tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36843989844583931092024-03-13T10:56:51.258-07:00BOX FIVE: David's Opera BlogDavid M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.comBlogger65125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-74399595864753568312014-03-06T18:44:00.000-08:002014-03-07T19:32:43.240-08:00WOZZECK<br />
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Just listened to the livestream of the season prima, with Levine back in the pit. He's conducted every performance of this work I've ever seen, all of which have been at the Met, and he always risks making the chandelier fall with that long loud trombone Bflat (?) after Wozzeck has killed Marie. From what I could tell, he did that again tonight. Moreover, as he always does, he makes this music accessible for those who aren't Puccini-scorners or demanders of atonality with their morning coffee.<br />
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Matthias Goerne replaced Thomas Hampson in the title role. I had doubts about whether Hampson should have taken it on. He's spent much of his recent career doing roles not right for his voice. Well, better health to him. Meanwhile, Goerne loaded us up with a bassy baritone sound that made his Wozzeck demented (of course) but never weak. I hope I'll get to hear his Amfortas, which I hear is in his future.<br />
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Debbie Voigt: well, who can deny she's in the second half of her career? That acknowledged, she took on Marie boldly, and never sounded bad, unless you're a true Voigt hayta. No one can do the "...als ich zehn Jahre alt war!" moment like Anja Silja in the Dohnanyi recording, so that's not a fair standard.<br />
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Peter Hoare's Captain and Russell Thomas's Andres filled the bill. I confess to a morbid fascination with the Doctor, so I'm very demanding about this role. I liked the aging Michael Devlin's under-voiced but highly stylized take on it when this production premiered. The best "Jetz ganz still" EV-AH was delivered by Norman Bailey in a British broadcast that I barely caught about 20 years ago: he let the three words descend, as though verbally burying Wozzeck. All that said, I was pleased with Brit import and Met debutant Clive Bayley: he got his creepy on, and delivered the high note and the very low notes. Jolly good. (A good role for Baileys, but watch the spelling.)<br />
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Simon O'Neill was a fine Drum Major, but I wish I had heard Stuart Skelton in the production's previous outing.<br />
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Levine's return-season to the house, and his return to an opera he has, in the now-overworked term, "championed"; Goerne's role debut, and Bayley's house debut, and a great performance: must have been fun to be there.David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-12063943099310832912013-11-07T20:10:00.000-08:002013-11-07T20:47:38.756-08:00<b><i>FRAU</i></b><br />
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Listening to the Sirius broadcast of the first <i>Frau Ohne Schatten</i> of the season.<br />
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I tuned in a bit late, so I'm just now discovering that this production is apparently compete: they've opened the traditional cut in Act III where the Nurse, abandoned by the Empress, sends the desperate Barak and his wife off in different directions as they seek each other. ("Menschen! Menschen! Wie ich sie hasse!") Well good for the Met on that one.<br />
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In fact, good for them across the board. Schwanewilms sounds lovely. I like the gruffness of that guy singing the Messenger. (Edited to add: that was Richard Paul Finke! His voice has gotten a bit flintier since I last heard him, as Alberich.) The Nurse is new to me, and doesn't erase memories of Mignon Dunn, but she's good. Johan Reuter sounds much better tonight than he did as Prus in <i>The Makropoulos Case </i>last year. This is my first time hearing Torsten Kerl, and he's a very satisfactory <i>baritonale</i> type of Heldentenor. Been a long time since I've heard Christine Goerke, but, have read about her transformation into a Hochdramatische, & I now believe it.<br />
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Above all, Vladimir Jurovsky is bring clarity and energy at the podium.<br />
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Now if only I could go <i>see</i> this production, which seems, from descriptions and still photos, to be a worthy successor to its amazing Merrill-O'Hearn predecessor.<br />
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"Auf, du Kahn,<br />
Trage dies Weib<br />
Mondberge hinab,<br />
den Menschen zu!"<br />
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You tell 'er, dude!<br />
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Now we're up to Schwanewilms's "Vater, bist du's?" and I think I'll stop now b/c I'll probably faint at "Ich will nicht."<br />
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P.S. Virginia Opera bass Nathan Stark is apparently making his debut is a small role in this run of Frau. Congratulations, @theStarkVoice !David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-60204453483294172192012-12-16T10:47:00.001-08:002012-12-16T11:23:30.332-08:00Gagnidze; anticipating HANSEL @ GSAGagnidze was good. He threw away "...tu sei la schiava" on Sprechgesang, but he's hardly the first Amonasro - the first *good* one, I mean - to do so. <br />
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So what am I doing now? I'm in the lobby of the University Theater at Old Dominion U., Norfolk, Va., waiting for HANSEL AND GRETEL in a production by the Governor's School for the Arts. <br />
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The Vocal Arts Dept of this high-school program has such depth of young talent, they're putting on three performances of HANSEL with three different casts. I make that 24 capable teenage voices. And that's just the Vocal Arts Dept: the Musical Theater Dept is separate.<br />
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I'm at the closing performance. I could have gone to them all, I suppose, but I still have law exams to grade, so I've chosen one Diva dei Tutte Dive at GSA - Malia Diaz - who's singing the Dew Fairy this afternoon. But I've also heard great things from Anyée Farrar, and I understand she kicked it as Gretel on opening night. <br />
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More later.David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-63919831285664845412012-12-15T11:31:00.001-08:002012-12-15T11:31:04.963-08:00Gagnidze - about time for meI break the long and excuseless silence of this blog to note that I am about to hear, for the first time, George Gagnidze. <br />
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Of course he came to the Met with the Bondy TOSCA, but that's hardly his fault, and somehow, despite his many Scarpie and Rigoletti since, I somehow haven't heard him until the b'cast of his Amonasro today.David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-12412601730871212322012-02-15T09:09:00.001-08:002012-02-15T09:17:40.132-08:00<span style="font-weight: bold;">Charles Anthony R.I.P.</span><br /><br />I have a lot to get caught up on, especially about the Met's RING, but for the sake of beloved Charles Anthony I had at last to shake the blogger rust off and post the news of his death at about 4:30 this morning. At the time @SusanneMentzer first posted it on Twitter and a Distinguished Personage confirmed it, the news was still not circulating in the media, nor yet on Opera-L, but here we lament his passing -- and also that of fellow character tenor Paul Franke a few weeks ago.<br /><br />Sometimes they were in the same shows: Franke as Cassio, Anthony as Roderigo; Franke as Spalanzani, Anthony as the Four Servants; Anthony taking over as the Holy Fool ("Simpleton" in those days) when Franke was promoted to Shuisky. And so on. Franke got more cracks at leading parts (David, the Captain, and of course The Witch!), but, don't forget, Anthony recorded Ernesto for the Record Club! <span jsid="text" class="commentBody"><br /></span><br />Two giants of their Fach, and two great artists. But today is Charlie's day. Praying for him and for his family.David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-90376431120641594172011-10-16T17:11:00.000-07:002011-10-18T13:21:14.041-07:00<b>Met ANNA BOLENA</b><div><br /></div><div>Some local news to catch you up on, but first, the live moviecast of ANNA BOLENA.</div><div><br /></div><div>Loved it. I emerged newly convinced of the potential for bel canto to convey serious drama. Beverly Sills convinced me of that back in the day, and she was my first and until today only Anna B. I still remember her (in Capobianco's production) giving the guard a big slap at the end of the Big Arrest Scene. </div><div><br /></div><div>I also retain a vivid aural memory of her "Coppia iniqua," but not, sorry to say, any memory of how she handled it dramatically, other than to say that Beverly never neglected the dramatic side of her bel canto roles.</div><div><br /></div><div>Anyway, Anna Netrebko nailed it. In the past there has been a spectrum of views on whether she could sing bel canto, with a discernible drift of majority opinion towards approving her as a verismo soprano (and in Russian opera, of course), but not in anything else. But in yesterday's ANNA, the technique-mavens were at least impressed at her progress since her PURITANI a few years ago, and I was just enchanted. Her voice had the richness of Callas at her best, she had trills (real or imitation, I'm not sure, but effective) for "Coppia iniqua," and she had (here we in the movie theaters are privileged) dramatic intensity throughout. </div><div><br /></div><div>(Another privilege we had: Netrebko doing her "naughty Anna" bit in her pre-curtain interview with Gelb when she turned from him to the camera to add "The Tudors" quietly to her list of preparatory movie-viewing.)</div><div><br /></div><div>Strong supporting cast throughout. Ildar Adbrazakov is a strong bass-baritone whose Enrico replicated the moody tyrant portrayed by Robert Shaw in A Man for All Seasons. Note to Gelb and other impresarii, tho': Ildar is a treasure, but he's a bass-baritone, not a bass. In roles that really require a bass, make sure you cast Furlanetto (like Silva in the upcoming ERNANI), or Pape.<br /><br />Since this opera lacks a no-kidding baritone role, like Enrico Ashton in LUCIA, there is no need to distinguish sharply between the baritone and a bass with whom he shares the stage, such as Raimondo. A bass-baritone Enrico VIII is fine if he's a powerful one like Ildar.