Tag Archives: archibald

Centre Stage

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So last night was this year’s iteration of the COC’s glitzy competition with cash and places in the Ensemble Studio at stake.  It’s a bit of a weird thing to write about because the public, and this year the media, only see a fraction of what the judges are judging.  We saw each singer do one aria.  There had been a closed round earlier in the day to which, unlike in previous years, the media were not invited.  Then there’s what the judges have seen in rehearsal, reputation etc.  All in all what happens on the night influences the outcome about as much as at an Olympic figure skating event.  So, in many ways it’s surprising that my picks were as close to the judges as they were.

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Arabella at the COC

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Tim Albery’s production of Richard Strauss’ 1933 opera Arabella, first seen at Santa Fe in 2012, finally made it to Toronto last night.  It’s, I believe, a Canadian premiere for the piece, which is a bit shocking for an important opera by a major composer.  It’s not a perfect piece.  The librettist, the incomparable Hugo von Hofmannsthal, died before he and Strauss could revise the second and third acts and there are places where it feels a bit unfinished but it’s still an impressive work.  The plot’s a bit contrived perhaps, though no more so than many more famous operas, but there’s real depth of humanity and Mandryka, the landowner/tribal chief from the southern fringes of the Habsburg empire, is a really fascinating study.

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COC 2017/18

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Last night the Canadian Opera Company announced the line up for the 2017/18 season.  It was all pretty much as predicted.  My predictions post got five out of six right and Dylan was right on the money down to timing.  So what do we get?

The fall season features, finally, Tim Albery’s production of Strauss’ Arabella first seen at Santa Fe.  Erin Wall, as expected, takes the title role while Jane Archibald, in one of three season appearances, sings Zdenka.  The Mandryka will be one of the few high profile imports, Tomasz Konieczny.  There are welcome appearances for David Pomery as Matteo and Claire de Sevigné as Flakermilli.  It’s a season full of Ensemble Studio graduates.  Patrick Lange conducts.  Partnering Arabella is Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore in a production by James Robinson adapted to set the piece in pre WW1 Niagara on the Lake.  Simone Osborne and Andrew Haji play Adina and Nemorino with Gordon Bintner as Belcore.  This is, I think, the first time I’ve seen husband and wife as soloists at the COC though the Pomeroys have been seen on stage together quite a few times.  Brit Andrew Shore rounds things out as Dulcemara.  Yves Abel makes his COC debut in the pit.

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Coming of Age in the Hebrides

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What are we to make of Handel’s Ariodante?  The plot centres on the notion that female chastity is the be all and end all of life.  It’s not a notion that would find much support in 21st century Toronto, even among a Sunday afternoon audience at the Four Seasons Centre.  Ginevra, princess of Scotland and heir to the king, is  betrothed to Ariodante.  Ariodante has a rival, Polinesso who is loved in a besotted kind of way by Ginevra’s maid, Dalinda.  Polinesso claims to have slept with Ginevra and offers to prove it to Ariodante.  He drugs Ginevra and gets Dalinda to put on Ginevra’s clothes and invite him into her room.  Ariodante disappears, apparently having committed suicide in a fit of despair.  On the flimsiest of evidence Ginevra, who has no idea what happened, is condemned to death.  Her accusers, including her father, don’t even bother to ask who the man in her room was.  Polinesso tries to remove the now inconvenient Dalinda from the scene but fails and when Ariodante shows up again she spills the beans.  Polinesso is killed by Ariodante’s brother in a duel but not before confessing.  All is forgiven and everyone carries on as if nothing in the least traumatising just happened.  So, what to do with this?

