requirements of the particular characteristics of the singers, but also written to adhere to standard classical opera drama arrangements of arias and duets, with familiar plot devices that involve mistaken and hidden identities. It’s also one of those Metastasian-style dramas where a significant part of the dramatic action has already to a large extent taken place before the opera starts, leaving the characters in a position to bemoan their fate as they strive to find a resolution over the two acts of the opera.

Before the opera even starts, you need to know that Demetrius, the King of Syria, has entrusted his son to a loyal friend Minteus while he is involved in a terrible struggle over royal succession. Minteus however dies before he can reveal the nature of his royal identity to the boy, Siveno, who is taken in by Polibius, the King of Parthia, as his adopted son. As the opera starts some years later, Polibio plans to marry Siveno to his own daughter Lisinga, but Demetrio, having resolved matters in Syria, has come looking for his son, in disguise (of course) as Eumeno, a Syrian ambassador. Polibius - believing that Siveno is the son of Minteaus - doesn’t accept Eumeno’s claims on the boy, forcing Demetrio to make plans to abduct his own son. By mistake, it’s Lisinga who is abducted, which leads to a stand-off confrontation between Demetrio and Polibio over their respective offspring.

The nature of this ‘dramma serio‘ dictates that Rossini’s first opera leans more towards the model of composition of the 18th century rather than towards the new Italian opera model of the 19th century that Rossini would play such an important part in establishing. The influence of Mozart is also evident in the musical approach in an early La Finta Giardiniera or Apollo et Hyacinthus style, if somewhat less adventurous in arrangements and technique, but it’s surprising just how much of the Rossini sound is evident even at this early stage. The first act is made-up almost entirely of duets, with only the bare minimum of recitative, allowing the bonds to be established between the characters much more effectively than solipsistic arias of emotional turmoil, and it builds up wonderfully towards the quartets that mark the confrontation of Demetrio and Polibio (Siveno and Lisinga are not passive figures in the drama by any means) and the brief ensemble finale. The arrangement may have been tailor-made for the Mombelli family, but it also works to the advantage of the musical drama.

Demetrio e Polibio would still however be little more than an early Rossini curiosity, a pleasant but dull and conventional drama, were it not for the wonderful effort put into every aspect of the work for the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro, the first modern production of the work in 150 years. As well as evoking the spirit of the Mombelli family through the period costume ghosts that inhabit a modern opera stage and thereby taking the origin of the work into account, director Davide Livermore also uses the haunted stage element to make the opera something wonderful to watch by employing plenty of Illusionist trickery. There’s relevance in this as well as entertainment, acknowledging the “old-style” theatricality of the work, but also using handheld flames to evoke the sparking of love and anger, while the proliferation of doubles, mirror images and disappearing acts all reflect the shifting identities of the characters. It makes a rather academic work seem much more meaningful and consistently entertaining.

The consideration given towards the presentation of this extremely rare work is also reflected in the delightful performance of the musicians, directed by Corrado Rovaris, and the singing performances. Bearing in mind that the difficulty of the roles as written was determined by the capabilities of the original cast, the singing is good across all the roles. Lisinga has the most challenging singing and María José Moreno takes in all the high notes - sometimes a little effortfully - but with great expressiveness. Demetrio has the most active role in the work as the villain of the piece (or perceived villain) and Yijie Shi demonstrates a fine Rossinian Italian tenor style that suits the role perfectly. The breeches role of Siveno doesn’t have quite so many demands placed on it in terms of singing but mezzo-soprano Victoria Zaytseva is absolutely fine for the part, while Mirco Palazzi’s reliable bass fulfils the requirements for Polibio with characteristic Rossinian verve. In terms of duets and ensemble work, the combination of their voices works beautifully in these lovely little arrangements.

On Blu-ray, this is another lovely package of a Rossini Opera Festival production. The High Definition transfer looks superb, and the stage design and direction is so strong that Tiziano Mancini doesn’t have to resort to video trickery to make it any more interesting. The usual high quality audio tracks in PCM Stereo and DTS HD Master Audio 5.1 give a detailed account of the fine music and the singing performance, making this curiosity all the more fascinating to listen to. The subtitles are in Italian, English, German, French, Spanish and Korean. The English subtitles have some curiosities of translation - “No more husband have I, a villain has subtracted him from me” is one example, but they are mostly fine if a little stiff and literal. As well as some words on the production and a full synopsis in the accompanying booklet, there is a fine 14-minute ‘Making Of’ with interviews and behind the scenes footage on the disc itself.