It’s that time of year when one looks back at the previous twelve months and reflects. It’s also customary to produce “best of” lists and the like. So here goes.
In terms of fully staged, large-scale opera productions it wasn’t an especially eventful year. The COC staged six solid, enjoyable productions but nothing that would hit my list of all time favourites. There was open criticism of Tcherniakov’s Don Giovanni from the usual suspects and more behind the scenes muttering about Pyramus and Thisbe but I thought both shows were examples of things that needed to happen. We need more contemporary opera and we need bolder takes on established classics. I wrote at length on why I thought the Don Giovanni received such a high degree of scrutiny, often from people who had reviewed Opera Atelier’s Alcina the year before, apparently oblivious to the liberties that were taken there! If I had to pick a favourite from the COC’s line up it would likely be Robert Lepage’s production of Schoenberg’s Erwartung featuring a stellar one woman performance by Krisztina Szabó. Opera Atelier’s offerings were, frankly, so much like virtually every other Opera Atelier production since the Flood as to leave anyone trying to write about them pretty desperate. OA watching has become a bit like Kremlinology. The most minute things are blown up into issues for want of anything else to write about!
The invitations to the big bash are out. The COC will announce the 2016/17 season on the 13th of January. So it’s time to crack the shoulder blades, eviscerate the chickens and check that spread sheet I’ve been running for the last few years. After all what’s the holiday season without a little humiliation?
The imminent death of the art song recital is perhaps an even more prevalent trope than “opera is dying” doomandgloomery. It reached something of a crescendo in Toronto when the Aldeburgh Connection shut up shop after thirty years. Oddly enough there still seem to be plenty of recitals of various kinds but unquestionably there has been something of a shift away from “two dudes in tails with a piano”.
So this week is the big Messiah week. I’ll be seeing two; the TSO’s “big, fat” Messiah on Tuesday and Against the Grain’s choreographed version the following night. The TSO version uses Andrew Davis’ “large scale” orchestration and has a great quartet of soloists. It’s playing at Roy Thomson Hall Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday through Sunday. The AtG version also has great soloists, it’s on a smaller scale and features Jenn Nicholls’ choreography. It plays at Harbourfront Wednesday through Saturday. There’s also Tafelmusik’s baroque take at Trinity St. Paul’s, also Wednesday through Saturday.
There are, I think, some really interesting trends emerging in the classical vocal scene in Toronto. On the one hand there’s the consolidation of the Neef/Debus era at the COC that has taken the company from decidedly provincial to being a first rate international opera capable of offering us, its audience, the best singers, directors and conductors in the world. I know that not everyone welcomes that change but it seems to me infinitely preferable to death by musical and dramatic sclerosis. But that’s not what this piece is about. What I wanted to explore was what’s happening at a more grass roots level. This probably need to be taken in two parts; opera and art song, though curiously the cast of characters overlaps in some interesting ways. This piece looks at opera.
Soundstreams’ high concept show Electric Messiah opened at the Drake Underground last night. So what is Electric Messiah? It’s a potent mix of Handel/Jennens, four exceptional singers from varied backgrounds, electronics, turntable artists and electric guitars. It’s “staged” in the round in a dive bar with the audience and artists mixed up all over the place. Curator Kyle Brenders, dramaturg Ashlie Corcoran and lighting designer Patrick Lavender have created something that’s weird and dynamic and exciting and, just occasionally, a bit self indulgent and I really enjoyed it. Probably my biggest complaint would be that it’s too short at around an hour.
operaramblings 