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div>(Ildar would be a perfect Ivan Khovansky in KHOVANSHCHINA -- but hey, crazy Met, you've <a href="http://www.metoperafamily.org/metopera/season/single/reserve.aspx?perf=11642#cast">cast him as Dosifei in the long-awaited KH. revival next spring</a>, with undoubted bass Anatoly Kotscherga as Ivan. Pardon me but I think you're crazy. Should totally be the other way around.)</div><div><br /></div><div>Stephen Costello's Percy -- ah yes, the voice that made me tweet "omg tenor!" when I was listening casually to the premiere over the 'net. What a gift to the lyric tenor world!</div><div><br /></div><div>Ekaterina Gubanova was a weak link for me. She has a real mezzo voice -- brava for that -- but the role of "Giovanna" Seymour goes high. Gubanova's voice showed itself dramatic indeed, to the point of harshness at times. </div><div><br /></div><div>Also: while we all have our potted rants against the "modern trend" of casting by looks, the very fact that I and so many others were watching this live performance <i>in a movie theater </i>shows it's a bit late to lock that particular barn-door, so let me just add that, despite her excellent acting, Gubanova was a few crumpets short of the sort of breakfast for which one could imagine Henry ditching Anne Boleyn.</div><div><br /></div><div>By chance I picked up an OPERA NEWS from a few months ago and saw that Gubanova was Fricka in La Scala's WALKURE last spring. A good review, and I could easily imagine her being brilliant in that role.</div><div><br /></div><div>In this run of BOLENA, Gubanova has the disadvantage (for which we must spot her some points) of replacing Latvian lovemuffin <a href="http://www.elinagaranca.com/en/biography">Elina Garanca</a>, the Met's new Carmen, who <a href="http://www.deutschegrammophon.com/artist/?ART_ID=NETAN">was Jane Seymour to Netrebko's Bolena in a production last spring(?) in Vienna</a>. </div><div><br /></div><div>Garanca was scheduled for the Met's production too, but, well, <i>l'amour est un oiseau rebel,</i> and La Garanca turned up with a bun in the oven at just a time when the baby-bump would have introduced an unhistorical complication into the already-thick story of Anne, Jane, and Henry. Quite frankly, the opening chorus of "the king's eye turns to another" would, in the age of surtitles/Met-titles, have just slain them in the aisles. Congratulations on the new life coming into the world, Elina, and we'll hope to catch your Seymour in the future when maybe we won't "Sey" so much....</div><div><br /></div><div>A shout-out, please, to my Twitter friend Keith Miller -- @KeithMillerBass -- whose tweets are full of opera-historical quizzes, and whose performance as Lord Rochford, Anne's brother, showed a fine bass-baritone voice and brought an extra dose of gravitas to the stage. </div><div><br /></div><div>Tamara Mumford nearly stole every scene she was in as Smeton, and in Eduardo Valdes, who played Hervey, the Met has a new character-tenor of the love-to-hate type.</div><div><br /></div><div>Marco Armiliato impressed me as a conductor who knows and loves bel canto, and who could and did keep the drama going well. </div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>How</i> well does he know it? Well, you couldn't necessarily tell from the camera coverage of the orchestra, but he conducted the overture without opening his score. This comes from a spy in the house. (My mom likes it when I call her that.) After the overture he started using his score. </div><div><br /></div><div>(I think there is pith in James Levine's talkback to colleagues who rebuked him for relying on the printed score: "Why not? I can read music.")</div><div><br /></div><div>The production: dark; the spots of color were rare and presumably deliberate. And why not? Henry's, court historically, was dark, not the place of soon-it'll-be-Shakespeare enlightenment we often see in historical dramas made in the Anglophone world . Costume designer Jenny Tiramani (think Monty Python's Ann Elk, but shorter, and actually knowing her stuff) says the surviving clothes and documentary evidence shows early Tudor courtwear was much darker than you often see depicted: lots of black velvet, black satin, and black silk.</div><div><br /></div><div>And -- living at the whim a moody tyrant -- it was a scary place to exist. I'm so glad McVicar captured this, and I'm so glad he included (tho' the libretto does not require it) the historical fact that Smeton was tortured. You know that line from A Man for all Seasons? -- Norfolk says it first, to More, in confidence, but Cromwell later repeats it back to Norfolk, in irony, demonstrating the omnipotence of the Tudor spy-state: "This isn't Spain -- this is England!"</div><div><br /></div><div>My point exactly. Tho' Catholic, I love DON CARLO as much as the next guy -- but I'm glad that Italian opera sometimes puts on stage historical moments that show Reformation-oriented royal courts acting in tyrannical ways too.</div>David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-39225816641085465842011-09-16T15:22:00.000-07:002011-09-16T15:23:30.224-07:00Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg: <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/09/15/ap/business/main20107116.shtml">"Scalia is my biggest buddy at the opera."</a>David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-921958150771265912011-08-03T19:35:00.000-07:002011-08-03T19:36:19.012-07:00<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/02/arts/music/paul-franke-ubiquitous-singer-at-the-met-dies-at-93.html">Paul Franke, RIP.</a> A staple of my childhood, and of the Met in that era.David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-9919358779279111232011-07-16T12:14:00.000-07:002011-07-16T12:17:22.718-07:00<b>CORNELL MACNEIL</b>, Verdi baritono supremo (and, in retirement, garage woodworker and machine tool guy), 1922-2011. Opera News's "Reunion" interview from 2007, <a href="http://www.operanews.com/operanews/templates/content.aspx?id=6210">here</a>.David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-40365730429438100372011-07-01T11:28:00.001-07:002011-07-01T12:35:54.769-07:00<span class="Apple-style-span"><b>San Francisco RING -- post 1</b></span><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><b>Travel: fun, not exotic</b></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">My daughter and I, almost on a whim, jetted west last week to see the S<span class="Apple-style-span">IEGFRIED </span>and <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; ">GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG</span> of Cycle 2 of San Francisco's 2011 summer RING.</span></div><div><span><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">Why not the whole thing? Cordelia, 16, has seen WALKÜRE several times recently, between the Met and the Virginia Opera. We would both have loved to see RHEINGOLD. But taking one thing with another -- tickets (even if only one for Walküre), and hotel nights (we don't have any apartment to borrow in SF) -- it adds up. Even as it was, it was a splurge, but a very worthwhile one.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">(Fwiw, Airtran did an excellent job getting us from southeastern Virginia to SF and back for $400 less then the next best offer; and fore a balance of economy and comfort we can recommend the Opal, on Van Ness Ave. between O'Farrell and Geary Streets, home to Mel's Diner, and within walking distance of the War Memorial Opera House. And of the Catholic Cathedral.)</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">It was her first, and my second, visit to this city. On our day "off," it was cablecars to the max for Cordelia, so we took the California St. line to Powell St. Finding the northbound Powell St. cars were too crowded, we went south to Union Square, then back up the Powell St. line to Fisherman's Wharf, then back to where we had entered the system at California St. and Van Ness Ave.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">But you don't want to read out that, you want to read about ...</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><b>The American RING</b></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">That's what director Francesca Zambello's production has generally been called. (The production was first developed jointly for San Francisco and Washington, except the recession forced the WNO to relinquish its role after premiering the first three operas: one suspects management issues at WNO had as much to do with it as the recession, which, if anything, his Washington less hard than other parts of the country. Perhaps the full Zambello RING will yet be seen at the Kennedy Center.)</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">Why American RING? Because the particular Regie at work here -- and yes, it's Regie, but what can I say, it's the good kind! -- is the setting of THE RING, with its swords and spears, in 20th century United States. Bad Regie imposes the director's will and ignores and crowd's out the composer's and librettist's. Good Regie tells the composer's-librettist's story in a way that's different from the way they asked for it to be told, but so that it's still the story they told, and no other. Also, bad Regie throws a lot ooh-aah-gosh-deep elements together and glories in the confusion thus created; good Regie is consistent and well thought-out from beginning to end; even things in it that are surprising make sense in context. Chereau's RING was an example of good Regie. So, very much, is Zambello's.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">So, American RING. Alberich is at first a Forty-Niner, panhandling for gold in the Rhine. Among the gods, the ineffectual ones -- Donner and Froh -- are preppies modelling Brooks Brothers country club outfits, and Wotan is the one of their ilk with business sense, and hence a Gilded Age tycoon. They will have to deal, however, with those two great big workers, Fasolt and Fafner, entering in their work-overalls aboard a girder lowered from a high story of the newly completed office building, Valhalla.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">In Walküre, Hunding is an Appalachian backwoodsman, whose kin ("Sippe") are all too much around (no need to "turn your steps to the west" to find them: "the West" starts here!), as are the trophy mooseheads on his cabin wall. Act II is split into two sets: first, the CEO suite of Wotan Inc., on which Brünnhilde jumps for her first Ho-jo-to-hos; then, a desolate abandoned area of unfinished (or collapsed?) interstates: the perfect place for the destinies of four people to take sudden and unexpected turns and falls.