BREAKING NEWS: Opera & Ballet

I want your Rex

Mon, 24 Jan 2022 14:30:31 +0000

Tenor William Burden, brining “supreme ease and dramatic conviction” to Oedipus.

The specter of COVID still shadowed this event. The company was in Verizon Hall at the Kimmel Center rather than their home theatre, the Academy of Music. More to the point, the evening was a concert performance rather than a staged one, pairing Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex with a short prelude of George Walker’s Lilacs, a setting of Walt Whitman’s famous elegy to Abraham Lincoln.

As you might imagine, the mournful notes of Lilacs and the dark cloud of the Theban plague in Oedipus Rex took on additional resonance in this moment.

Yet there was much to feel reassured and joyous about, though as an evening of drama in music, Oedipus + Lilacs was successful more in parts than as a whole.

I think Oedipus Rex is, for many, a hard-sell work that frankly benefits from a theatrical staging, such as Julie Taymor’s imaginative film version. On its own, the juddery, neurotic quality, mostly horrific but also illuminated by flashes of mordant wit and considerable irony, is a challenge to both performers and audiences.

While I appreciate the idea of prefacing Oedipus, which runs under an hour, with a prelude, Lilacs—an episodic work of introspective lyricism—doesn’t launch the right mood. I find Walker’s instrumental writing, full of gorgeous colorations and sweep, more interesting than the vocal line; here, Tiffany Townsend’s vibrant voice didn’t sound in best form.

Oedipus begins with a short, spoken prologue, and narration continues through the piece. Often it’s performed by an actor. The French by Jean Cocteau is almost always translated into the vernacular, while the rest of the libretto remains in Latin. Here, the narration was provided by storyteller Charlotte Blake Alston, whose sonorous and straightforward delivery, appreciable on its own, missed the work’s febrile electricity.

That shockwave also didn’t entirely come through in the musical performance, which—despite some very fine singing, both by soloists and male chorus, and by conductor Corrado Rovaris, in typically vigorous form—remained more honorable than gripping.

Still, there as much to appreciate. At the top—and reason enough to call the evening a success on their merits alone—were the performances of William Burden (Oedipus) and Rehanna Thelwell (Jocasta). Burden’s burnished lyric tenor, astonishingly untouched by time, remains a glory, and he limned the difficult, angular writing with supreme ease and dramatic conviction.

Thelwell’s opulent, port-wine mezzo is a gorgeous and distinctive instrument; she also has considerable presence. The tricky intervals weren’t always perfectly pitched, and she somewhat under-characterized Jocasta’s more heated outbursts—but this is a voice in a million, and surely a career to watch.

Able support was provided by Mark S. Doss (Créon; also the Messenger), Jonathan Lemalu (Tiresius), and Ethan Burck (the Shepherd). Burck, a Curtis student, heroically stepped in at the last minute. Strangely, given the fine acoustics of Verizon Hall, the balances here sometimes found the orchestra swamping the singers, though Burden in particular rang out with ease in the house.

As I said earlier, the enthusiastic audience applauded for minutes, and clearly would have stayed longer—both a recognition of our beloved home team and a hope for more to come soon. The company plan is to mount a fully staged Rigoletto back at the Academy in April/May.

Meanwhile, Friday’s performance of Oedipus + Lilacs is available for streaming through Opera Philadelphia’s website.

Madwoman

Mon, 24 Jan 2022 13:56:20 +0000

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWc16QRw8-U

On this day in 1958 soprano Inge Borkh made her Metropolitan Opera debut as Salome.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=UzdE2RmS7yw

Ronald Eyer in Musical America:

The German soprano Inge Borkh made her Metropolitan debut in the title role of “Salome” and cut a rather controversial figure with some sharp divisions of opinion about the “rightness” of her interpretation. Granting the obvious fact that there never was and never will be a perfect Salome since, as Strauss himself said, the role requires “a 16-year-old girl with an Isolde voice,” a good performance can only be assessed negatively as the one which is least unseemly.

Miss Borkh, who certainly possesses an Isolde-type voice, is a statuesque, but well-proportioned woman and clearly is not the fragile child-princess of Wilde’s, and Strauss’s, invention. But she has made a thoughtful, intelligent study of this impossible part; she has developed a characterization in which every detail is calculated, down to the smallest movements of the dance, and she produces an entity which is consistent and, therefore tasteful and, for many people, exciting. I personally prefer a more acidulous and penetrating voice, particularly in the lower reaches, and a somewhat simpler acting style (Strauss always deplored tendencies to overact the part).

