Рецензии предстоящих постановок
1As our operatic experiences continue to be framed by pandemic conditions, virtual and live landscapes abound with chamber works, reduced orchestrations, and adaptations. One overarching trend is the careful attention to filmic dimensions of digital premieres, nudging the game forward from the generally high production values of cinema broadcasts. In this context, Andrea Breth’s staging of The Turn of the Screw for La Monnaie (directed for video by Miriam Hoyer with sound design by Christoph Mateka) achieves a highly satisfying level of polish. At the same time, one recognizes a precisely executed live performance at its core – one that would be thrilling to experience in person. The nebulous atmosphere of Henry James’ novella supports Benjamin Britten’s handling of Peter Quint and Miss Jessel as deceased spirits who seem to retain influence over the orphans Miles and Flora. By contrast, the children’s world in the operatic score is peppered with realistic music-making moments like the song Tom, Tom the Piper’s Son, evocative of youthful naïveté. All the more telling, then, is Britten’s scene in Act 2 when the 10-year-old Miles is to perform beyond his years at the keyboard, his prowess suggestive of adult strength and abilities. Already during the Prologue Breth uses the piano as a prop and portal into the realm of the surreal. When the instrument in the orchestra pit opens up to include its counterparts and the narrator’s recollection unlocks a warped, multi-layered tale, a male actor slowly slides into the broken grand piano on the stage floor. Miles and Flora later slither out of the same space to sing the song about the piper’s son. As enacted, their simple song is anything but. Their innocence is scarcely palpable in this labyrinthine flashback, exquisitely realized through Raimund Orfeo Voigt’s unsettlingly stark and fluid sets. A pair of over-sized wardrobes later serve as portals to darkly imaginative spaces, creatively coordinated with blocking and gestures to emphasize a sense of the surreal. Ed Lyon delivered an arresting performance of the Prologue’s narration, capturing our attention and concern before his anonymous image takes on symbolic heft. Six male dark-suited doubles populate the production. At several moments we see them as voyeurs or lifeless reminders of something elusive or missing, while during an early instrumental interlude one emerges as the spinster Governess’s romantic dance partner. (All of the orchestral transitions are sophisticated and far-reaching in their visual treatment.) Sally Matthews sang a richly hued and deeply invested vocal performance as the Governess throughout, as did Carole Wilson in the role of Mrs Grose, both reinforcing the impression that the experience of the story strongly colours its retelling. This is also true of Julian Hubbard’s wildly disheveled and riveting performance of Peter Quint, who appeared as the source of anarchy and transgression from the outset. He dominated Miss Jessel, attractively and seductively sung by Giselle Allen. Henri de Beauffort and Katharina Bierweiler crafted essential and mature performances of Miles and Flora respectively in this intricate theatrical conception. Contributing provocatively against the grain of this tapestry of shattered innocence and concomitant distortion are the orchestral voices, at times pure or nostalgic, at others assuredly robust and genuinely effusive. Ben Glassberg conducted the mostly masked orchestra with firm focus to embody these human dimensions, connecting fruitfully above all with Matthews’ Governess and preventing the otherwise moribund tale from collapsing flat.
Рецензии прошлых постановок
10Ze hebben zich verdiept in Tsjechische/Boheemse liederen van Janacek, Dvorak en Kapralova. Nicky Spence begon zelf het recital met Janaceks Láska, waarna alle zangers (drie sopranen, twee mezzo's en een bariton) een voor een lied of duet konden zingen. Daarbij zorgden ze ook voor wat dramatische interactie zodat de eerste helft van het recital een samenhangend geheel vormde. Er waren een paar zangers die eruit sprongen. In de eerste plaats Emma Posman die met een heldere sopraan Dvoraks Zalo dievca, zalo trávu zong en die later met de expressieve mezzo Estelle Defalque het Moravische duet Moznost vertolkte. Ook Leander Carlier toonde potentieel met een zeemzoete bariton, onder andere in zijn duet Nejistota met Defalque. In het tweede deel van het recital stond het Dagboek van een verdwenene van Janacek op het programma. Het is een liedcyclus van ongeveer een half uur, bestaande uit 21 korte liederen en één piano-intermezzo, die het verhaal vertelt van Janicuk die betoverd/verleid wordt door de zigeunerin Zefka... een soort mysterieuze Lorelei-figuur. Het is een atypsiche liedcyclus omdat hij naast de titelrol voor tenor ook de interventie vraagt van een alt, hier gezongen door Raphaële Green die we ook kennen van haar tijd in het Jong Ensemble van Opera Vlaanderen, en een vrouwenkoortje dat vanop het balkon zong. Ze hadden ook wat regie-aanwijzingen verweven in hun voorstelling voor een geanimeerde en meeslepende uitvoering. De voorstelling ging trouwens door in de Fioccozaal waar gewoonlijk het Muntorkest repeteert. Het is een ideale zaal voor liedrecitals, niet overdreven groot en met een korte afstand tussen de artiesten en het publiek. Hier zouden best wat meer recitals mogen geprogrammeerd worden, al dan niet met jonge zangers. Het recital werd afgesloten met twee bisnummers die voor nog wat extra sfeer zorgden, inclusief trommelbegeleiding door Spence en danspasjes door de jonge zangers... waardoor iedereen opgewekt de zaal verliet naar een druilerig Brussel.