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">The Valkyries are paratroopers who drop onto the stage, goggles and all. Posted along rickety stantions surround the Valkyries' Rock are faces of Valhalla's heroes -- except it is said that the faces are those of real Americans fallen in Vietnam, Iraq, etc. Or so it was said when I saw this Walküre in DC in 2007: as mentioned at the start, I did not see it in SF this time. If I am right about the faces, then a question could be raised. Though very moving at one level, one could ask whether appropriating these faces for a dramatic production (unless of course each of the families individually gave consent) could be considered sailing close to a moral line and maybe even a legal one (invasion of privacy, false light). Just saying. Discuss among yourselves. Beyond any doubt, it's a powerful and moving production. Real fire, too: no elf'n'safety ditziness about that!</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">Enough for now. In my next post I'll start comment on the Siegfried production and performance from Cycle 2.</span></div>David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-81673906434434356472011-06-04T10:48:00.000-07:002011-06-04T11:53:20.727-07:00<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/giorgio-tozzi-operatic-bass-who-dabbled-in-musical-theater-dies-at-88/2011/06/02/AGNqSYHH_story.html">GIORGIO TOZZI</a>, 1923-2011<div><br /></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; ">Funeral services for this great Metropolitan Opera and San Franisco Opera bass, and University of Indiana maestro, were held this morning in Bloomington, IN.<br /><br />Giorgio was a friend of my parents, and I often heard the story about he almost delivered me: he was being interviewed by my Dad for Living Opera when my Mom went into labor with me.<br /><br />He was in the first opera I ever saw at the Met (Don Basilio, when I was about four). I refused to believe that he and Basilio were the same guy (really, the idea of taking make-pretend to a Metropolitan scale, with identity-obscuring make-up, sort of stretches a 4-yr-old's mind), so the next time he was over at the apartment, he brought with him the red socks that were part of the Basilio costume in the Eugene Berman production, and then I believed him.<br /><br />Later he invited me and Dad to visit him in his dressing room before, not after, a performance of NOZZE, so I could learn more about the process of becoming a character. By then he was already Figaro and Boris for me, thanks to the <a href="http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/album.jsp?album_id=224536">Leinsdorf NOZZE</a> and the Metropolitan Opera Record Club <a href="http://www.opera-club.net/release.asp?rel=327">NOZZE</a> and <a href="http://www.opera-club.net/release.asp?rel=344">BORIS</a>.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; "><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; ">I last spoke to him early in 2008. That was barely two months after my Dad's death, and we had a lot to talk to about. He had "almost delivered" me, and here I was, almost 50, letting him bring me solace. Also, I had seen NYCO's revival of VANESSA the previous November, and I wanted to chat about that. He knew Dick Stilwell, who sang his role of the Old Doctor, so we talked about Stilwell's progress from light baritone to bass-baritone, and how the Old Doctor is kind of zwischenfach anyway, Harvuot understudied it and did some performances, etc. etc.<br /><br />I mentioned that I had collected some his RIGOLETTOs from the '50s, some with <a href="http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/album.jsp?album_id=55956">Warren</a>, some with <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A787-2004Oct26.html">Merrill</a>. That set him off reminiscing about how different those two greats were to work with as Sparafucile. Warren was consumed with the character of Rigoletto. Merrill, more easy-going, maintained greater life/work separation, but when that voice came out...! It was Giorgio who, decades earlier, had coined the phrase "a Stradivarius in his throat" to describe how Merrill got his effects with a deficit of formal training.<br /><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; ">Another topic of conversation: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nell_Rankin">Nell Rankin</a> was another family friend, and I have a <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Amilcare-Ponchielli-Gioconda-Farrell-Corelli/dp/B000FM88QQ">GIOCONDA</a> where she sang Laura to his Alvise (as she did at his Met </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; ">debut, but <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Amilcare-Ponchielli-Gioconda-Farrell-Corelli/dp/B000FM88QQ">this</a> was some years later). In Act III, he really got scary, and </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; ">it got to me in a way that scene rarely does. I figured out why, I told him: </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; ">my emotional reaction had been "Uncle Giorgio is being mean to Aunt Nell!!" </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; ">He laughed heartily, then said: "When you have a colleague that generous, it </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; ">makes you generous in return!"</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; "><br />Stepping back a bit, here's how I've long seen the Tozzi legacy, which must be seen alongside that of <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/culture-obituaries/theatre-obituaries/7901323/Cesare-Siepi.html">Siepi</a>. A basso cantante can be "round" or "pointy." I don't mean in personal shape: I mean in quality of voice. A "round" basso cantante voice will be more paternal, more marmoreal, more comfortable venturing into bass-baritone rep (as Tozzi successfully did as Hans Sachs). The "pointy" basso cantante will be bouncier, saucier, a much more natural Don Giovanni and Mephistopheles. Obviously that was Siepi. (His Met Gurnemanz was a great success, but not one I would have predicted, and incidentally, Tozzi ventured into King Marke and Rocco around the same time, 1970. A friend points out that Tozzi too sang Gurnemanz -- but at San Francisco, not at the Met.)<br /><br />The amazing thing about Pinza had been that he combined "round" and "pointy" in one concentrated essence of what a basso cantante should be. By the mid-50s, he has been replaced by two men instead of one: Siepi replacing him<br />on the "pointy" side, and Tozzi replacing him on the "round" side.<br /><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; ">Inevitably, "Mr. Pointy" (apologies to BTVS fans) can excel in many of "Mr. Round"'s roles, more than the other way around. Thus, both Tozzi and Siepi were great as <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeMiQ4LX_5M">Padre Guardiano</a> (to take the least "pointy" role I can imagine), while Tozzi was never Siepi's equal as Don Giovanni, and indeed, sang the Commendatore opposite Siepi a few times. Yet there are some roles that are clearly better for "Mr. Round." Tozzi sang Arkel at the Met many times, and I don't think Siepi ever did. You'd think Siepi's Sparafucile (surely the ultimate literally "pointy" part, and recorded by Siepi, though rarely if ever done by him at the Met, I think) would blow Tozzi's out of the "fiume" -- but those '50s recordings I mentioned earlier, and the <a href="http://www.classical.net/music/recs/reviews/r/rca60172a.php">Perlea studio set</a>, refute that assumption.<br /><br />Of course they both sang Boris: Siepi first (with Tozzi as a glorious Pimen), and Tozzi later (on the MORC recording, on the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jzP50ZyIHQQ">NBC Opera Theater version</a>, and finally at the Met ca. 1962). They did the role in different ways: Siepi gave us the tormented ruler; Tozzi gave us the tormented *father.* Both were unutterably great.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; "><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; font-family: Arial; font-size: small; ">(Besides the Washington Post obit linked in my headline, <a href="http://www.gramophone.co.uk/classical-music-news/obituary-giorgio-tozzi">here</a> is another, slightly offbeat one from Gramophone. The special pleading for Nicola Zaccaria is intrusive, but then, the sound of axes grinding is almost as much part of opera as the sound of orchestras tuning!)<br /><br />RIP, "Uncle Giorgo."<br /></span></div>David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-68584363722488567012011-04-02T11:04:00.000-07:002011-04-02T14:28:30.305-07:00<span style="font-weight: bold;">Liveblogging RHEINGOLD b'cast</span><br /><br />* <span style="font-weight: bold;">Prelude</span>: smattering of applause at about point where set becomes fully visible. Not strictly Wagnerian, but I'm not going to tut-tut at a matinee audience having a good time and showing appreciation for this production -- a novel one criticized by some who criticized Schenck/Schneider-Siemssen for its stodginess, and admired by others, like me, who loved the Schenk prodn like an old teddy bear.<br /><br />EDITED TO ADD: A friend who possesses the charism of opera-nerd infallibility points out: "The applause greeted the entrance of the Rhinemaidens 'flying' on their wires. It's an excellent effect."<br /><br />* <span style="font-weight: bold;">Eric Owens</span> rules. Can't believe that he drew more snarks than any other cast member in last fall's run. As someone noted, Richard Paul Fink, the #1 Alberich of the Schenck years, who sang last Wednesday's performance, may still be the current allodial owner of the role, from whom all others hold only in fee. (Sorry, I <span style="font-style: italic;">do</span> write a <a href="http://ninomania.blogspot.com/">law blog</a> on the side.) But the same observer noted that Owens's approach is more cantante. Well, that's <span style="font-style: italic;">good.</span> Listen closely to Neidlinger, the all-time king of Alberichs. His portrayal, vocal no less than thespianic (I never saw him on stage), is monumentally evil, but he sings every note: his Alberich is almost bel canto. Owens is closer to that tradition than RPF. (Btw I loved RPF's Alberich in the last go-round of the Schenck production, and I have the posts on this blog to prove it.)<br /><br />* <span style="font-weight: bold;">Terfel</span>. He doesn't sound like he did twenty years ago. Well, who does? But, does he sound like he did in last fall's run of RHEINGOLD? Or have this role and the concurrent rehearsals for the more difficult WALKURE Wotan been taking a toll? The RHEINGOLD Wotan is still within the capacity of this amazing voice, and I still like the match-up of Terfel with Owens: bass-baritone-leaning-to-baritone versus bass-baritone-leaning-t0-bass, duelling over the Ring. I'll be interested to see the attacks and defenses on this point....<br /><br />* <span style="font-weight: bold;">Selig</span> as Fasolt, <span style="font-weight: bold;">Konig </span>as Fafner. As last fall, a perfect matching of basses to giants. Both are deep basses, but Selig has a touch of gentleness, and Konig has a touch of -- idk, The Revenge of Fu Manchu or something.