Προηγούμενες Κριτικές Παραγωγής
13“Federica Vitali è una Butterfly torreggiante. Verginale e pudica quando va incontro al suo sposo, che accetta e abbraccia come un dono del destino; incrollabile nel suo intento di tenere accesa la fiamma della speranza, a dispetto dell’evidenza. La sua vocalità, verticale anch’essa, cristallina nell’emissione e nell’articolazione, sembra plasmarsi ad arte addosso alla figura minuta e granitica del personaggio, inseguirne ogni pensiero e dare ad esso voce e tinta.”
Federica Vitali indaga alla perfezione, dandone al contempo una eccellente interpretazione, la figura di una Butterfly che ama senza condizioni, che è strenua difenditrice della fides e che, una volta delusa nel profondo, mantiene ugualmente una straordinaria dignità, anche nel momento supremo. Una prova tutta in crescendo la sua, che raggiunge il suo apice nel secondo e terzo atto: la voce è limpida, fresca e solida in tutti i registri, la perizia tecnica di vaglia, il fraseggio ottimamente curato, l’attenzione alla parola pregevole.
The vocal star of the evening, however, was septuagenarian Rosalind Plowright, whose commanding presence as the Old Baroness dominated the stage, combining moral rectitude and practicality in her shrewd advice and punishing judgment.
Stealing the show was the Ariadne of Nicola Said (currently a student of Yvonne Kenny). The pathos of her final aria was little short of magnificent, and she entered into the spirit of Callas perfectly. Bright-toned and expressive, and blessed with excellent stage presence, she captured our hearts.
Theseus was sung by baritone Josep-Ramon Olivé, who ‘in recording’ gave a noble account of the role, generally restrained in demeanour except in occasional moments of extreme passion. His voice has a roundness and muscularity that makes it a powerful instrument – he rose easily above the orchestra, but I was impressed by the sensitive text-based approach that he adopted in his singing." "Olivé was on stage again as Alexandre with the same sturdy qualities as before, but indulging in hammy acting worthy of Rossini’s operas,
Canopies flapped on a blustery June night but nothing could shake this scintillating new production out of its stride. Working against imposing yet fluid wood-panel designs by her fellow countryman takis, the Greek director Rodula Gaitanou has made OHP’s intractably wide stage seem like a walk in the park. Alison Langer’s cheeky factotum Oscar and Rosalind Plowright’s imperious sorceress Madame Arvidson were superbly defined, adding juice to the melodrama and singing with absolute conviction despite the silliness of their roles. Benjamin Bevan and John Savournin trod a fine line between comedy and darkness as the two would-be assassins, Ribbing and Horn, and there was a predictably strong cameo from Ross Ramgobin as the impecunious sailor Cristiano.
A masked ball is a time of play and role-play, celebrating the duality, the conflicting selves within us all, allowing us to set aside our everyday public mask put on an alter ego for the evening. It seems appropriate then that Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera has a deep fissure running down the middle of its drama. Is it a fragile, unfulfilled love story – Rattigan or David Lean with an Italian accent and rather more blood – or is it an exuberant piece of gothic horror with a love story and political agenda tacked on? The answer is, of course, both, and that’s the problem with Verdi’s mid-career drama: you never know which opera you’re going to get.
The young Welsh soprano Natalya Romaniw was a hit in Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin at Garsington last month and this performance could be her last before she becomes an international star Those of us who heard the young Welsh soprano Natalya Romaniw sing Tatyana in Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin at Garsington last month were hit by a musical coup de foudre: where had this wonderful singer been hiding, and what else could she do? The answer to the second question has come with her performance as Lisa in the same composer’s The Queen of Spades at Opera Holland Park in London. This is a darker and more psychologically complex role, but she brings to it the same exquisite artistry, and the same luminosity of tone: catch her there before she goes – as she surely soon will – into international orbit.
So often at its best when punching above its weight, Opera Holland Park delivers a corker with its sumptuous new production of The Queen of Spades, Tchaikovsky’s most sophisticated and ambitious work for the theatre. I don’t know how the management can pull off such a challenge on a circumscribed budget, but it demonstrates what can be achieved when daring and imagination is matched to hard commercial nous. Resourceful casting of singers at turning-points in their careers is the key here. Peter Wedd isn’t the most intense of actors and his rather bland presentation of the anti-hero Herman doesn’t convey the psychotically obsessive quality that compels the character to self-destruction. But he satisfied nevertheless: his recent successful transition to the dramatic tenor repertory means that he can sing the notes fluently without the shouting and bleating to which others in this taxing role make desperate recourse. Now in the autumn of a career marked by startling ups and downs, Rosalind Plowright seems to have found a niche as a character mezzo-soprano: her crippled yet ramrod Countess - spidery and splenetic, the lineaments of her youthful beauty still visible – made a striking impression.
Conductor Matthew Kofi Waldren marshalling the musical forces with consummate stylistic expertise…this is world-class opera. 5 stars
Waldren is proving himself one of the most adept and dynamic young British Verdians