Norman Kelley was a frenetic Herod and Blanche Thebom complemented him with the regally glacial, venomous Herodias that is one of her most notable characterizations. Mack Harrell sang very well and he did all that can be done with the undeveloped role of Jokanaan. The conducting of Mr. Mitropoulos was curiously uneven. He tended to slur over the lovely subtleties of the score and, in the succession of his tempos, to create slackness that vitiated the mounting tension which must be built relentlessly from beginning to end if the great closing scene is to be the tremendous psychological and musical catharsis it was intended to be. Despite Miss Borkh’s fine work here, the final scene came almost as an anticlimax.

Birthday anniversaries of playwright Pierre-Augustin Beaumarchais (1732), patron, librettist and operatic inspiration Gustavus III (1746), composer, writer and operatic inspiration E T A Hoffmann (1776), bass-baritone Jaro Prohaska (1891), mezzo-soprano Elena Nicolai (1905), composers Gottfried von Einem (1918) and Leon Kirchner (1919).

“I do like to win”

Sun, 23 Jan 2022 14:54:11 +0000

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=rpmF-8Cf6jc

On this day in 1964 the American premiere of Menotti’s The Last Savage took place at the Metropolitan Opera featured George London, Nicolai Gedda, Roberta Peters and Teresa Stratas, with Thomas Schippers conducting.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzDD7lktEVI

Birthday anniversaries of tenor Vladimir Rosing (1890), bass Manfred Schenk (1930) and soprano Teresa Zylis-Gara (1930).

Slim pickings

Sun, 23 Jan 2022 13:29:15 +0000

As you probably now theatres are closed in Ontario until the end of January and, it seems, organisations are taking a very cautious approach to February. It’s not very heroic but given the flakiness of the Ontario government it’s understandable. The COC’s Madama Butterfly is to be an on-line stream and a whole raft of performances at the RCM are postponed or rescheduled. The only confirmed shows of vocal interest at this point that I’m aware of in February are the Stewart Goodyear concert on February 9th and the Opera Atelier All is Love on February 19th and 20th; both at Koerner.

LPO/Canellakis - Boulanger, Wagner, and Scriabin, 22 January 2022

Sat, 22 Jan 2022 22:58:44 +0000

Royal Festival Hall

Lili Boulanger: D’un soir triste
Wagner: Tristan und Isolde: Prelude to Act I and ‘Liebestod’
Scriabin: Symphony no.4, op.54, ‘Poem of Ecstasy’

London Philharmonic Orchestra

Karina Canellakis (conductor)

London Philharmonic Orchestra, Principal Guest Conductor Karina Canellakis, (c) Benjamin Ealovega

Disappointment was palpable when a pre-concert announcement informed us of a change to the programme. Ravel’s Left-Hand Piano Concerto would no longer be played, Cédric Tiberghien having been indisposed at very short notice. All of two hours, I learned later, had made it impossible to find a substitute or indeed to offer an alternative work, and the pianist was understandably frustrated by the experience. Wagner, initially slated to preface the Ravel, now came second, Lili Boulanger’s D’un soir tristemoving to the first half. Scriabin’s Poem of Ecstasy remained last, but now with the second half to itself. It may not have been the programme anybody wanted, but it received an excellent, in many ways outstanding, set of performances from the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Karina Canellakis. As ever right now, we gratefully made the best of a less than ideal situation.

D’un soir triste proved something of a revelation to me. I do not think I had heard it before; if I had, it cannot have been in a performance as impressive as this. Its opening reminded me, perhaps oddly, of Puccini’s Il tabarro: above all in the marriage of particular, dark orchestral colouring to other aspects of Boulanger’s writing (harmony and rhythm). It was built otherwise, quite otherwise, although that impression returned at the end of a finely turned symphonic poem (both as work and performance). Debussyan and Wagnerian roots were unmistakeable, but only a small part of a more richly post-Romantic canvas. On occasion, I fancied there might even be a little of something more Expressionist, giving a piece such as Schreker’s Vorspiel zu einen Drama a run for its money. Although ardent, indeed passionate, this remained far from the hothouse. The abiding impression was clean yet dark, with a keen sense of narrative, propelled by excellent wind and later strong solos. There was decided unease too, evoked as much through timbre (pizzicato, for instance) as harmony. A powerful, yet ambiguous climax was just as well traced as its preparation and aftermath. Fascinating.

The intensity of the opening to the Prelude to Act I of Tristan was welcome enough; still more so were Canellakis’s unerring pacing and the LPO’s depth of tone and, later, fine orchestral balance. There was unfussy variegation too: chiaroscuro that never drew attention to itself, never seemed present for its own sake. Again, Canellakis built the music to a splendid climax, its trumpets already presaging Scriabin. There was true Wagnerian melos here—and this from someone far from unexacting when it comes to Wagner. The so-called ‘Liebestod’ (properly ‘Isoldes Verklärung’) does not belong tonally with the Prelude, but an excellent performance such as this can allay such qualms. This was an alert, comprehending performance, which might perhaps have had greater breadth, but did not drag. Crucially, it glowed. On this evidence, Canellakis may turn out to be a Wagnerian to be reckoned with. The LPO’s recent experience with Wagner at Glyndebourne could not have been put to better use.

