The recording of Richard Strauss’ Die Frau ohne Schatten made at the Salzburg Festival in 1992 is very much Sir Georg Solti’s show. The conducting is superb and the Vienna Philharmonic, of course, respond for Solti. From the opening, shattering cords through the various orchestral interludes to the final ensemble and chorus Solti is utterly convincing in his command of tempi and dynamics.
The Royal Conservatory has now announced the 2015/16 season. The full details plus how to subscribe, buy tickets etc is here. It’s the usual rich mix of music in a wide range of genres. Here are the things I will be looking out for:
April 24th 2016 in Koerner Hall at 3pm there’s a recital by Bryn Terfel with Natalia Katyukova. This is definitely the big name vocal gig of the season.
The Royal Opera House production of Wagner’s Der fliegende Holländer finally made it to Toronto yesterday with a showing of the film at the Bloor Hot Docs Cinema. There areva couple of Toronto connections. The production was created by Tim Albery, although Daniel Dooner directs this revival, and the Senta is sung by Adrianne Pieczonka who was present with her family and introduced the film. The Dutchman, of course, is played by hulking Welshman Bryn Terfel who wasn’t there. He was probably crying into his beer somewhere at Wales coming up short in the Six Nations. Continue reading
Royal Opera House cinema screenings are back at the Bloor Cinema and it seems that the full season will be available. ENO are you watching or is your sense of Ontario gepography akin to your business acumen?
First up, tomorrow, at noon they’re screening Giordano’s Andrea Chenier directed by David McVicar with Jonas Kaufmann and Eva-Maria Westbroek.
March 22nd sees Tim Albery’s production of Wagner’s Der fliegende Holländer with Adrienne Pieczonka and Bryn Terfel. Ms. Pieczonka will be on hand to introduce the piece.
On June 28th we get a new John Fulljames production of Weill’s Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny with Anne Sofie von Otter.
July 26th sees John Copley’s venerable production of Puccini’s La Bohème. This production is almost as old as I am. Anna Netrebko and Joseph Calleja play Mimi and Rodolfo.
Finally, on August 30th we can see a new production of Rossini’s Guillaume Tell directed by Damiano Michieletto with Antonio Pappano conducting. The cast includes Gerry Finley and Malin Bystrom.
Cecilia and Bryn at Glyndebourne is the DVD recording of a concert from 1999 featuring two of those singers who prove you don’t have to be dead skinny to be a great singer and have a commanding stage presence. It’s great fun, focussing on the lighter end of the repertoire for the most part. It’s mostly Mozart with some Rossini, Donizetti, Haydn and Handel thrown in. There are a couple of overtures and a few arias but the greatest pleasure comes in the duets. For the second time in a week I got to see Lá ci darem la mano sung by singers of extremely contrasting heights and where else is one going to see Mr. Terfel and Ms. Bartoli sing the Pa-pa-pa-pa duet from Die Zauberflöte. As ever Ceci’s coloratura is a thing of wonder and Bryn is no slouch. The accompaniment is ably provided by Myung-Whun Chung and the London Philharmonic. It’s the perfect antidote to a week of watching Wozzeck.
We got to see Kasper Holten’s new Don Giovanni from the Royal Opera House in Toronto yesterday. It wasn’t live but I really don’t think that matters. I’m not going to dwell too much on production or performance because it’s already been extensively reviewed elsewhere. I concur with the general tenor of the reviews that the singing and acting is extremely strong. Certainly Holten got a more intense performance out of Mariusz Kwiecien than Michael Grandage did at the Met and Veronique Gens was a very fine Donna Elvira. There really weren’t any weak links.
Puccini’s Tosca doesn’t seem to lend itself to Regie type treatments. Even quite adventurous directors seem to mostly stick to the very specific time and place of the libretto (even though, as Paul Curran pointed out to me, the plot makes no sense in the Rome of 1800). In the 2012 Royal Opera House recording Jonathan Kent certainly takes very few liberties with the piece; the church is a church, the palace a palace and the castle a castle. There are a few deft design touches. Both Cavaradossi and Tosca wear very bright colours indicative of the new dyes that became available at the period (actually I think this is a slight anachronism – must check with the fashion lemur) whereas Scarpia is more conservatively attired. Generally though it’s pretty straightforward.
Robert Carsen’s production of Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffmann does a very decent job of presenting this rather muddled and overly long piece. He sets it in and around a production of Don Giovanni in which Hoffmann’s current infatuation, Stella, is singing Donna Anna. There are several quite clever DG references scattered around. By and large it works and is one of the better “theatre in theatre” treatments that I’ve seen.
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
I had very mixed feelings about today’s HD broadcast of Siegfried from the Metropolitan Opera. Early reviews and comments by friends had been largely negative about the staging and there was a widespread view that “the machine” was intrusively noisy. As it turned out I was pleasantly surprised. For once Gary Halvorson’s relentless close ups were a boon. From what little we could see of them, the first and second act sets were both uninteresting and gimmicky. The 3D leaf scattering, the crudely pixellated woodbird and the laughable Wurm were just among the sillier features. To be fair , the beginning of the third act made effective use of the set but that was the only place that it did work well. So focussing on the singers made a lot of sense.
operaramblings 