World Opera Houses Productivity

The Turin newspaper La Stampa published this graph showing the productivity of Italian opera houses vs houses from all over the world, for the 2009-10 season. The first column of numbers indicates how many operas were staged this season, the second is how many were new productions, and the third is how many performances were staged in the full season. Great news for the Met here in New York, but grim news for Italian opera houses. (Click the image to expand).

Luisi to the Rescue!

Alban Berg's Lulu was the last production to be mounted by the Met this season. What a dramatic way to go out! Before my review, there is a little bit of news to start...

Lulu was originally scheduled to be conducted by Met Music Director James Levine, one of if not the foremost conductor of Second Viennese School music. Recurring health problems resulting in surgery forced him to cancel, much to the worry of New York City opera fans. On the flip side, shortly after that announcement, Fabio Luisi took over Mr. Levine's remaining performances of the season, Lulu included. Two weeks ago, he was appointed as the Met's Principal Guest Conductor.

The most remarkable thing about Wednesday night was Mr. Luisi's concentrated and nuanced performance of such a dense work, which proved he is indeed on the same bar as Mr. Levine. Throughout the four hour evening, there was never a moment of lagging energy. Every detail of the score was handled with care and nothing seemed overlooked. There are a few chords at the end of the opera when Jack the Ripper kills Lulu, and the effect was more chilling than any horror movie I've seen. (Granted this was the first time I had heard the entire work, so there was no anticipation). That was just one of many memorable moments. What struck me most was the music's ability to portray such a wide rage of emotions, and to switch gears with almost no notice. From horror to romance, it was all there, even if in condensed form.

Lulu is still a relatively new opera and it's musical ideas are plentiful, almost an amalgam of music history. The work was an exponent of the newly-developed 12-tone technique, which to the naked ear it seems atonal. There are heavy influences of Wagner's grandiosity, and there are even a few samplings of jazz or cabaret music, (probably heard by Berg in Germany's Weimar Republic of the 1920s). The opera only premiered in it's complete version in 1979, years after the composer's death in 1935. Berg died while writing the opera and until 1979 the unfinished version of two acts was performed. However, he left sketches as to how the remaining third act should be orchestrated, but his widow restricted access to them, insisting that Lulu should be left the way it was when Berg died. She finally died in 1976 (no offense). It was then announced that the publisher had granted a secret commission to the Viennese composer Friedrich Cerha to complete the work. The result is a seamless, unified musical experience. The music is as vivid at the end as it is during the first two acts. George Perle summed it up nicely...

"It is in the nature of things that one cannot anticipate the insights, judgments, and second thoughts of genius, so we can never know to what extent and in what respect Berg's own orchestration might have differed from Cerha's. But nowhere does one have the impression that a hand other than the composer's has had to take over the instrumental realization of the unscored portions of the third act."

In addition to the rock solid conductor, the cast was no less impressive. Marlis Petersen, Anne Sofie von Utter, Gary Lehman, and James Morris showed the difference between good singers and those who are emotionally committed. They were riding the wave created by the Poseidon of the evening.

Mr. Luisi's musicality and energy were reminiscent of Mr. Levine's best performances. And though I did not catch it, his Tosca a few weeks ago drew praise from both audiences and critics alike, (a rare occurrence in New York). All of this is more remarkable given that he only made his company debut in 2005. Whatever the future holds for Mr. Levine, and I wish him a speedy recovery, Mr. Luisi's three year contract with the company takes some of the anxiety away about the Met.

After quite an eventful season, the Met went out struttin'. See you in the fall for some Wagner...

New Met Ring Cycle Trailer

This newly released trailer offers some glimpses of the Met's new Wagner Ring Cycle. It is being directed by Robert Lepage, who previously directed Berlioz's Faust at the Met. The first two segments, Das Rheingold and Die Walkure, are premiering next season, and the last two, Siegfried and Götterdämmerung, will premier during the 2011-12 season. I'm so freekin' excited!

Two Recitals By Two Very Different Sopranos

Back in November, the legendary dramatic soprano Aprile Millo gave a recital in the Rose Theatre at Jazz at Lincoln Center. This past Thursday, Federica von Stade, a champion for over 40 years of everything from classical to contemporary music, gave her farewell recital at Carnegie Hall. The former was in top vocal form, looking and sounding utterly fabulous after struggling with her weight the past few years. The later was warm, cute, and made a packed Carnegie Hall audience feel right at home. Both recitals were deemed highly successful by audiences and critics alike, and it is only now that I realize one's dramatic superiority over the other.