Scriabin’s Poem had many of the same virtues, albeit, quite rightly, with greater languor. Again, Canellakis offered a poised, clear account, as well balanced as it was well directed. She is evidently a conductor who has music flow without ever making the experience about her. One inevitably heard fragments of Tristan throughout, yet as a springboard, not a cage. In this work, journey and frustrations are surely more the thing than arrival. There was assuredly no doubting the sexual charge of its ebb and flow. Climaxes can hardly be subtle, nor is there much point in trying to make them so; they made their point in vivid, enjoyable fashion. To hear a full orchestra at something close to its best in so fine a performance was magnificent reward. As for the rest, one can but admire Wagner’s economy.

La bohème

Sat, 22 Jan 2022 15:00:45 +0000

Starring Maria Agresta as Mimì and Charles Castronovo as Rodolfo.

Grande dame

Sat, 22 Jan 2022 13:34:21 +0000

Born on this day in 1878 actress and acting coach Constance Collier.

Our "yesterdays" en chansons....Joan Baez.(live 1975)

Fri, 21 Jan 2022 22:53:00 +0000

Who's got eyes bluer than robin's eggs? Guess... Best 'Love ' song ever.... As I remember your eyes Were bluer than robin's eggs My poetry was lousy you said

Operatic Suicides

Fri, 21 Jan 2022 20:26:25 +0000

An art form that focuses on the extremes of human emotions will certainly have self annihilation as a regular subject. Suicide appears so frequently in opera that I could devote scores of articles to it. It’s such a common event that it’s even stimulated medical journals to comment on it. See Four centuries of suicide in opera for a statistical discourse on the subject. For this piece I’ve chosen 15 operas that have suicides central to their plots. They have different motives and means. Some could arguably claim to be deaths under another category. Regardless, I chose them because they readily came to mind.

Verdi and Puccini account for more than half; so let’s start with them. In Act 3 of Luisa Miller, Rodolfo puts poison in drinking water and encourages Luisa to drink it. He does likewise. He thinks she has betrayed his love. He then finds out that she was forced to write him a letter declaring her love for the wonderfully named Wurm in order to save her father’s life. Too late! They both die, but not before singing some beautiful music and leaving just enough time for Rodolfo to dispatch Wurm. Rodolfo gets a trifecta here; he’s a double murderer and a suicide This excerpt is from a 1968 performance at the Met featuring Montserrat Caballé, Richard Tucker, and Sherrill Milnes.

In Act 4 scene 1 of Verdi’s Il Trovatore, Leonora (soprano) drinks poison rather than give herself to a baritone. He’s got her true love, a tenor of course, in a dungeon and won’t let him go unless Leonora exchanges her person for his (the tenor’s). Everything goes wrong and only the baritone is still standing at the final curtain. The duet that results in Leonora’s fatal draught is one of Verdi’s few for soprano and baritone. The singers are Zinka Milanov and Leonard Warren.

Verdi’s La Forza Del Destino was written for the Bolshoi Kamenny Theatre of Saint Petersburg, Russia. It was first performed there in 1862. In its initial form, rarely used today, the opera ended with Don Alvaro, overcome by the guilt at having killed or caused the death of all the Calatravas, jumping to his death into the nearby ravine cursing humankind. This bleak ending was replaced by the exquisite trio that leaves the remorseful Alvaro still alive. The original music from the end of ‘Pace, Pace, Mio Dio’ to the opera’s conclusion is led by Valery Gergiev and the players of the Mariinski Theater in St Petersburg. Forza original conclusion

Aida ends with the tenor (Radames) locked in a vault as punishment for treason. He will remain there until dead – either from suffocation or dehydration. To his surprise he finds that Aida has preceded him so she can share his fate. Thus he will die by execution, while she is a suicide. Renata Tebaldi and Carlo Bergonzi are the doomed lovers in this recording.

Puccini’s first of four suicides is his most famous – Tosca’s leap from atop the Castel Sant’Angelo. Maria Callas, the definitive Tosca of the last century is the jumper. She’s killed the evil police chief Scarpia and has just witnessed the execution of her lover Cavaradossi. She thought it was a mock shooting, but it was for real. Her last words as she goes airborne are O Scarpia, avanti a Dio!

Cio-Cio-san the protagonist of Madama Butterfly commits ritual suicide when she realizes how utterly betrayed she has been by the American naval officer, BF Pinkerton, who married her for 30 days. She thought it was permanent and waited for his return; it three years during which she remained loyal. Maria Callas is Butterfly in this recording of her death scene.

