La cosa vostra?

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If you are a fan of bel canto comedies you will probably enjoy the 2009 Glyndeboure production of Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’Amore quite a lot.

Director Annabel Arden sets this bucolic comedy in the Italian countryside of the 1950s (though some of the iconography is more appropriate to the Mussolini period).  It has some of the look, but little of the edge of Italian neo-realist cinema.  It does though take the work fairly seriously with a Dulcamara who is isn’t the obvious quack we usually see but just hints at having real powers.  Dulcemara also acquires a rather bizarre mute assistant.  Beyond that it’s all carefully staged with the chorus action well directed and performed. Continue reading →

Existence is futile

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I think my good luck run with Offenbach just ran out.  I really didn’t enjoy the 1991 Opéra National de Lyon production of La Vie Parisienne.  The productions of La Belle Helène and Orphée aux Enfers which I reviewed last week were very much performances by operatic forces letting their hair down; comparable, perhaps, to ENO doing Gilbert and Sullivan. The Lyon La Vie Parisienne seems to come out of an entirely different performing tradition. Continue reading →

A fun La Belle Helène from Zurich

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Having had a lot of fun with the Lyon recording of Orphée aux Enfers I decided to try and track down some more Offenbach operetta and managed to find a Zurich recording of La Belle Helène conducted, perhaps surprisingly, by Nikolaus Harnoncourt.

It’s not perhaps as wildly funny as the Orphée nor perhaps does it have as many memorable tunes but it’s good fun in an undemanding (at least for the audience) sort of way.  The Zurich production, by Helmut Lohner, is painted in pretty broad brush strokes.  The costumes a re very colourful, a bit silly and most have writing on them, much of it, oddly, in English.  The thunder machine is positively Heath Robinsonish.  There’s lots of stage action and fairly silly dancing around.  It’s all very fast paced and doesn’t take itself too seriously despite the sleeve notes leading one to expect more in the way of social satire.  Harnoncourt is obviously having a whale of a time and occasionally gets caught up in the stage action rather as he does in the Salzburg King Arthur.  Continue reading →

Which way do you dress?

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Last night I attended the dress rehearsal of the Canadian Opera Company’s upcoming double bill of Zemlinsky’s A Florentine Tragedy and Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi courtesy of Peter McGillivray who sings Marco in the latter. I’ve never been to s dress rehearsal before and I don’t think it’s kosher to “review” a production based on one so I’m going to concentrate on the “dress rehearsal experience” and just a few notes about the show. Continue reading →

Scintillating Il Turco in Italy from Zurich

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I don’t suppose anybody watches a Rossini comedy for profundity or great insights into human nature but there’s no denying that done well they can be great fun.  This 2002 performance of Il Turco in Italia from the Opernhaus Zürich certainly manages to be that.

The basic plot is predictably silly and full of stock characters; gypsies, flirty young wife, dim older husband, lecherous Turk etc. but wrapped around this is the idea of a poet who is recording what he is seeing as the basis for a new play while, sometimes successfully, sometimes not, trying to influence the action to meet his needs.  It’s quite clever and often very funny.

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Amici Ensemble – Season close and new season announcement

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Yesterday I attended the final concert of the 2011/12 season of the Amici Ensemble at the Glenn Gould Studio courtesy of Executive Director Lizzie Bowman.

It was my first time at the Glenn Gould and I was impressed by the space.  It’s pretty much ideal for chamber music.  They also have Glenn Gould’s childhood piano on display which is another addition to Toronto’s collection of secular relics.  There is a book or thesis at least in that topic.

The concert was a varied mix of pieces from the first third of the 20th century.  That’s pretty much a sweet spot for me as it’s pretty much where I discovered classical music.  My first classical LP purchase was of the Janáček string quartets.  Some of the music I was very familiar with.  Some was quite unknown to me.  Also, the ensemble was different for each piece.  It made for an interesting afternoon.  Continue reading →

How to write an opera review for a Toronto newspaper

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The following quick guide to how to write an opera review for one of Toronto’s (inexplicably) prestigious newspapers is based on extensive analysis of the same.  Given that those papers seem hell bent on sacking anybody with actual knowledge of the arts it is felt that such a guide might prove useful to, say, the Gardening Correspondent, when he or she finds that they have been assigned to cover an opera. Continue reading →

Very traditional Don Giovanni from the Metropolitan Opera

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The 2000 Metropolitan Opera recording of Mozart’s Don Giovanni is based on Zeffirelli’s 1990 production somewhat modified by director Stephen Lawless.  It’s an entirely traditional “breeches and boobs” affair with baroque painted flats, tricorne hats etc.  Blocking is mostly very basic with a lot of “park and bark” just livened up with a bit of prop twiddling.  It works because it has a superb cast who sing and act (within the limits of the production) extremely well.

At the core is Bryn Terfel in the title role.  You get what you expect; a big voice that can be scaled back to quite beautiful, menace, physical presence and a touch of humour when required.  If you have seen his more recent Scarpia or Mephistopheles you know what to expect.  He’s backed up Ferruccio Furlanetto in a rather broadly comic take on Leporello which, though I find it unsubtle, isn’t inappropriate in this production.  The Terfel/Furlanetto relationship is very much master/servant.  No ambiguity about two sides of one character here! Continue reading →

Back to Offenbach

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After the hours of discussion about what Lee Blakeney really meant in his COC Les Contes d’Hoffmann a little light relief seemed called for.  Fortuitously I had just got my hands on the 1997 Opéra National de Lyon recording of Offenbach’s Orphée aux Enfers so I thought that might do the trick.  I was dead right.  The production by Laurent Pelly is an absolute hoot (or, to quote young British mezzo, Emilie Renard “FILTHY!”).  The high speed, somewhat surreal production is brilliantly executed by a predominantly French cast including Natalie Dessay as Eurydice and Laurent Naouri as Jupiter.  There’s so much going on that it would be tedious to provide a full description.  Continue reading →

Tales of Hoffmann at Canadian Opera Company

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Last night saw the third performance in the current run of Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffmann at the Canadian Opera Company.

It’s a peculiar work.  It was Offenbach’s first and only foray into grand opera and he didn’t live to complete it.  This leaves all sorts of performance issues regarding orchestration, sequence of the acts and spoken dialogue vs accompanied recitatives among others.  The COC version uses the conventional act order; Olympia, Antonia, Giulietta, and recitatives with orchestral accompaniment which makes for a long night but is probably the best fit with director Lee Blakeley’s take on the piece, previously seen at Vlaamse Opera in 2000.

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