Both Ms. Millo and Ms. Stade narrated throughout their recitals, and effectively broke down the concert hall divisions between performer and spectator. Ms. Stade however, ended up coming across as a caricature of herself. Before each piece, she explained how it related to her life with a voice like she was narrating a story. Many times it was a song about Paris- "La Vie en rose" by Ned Rorem, "Voyage à Paris" and "Hôtel" by Francis Poulenc, and selections from "Les Jardins de Paris" by Marc Barthomieuand, just to name a few. Okay so she loves the city, but who doesn't? Other times it was a song about a convent, reminiscent of her childhood in Washington, D.C. ("A Prayer to Saint Catherine" by Virgil Thomson), or about her daughter ("Jenny Rebecca" written for her by Carol Hall), or just some topic she found pleasant. Even the Mahler ("Lob des hohen Verstandes", adapted from the folk story The Youth's Magic Horn) was light, where a donkey judges a contest between a cuckoo and a nightingale. Right before intermission, her longtime collaborators, the baritone Richard Stilwell and bass Samuel Ramey joined her for a charming trio rendition of Bernstein's "Some of the Time" from "On the Town." Her final selection, "Send In The Clowns" is always a gem to hear and fit her glimmering voice perfectly. Unfortunately, whatever the song was, it always had a happy ending and was never heart-wrenching. She talked to the audience in an overly dramatic way as if Carnegie Hall was full of children. The end product seemed like a cross between Cinderella and Julie Andrews. Her singing, on the other hand rang with golden and refined glamor, obviously having waned after a long career but still more than pleasant, and more than anything, mature. A successful recital, but a lot was missed. She got so famous in the 1970s by playing Cherubino in Le Nozze di Figaro, a role full of yearning. That depth was missed here.

By stark contrast is the dramatic soprano Aprile Millo, considered by many to be the last beacon of light in a long line of Verdi sopranos. Her recital back in November is as vivid in my memory as if it were last week. Held in a much smaller venue than Carnegie Hall, The Rose Theatre's small stage and oval structure (like a small opera house) worked nicely, if less gloriously than Carnegie. She made up for the hall's lack in glamor by wearing a huge gown dress and tiara. The house was full with a highly enthusiastic audience.

From start to finish, she sang with as much conviction and unwavering intensity as she does on her most treasured recordings. The first half was full of songs by 19th century composers. Of particular note were Ermanno Wolf Ferrari's "Buondì, cara Venezia" (from Il Campiello), "Von ewiger Liebe" by Johannes Brahms, and "Ne poi, krasavitsa, pri mne" by Sergei Rachmaninoff. Her voice is huge, with a very wide yet sensual vibrato. Her artistic maturity is also rare among singers today, as she infuses passion into every word she sings. In "Buondì, cara Venezia" and "Ne poi, krasavista, pri mne", her elongation of certain words and her ability to sing every note in her range at any dynamic marking made the music even more touching. This is a type of voice rarely heard today.

If the first half was moving, the second half was mesmerizing. After an unexpected early intermission (because of an audience member falling down some stairs), Ms. Millo came back with vigor. Her "Tre Canzone Nepoletane" were accompanied by a musician with equal expressivity, the accordionist Mary-Lou Vetere. And this just served as the warm up for the opera section... Here her complete musical capabilities were unleashed. She sang "Laggiu nel Soledad" from La Fanciulla del West, "Undiste...Ah dove sei crudele" from Il Trovatore, "L'altra notte in fondo al mare" from Boito's Mefistofele, and "Ed ora, io mi domado" from Leoncavallo's Zaza. Her technical control is utterly amazing. In less than a second, she can move from a beautiful pianissimo to the most glass-shattering forte, all while evenly supporting on the same note. The zenith came with "L'altra notte...", which she preceded with a comment asking the audience to bare with her. Here, her artistry and concentration silenced the audience, and the ovations following the piece were apocalyptic. How else could I remember it five months later? Ms. Millo is a singer who has not always been in the spotlight during her 25 year career, but who on that night showed us she is still an artist with drive. Despite my nagging cold, I never got bored.

Both Ms. Stade and Ms. Milo gave successful recitals. Ms. Stade has been and is likely to remain one of the world's most beloved sopranos. But Ms. Millo, even while in a far less glorious hall, pushed herself, lived in the moment, made people scream and made them cry. In my mind, that's what matters most.

"Aria on the Future"

Renée Fleming, the populist diva, talks about her past, present, and future. Wall Street Journal article.

Solid Yet Uninspired Performance of Rare Rossini Opera

Renée Fleming long ago proved that she has some say as to what operas are produced at the Met. A versatile and technically aware singer with a unique buttery sound and enchanting stage presence, she has commanded roles in German, Italian, French, Czech, Russian, etc. and in 2008 became the only woman to highlight an Opening Night Gala for the Met, where she sang three acts from three different operas. Not always thought of as a master bel-canto singer, Ms. Fleming still managed to convinced the Met to stage Armida. An opera by Gioachino Rossini, it is one of the composer's nine serious operas from his time in Naples (1817-1822), and is rich in experimental music characterization. Armida is a sorceress, who throughout a nearly four hour long opera (including two intermissions) travels from desert to magical worlds and seduces six Crusaders, each a tenor role with incredibly difficult music. The opera is rarely staged, partly because of its traditional serious opera format that is so different from Rossini's comedies, but also because it is hard to find six tenors who can sing the music. For the opera's premiere in 1817 Rossini used only four tenors, one for the role of Rinaldo and three others for the remaining five roles. If there is a single 'bravo' to be heard about this production, it is the Met's ability at finding six tenors, each with a unique voice that stands up to the alluring Ms. Fleming.

