Tag Archives: donizetti

Golden Age; the CD

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Being distinctly impressed by Erin Morley and Lawrence Brownlee’s performance at Koerner Hall las month, I got my hands on the CD on which the tour is based. It’s much the same material but with orchestra which really changes things up a bit. It’s a different order too. They begin with six numbers in French starting with comic duets from La fille du régiment and Le comte Ory. It’s very playful but backed up by exquisite technique. There’s no sense of strain despite some serious high notes and some exacting coloratura passages for Morley. The orchestra; the Múncher Rundfunkorchester conducted by  Ivan Repušić sounds great too.

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Brilliantly sung Lucia from la Scala

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The 2023 video recording of Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor from Milan’s La Scala is quite interesting. The production is not especially exciting but the singing; especially the partnership of Lisette Oropesa, as Lucia, and Juan Diego Flórez as Edgardo is. The rest of the singing is excellent as is the orchestral playing. It’s also given without the usual cuts.

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24 carat Golden Age

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It’s not often that one attends a recital that is so stunning that one struggles to find words to describe it but The Golden Age recital given by soprano Erin Morley, tenor Lawrence Brownlee and pianist Malcolm Martineau at a packed Koerner Hall on Thursday evening, as part of Toronto Summer Music, was in that class. Most of the rep was drawn from the Golden Age album released last year with a few change ups. It’s basically all highly virtuosic material in the bel canto style (plus a couple of piano pieces).

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Ensemble Studio do the standards

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Last Tuesdays’s concert in the RBA featured four singers and two pianists from the Ensemble Studio in a concert of highly recognisable opera arias.  I guess with Barber of Seville and Rigoletto coming p on the FSC stage that was a bit inevitable.  It was though very well done with all four singers not only singing well but really conveying a sense of character.

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Coming up in November

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Here’s what’s coming up next month as best I know.

  • Canadian Stage’s presentation of Robert Lepage’s The Far Side of the Moon opens at the Bluma Appel Theatre on November 1st and runs until the 16th.
  • In the RBA lunchtime series we have the Wirth Vocal Prize winner in recital on the 6th
  • Branden Jacob-Jenkins’ The Comeuppance is playing at Soulpepper.  Previews are October 30th to November 5th with opening night on the 6th and the run continuing to November 23rd.

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Lively Don Pasquale

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The production of Donizetti’s Don Pasquale recorded at the 2024 Donizetti Festival in Bergamo is lively colourful and, generally, well done.  Amélie Niermayer’s production is essentially contemporary with a heavy emphasis on class difference between the relatively upscale Pasquale clan and the Malatestas who are shown as some sort of Italian equivalent of “Essex man”.  Doctor Malatesta has tattoos and wears a heavy gold chain and when we first see Norina she’s in braids, a T shirt, fishnets and also sports tattoos.  Her taste doesn’t improve much after the “wedding”.  In contrast, Ernesto is more stylish and less of a dweeb than in other productions I’ve seen.

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Dancing with Death

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Stephen Langridge’s production of Donizetti’s Roberto Devereux recorded at the Donizetti Festival in Bergamo in 2024 is heavy on death symbolism.  The general look of the sets is fairly abstract with a sort of light box with a gallery and a few bright red elements; the throne, the Nottinghams’ bed and so on, but there are skulls and other memento mori everywhere.  Costuming is sort of operatic Tudor but Elisabetta’s dress is a print that includes skulls and she’s doubled by a human size, identically dressed, Death puppet.  As seems to be the fashion, much of the time only the front of the stage is lit leaving characters lurking in the gloom upstage.

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Zoraida di Granata

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Zoraida di Granata is an early serious opera by Donizetti.  It’s set in Muslim controlled Granada in 1480.  The city is under siege by the Spanish and the usurper Almuzir is in control and wants to marry Zoraida, daughter of the former king, but she’s in love with Abenamet, leader of the aristocratic and warlike Abencerrages.  Almuzir makes Abenamet commander in chief of his army and entrusts him with a sacred flag.  If he returns victorious and with the flag he gets Zoraida but if he loses the flag he’ll be executed as a traitor.  Naturally Almuzir has arranged for his sidekick, Ali, to betray the flag to the Spanish.  The victorious hero is going to be executed but Zoraida promises to marry Almuzir if he spares Abenamet.  Then the lovers meet secretly and after the statutory rowing about Zoraida betraying him Abumet exits.  But Ali has overheard the conversation and gets Zoraida sentenced to death for treason.  Only a knight showing up to defend her in trial by combat can save her (that again!).  Of course it’s Abenamet in disguise and he beats Ali who fesses up.  The clan want to kill Almuzir and Ali but Abenamet forgives them and in return gets the girl.

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Not really a review at all

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So Thursday lunchtime I went to see Karoline Podolak and Wesley Harrison supported by Mattia Senesi and Brian Cho in the RBA.  It was a “schmaltzy” programme (Wesley’s description not mine!).  The whole thing consisted of arias and duets from La Traviata, The Barber of Seville and Don Pasquale with a bit of Lehar and a final Prayer chucked in.

It was the sort of rep that if it came up on University Challenge any opera goer would be hitting the buzzer in under two seconds!  And it’s all lovely of course.  It was beautifully sung by two beautiful people with two excellent pianists.  They sing beautifully separately and wonderfully together and Karoline’s coloratura is spectacular.  It’s rep that fits them like a glove at this stage of their careers and I’m not going to bore you with a blow by blow account.  It was unalloyed, undemanding enjoyment made all the better by being in the RBA on a sunny day!

Photo credfit: Karen E. Reeves.