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Guth’s Figaro at the COC

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Claus Guth’s production of Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro, first seen at Salzburg in 2006, opened last night at the COC.  I was curious to see how it would be received because, while by no means an extreme production by European standards, it’s well beyond the 1970s aesthetic beloved by sections of the Toronto audience.  The aesthetic is Northern European; a Strindberg play or a Bergmann film perhaps.  It’s monochromatic, quite slow and focusses on the darker side of the characters’ psyches.  It’s the antithesis of Figaro as Feydeau farce.  There’s also a non-canonical character, Cherubim.  He’s a winged doppelganger of Cherubino and seems to be a cross between Cupid and Puck.  Pretty much omnipresent he manipulates scenes and characters though with a power that falls well short of absolute.  Perhaps the whole production is best summed up in the final ensemble.  Cherubim visits each couple in turn and is brusquely rejected.  Only Cherubino is still subject to his power and that seems to have become destructive.  Perhaps the message is “Now we are married forget this love nonsense and let us get back to our drab lives of quiet despair”.

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So wondrous sweet and fair!

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On a bright, sunny winter’s day there are few more inviting places to be than the Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre positively glowing in the sunlight.  When one’s reason for being there is a recital by Jane Archibald with the redoubtable Liz Upchurch at the piano one feels doubly blessed.  It was one of the best performances of the many I have attended in that space. KLP150210-_DSC2882 Continue reading →

Tcherniakov’s Don Giovanni

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Last night Dmitri Tcherniakov’s much anticipated production of Don Giovanni opened at the Four Seasons Centre.  The production is basically a known quantity.  This is its fourth run overall and it was recorded for TV and DVD in Aix-en-Provence; which is a lengthy way of saying that nobody should have been very surprised by what they saw last night.  Inevitably some were.  Rereading my review of the DVD I find I have nothing much to add to what I said there about the first act and the overall concept so I’m going to pretty much going to repeat it here.

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Moving into February

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footstepsIt’s getting pretty busy in Toronto.  Here are a few upcoming things of interest that I haven’t already mentioned.

This year, the Faculty of Music’s annual student composer project is a co-production with Campbell House Museum, the 19th century home of Sir William Campbell, Chief Justice of Upper Canada. Footsteps in Campbell House is a series of pieces by student composers to words by Michael Albano.  The audience moves around the house exploring the lives of those who livedd there.  There are five performances on January 30th and 31st and February 1st.  Each performance is limited to 35 people.  Tickets are $20 and available here.  I’m really intrigued by this but there’s no way I can go.   Continue reading →

Comfort ye my people

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‘Tis the season to Hallelujah in Toronto and Handel’s Messiah is everywhere.  Last night was the first performance of the biggest of them all, the Toronto Symphony and the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir at Roy Thomson Hall.  Traditionally this is Toronto’s equivalent of John Barbirolli and the Huddersfield Choral Society so I was surprised to see a set up for a rather small orchestra.  In fact about thirty instrumentalists were used, playing modern instruments of course, with about 150 choristers.  It was something of a sign of things to come as conductor Grant Llewellyn took us through the piece quite briskly and rhythmically with even some ornamentation in the da capo repeats.  It’s becoming more common I think for conductors to get something approaching an HIP sound out of a modern orchestra as we’ve seen with Harry Bicket  in various opera houses.  The orchestra and chorus responded pretty well to the less staid approach with the sopranos sounding particularly spritely and incisive.

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COC’s Semele is Brooklyn bound

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New Yorkers will get a chance to see Zhang Huan’s somewhat controversial production of Handel’s Semele at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in March.  The COC is touring the production, seen in Toronto in 2012, with the wonderful Jane Archibald again taking the title role.  The supporting cast is, on paper at least, more than a match for the one seen at COC.  Colin Ainsworth is the god Jupiter, and Welsh contralto Hilary Summers portrays both Jupiter’s jealous wife, Juno, and Ino, Semele’s sister. Katherine Whyte playsJuno’s messenger, Iris and Kyle Ketelsen sings both Semele’s father, Cadmus, and the god of sleep, Somnus. Athamas will be sung by Lawrence Zazzo.  Christopher Moulds conducts with the COC Orchestra and Chorus.

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