The quickly rising star, Lawrence Brownlee sang Ronaldo with relaxed beauty, nailing passages throughout the two-and-a-third octaves role. He hit his high Ds with effortless accuracy, (the highest tenor note in the opera). Despite the pluses, his volume and projection were lacking. Singing next to José Manuel Zapata, his voice at times seemed dwarfed. On another note, no matter how much diction training one has, there is still a definite difference between a native English speaker and a native romance language speaker. Sorry to say, but Mr. Brownlee sang like a gringo. The remaining four tenors- Bruce Ford, Kobie van Rensburg, Barry Banks, and Yeghishe Manucharyan stood up to their demanding roles quite nicely.

Though always in control of her voice and full of warm sensual texture, Ms. Fleming seemed restrained last night. She sang pleasantly, but never overwhelmingly. I know she can sing Armida fearlessly because she did so on her "Bel Canto" album in 2002. Has time taken its toll? Probably not, that was only 8 years ago. So what was it?

Quite possibly a lack of inspiration from the conductor and director. Mary Zimmerman's production was largely uninteresting to look at and bordered at being a farce. The only thing that didn't seem to be made cheaply were the costumes, beautifully designed by Richard Hudson. Knights wore shiny silver armor draped with red fabric and the commanders wore long and elegant black suits seamed with bright red. The Act II ballet was entertainingly choreographed by Graciela Daniele in her Met debut, and she successfully made the chorus members 'move'. Does Ms. Zimmerman actually like opera? Certain props from the set looked like they were from a child's playpen, and the white rotunda wall encircling the action was the most boring stationary set-piece I've ever seen. The blocking was uneventful. I simply don't understand how such a magical opera, one with limitless Romantic possibilities, can turn into Sesame Street.

Understandably so, the conductor Riccardo Frizza seemed uninspired. He led a solid performance, though didn't stand out for any strong interpretive choices.

The audience's body language and applause throughout the evening seemed lackadaisical. I heard a few scoffs at the production, and at the curtain call the 'boos' roared out. This time I must admit, I wanted to join them.

Countertenors Rule the Night

This was only my second time at City Opera and my first time seeing a live Handel opera. Though Partenope (dating from 1730) is a Baroque opera comprised of the sometimes monotonous recitative/aria form, Friday night's performance was luxuriously sung and entertainingly directed. Two of the roles were written for castrati (emasculated men who maintained their high voice after puberty), though since castrating men is no long in vogue, trained countertenors now sing these parts. The voices of the castrati were said to be sublime, combining the elegance of women with the forcefulness of men. In 1957 Harold Schonberg wrote that "the castrati, and apparently all other singers of the day, had a technique that would be impossible to duplicate... no harder music exists for singers." Who can possibly know if that is actually true? Unfortunately, the only castrato to make a solo sound recording was Alessandro Moreschi, the last Papal castrato, who died in 1922. Granted the recording quality is not great, but his choir trained voice is evidently nothing remotely representative of the pop star icons that enchanted opera houses for centuries. Still worth a listen.

Given that we'll never know what the most famous castrati sounded like, on Friday night the countertenors Anthony Roth Constanzo and Iestyn Davies sang to the best of my imagination just like them. Mr. Davies (playing Arsace), is a fast-rising British countertenor and Mr. Constanzo (playing Armindo), is his American counterpart. Mr. Davies's voice is warm and powerful, with unending and tasteful musicality. His projection reminded me of the commanding mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe. Mr. Constanzo's voice is much lighter, and floated the melody beautifully. Every now and then he unleashed the power, but most of the time restrained his dynamics and size to better serve the music. His small physique was exploited wonderfully by the director, who played on the irony that his part was a brave prince. Instead of using a sword during the battle scene in Act II, he took off his glove and threw it at the enemy, promptly scurrying away.

With such a stilted plot, Handel operas have become the perfect match for experimental and liberal productions. Even though Partenope is an opera seria, an imaginative director can easily make comedy out of the libretto while staying truthful to the music. Francisco Negrin's production was light, satirical and entertaining throughout. Christian Curnyn led an inspired orchestra and communicated seamlessly with the singers. Perhaps a Handel opera is not dramatic or real enough for the more famous opera houses of the world, and I will admit that I dozed off into a hypnotic slumber a few times, but no one can deny the raw energy or lyrical beauty found in Partenope and other Handel operas.