A few years ago, Susan Graham sang Iphigenie in a San Francisco Opera production that contributed to my hypothesis that “everything Susan Graham touches turns to gold.” Yesterday she sang the role at the Met, with the extra added advantage of having Placido Domingo as her Orestes. Why is this opera not more popular? Perhaps it takes performers of the stature of Graham and Domingo, but the bottom line was that I and all my friends in attendance were very well pleased.
The four acts of the opera were presented with one intermission, a seamless transition between acts 1 and 2, and acts 3 and 4, and just one set. The main part of the set was a large room, dominated by the sacrificial altar to the right of center and to the right of the altar a very large statue of what I take to be Diana—it was not very well lit, and the camera didn’t spend much time with it. The walls were a dark red, punctuated with a number of sconces with burning flames. In the center of the back wall was a door, carved in high relief, through which all the characters entered and exited the chamber. On the other side of the left wall of the altar room was a smaller, very dark room that looked like a storeroom, with a pile of heavy wooden furniture at the back, but given the shackles attached to the wall, and the prisoners constrained by the shackles, it was a prison cell.
“Where are the arias?” asked my music-major friends attending, with me, our first performance of Die Walküre, oh so many years ago. The same question could apply to this 1781 opera. It was rather Wagnerian, in that the music served the drama rather than the “mistaken vanity of the singers” as Gluck wrote in his preface to his first “reform opera,” Alceste. The music simply flowed from character to character to chorus to character, lacking any set pieces such as Una voce poco fa or Largo al factotum. At one point Domingo had a lengthy part, which he performed wonderfully well, and which would have elicited thunderous applause from the audience if the music had paused—but it didn’t, and the drama simply continued.
The overall effect was rather unusual. The opera gives you no take-aways in the form of memorable tunes, no Una voce poco fas or even a Winterstürme; in that sense I compare it to Palestrina, in that it is music that is wonderful to listen to, at the end you’re very glad you’ve attended, but you can’t really remember any of it. Maybe you can, after enough hearings. Graham and Domingo sang masterfully, as did Paul Groves and Gordon Hawkins in the lesser roles of Pylades and Thoas respectively. This performance is edging toward alpha quality.
Now if I could only get my friends who enjoyed Iphigenie in Tauride so much to come to Wagner with an open mind ...
Sunday, February 27, 2011
The Barber of Seville, Opera San Jose, Feb. 24 2011
We returned four days later to see the other cast:
Figaro: Adam Meza
Almaviva: Chester Pidduck
Rosina: Cathleen Candia
Dr. Bartolo: Torlef Borsting
Don Basilio: Paul Murray
Fiorello: Anders Froehlich
Berta: Kindra Scharich
Thanks to attending Larry Hancock’s pre-performance lecture, I learned that director Jose Maria Condemi comes from a Latin American tradition that enjoys using inside jokes; specifically, the carrots in the Act 1 finale are an oblique reference to The Rabbit of Seville, and the apple on Ambrogio’s head a more obvious reference to Rossini’s final opera, William Tell. During the Largo al factotum, a young man and woman pantomimed the essence of the plot of The Elixir of Love, with Figaro playing the role of Dr. Dulcamara by offering the potion/wine to the man.
Adam Meza cut a very fine figure as Figaro, with the commanding stage presence that the role demands. He sang well, but without the richness of tone that Karagiozov produced in the other cast. If we had a Figaro with Kragiozov’s voice and Meza’s acting, we’d really have something.
Paul Murray, who had really impressed me as Alidoro in La Cenerentola, was our Don Basilio. I continue to be impressed, and hope to hear more from him in the future.
Torlef Borsting is benefiting from the training that is part of being an Opera San Jose resident artist. His A un dottor della mia sorte exceeded my expectations.
Chester Pidduck’s Almaviva was disappointing. It’s not a large voice, and he had a certain amount of trouble negotiating the florid passages in Ecco ridente, though he was more effective in the second act. Cathleen Candia sang a satisfying Rosina. Ming Luke, new to the podium in my experience, led a performance that sparkled just a bit more than Bryan Nies’s. Overall, a beta.
Figaro: Adam Meza
Almaviva: Chester Pidduck
Rosina: Cathleen Candia
Dr. Bartolo: Torlef Borsting
Don Basilio: Paul Murray
Fiorello: Anders Froehlich
Berta: Kindra Scharich
Thanks to attending Larry Hancock’s pre-performance lecture, I learned that director Jose Maria Condemi comes from a Latin American tradition that enjoys using inside jokes; specifically, the carrots in the Act 1 finale are an oblique reference to The Rabbit of Seville, and the apple on Ambrogio’s head a more obvious reference to Rossini’s final opera, William Tell. During the Largo al factotum, a young man and woman pantomimed the essence of the plot of The Elixir of Love, with Figaro playing the role of Dr. Dulcamara by offering the potion/wine to the man.
Adam Meza cut a very fine figure as Figaro, with the commanding stage presence that the role demands. He sang well, but without the richness of tone that Karagiozov produced in the other cast. If we had a Figaro with Kragiozov’s voice and Meza’s acting, we’d really have something.
Paul Murray, who had really impressed me as Alidoro in La Cenerentola, was our Don Basilio. I continue to be impressed, and hope to hear more from him in the future.
Torlef Borsting is benefiting from the training that is part of being an Opera San Jose resident artist. His A un dottor della mia sorte exceeded my expectations.
