Giacomo Puccini - Il Trittico
Bayerische Staatsoper, Munich - 2017
Kirill Petrenko, Lotte de Beer, Wolfgang Koch, Eva-Maria Westbroek, Yonghoon Lee, Ermonela Jaho, Michaela Schuster, Claudia Mahnke, Ambrogio Maestri, Rosa Feola, Pavol Breslik, Kevin Conners
Staatsoper.TV Live - 23 December 2017
For me personally, if you want a showcase for the composer's work, Puccini's trittico consists of La Bohème, Madama Butterfly and Tosca. That's not a terribly original selection I admit, but they are each pinnacles of popular Italian opera that have delighted audiences for over a hundred years, and they do reflect the range of prime Puccini. On the other hand, the idea of watching those three operas back to back is perhaps too much for any sensitive mortal to endure, so fortunately Puccini has a rather more accessible and less emotionally fraught option, although anyone watching the Suor Angelica section of the Bavarian State Opera's 2017 production of Il Trittico might have just cause to dispute that point.
There's a case to be made that the heightened human dramas of each of the three short opera that form Il Trittico are just concentrated essence of Puccini, and indeed there is some correspondence with the composer's great full-length operas. Il Tabarro covers much of the same range as La Bohème (and even directly references that opera); Suor Angelica is a variation of sorts on Madama Butterfly's mother forced to abandon her child; and Gianni Schicchi... well, Gianni Schicchi just stands in a category entirely of its own, not only among Puccini's compositions, but as pretty much the best and funniest work of comic opera ever written.
Il Trittico is not only a showcase of some of Puccini's best writing, but it can also be a showcase for a director who is unable to resist the temptation to try to link them at least thematically, since there is little common convergence of tone, period or character between the three short works. Lotte de Beer connects the three pieces in only the most abstract of ways for the new production in Munich. Each of the one-act operas remains in the period of its original setting, and plays out closely to the libretto, but each take place within the wide opening of what looks like a large tunnel. The concept behind this is something to do with time, connecting the past with the future, but it's not something that makes a great impression or present the works in any new or revelatory way.
It's a bit unimaginative but it's in keeping with the more half-way house that the Bayerische Staatsoper have been employing recently, moving back a little from the more extreme ends of Regietheater. It might not be as adventurous, but it does seem to be working much more consistently than the hit-and-miss approach of recent years. As far as Il Trittico goes, Bernhard Hammer's set designs do at least narrow the stage down to a tighter focus that emphasises the emotional density of the works, while Lotte de Beer's relatively straightforward direction lets the dramas showcase their own qualities.
Each of the dramas plays out then strictly in period costume and according to the original intentions of the libretto, and the lighting ensures that the mood of each piece is faithfully represented on the stage and that it never feels clinical, even if there are few of the usual props. The only extravagant effects are those which are called for in the music and the drama, with one of the sections of the tunnel rotating 360-degrees at the concluding dramatic revelations of Il Tabarro and Suor Angelica, lifting their moments of death and transcendence to another level. Gianni Schicchi, as I say, is a very different kind of work with a punchline all of its own, and that's taken into account here without the need for 'special effects'.
Aside from the concluding moments however, Il Tabarro feels mostly functional in the Munich production. It is nonetheless effective in its emotional expression and the impressionistic dark undercurrents are realised in the intense musical direction of Kirill Petrenko, and in the singing performances of Wolfgang Koch, Eva-Maria Westbroek and Yonghoon Lee. As the final piece Gianni Schicchi is often a winning conclusion to Il Trittico if a director can really tap into the work's rhythm and humour, and Lotte de Beer captures that well. There are neat little touches to the comic acting and great timing from Michaela Schuster as Zita and Ambrogio Maestri as Schicchi, with some sweet singing from Rosa Feola and Galeano Salas standing in for Pavol Breslik, who lost his voice and had to mime the role.
It's Suor Angelica however that is the standout piece here, the main course to Il Tabarro's starter and Gianni Schicchi's icing on the dessert cake (someone has been watching too much Masterchef on TV recently), and what makes this Suor Angelica so memorable is the extraordinary performance of Ermonela Jaho. The Albanian soprano has taken on the role of Sister Angelica before, most notably in the Royal Opera House production of Il Trittico available on DVD, and she is always impressive, but it seems like there are still depths in it for her to explore. Vocally, it's a stunning performance, marrying technique to an intense dramatic delivery that pushes at the limits, with precisely pitched high notes carrying a distinctive timbre that is Jaho's own sound and expression. It's probably the single greatest performance I've seen in an opera all year.
Since I'm making a big deal about this being a showcase work (in case you haven't noticed), one shouldn't neglect the part played by Kirill Petrenko's conducting of the Bayerisches Staatsorchester. By no means does he attempt to find a common sound for the work as a whole, but finds the appropriate tempo and tenor for each individual piece. More than just being a distillation of classic Puccini pieces, Il Trittico is Puccini+, where the composer explores new sound worlds. There are hints of Wagner's Flying Dutchman in the situation and dynamic of Il Tabarro, you can hear the influence of Impressionism and there is even some dissonance as Puccini responds to demands of each of the works in new creative ways. It's an evening of marvellous music that the Bayerische Staatsoper's Il Trittico showcases brilliantly.
The next live broadcast from the Bavarian State Opera is Wagner's Die Walküre on 22nd January 2018. Conducted by Kirill Petrenko, Directed by Andreas Kriegenburg, the cast includes Simon O'Neill, Anja Kampe, Nina Stemme, Wolfgang Koch and Ekaterina Gubanovana.