<br /><br />* That was a great "Vielleicht -- JA, VIELleicht" by <span style="font-weight: bold;">Siegel</span>: just the way Wieland and Bohm told Erwin Wohlfhart to do it in '67 (rehearsal footage from Bayreuth back then has <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k8Rpw2vizPs">made it onto Youtube</a> -- notice also how Neidlinger here is crazily into the staging but sings an octave down in this rehearsal-room take).<br /><br />* <span style="font-weight: bold;">Arnold Bezuyen</span> has has a rapid and well-deserved rise to fame as Loge, both in Europe (incl. Bayreuth) and in L.A., where Achim Freyer's grinning Mephisto costume for this role fits Arnold's naturally wide mouth. He certainly brings a lot of flair and giggles to the role. Too many giggles, anyone think?<br /><br />* Owen's "Hab't acht" monologue: totally Neidlinger/Fink class. And Terfel's "Vergeh, frevelndner Gauch!" response -- there's really nothing wrong with our Wotan today.<br /><br />* <span style="font-weight: bold;">Stage mechanism noise</span>: right then -- Alberich turned into a dragon -- was the first time I heard any (listening on WQXR over my laptop). Haven't heard any until now. And if a dragon can't creak, what can?<br /><br />* Haven't mentioned conductor <span style="font-weight: bold;">Fabio Luisi</span> yet (subbing for Levine, who is recovering from back surgery), but the Scenes 3-4 interlude is a good place to start. I like his pacing. His rubati in this interlude are traditional but well-executed. All the way back at the beginning I liked the way he avoided the RING-original-sin of not holding the E-flat pedal longing enough (my hero here is Solti; even Levine sometimes offends on this).<br /><br />Luisi has e'er now shown himself to be one of those Italian maestros gifted in German rep. The next Sinopoli? (NB My favorite Toscanini recordings, by far, are his Wagner excerpts. He could draw perfect playing from any orchestra in any rep, but, imo, he was above all a Wagner specialist.)<br /><br />* Owens understated his first "Der Ring?" -- the way people sometimes gasp or whisper their first repetition of unbearable news.<br /><br />* Well, that note on "Soll an Freude dir frommen mein <span style="font-style: italic;">Fluch</span>" won't go down as Owens's happiest moment. Time to regroup forces for the actual Curse....<br /><br />*....which he's doing. Sounds effortless again.<br /><br />* Ok, ok, no need to hold "Knecht" too long if you're scraping the bottom of the voice-barrel. Good support there, Maestro! (A good opera conductor not only keeps the orchestra together but perceives when a singer needs the fire brigade.)<br /><br />* <span style="font-weight: bold;">Eric</span>, you've just finished another performance of one of the most difficult roles in your rep, and it was great until the last few seconds -- which, unforch, are highly exposed. Now go rest, then see your coach. See you on fb!<br /><br />* The <span style="font-weight: bold;">Giants</span> are back: Selig (Fasolt) sentimental, and Koenig (Fafner) bloody mean!<br /><br />* <span style="font-weight: bold;">Stephanie Blythe</span>'s Fricka, to me, neither adds much nor detracts anything. Am I missing something? Some of her fans admit as much but blame it on the production. I don't buy that. She just doesn't move well in any production, and has a good-but-not-great voice. I saw her WALKURE Fricka in the previous production -- and she tripped over a piece of the (admittedly very uneven) set. However, she recovered in character -- imperiously waving of support efforts from James Morris, who also avoided breaking character.<br /><br />* <span style="font-weight: bold;">Patricia Bardon</span> (Erda) has a fine contralto voice, but I'd have sworn she got the melody-line slightly wrong in her opening line.<br /><br />* I can hear some <span style="font-weight: bold;">stage machinery noises</span> again. Erda descending? And who's that backstage shouting something?<br /><br />* AWESOME how Luisi slows things down ominously just before the Giants' fight scene.<br /><br />* W-wait. Did I just hear some audience laughter? At what -- the <span style="font-weight: bold;">body of Fasolt sliding down the plank</span>, Sweeney-Todd-style? Sorry, that's not a laughing moment, I don't care if you <span style="font-style: italic;">are</span> a matinee audience with buses back to Philly waiting for you....<br /><br />* Call to the Mists: <span style="font-weight: bold;">Dwayne Croft</span> is a fine Donner. And his brother Richard was a fine Loge last fall. <span style="font-style: italic;">Is there some law that the Croft brothers can't ever appear in the same performance?</span> (E.g. in PELLEAS....?)<br /><br />* "Abendlich strahlt der Sonne Auge": Terfel sounding the best he has all afternoon; his familiar self.<br /><br />* Entrance of the God: Luisi's pacing -- neither slow nor fast but steady and stately -- excellent!<br /><br />* Big hand for Owens; he acknowledges "orchestra," meaning probably Luisi, I'm guessing<br /><br />* Big hand as well for Bezuyen and Terfel<br /><br />* Now Luisi on stage<br /><br />* I don't like the Met's gradual abandonment of traditional Met curtain calls in favor of Broadway bows, but that's a separate post. Admittedly, in RHEINGOLD, the only difference is whether the curtain is (Broadway style) or is not (traditional Met style) up during curtain calls.<br /><br />* "Von Morgen bis Abend" -- so much happens in such a short time in DAS RHEINGOLD: the gold is stolen, the Ring is forged, Valhalla is completed, the Ring is stolen and cursed, Wotan dooms himself and the gods though his momentarily hanging onto it (Erda is flatly wrong if she thinks Wotan can save the gods by getting rid of it -- maybe she's just on a seduction mission: dark temptress 'n' all that); and the gods take possession of Valhalla thinking they're in the catbird's seat when they're actually in the crosshairs.<br /><br />Playing time? Two and a half hours, give or take. Slightly longer than Act II of DIE WALKURE. Shorter than Prologue + Act I of GOTTERDAMMERUNG.<br /><br />Yes, later installments of THE RING proceed more spaciously: that's because they focus, much more than does RHEINGOLD, on the human dramas between the characters ("human" even when they involve interactions between gods and men, or passages from divinity to "mere" humanity).David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-83317198206720889072011-01-15T10:57:00.000-08:002011-01-15T11:09:39.429-08:00Listening to Met b'cast TRAVIATA. Thinking of suspending my ban on soprano crushes (mezzos free to apply) due to <a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Marina_Poplavskaya06.jpg">Poplavskaya</a>; I was carried away by her <a href="http://www.cbc.ca/canada/montreal/story/2010/12/08/don-carlo.html?ref=rss">Elisabetta</a> last month. Right now we've just finished Act I of T., and I want to say You go girl, sounding' great, and don't let anyone pressure you into trying high options you don't feel comfortable with!David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-75841761697196229282010-10-23T16:43:00.000-07:002010-10-28T13:00:58.967-07:00<span style="font-weight: bold;">The Better BORIS Bureau -- seal of approval</span><br /><br />We interrupt our rolling review of the Lepage RHEINGOLD (see <span style="font-style: italic;">infra</span>) to review today's live telecast of the Met's new production of BORIS GODUNOV, directed by <span style="font-weight: bold;">Stephen Wadsworth </span>(taking over on short notice from Peter Stein, who got marooned in Europe this summer either by a rude American consular officer or by his own Euro-'tude -- different interpretations are possible, and all equally unimportant), and starring the one, the only <span style="font-weight: bold;">Rene Pape.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">What this production replaces</span><br /><br />The previous production that premiered in 1974, with austere yet atmospheric sets designed by the formidable Ming Cho Lee, hardly needed replacing. It managed a clean and dry stage look, while taking advantage of things like onion domes, and, in its proper scene, St. Basil's. And no one who saw it will ever forget Boris tumbling down a flight of stairs leading to his throne -- not falling and rolling, but pitching forward like a tree. Each time it happened, the audience was sure the bass had broken his neck. Or perhaps it was the unique athletic ability of Martti Talvela, for whom the production was designed. But then Jerome Hines did it too! And Sam Ramey! (OK, Sam's so small, he could probably walk away from a fall from a tall building, but still....)<br /><br />Years later I met Prof. Richard T. Gill at a conference. Gill was an economist at Harvard. He was also a bass, and had a substantial career as a second-tier soloist at both the City Opera and the Met. Expecting to talk only about economics at this conference, he was delighted to meet someone who had seen him in almost every operatic role he ever did. At the Met, he told me, they gave him a few performances as Pimen in BORIS, plus the opportunity to cover the title role. As an official cover, he got to do one dress rehearsal as Boris. He was tall and thin, so they got Jerry Hines's costumes out of mothballs for him. It was then that he discovered how every Boris in that production fell downstairs without killing himself: the Tsar's costume for the death scene was heavily padded! Prevents injury, builds confidence. Like rolling in a log, ya know.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">A new look</span><br /><br />Well: new donors, new star bass -- new production. What we are given by set designer <span style="font-weight: bold;">Ferdinand Woegerbauer</span> and costume designer <span style="font-weight: bold;">Moidele Bickel</span>, who did their work before save-the-day director Wadsworth took over, is basically period costumes (maybe with designs a bit swirlier than late 16th century boyars actually favored; experts may debate), with a really boss Crown of Monomakh for the Coronation Scene. But why was Marina in black? To match Jesuit Rangoni? More on this anon.<br /><br />For the sets, Russian atmosphere was somewhat sacrificed to adaptability. Like many opera directors today, Wadsworth abhors a "down" curtain: scene changes take place in full audience view. So, for instance, Pimen's monastery is not seen as such: it's a downstage space, with Boris, enthroned, still visible upstage through some of the scene, and choristers reacting to Pimen's multiple narratives. (As the old John Gutman translation used to say: "I was in Uglich. They sent me there to do a term of penance." Someday I must see Uglich to find out whether it really sucks as hard as this opera makes out.) (Also: Boris's scepter must be as corked as a bat, given how long he holds it aloft in some parts of this production.)