La basse biélorusse, Alexander Roslavets, fait preuve d’un panache et d’une présence scénique remarquables dans tous les rôles qu’il interprète : le barbier Ivan Iakovlévitch, le rédacteur en chef du journal, le médecin et le policier. La partie vocale bizarre et décousue d’Ivan Iakovlévitch, abasourdi par l’alcool et terrorisé par sa femme demande une grande imagination théâtrale et Roslavets l’incarne avec brio . De même, son interprétation du rédacteur en chef sniffeur de coke ou du médecin qu’on pourrait confondre avec un hologramme de Karl Lagerfeld. Familier avec l’œuvre lyrique de Chostakovitch – il a déjà chanté les divers rôles dans Lady Macbeth de Mtsensk – Roslavets possède une voix puissante, étoffée et grave qu’il projette avec un élan et une justesse admirables, sans rien sacrifier de son imposante présence scénique.
Dans les multiples rôles d'Ivan Yakovlevich, du rédacteur en chef du journal, d'un médecin et escort, Alexander Roslavets et sa voix de basse s’assure une présence remarquée. Le chanteur d’origine biélorusse est puissant, grave et ferme. Initiateur de l’histoire, le coupeur de nez-chanteur aiguise son instrument vocal comme sa lame de barbier.
“The Ukrainian Yuriy Yurchuk draws very well that incomprehensible and contradictory Onegin, in a certain way a precursor of Russian philosophical nihilism and whose life has neither direction nor moral sense. His voice is pleasant and well projected.”
“The famous Eugene Onegin is sung by baritone Yuriy Yurchuk, who held this role for his debut at the National Opera of Ukraine in 2018. Here he elegantly interprets the indecisive seducer. Although he is a smug and condescending character, his doubts and remorse quickly resurface through a versatile singing ability.”
"Allison Cook also gives a tour de force performance. It’s not so much that she portrays the Duchess, rather she reincarnates her. First as a playful sex-goddess, then as a fallen angel. With a final number as gripping as the best bel canto aria.” (Koen Van Boxem, Tijd, September 2015)
Damiano Michieletto’s Olivier Award-winning productions of Cavalleria rusticana and Pagliacci were premiered in 2015 and then put on again in 2017 but not since. Here they were splendidly revived by former Jette Parker Young Artist Noa Naamat and continue to justify that Olivier! The nineteenth century was ending, and audiences turned from Wagner’s gods and heroes to embrace post-Verdian verismo with its stories that reflected real-life happenings. The birth of this movement came with the premiere of Mascagni’s Cavalleria rusticana in Rome on 17 May 1890. It was soon twinned with Leoncavallo’s 1892 Pagliacci and together they caused verismo to sweep Europe influencing many diverse art forms. New York’s Metropolitan Opera first paired the works in 1893 and they were first seen together at Covent Garden the following year except the order we are used to today was reversed. The Cav & Pag double-header soon proved as popular as the regularly performed Puccini operas or genuine Verdi masterpieces in the affections of opera lovers, though recently they have fallen somewhat out of favour. Before Michieletto’s staging of Cav & Pag they had not been performed together by the Royal Opera for more than 25 years. From around that time I have some exhilarating memories of Plácido Domingo (Turiddu/Canio), Giuseppe Giacomini (Turiddu), Jon Vickers (Canio), Pauline Tinsley and Josephine Barstow (as Santuzza) and Piero Cappuccilli (Alfio/Tonio); several sadly no longer with us. Perhaps a reassessment of the operas is overdue and what Michieletto does with them can only help.
La commedia è finita (almost). Former Prime Minister Theresa May was in the house for its Cav & Pag double bill, an evening of bitter feuds, betrayal and murder. Michael Gove reportedly left before curtain-up. It’s been a fraught few weeks in Floral Street. There have been more cast reshuffles in this Royal Opera revival than Boris Johnson’s cabinet of late: Anita Rachvelishvili out, Ermonela Jaho out, Jonas Kaufmann missing the first two performances and deciding not to sing Canio when he does get on stage. At one point, Kaufmann’s replacement in Pagliacci bowed out of the first two nights as well. It was the Alagnas who rode heroically to the rescue. Aleksandra Kurzak took on the roles of Santuzza and Nedda (thereby requiring an acting double because Damiano Michieletto has each character silently appear in the intermezzo of the other’s opera) and Roberto Alagna sang Canio. And as Turiddu in Cavalleria rusticana, we had SeokJong Baek who had already come off the subs’ bench, to excellent effect, in the recent Samson et Dalila.
Tout comme le baryton italien Gabriele Nani joue Marco avec une intensité d’opéra bouffe à la pointe de sa voix vive, d'un ton confiant et éloquent.
La Monnaie / De Munt has announced a number of live streams set to take place throughout the month of February. Per a press release, the company’s live streams are made possible with the support of the tax shelter of the Belgian federal government.