Chester Pidduck’s Almaviva was disappointing. It’s not a large voice, and he had a certain amount of trouble negotiating the florid passages in Ecco ridente, though he was more effective in the second act. Cathleen Candia sang a satisfying Rosina. Ming Luke, new to the podium in my experience, led a performance that sparkled just a bit more than Bryan Nies’s. Overall, a beta.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
The Barber of Seville, Opera San Jose, Feb. 20 2011
It has been quite a while since I’ve seen a “This performance is sold out” sign in front of the box office at the California Theatre, but there it was on Sunday—congratulations!
After the sprightly overture (which Rossini had borrowed from his Aureliano and Palmiera and Elizabeth, Queen of England), the curtain went up on a traditional set showing us a street in Seville. In the center, a two-story building with a front door and a wall fountain below, a balcony above and to the right, and directly above the front door, a translucent window through which we could see characters approaching the balcony. On the street, to the left, flower bed and a lamp post, and to the left of that, another building with a front door, separated from Dr. Bartolo’s house by a tiny alley. To the right, an alleyway entrance flanked by two palm trees, and further to the right, the door to a smaller house.
At the end of the first scene, Figaro and Almaviva stepped to the front of the stage to launch the finale with La bottega? while the curtain came down to cover the rotating of the set to display the interior of the house, where the remainder of the action will take place. We see the other side of the front door, with two massive sliding bolts above and below the latch; much stage business was made of opening and closing these bolts. In front, an easy chair and a sofa and a small writing desk; doors to the left and right. The overall color scheme was ochre; the first floor had a wainscoting with red and black diamonds over the ochre.
Our cast:
Figaro: Krassen Karagiozov
Almaviva: Michael Dailey
Rosina: Betany Coffland
Dr. Bartolo: Silas Elash
Don Basilio: Isaiah Musik-Ayala
Fiorello: Anders Froehlich
Berta: Tori Grayum
The stand-out performer was Karagiozov, who sang Figaro with the authority and vocal heft that the role calls for, though he lacked the last bit of stage presence that a Joseph Wright would have brought. (Wright sang Don Giovanni a few years ago, and it was fun seeing him enjoying being the Don.) I'm not sure that Elash’s voice was shown off to its best effect as Dr. Bartolo; I would love to hear him in Don Basilio’s La calunnia.
Jose Maria Condemi’s staging baffled me. It wasn’t offensive (for that, I refer to the Macbeth in San Francisco a few years ago), but I just didn't get the points that were trying to be made. Figaro enters, blindfolded, with four women pawing at him, as though he is The Stud Of Seville. Whereas the text calls for Fiorello’s musicians to praise Almaviva for their generous payment, these musicians wave their coins under his nose and point their instruments at him as though he has underpaid them. Berta always had a pipe in her mouth. I like to anticipate what the director might do with the Act 1 finale, for which all sorts of clever stagings have been devised. Here, the soldiers sent to arrest the “drunken” Almaviva wind up rotating in place, while various carrots are swung overhead. Huh?
It seemed that the Act 2 finale was cut just a little bit to bring the curtain down a few seconds before 11:00, at which time overtime charges kick in.
Overall, the performance did not sparkle as much as it might have. For that, and the baffling staging, I will award a “beta,” but barely.
After the sprightly overture (which Rossini had borrowed from his Aureliano and Palmiera and Elizabeth, Queen of England), the curtain went up on a traditional set showing us a street in Seville. In the center, a two-story building with a front door and a wall fountain below, a balcony above and to the right, and directly above the front door, a translucent window through which we could see characters approaching the balcony. On the street, to the left, flower bed and a lamp post, and to the left of that, another building with a front door, separated from Dr. Bartolo’s house by a tiny alley. To the right, an alleyway entrance flanked by two palm trees, and further to the right, the door to a smaller house.
At the end of the first scene, Figaro and Almaviva stepped to the front of the stage to launch the finale with La bottega? while the curtain came down to cover the rotating of the set to display the interior of the house, where the remainder of the action will take place. We see the other side of the front door, with two massive sliding bolts above and below the latch; much stage business was made of opening and closing these bolts. In front, an easy chair and a sofa and a small writing desk; doors to the left and right. The overall color scheme was ochre; the first floor had a wainscoting with red and black diamonds over the ochre.
Our cast:
Figaro: Krassen Karagiozov
Almaviva: Michael Dailey
Rosina: Betany Coffland
Dr. Bartolo: Silas Elash
Don Basilio: Isaiah Musik-Ayala
Fiorello: Anders Froehlich
Berta: Tori Grayum
The stand-out performer was Karagiozov, who sang Figaro with the authority and vocal heft that the role calls for, though he lacked the last bit of stage presence that a Joseph Wright would have brought. (Wright sang Don Giovanni a few years ago, and it was fun seeing him enjoying being the Don.) I'm not sure that Elash’s voice was shown off to its best effect as Dr. Bartolo; I would love to hear him in Don Basilio’s La calunnia.
Jose Maria Condemi’s staging baffled me. It wasn’t offensive (for that, I refer to the Macbeth in San Francisco a few years ago), but I just didn't get the points that were trying to be made. Figaro enters, blindfolded, with four women pawing at him, as though he is The Stud Of Seville. Whereas the text calls for Fiorello’s musicians to praise Almaviva for their generous payment, these musicians wave their coins under his nose and point their instruments at him as though he has underpaid them. Berta always had a pipe in her mouth. I like to anticipate what the director might do with the Act 1 finale, for which all sorts of clever stagings have been devised. Here, the soldiers sent to arrest the “drunken” Almaviva wind up rotating in place, while various carrots are swung overhead. Huh?
It seemed that the Act 2 finale was cut just a little bit to bring the curtain down a few seconds before 11:00, at which time overtime charges kick in.
Overall, the performance did not sparkle as much as it might have. For that, and the baffling staging, I will award a “beta,” but barely.
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