<br /><br />As if in compensation for some loss of <span style="font-style: italic;">vieille Russie </span>atmosphere by comparison to Ming Cho Lee's sets, we get a lot more color. Lee gave us a lot of shades of gray, except for the Polish Act, which was shades of blue; the death scene, which was red, gold, and black; and of course, St. Basil's. Here, color is used vividly throughout. In fact, Wadsworth and Woegerbauer defy the convention Russia-gloomy, Poland-lively. The Polish Act was actually the darkest and most uniform: white-clad nobles, black-clad Marina and Rangoni, dimly-lit Sandomir; variety provided only by "Dimitri"'s red leather jerkin, and -- ahem -- Rangoni's <span style="font-style: italic;">red leather gloves.</span><br /><br />The <span style="font-style: italic;">book</span> -- yes, luv, I'm getting to that. Most scenes (perhaps all: <span style="font-weight: bold;">Brian Large</span>'s expert camera work left that unclear) featured a large book, downstage left. Sometimes it was the Cyrillic-filled chronicle in which Pimen is writing. Other times it was the map of Russia that Fyodor compiled -- and that Marina stood on to accept dazzled obeisance from "Dimitri." Some will say cool; some will say gimmick; I'm sure Martin Bernheimer said (tho' I haven't checked) "Ah, symbolism." At certain points the direction "Now go stand on the book because you're singing something important" seemed a bit obvious; at other times it kind of worked. A wash, over-all.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Holy Fool</span><br /><br />This production is very Russian in that it makes much of the character of the Yurodivi, or Holy Fool (reductively called the Simpleton in earlier Met tradition). He is the first character we see: he is praying in the monastery courtyard even before the crowd arrives. During the prelude, Boris, having escaped his minders, comes out to him, seeking something. The Holy Fool tries to give him a stone of some kind.<br /><br />Note to directors: Christianity has a rich range of symbols, but stones aren't among them. If you show a representative of prophetic, non-hierarchical holiness trying to give someone a stone (instead of, say, a cross or an icon), <span style="font-style: italic;">no one will know what you mean.</span><br /><br />Anyway, Boris gets hustled back into the monastery before he can accept whatever gift it was the Holy Fool meant to give him. Evidently this is not an ambitious Boris orchestrating demonstrations in favor of his own coronation, as Pushkin's play suggests, and playing hard to get, as Shakespeare's Richard III does. He seems conflicted from the get-go.<br /><br />All this, of course, is directorial invention. The Holy Fool has no lines until Act IV. There, in the shadow of St. Basil's, he refers almost casually to Boris's killing of Tsarevich Dimitri. Holy Fools are innocent, non-manipulative truth-tellers. The staging of the confrontation was the best I've ever seen or heard of: <span style="font-style: italic;">Boris knelt</span> before the Fool. (Whether or not it's good theology for the Fool to refuse to pray for "Tsar Herod" -- "Do not pray for him, says the Mother of God" -- we can discuss some other time. In any case, the Fool in this production does have something to offer Boris: that stone!)<br /><br />The Holy Fool was played with sweetly maniacal eyes and an even sweeter tenor voice by <span style="font-weight: bold;">Andrei Popov.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Boris -- Rene Pape</span><br /><br />There aren't enough good things to say about Pape. I've seen Talvela, Hines, and Ramey on stage, and I've heard Pinza, Siepi, Tozzi, London, Christoff, and Ghiaurov on records. Every bass or bass-baritone wants to make Boris his own, and the great ones do, including all those I've just mentioned. (I have special affection for Talvela, Siepi, and Tozzi, the first and last of whom were also awesome as Pimen before they got the big promotion!) (Props also to Anatoly Kotscherga, who solidly anchors the Abbado recording.)<br /><br />Pape's voice is huge, handsome, dark, and round. To compare with some of my other favorites: Tozzi was almost too paternal, and Talvela almost too barbaric. Pape brings these qualities together. And -- thanks to TV director Brian Large's camera work -- we can see with Pape's first-class acting the Tsar's inner torment: not a scrap of scenery-chewing, just Christian conscience and human anxiety.<br /><br />He -- Boris -- wanted to do so much good; <span style="font-style: italic;">had </span>done so much good as de facto regent of Russia under the pious wantwit Fyodor I (Pimen's favorite Tsar); seemed to do so much good for the first few years of his reign; but then the fears that he spoke of at his coronation closed in: famine, fires, untimely deaths of which was innocent, and the memory of the one untimely death of which (according to the legendary history accepted as fact in this opera) he was <span style="font-style: italic;">not</span> innocent, that of Tsarevich Dimitri, whose survival would have blocked Boris's way to the throne.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Gergiev's choice of versions, esp. as applied to Act II</span><br /><br />Very commendably, this production, includes Act III -- the "Polish Act" -- which means that, pro tanto, Maestro Valery Gergiev is using Mussorgsky's 1874, but with (as is highly traditional) the St. Basil's Cathedral scene from the 1869 version retained. Bravo. But Gergiev also made an unusual choice: for the latter half of Act II -- the scene in the Tsar's Apartments, an act that combines family intimacy, high politics, and horrible conscience-driven hallucinations -- he reverted to the 1869 version; i.e. for Boris's Monologue, the ensuing Boris-Shuisky confrontation, and the hallucination (which, in this version, does not involve the clock chimes, so ixnay the familiar term "Clock Scene").<br /><br />Good decision?<br /><br />The minus side: you lose some familiar and excellent music; and you lose the bit where Boris burns Shuisky another one, and Shuisky replies that, really, in Tsar Ivan's time the Shuiskies were not accustomed to being spoken to that way, and Boris replies that, really, if Tsar Ivan were around today he'd roast this particular Shuisky alive and sing a psalm around the campfire while doing it, so shaddup about past Shuiskies and tell me what your spies have told you. And you lose the stroke of genius whereby Boris's hallucination of the child Dimitri is keyed to the chiming and moving figurines on the clock (hence "Clock Scene").<br /><br />The plus side: the 1869 version actually conveys more information, esp. in Boris's monologue. For example, did you know that Boris's sister Irina (who had been married to Tsar Fyodor I, thus facilitating Boris's rise to prominence as a statesman) died during Boris's reign -- and popular rumor had it that Boris had had her killed? (He didn't, even in legend.) There's also info about the plagues, fires, and famines that you get only in the '69 version of this scene.<br /><br />Net? For me, 1874 is my story and I'm sticking to it. But I don't disapprove of Gergiev's decision to experiment here.<br /><br />Shuisky, looking younger than usual, was well sung by tenor <span style="font-weight: bold;">Oleg Balashov</span>. This production shows him really double-dealing: in the Polish Act, he turns up at Sandomir, ingratiating himself with Boris's enemies, with Rangoni introducing him around. In the last scene, he's part of the False Dimitri's retinue, while other princes and boyars are getting tortured by the mob for their loyalty to Boris. (Historically, this runt of the clan that once ruled Suzdal and fought beside Grozny, after quasi-reigning for a few years as Vassily IV, finished out his life as a political exile in Poland. LKF.)<br /><br />As conductor more generally, Gergiev was what he always is: energy, propulsion. A few of his tempi were too quick for my Knappertsbuschian tastes, but the fire was always there, and always white-hot. Mr. Large's camera-work frequently caught singers looking at him -- I mean, more often than soloists usually look at the conductor -- which may suggest that he's a bit mercurial: tempi not set in stone in rehearsal, need to watch constantly, etc. (Nikitin, as Rangoni, was especially doing this.) But this long, leave-nothing out version of BORIS flew by, without too many of those rushed tempi I mentioned. Gergiev has shown that he can truly mangle non-Russian repertory (his OTELLO, anybody? or DON CARLO? or his Maryinsky RING on tour at Covent Garden?), but in Russian rep, he's infallible.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Fyodor and Xenia</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Jonathan Makepeace</span> and <span style="font-weight: bold;">Jennifer Zetlan</span>, with Wadsworth's help, made much more of the Godunov children than is usually the case. It's a Wadsworth principle that every character, even in a sprawling work like this, has his or her own story, and so Fyodor and Xenia emerge more individuated than usual. Makepeace has a strong boy soprano and acts well. Zetlan -- with a pretty/homely a face of the sort you "don't get tired of," and with a rich range of expression -- managed the feat of looking about ten years old in the Coronation Scene, then aging into teen-hood by Act II. (Six years elapse between these scenes.) Her alternating cheered-up and not-cheered-up moods during the songs and dances with Fyodor and their nanny (<span style="font-weight: bold;">Larisa Shevchenko</span>) were delightful.<br /><br />In a coup that has mysteriously eluded earlier directors afaik, Wadsworth brings Xenia as well as Fyodor onstage for Boris's death. (She enters at the point where he mentions her.)<br /><br />In some productions -- and this way is valid too -- Boris's death scene is fraught with politics. At the Met in the '60s, Shuisky would put his foot on the first step of the throne, until Fyodor, cradling his father's body, shoots Shuisky one of those looks that sterilizes frogs at forty paces. In the Ming Cho Lee production, loyal courtiers extracted Fyodor from his embrace of Boris and carry him, underarm, up the stairs and set him on the throne.<br /><br />Here, politics vanishes in this scene. It's a strictly and highly intimate family scene: Boris, Fyodor and Xenia. Even the chorus that half-sings, half-whispers "He's dead" is off stage.<br /><br />There's a reason for this intimacy. Remember how all scene changes are in full audience view in this production? As soon as the ethereal strains that close out the scene of Boris's death are over, you hear a roar: you think maybe it's a spontaneous ovation. No: it's (the Met chorus now playing) a bloodthirsty revolutionary mob, rushing in to begin the final scene, usually called the Forest of Kromy Scene. Where Pape, Makepeace, and Zetlan vanish to, I couldn't tell you. Possibly they "escape" in the confusion; possibly the Met stage's trap doors are involved. All I can tell you is, they're gone.