Links: Bayerische Staatsoper, Staatsoper.TV
Alfredo Catalani - La Wally
Grand Théâtre de Genève, 2014
Evelino Pidò, Cesare Lievi, Ainhoa Arteta, Bálint Szabó, Vitaliy Bilyy, Yonghoon Lee, Ivanna Lesyk-Sadivska, Ahlima Mhamdi, Bruno Balmelli
ARTE Concert - June 2014
Like most of Puccini's Italian contemporaries (Leoncavallo, Mascagni, Zandonai, Alfano), Alfredo Catalani's compositions are now rarely performed and all but forgotten. Some of those composers have at least one well-known work that is occasionally revived and performed, but in Catalani's case, although La Wally has some measure of recognition, it's mainly on account of one famous aria in the opera, "Ebben! Ne andrò lontana". Actual staged performances of the work however are rare indeed.
Maria Callas brought some recognition to the work, or at least its famous aria, but more recently its fame has chiefly been through the use of the aria in Jean-Jacques Beineix's 1981 French cult classic film 'Diva'. Involving the trade of a secret bootleg recording of the aria sung by a temperamental soprano who refuses to allow any recordings of her performances, the film played no small part in giving the aria from La Wally an air of mystique, glamour and prestige (and vice-versa the aria the film).
The revival of Catalani's La Wally at the Grand Théâtre de Genève for the first time since 1962 doesn't attempt anything as ambitious as linking it with Diva - although the theatre promoted their new production with free screenings of the more recognisable Beineix movie - but settles for a traditional staging that simply gives the audience the rare opportunity of seeing the aria in its original context and evaluating whether the opera has any attraction to a modern audience. It proves to be a fine performance of Catalani's opera, even if it doesn't make a convincing case for the work having any lasting qualities.
While it's a pleasant enough work, skillfully composed and dramatised, the problem with La Wally is that it doesn't have any real distinguishing characteristics. With an Alpine setting, family rivalries and romantic entanglements involving a virginal daughter being forced into an marriage of convenience, the subject of La Wally has much in common with opera semi-seria and bel canto works like Bellini's La Sonnambula, Donizetti's Linda di Chamounix and Halévy's Clari. Catalani may not be a Bellini or a Donizetti, but La Wally does have at least one thing going for it. It has one great aria and unfortunately that is likely to remain the opera's chief claim to fame.
The problem is not so much the plot as what you do with it, and musically, La Wally is not particularly adventurous. The subject of the drama could be adapted more closely towards an Alpine version of passions and family feuds in the verismo style of Catalani's contemporaries, particularly Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana. (There is even a village religious procession written into the work that is tied to La Wally's declarations of purity). There are in any case plenty of conflicting passions to evoke and bring to the surface and, on the face of it, we also have a heroine who is not entirely an innocent but rather a proud and temperamental figure who gives full vent to her passions. There's plenty here for a soprano to get her teeth into, and you can see why a performer like Maria Callas would be attracted to the role.
The cause of all Wally's problems is her secret love for Giuseppe Hagenbach, the son of her father's long-time enemy. Made aware of this by Gellner - observant to Wally's behaviour since he himself in in love with her - her father Stromminger declares that she will marry Gellner forthwith or leave the south Tyrolean village of Hochstoff forever. Wally chooses to leave ("Ebben! Ne andrò lontana"). Her father dies soon after however and Wally inherits the Eagle Tavern. Jealous over the attentions that Giuseppe shows to the barmaid Afra, Wally responds furiously and throws a drink in the girl's face. In revenge Giuseppe bets that he can steal a kiss from Wally and bring her pride down to size.
This is not a big deal, you might think, not anything that you are going to write an opera about, but Wally has just declared how even a kiss would be a defilement of virginal purity. As she is in love with Giuseppe, she's going to find that a hard position to maintain, and the young woman is indeed made a fool of before the whole of the village. The dramatic resolution to the dilemma that has arisen in La Wally at least gives the work another distinctive feature which makes great use of its south Tyrol setting at the same time as it makes it extremely difficult to actually stage effectively. Having rescued Giuseppe from a ravine that he is thrown into by a vengeful Gellner and achieved forgiveness and reconciliation with the man she loves, Wally dies caught up in an avalanche on the mountain.
That's quite a coup de théâtre if you can carry it off. Director Cesare Lievi at least keeps the drama moving well to take us credibly to this point, and Evelino Pidò conducts the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande with loving attention for Catalani's score. Ezio Toffolutti's production design for the Grand Théâtre de Genève's La Wally is however very much a traditional period costume production with painted backdrops, basic props to represent the village and the tavern in Acts I and II, so recreating an avalanche on the stage was always going to be a bit of a challenge. Act III and IV, where the landscape plays a large part in the drama, is a little more abstract, with walls like shards of ice and a projection of a moon-like skull behind the slope that drops into a ravine. The slope is however merely a long white sheet that drags Wally into the hole at the climax, with flowing dry ice spilling over the backdrop behind her.
It's a basic representation of the scene, but it works reasonably well. Principally that's because Catalani scores practically the whole of Act IV as a lament for all Wally's troubles without stretching to bel canto ornamentation, but mainly it's because Spanish soprano Ainhoa Arteta makes this position (a precarious one) feel achingly real. She's not Maria Callas by any means, but it's a challenging role that the success of the opera rests upon, and Arteta carries it through impressively. Act IV also gives Giuseppe the chance to match himself to the soprano in a glorious duet, and it's here that Yonghoon Lee also demonstrates his worth. The other roles are less critical, but are also well performed here with Ivanna Lesyk-Sadivska's pure, clear timbre marking her out in the trouser-role of Wally's only true friend Walter.
Links: ARTE Concert, Grand Théâtre de Genève
