So besides producing, well, opera the nice folks at Opera 5 produce videos called Opera Cheats. The best way to find them is to go to their Youtube channel. But just for fun, here’s a recent and rather brilliant one.
Opera Cheats
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Petitbon’s Lulu
Vera Nemirova’s production of Berg’s Lulu was recorded in the Haus für Mozart at Salzburg in 2010. It’s presented in the now conventional three act version completed by Friedrich Cerha. The sets are painterly, including in Act 1 a giant painting of the title character. Lighting is used to create a very distinct palette for each scene and the detailed direction of the actors is careful and effective. I didn’t see any big ideas but then on this video recording, if there had been any, they would likely have been lost in the incessant close ups and strange camera angles. One “trick” perhaps is that much of the action in Act 3 Scene 1 takes place in the auditorium with a fair bit of confusion as the actors hand out fake cash to the punters. This is, of course, the scene where the glitterati go broke so perhaps some irony is intended.
Rejoice greatly
The line up for the annual Messiah fest is becoming clearer. Traditional heavyweights, the Toronto Symphony and Tafelmusik go head to head. The Symphony’s line up of soloists is Klara Ek, soprano; Lawrence Zazzo, countertenor (which may not please the traditionalists or the mezzo fanatics); John Tessier, tenor and John Relyea, bass-baritone. The chorus is the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir and Christopher Warren-Green conducts. Dates are the 17th, 18th, 20th, 21st and 22nd December at Roy Thomson Hall. Tafelmusik field Dame Emma Kirkby, soprano (buy now while stocks last?); Laura Pudwell, mezzo-soprano; Colin Balzer, tenor and Tyler Duncan, baritone. Ivars Taurin conducts. Performances are 18th, 19th, 20th and 21st December at Koerner Hall. On the 22nd Tafelmusik also have their traditional singalong Messiah at Massey Hall.
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More upcoming shows; old and new
The Ontario Philharmonic and Richard Margison are doing a show of Italian opera “greatest hits”. There are two shows; December 10th at Koerner Hall and the Regent Theatre, Oshawa on December 7th. Full details.
Up in Montreal a new outfit, Stu and Jess Productions, are doing Menotti’s The Medium with a cast drawn from current McGill graduate students. That runs from November 7th to 9th in a converted church in Verdun. Full details
Last, but not least, the Glenn Gould School annual production at Koerner Hall has been announced. It’s The Cunning Little Vixen by Janáček and it plays at Koerner Hall on March 19th and 21st. I’m interested to see how they handle the dance elements. More details.
Ticket; going once
I have a ticket for tonight’s performance of Opera Atelier’s Abduction from the Seraglio. I’m far too sick to go so if you would like it give me a shout. It’s “print at home” so I should be able to transfer it fairly easily.
In which I get a plague and miss one
Last night I was at the Arts and Letters Club for the opening night of Opera 5’s Edgar Allan Poe themed show In Pace Requiescat. I had hoped that I had kicked the thing that has been afflicting me since Wednesday but I was over optimistic. I spent the first half of the show either in a coughing fit or trying desperately to avoid one and then had to leave at the interval thus missing Cecilia Livingston’s new piece The Masque of the Red Death.
What I did see; Daniel Pinkham’s The Cask of Amontillado and Debussy’s La Chute de la Maison Usher, was, as best I recall, pretty good. Staging and costumes are appropriately creepy and there was some very good singing from Adrian Kramer and a brief appearance from Lucia Cesaroni that made me want to see more. If I can shake this thing before the end of the run I’ll go back and do a proper review. There are further performances on Wednesday and Thursday.
On The Nose
Today’s MetHD broadcast was Shostakovich’s absurdist opera The Nose based on a short story by Gogol. It’s about a bureaucrat whose nose falls off. The nose then gallivants around town impersonating a state councillor while the bureaucrat tries desperately to get it back. It’s a lovely Shostakovich score but honestly the one joke wears a bit thin when played out over two hours without an interval. Where’s a Soviet censor when one needs one?
Bottoms up!
Christopher Gillett and I have a fair bit in common. We are both English and much the same age. We are both on second marriages to performers; the failure of our first marriages being at least partly related to the vagaries of travelling for work. We are also both tenors. There the similarities end. Mr. Gillett sings for a living which I, to the great relief of the music loving public, do not. He also does not like cats. This makes me a bit suspicious but whatever.
Upcoming events
Next Sunday the Amici Ensemble have an interesting looking concert of works all transcribed for forces not originally intended by the composer. It’s called, appropriately enough, Transfigured Transcribed. The highlight for me is Verklärte Nacht transcribed for piano trio but there’s also some Berg, some Brahms and some Bartok. The concert is at 3pm at Mazzoleni Hall. More details and tickets.
This weekend also sees the opening of Opera Atelier’s Abduction from the Seraglio and Opera 5’s Poe themed show Requiescat in Pace. If that wasn’t enough, this afternoon the MetHD broadcast is Shostakovich’s The Nose in William Kentridge’s well reviewed production. It’s surely the highlight of this season’s line up and the only one I will be bothering with.
Die Soldaten
Berndt Alois Zimmermann’s Die Soldaten was something of a sleeper hit at the 2012 Salzburg festival and is now available on DVD and Blu-ray. It’s a peculiar work. It’s very episodic and requires massive forces. There are 16 singing and 10 non-singing roles, a 100 piece orchestra, a jazz band and more. At Salzburg the scale was magnified by staging it in the Felsenreitschule, using the full 40m width and enormous height of the stage. I’ve included some full stage shots in the screen caps to give an idea of how huge this all is. They can be expanded to full size Blu-ray caps (roughly three times the size of the image in the review).
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