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Pimen</span><br /><br />Can you deal with a wise, elderly Russian monk who is clean-shaven? White-haired, white-clad, but clean-shaven? I sense a failure of research here, or maybe an excessive desire to be different ("EVVVVVerybody puts a long beard on Pimen...").<br /><br />If you can get past that, you may like saintly Brother Pimen as presented here. He's wise, and diligent, probably very holy, but on one subject, just a little bit off his nut: the murder of Tsarevich Dimitri. He was there, you see: he heard the Tsaritsa's first screams, he saw the people's arrest of the knifeman -- "that Judas, Bityagovsky" (as the Met's surtitles say).<br /><br />(The libretto says "Yehuda Bityagovsky." I've never been easy in my mind whether this really means "[a guy by the name of] Yehuda Bityagovsky," or "that traitor, Bityagovsky" -- or just possibly, "that Jew, Bityagovsky.")<br /><br />This Pimen is obsessed with this event. When he turns his chronicling duties over to young Grigori, he hands over his newly-sharpened quill (the camera dwells on Pimen sharpening it), but he <span style="font-style: italic;">takes his ink-tray away with him.</span> Wha...? Is he signalling that Grigory should in fact use sharp tools, rather than ink?<br /><br />Anyway, the eyes of bass <span style="font-weight: bold;">Mikhail Petrenko</span> start to flash when the subject comes up. In the scene of Boris's death, he is less an old man with a story than (all in white) an avenging angel: he even grabs Boris by the collar at the climax of his narrative.<br /><br />I was delighted with Petrenko's voice. A few years ago I heard him at the Met give a distinctly underwhelming performance as Hunding in DIE WALKURE, which was put to shame by the unforgettable, stage-grabbing Hunding I saw in May of '09 -- Rene Pape! Either Petrenko's voice has greatly improved, or he was just not comfortable in Wagner back then. To equal his Pimen vocally, you'd have to go to Plishka (in the Rostropovich recording, or many a Met b'cast tape), or Tozzi (in a Met b'cast tape from '56), or Talvela (in the Ghiaurov/Karajan recording of the Rimsky-Korsakov version).<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Grigori, later "Dimitri"</span><br /><br />What do you call this character? The Russian libretto I've accessed on the web calls him "Grigori" in Act I, and in Acts III and IV, самозванец, "pretender." Never "Dimitri," tho' some English libretti call him that. I'll stick with Grigori.<br /><br />The length and difficulty of this role doubled when Mussorgsky added the Polish Act (in the 1874 revision). It turned the role into the musical equivalent of a romantic tenor lead, except that a) he's still an unscrupulous schemer, and b) he'll never get star billing, because the lead bass will always get that. This means that this role has had trouble attracting tenors equal to its demands. No such problems arose, however, with the role in the hands of <span style="font-weight: bold;">Aleksandr Antonenko</span>. Germans have Heldentenors, Italians have (what Americans call) "can beltos"; whatever the Russian equivalent is, he's that. Not especially tender, but solid and brilliant throught this role's wide range.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Marina and Rangoni</span><br /><br />Awright, what's going on?<br /><br />First, I know the Polish Act is often omitted these days. The stated reason is "authenticity": it wasn't part of the "original version." That's pious BS: the real reason is to avoid the cost of hiring a first-rate mezzo-soprano and baritone for these two roles, and of building a set to represent the Palace of Sandomir. So when we get the Polish Act at all as part of BORIS (and I think it's essential: the producers who said the 1869 version needed more dramatic sweep and a serious female lead were <span style="font-style: italic;">right</span>, and Mussorgsky wrote some of his best music for these scenes), I suppose we must be grateful.<br /><br />That said, is it a given that there must always be hints (of varying degrees and types) of sexual intrigue between Princess Marina and the Jesuit, Fr. Rangoni?<br /><br />Rangoni was Mussorgky's creation. He's not in the Pushkin play, which features only an unnamed Jesuit with a quick line or two. Fr. Rangoni, SJ, is a product of the Slavophil imagination. The historical Rangoni was a lay nobleman who represented the Vatican at the royal court of Poland-Lithuania. To fulfill the Slavophil nightmare, though, he had to be a priest, and not just any priest, but a Jesuit.<br /><br />The Jesuits in their first century were in deadly earnest: they accomplished amazing feats of missionary work (think of St. Francis Xavier in Japan), and lots of martyrs. Now, I can't claim that none of them were attracted to, or inspired attraction in, the women of the high society they often moved in. It may have happened. But for a Slavophil -- and this is my point -- you don't <span style="font-style: italic;">need</span> that in order to make Jesuits creepy. They come creepy right out of the box, just because they fervently spread the -- heretical, from a Russian Orthodox "ultra" p.o.v. -- Roman Catholic faith.<br /><br />But moderns are incapable of seeing religious questions as intrinsically serious. Why should Rangoni be creepy -- as his music, and others' reactions to him, clearly show he is -- just because he'd rather Russians be Catholic and Russians would rather Russians be Orthodox? There must be something else! GOT IT....!<br /><br />In this production, <span style="font-weight: bold;">Ekaterina Semenchuk</span> is one bombshell of a Marina. Put it this way, if Anna Chapman has a rich mezzo voice, that'd be this Marina. That something other than spiritual direction is going on between these two is made clear, though, mercifully, the details are not. (And to think some people think it's weird that some priests will only have spiritual chats with women in a traditional, non-face-to-face, through-the-grille confessional.) What's less clear is who the instigator is or was. It could very well be Marina. In this production, she rejoiceth in her seductive power the way that horse in Job paweth in the valley.<br /><br />As Rangoni, the Jesuit who (in this production) gives up the girl for the greater good, the craggily handsome <span style="font-weight: bold;">Evgeny Nikitin</span> is a Father What-a-Waste. (All Catholic girls know what that is.) In older days at the Met, Rangoni was usually Morley Meredith, who was, not to put too fine a point on it, Boris Karloff with a dry bass-baritone voice. How nice to see a Rangoni who doesn't crack mirrors as he passes.<br /><br />Jesuits were supposed to be comfortable in high society, and in that regard, Wadsworth gets it right: Nikitin's Rangoni chats with Grigori across living room furniture, legs crossed, at ease -- all that's missing is a cigarette (which Pape was enjoying backstage, but that's a separate post). And what's he doing, at least as Wadsworth sees it? Setting up this worthless vagabond-ex-monk with the Best Girl in Poland, all for the greater glory of God. And smiling while he does it. Maybe his whispered prayer to St. Ignatius isn't pointless or hypocritical after all!<br /><br />Oh and -- costume. The Jesuits these days remain badly in need of some counter-reformation, and I think if they could swan about the way Nikitin's Rangoni does -- clericals decked out with black knickers, a black leather knee-length pinch-waist coat, and crimson gloves -- I think that could happen. Trent Punk.<br /><br />Singing -- oh yes, Nikitin did that too. See, when he first came to the Met, it was as Fasolt in DAS RHEINGOLD -- a bass part. But baritone is his Fach -- lately I even heard of him doing as high-lying a role as the Herald in LOHENGRIN. Mussorgsky marked Rangoni as "bass" in the score, but, at least at the Met, since the '30s, it's been baritone territory. Nikitin may not be ready, or suited, for Verdi baritone parts, but the baritone voice he's settled into is more mellifluous than that of, say, Sergei Leiferkus (an excellent Rangoni in his time) or Nikolai Putilin. Onegin and Igor should be in his future.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Smaller parts</span><br /><br />With Pape, Semenchuk, Petrenko, Antonenko, Balashov, and Nikitin in the major roles, this performance could have gotten away with a few weak performances down-ticket -- but there were none. Veteran bass <span style="font-weight: bold;">Vladimir Ognovenko </span>(a Boris back home) showed the right buffo style as Varlaam. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Nikolai Gassiev</span>, who's been doing character-tenor roles in Petersburg since Rasputin was a cadet, was a mischievous and eye-catching Missail. Young <span style="font-weight: bold;">Alexei Markov</span> showed a baritone voice of Hvorostovskian potential as Shchelkalov, Secretary of the Duma (virtually a star role). <span style="font-weight: bold;">Valerian Ruminski </span>and <span style="font-weight: bold;">Gennady Bezzubenkov </span>provided two mean and bassy police officers (and hey guys, great whip sound-effects in the first scene -- uh, those <span style="font-style: italic;">were</span> sound effects, right?). <span style="font-weight: bold;">Olga Savova</span> was an Innkeeper right out of Gogol.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Mikhail Svetlov </span>excelled as Mitiukha, the one character above all who, for me, exemplifies the "here comes everybody" aspect of this opera: Mussorgsky didn't leave out any element of Russian society, not even the designated peasant "smart guy," the plebeian whom the other plebeians instinctively ask questions of. That's Mitiukha. In English village life, this is what would be called a "Lord High Everything Else."<br /><br />Only problem is, with all these superb Russian <span style="font-style: italic;">comprimarii</span>, there was little room for the Met's own <span style="font-style: italic;">artisti di casa</span>. Two of these did in fact get cast: <span style="font-weight: bold;">Andrew Oakden</span> and <span style="font-weight: bold;">Mark Schowalter</span> as the adventurous Jesuits in the last scene, Lavitsky and Chernikovsky. I'm afraid I was at a loss to figure out what Wadsworth meant to have happen to them: they narrowly escape being hanged thanks to the timely arrival of Grigori, all decked out as the conquering "Dimitri." Then they're about to follow him, but they look at the various dead guys all around -- and sort of sink down too. You might expect them to pray for the dead -- but a quick, silent Liebestod? No comprendo -- but all is resolved, if sadly, in the final, mournful prophecy of the Holy Fool, which closes out the opera.David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-83245830662784121472010-10-09T17:10:00.000-07:002010-10-15T18:31:36.292-07:00DAS RHEINGOLD review, part one: the road to this production<br /><br />The music-dramatic spectacular of Wagner's RING needs re-staging from time to time, sometimes even re-thinking. But during the Postwar, not to say since the days of Adolph Appia, this has in fact been happening. Are re-think ideas endless?<br /><br />European <span style="font-style: italic;">Personenregie</span> is a dead-end: even if a encasing Wotan's head in a birdcage somehow <span style="font-style: italic;">does</span> tell us something, it's more likely to be something the director learned in Europe's endless grad-school culture than anything Richard Wagner meant to narrate.<br /><br />The "neo-Bayreuth" style of Wieland Wagner was beautiful in its austerity, but its quarter-century reign on the Green Hill (longer elsewhere) was a long inning indeed, and in any case, it had two flaws: it underplayed the role of color in Wagnerian staging (or do I just think so b/c those productions were mostly photographed in b&w? I think they were photographed that way b/c they <span style="font-style: italic;">were</span> that way); and they depended on a generation of singers so great in both their vocalism and their dramatic sense that their like cannot be depended on.<br /><br />Wieland Wagner defended that lack of literal-looking trees in his RING sets with the remark, "Why do I need a tree when I have Astrid Varnay?" Meaning, not that this great (American!) soprano was a tree, but that her vocal and dramatic presence made sets kind of beside the point. But is there a new Varnay today? Enough of them to supply the (growing!) demand for RING productions? Frak that! -- even Bayreuth is now employing Linda Watson; an estimable lady (I've seen her Brunnhilde at the Met), but not a Varnay, or a Flagstad, or a Moedl, or a Nilsson.<br /><br />What else? Well, there's the type of <span style="font-style: italic;">Konzeptproduktion </span>that doesn't deserve to be dismissed as "Eurotrash"; productions that impose an interpretation, but do so with consistency and evident intelligence, and work with the text and music, not against them or in apparent ignorance of them. Ultimate example: Chereau. Archetypal term of praise from reluctant admirers (like me): "It works." Yes it did -- but how many such ideas are out there, w/o tipping over into Eurotrash? And, even if they were abundant, do we really want every RING to come with some director's <span style="font-style: italic;">Konzept</span>? Can't we have some "pure" Wagner somewhere, some time?<br /><br />The Met thought so. After a 1967-1982 experiment with a neo-Bayreuth style (the complete cycle was last given in 1975), James Levine realized that "conservatism" had become radical, and took to the barricades. Everyone said you could never again have literal spears, shields, and sets that represent the forests and mountains of mythical ancient Germany. Levine said, why the hell not? Who sez?<br /><br />No need to change set designers: the clever and versatile Gunther Schneider-Siemssen, who had designed the broken-ring world-disc, abstract buildings, and sky-swirls for the 1967 "Karajan" production, was re-hired to work with director Otto Schenck on a panoply of ultra-realistic sets, such as might have been seen in Wagner's day, but enhanced by modern stage technology.<br /><br />The result was right out of New York opera-world master-plots: fans loved it, critics hated it, it drew generations of new Wagnerian singers to the Met, and it put paying butts in seats, wall to wall, for a quarter-century. And that's not counting earnings from the DVD and (not identical) CD releases.<br /><br />But 20-25 years is about the average life-span for any RING production at the Met. Ask me, I'd have kept the Schenck version indefinitely. But I can't honestly complain it got stiffed, lifespan-wise. And besides, it <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span> on DVD.<br /><br />But -- what to do next? As my survey above was meant to suggest, the best options are all either just as "done already" as ultra-realism, or else they're simply bad. (I admit I haven't seen the LA Opera's hyper-modern production, which I've already ragged on a bit in this essay; but, to judge from their ticket sales, hardly any one else has either, and that should tell you something. In the age of the internet, people can find multiple reviews and see both still pictures and video clips, and decide whether they really <span style="font-style: italic;">want</span> to see a stage full of laser beams and Wotan with a birdcage on his head, or not. Evidently, most don't.)<br /><br />(The idea behind LA RING director Achim Freyer's wire-encasement of Wotan's head may be -- just guessing here -- to show the audience, who would never otherwise have guessed, that Wotan is imprisoned by the choices he has made. Oooooooooo, deep, man. "Ah, symbolism," as Martin Bernheimer might say.)<br /><br />But if we don't want old and we don't want bad, what is there? Well, there has not yet been "fusionism" in Wagnerian staging: that is, anchoring certain aspects of a production firmly in tradition and the composer's narrative -- costumes and props, say -- but <span style="font-style: italic;">fusing</span> that traditionalism with a non-representational (and to that extent, non-traditional) set, which will dispense with representationalism not for the hell of it, but in order to achieve scenic effects in a new way, a way made familiar by theater phenomena such as Hal Prince (how "representational," really, are his classic productions of SWEENEY or PHANTOM?) and Cirque du Soleil.<br /><br />Only one man for <span style="font-style: italic;">that</span> job -- a man with experience in both CdS and opera -- by name, Robert Lepage. And by 2005, Peter Gelb was talking to him about taking charge of a new RING production at the Met.<br /><br />And now, RHEINGOLD is here. For my money (and I think I've shown my traddy cards clearly enough) it is a triumph. It's a long way from a traddy production: e.g. the gods assemble, not on a set that looks like the grassy mountain-top called for in the score, but in front of a row of vertical slats that pivot, turn, and re-form to change scenes or to make necessary adjustments within a scene. These slats are highly reflective, and both light and images (e.g. bubbles coming from the mouths of the Rhinemaidens, fire around Loge's feet) are projected on them constantly.<br /><br />But notice -- the slats move around to tell Wagner's story, not some new one invented by the director. And what's projected on them are elements directly or indirectly from Wagner's libretto (after all, Scene One does take place "in the River Rhine -- <span style="font-style: italic;">in</span> it," as Anna Russell pointed out, and Loge is the god of fire). Revolutionary means to conservative/preservative ends. Or, if you prefer (as I do) to can the political metaphors: a kickass new way to tell a familiar story (or to tell as afresh to those not familiar with it).<br /><br />In the previous production, Schenck and Schneider-Siemssen gave us at the finale of their RHEINGOLD a beautiful Rainbow Bridge leading to a visible Valhalla. But it was done entirely with light-tricks, so no opera-singers-portraying-gods could actually "cross" it and "enter" Valhalla.<br /><br />What does Lepage give us? An aurora-borealis of color in the sky, representing the rainbow; a laser-light "bridge" hiding an escalalator that enables the "gods" actually to rise slowly up the steep "bridge" behind the lasers; then the slat that had been raked to make all this visible horizontalizes, so that the "gods" can continue their walk (sans escalator) into Valhalla. The slat then verticalizes behind them, solemnly shutting Valhalla (Loge, by choice, remains outside); lights projected on the slats show Valhalla to be built of black alabaster with much white marbling (the Giants use quality materials).<br /><br />Frakkn' <span style="font-style: italic;">amazing.</span>David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-52075450191400494312010-09-29T13:33:00.000-07:002010-09-29T13:40:18.735-07:00<p><span style="font-weight: bold;">Met RHEINGOLD round-up</span><br /></p><p><a href="http://bit.ly/a61LUr">Heidi Whaleson in the WSJ</a>: "a high-tech extravaganza oddly married to an old-fashioned stand-and-sing aesthetic." To me, that's basically praise.<br /></p><p><a href="http://bit.ly/aKPbuf">Stage-machinery malfunction at very end</a> meant gods had to shuffle off to Buffalo instead of entering Valhalla. But hey, the history of RING productions is a history of prop malfunctions. See my Dad's book, "Prima Donnas & Other Wild Beasts," for the section on anvils that split *before* Siegfried strikes them. You deal with it.</p><p><a href="http://bit.ly/cNxZBv">Philly says "flawed,"</a> which tells you a lot about Philly.<br /></p><p>My longtime friend Martin Bernheimer (writing for The Financial Times) is the world's greatest opera critic, and perhaps the last of the truly learned ones. But he's mighty hard to please in RING productions. He railed endlessly against the Met's previous, ultra-realistic one, but does he like this new, more abstract one? <a href="http://bit.ly/aArMmF">Ha!</a> <sigh>Oh, Martin: Neo-Bayreuth has been done, Chereau has been done, you didn't like Schenck (tho' I did), and the less said about European "Regie," the less said the better. This is something really new yet really committed to telling Wagner's story, not the director's. <sigh></sigh></sigh></p> <p><a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/opera/8030602/Das-Rheingold-Metropolitan-Opera-New-York-review.html">Claire Prentice in The Daily Telegraph</a>: "a triumph...Lepage treated the audience to a mesmerising display of virtual magic...Images projected on to the set evoke the depths of the Rhine, the mountaintops of the gods and the underground realm of the Nibelungen....Wearing costumes inspired by early productionsthe singers move around a stage bathed in infrared light. Computers pick up their movements and envelop them in projected pictures that move with their voices and the score. Wherever the god Loge goes, a flaming aura follows...."</p><p>Oo! Oo! <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TDUUJzlma74">A quick video about the production</a>, narrated by director Lepage! (Ignore the opening: it's Baroque, but don't fix it.)</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-15088000814724372182010-09-27T18:46:00.000-07:002010-09-27T18:47:32.247-07:00First reaction I've heard from tonight's premiere of RHEINGOLD (and therefore of the entire Lepage RING): "Es lebt Richard Wagner!" Sounds encouraging, no?David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-69612064761986194522010-09-13T18:49:00.000-07:002010-09-13T18:50:49.533-07:00Berg, who was so much more than just Schoenberg! Plus Schreker, and more! Alex Ross writes about a festival at Bard this past summer:<blockquote>Berg, who was born in Vienna in 1885, is classified in most music histories as an epigone of Arnold Schoenberg. Although Berg followed Schoenberg in abandoning conventional tonal harmony and, later, in adopting twelve-tone composition, his works reverberate with echoes of Wagner, Strauss, and, especially, Mahler. If Schoenberg always seemed to be marching in a straight line, Berg moved in majestic loops. In that spirit, the “Berg and His World” festival presented a dizzying mélange of early twentieth-century styles: the late-Romantic outpourings of Mahler, the gilt-edged impressionism of Schreker, the Brucknerian bombast of Franz Schmidt, the brittle sonorities of Paul Hindemith...<br /><div><div style="overflow: hidden; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; border: medium none;"><span></span></div></div></blockquote><div><div style="overflow: hidden; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; border: medium none;"><span><br />Read more <a style="color: rgb(0, 51, 153);" href="http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/musical/2010/09/13/100913crmu_music_ross#ixzz0zSr3mJli">http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/musical/2010/09/13/100913crmu_music_ross#ixzz0zSr3mJli</a></span></div></div>David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-40506191277556123202010-06-24T18:43:00.000-07:002010-06-25T18:25:01.650-07:00Today on the 'Net (actually, on a networking site called Who-Hub) I encountered the following <a href="http://www.whohub.com/en/answ.php?eqid=376&vgo=quest&type=&tag=CULTURE#ixzz0rpDUFjkc">interview question</a>: <span class="question"><b>Do you think video games, chat rooms, etc. have a dangerous addictive effect on teenagers?<br /></b></span><div style="overflow: hidden; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; text-align: left; text-decoration: none; border: medium none;"><br />Here's my answer:<br /></div><br />No. -- Well, maybe than can, but I think the word "addiction" has become drastically overused. There are some things that some people like to do a lot, while other people aren't that into them. Nothing wrong with that -- until the latter start to label the former "addicted" and start to medicalize their situation.<br /><br />Do many teenagers today spend too much time with videogames and other online diversions, displacing both human interaction and other forms of education? Yes, maybe they do. When I was a teenager, I spent long hours under my headphones listening to various forms of classical music, mainly Wagnerian opera. Did I spend too much time with that, displacing both human interaction and other forms of education? Yes, maybe. Do I care? No.<br /><br />And any educational specialists who came around theorizing that my Wagnerian opera-listening might have a dangerous addictive effect on me would have gotten Wotan's spear right through their interfering little hides.<br /><br />You know what? I think the tendency to label other people's cultural passions as "dangerously addictive" has a dangerously addictive effect on educational theorists, psychologists, <a href="http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/edwest/100044769/facebook-is-a-mental-health-threat-says-brussels-mep/">Euro-parliamentarians</a>, and other types we could use less of. I think we should do something about it.David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-33198041555276255602010-06-24T10:30:00.000-07:002010-06-24T10:31:33.554-07:00Pianist Stephen Hough <a href="http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/culture/stephenhough/100044399/die-meistersinger-and-the-fourth-reich-of-art/">blogs in London's Daily Telegraph</a> about the Welsh National Opera's production of MEISTERSINGER. Most interesting! (And yt has a comment)David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-5046016768630496272010-06-08T16:39:00.000-07:002010-06-24T10:32:41.433-07:00<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giuseppe_Taddei">Giuseppe Taddei, RIP</a><br /><br />A baritone as remarkable for his versatility as for his longevity on the stage. Not many singers succeed, at much the same periods in their careers, in relatively light baritone roles like <a href="http://www.play.com/Music/CD/4-/774874/La-Boheme/Product.html">Marcello</a>, and in roles usually thought of as more in the bass-baritone line, such as <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Mozart-Schwarzkopf-Cossotto-W%C3%83%C2%A4chter-Giulini/dp/B000002S1E">Mozart's Figaro</a>, and also <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Mozart-Giovanni-Sutherland-Schwarzkopf-Cappuccilli/dp/B000002RXD">Leporello</a>, which is sufficiently bass territory to have been in Kipnis's repertory (though, yes, also in Evans's and Terfel's). Taddei performed and recorded all these roles -- and also the uber-dramatic roles of the Italian rep, such as <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Verdi-Rigoletto-Giuseppe/dp/B000FWGYOE">Rigoletto</a> and Scarpia (the latter famously <a href="http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/album.jsp?album_id=133913">recorded under Karajan with Price and diStefano</a>.)<br /><br /><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/04/arts/music/04taddei.html">The New York Times's obit</a> concentrated on the longevity angle, since the Met -- due to Bing's famous ham hands with singers' egos -- failed to secure his services until he was 69! (And what was Jimmy -- who usually handles singers so much better -- thinking of when he offered this titan a role like Fra Melitone as a Met debut role? I guess he was thinking cameo; but even at 69 Taddei was not yet old enough to be doing cameos!)David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-91015612564377164762010-05-20T06:56:00.000-07:002010-05-20T07:00:25.886-07:00Currently listening to RING on endless-loop basis, as needed, to get the grading of exams done. Just finished <a href="http://www.cduniverse.com/search/xx/music/pid/2467722/a/Wagner:+Der+Ring+Des+Nibelungen.htm">Bohm '67 Bayreuth cycle</a>. Even as late as that, Josef Greindl blew away the competition as Hagen, and Windgassen had breath for the entire Act III narrative.<br /><br />As for Bohm -- well, I'm from the Kna-Goodall school, but Bohm shows one that exciting need not mean slow.David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-58999591621674901392010-05-02T21:43:00.000-07:002010-05-02T21:44:46.042-07:00Simon Heffer (Daily Telegraph, London) <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/simonheffer/7575769/Dont-be-afraid-of-Wagner.-Hes-not-a-Nazi.html">reviews <span style="font-style: italic;">The Faber Pocket Guide to Wagner</span>, by Michael Tanner</a>David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-23636205019352828232010-04-03T12:25:00.000-07:002010-04-03T13:18:29.516-07:00AIDA today<br /><br />I read on a priest's blog today that Holy Saturday is in a sense a day of "silence." I've always been a bit Fail on that part of the Triduum: worst of all two years ago when I spent that afternoon at the Multiplex watching the live HD transmission of TRISTAN -- and got a nice late-Lenten headache for it, thanks to the dizzy-making direction that day, with all its shifting "boxes." Enough about that.<br /><br />Today I'm at home, but the AIDA broadcast is on the radio in the library (while the Holy Father's Easter Vigil Mass in on the telly in the living room).<br /><br />We're at O Patria Mia right now, and I must say Hui He is quite a find and potentially quite a treasure. Where is she from, both nationally and in terms of the opera-professional ladder? The guardians of the memory of Milanov and Tebaldi who post of the great listserv Opera-L have been cautious in their praise, but look: we so often have chatter -- oops, there went the high C, and I've got to say, I've gotten better ones at the A&P -- but let me finish the thought: <span style="font-style: italic;">in general,</span> we have so often had to chatter about what in iron age of voices we live in compared to the golden age of our youths or (in my case, I assure you) childhood, that when an Aida comes along who is at least worthy of serious comparison with the Greats, we should cheer, encourage, maybe do the "Dilbert victory jig." (As well as suggest some coaching for that high C.)<br /><br />Zajick is amazing. Too bad there's only one serious Italian-style dramatic mezzo in the entire frikkn' world right now. Makes putting on AIDA kinda difficult, knamean? (D'Intino? Maybe. Borodina is past it now. Ganassi? Has she really moved successfully beyond the Berganza repertory?)<br /><br />I like Licitra's voice, but it tends to flatten at the top. And by "flatten" I don't mean go flat in terms of pitch: I mean that it sounds like it's pressing against an upper limit, as if you were trying to serve jello to the neighbors upstairs directly through the ceiling. A shame, b/c he's got a lot going for him in the heart of his range. And it's nice to hear a Radames who is a tad more lyrical than a standard "can belto" -- as just now, when he pulled back to a mezza voce on "Fuggire!" Cool!<br /><br />The lower-voiced guys aren't on the same level. Carlo Guelfi is effective dramatically, but the great baritone voice you can here in his recorded TABARRO didn't last long. Carlo Colombara's Ramfis does not suggest a bass who does first-string roles as well, tho' I know he does. Stefan Kocak as the King makes me feel that if I practice my scales in the shower a little longer, who knows.... "Dunque tu sei -- Sua padre" wasn't exactly like the days when Luben Vichey or Louis Sgarro would hand off to Leonard Warren or George London, was it?<br /><br />Marco Armiliato shows again that he is a great Verdian. The orchestra and chorus sound great; Marco punctuates the possibly-too-familiar score with a few rubati, and the ensembles are omg grand.David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3684398984458393109.post-16926518184131790802010-03-24T19:50:00.000-07:002010-03-24T19:54:06.305-07:00<a href="http://www.sfcv.org/article/in-memoriam-blanche-thebombr1915-2010">Blanche Thebom, RIP</a><br /><br />Now I'm going to say right here that my favorite mezzo of that era was Nell Rankin. But Rankin and Thebom's overlap of repertory, though substantial, was not complete, and anyway, they brought different virtues to their roles. Today, sadly, is Blanche's day (Nell died four years ago, before I began this blog), so, RIP Thebom.David M. Wagnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07986833157160434927noreply@blogger.com0