Suor Angelica is the second of the three one act operas that make up Il Trittico. The unifying theme of the three seemingly unrelated operas is hidden death. Suor Angelica is the story of a young noblewoman sent to a nunnery because of an illegitimate pregnancy. Puccini’s sister was a nun. He consulted her about the daily activities of life in a convent which make up the first half of the opera. After seven years in the convent Angelica is visited by her aunt only to sign some necessary documents related to the upcoming marriage of her sister. During the encounter with her haughty aunt she learns that her child died two years ago. Distraught she takes poison only to realize that she has committed a mortal sin. She prays to the Virgin for forgiveness. As she dies she sees a vision of the Virgin and her son who rushes to her. When performed by a great singing actress this scene has the power to sweep away an audience. Angelica is commonly thought to be the weakest of the three operas. One would only say that is he had not seen the opera performed as Puccini intended. Tebaldi Angelica’s death

The only suicide presented her that doesn’t end the opera is Liu’s death in Puccini’s final and uncompleted Turandot. She stabs herself rather than reveal Prince Calaf’s name. This self sacrifice quiets the mob that had been clamoring for the name. Calaf after answering Turandot’s riddle had offered to submit to the murderous Princess if she could learn his name before dawn. Montserrat Caballé sings Liu’s brief aria before the fatal knife ends her life. The excerpt includes the music that follows.

Two selections from Ponchielli’s Las Gioconda: The opera’s final scene open with the aria Suicido in which Gioconda details her plan to die rather than submit to the evil baritone Barnaba – you can see a pattern in Italian opera. Caballé is again the soloist. The very end of the opera depicts Gioconda’s mock submission to the baritone brute. Just when he thinks he has her, she stabs herself. In frustration he shouts at her lifeless body that he murdered her mother the previous evening. When that grisly newsflash gets no reaction, he growls and leaves – curtain. Sherrill Milnes joins Caballé.

Next, two Wagner sopranos who do themselves in. Senta in The Flying Dutchman leaps to her death in an act of self sacrifice which frees the Dutchman of his curse of endless cruising. Berndt Weikl is the Dutchman, Cheryl Studer is the airborne soprano. Der fliegende Holländer final scene

Wagner’s Ring Cycle ends with everything back to the way they were before the marathon started. In the final scene of Götterdämmerung Brunhilde rides her horse into a fire, Valhalla burns, the Rhine overflows its banks, and the ring is restored to the Rhinemaidens. The incomparable Birgit Nilsson leads the fireworks in this performance recorded in Bayreuth under the direction of Georg Solti.

Daniel Auber’s La muette de Portici inaugurated the genre of French Grand Opera. It also has the distinction of having its title character as a mute. It takes place in Naples in 1687 during the revolt against Spanish rule led by the fisherman Masaniello. The opera is also called Masaniello. It has a complicated plot that ends during an eruption of Vesuvius. Fanella, the mute of the title and Masaniello’s sister, throws herself off a terrace on hearing of her brother’s death. Sometimes she’s said to hurl herself into Vesuvius itself. While an impossible feat, it’s not too wacky for an opera. This finale to the 5th and final act is from a production in Dessau, Germany

Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette was first performed in Paris in 1867. You know the story. It ends with a double suicide. Romeo takes poison, Juliette uses a dagger. Placido Domingo and Ruth Ann Swenson are the teenage lovers. Romeo et Juliette final scene

Massenet’s Werther is based on Goethe’s novel The Sorrows of Young Werther which set off a string of copycat suicides in young men after its publication in 1787. In the opera Werther shoots himself during the interval between the opera’s final two scenes. He uses a pistol borrowed from the husband of Charlotte the woman he loves. She arrives too late to stop him from shooting himself; he is dying when she enters his room. She consoles him by declaring her love. He asks for forgiveness. After he dies, Charlotte faints. Outside children are heard singing a Christmas carol. Federica von Stade and Jose Carreras are the soloists. Werther final scene

As I said at the top, there are sufficient suicides to consume dozens of posts. But this is it for now.

Lorenzo’s toil

Fri, 21 Jan 2022 13:30:21 +0000

“Meet our new chief conductor Lorenzo Viotti – Dutch National Opera”

One of a kind

Fri, 21 Jan 2022 07:02:51 +0000

Born on this day in 1926 bodybuilder and actor Steve Reeves.

Late bloomer

Thu, 20 Jan 2022 15:00:24 +0000

We will hear a 1971 RAI broadcast of Tchaikovsky’s Pikovaya Dama (or, in this case, La Dama di Picche); Tippett’s A Child of Our Time conducted by Colin Davis; and highlights of her Pamina, Countess Almaviva and Elsa.

Although I probably first heard Zylis-Gara on one of her early Mozart Met broadcasts, my most vivid initial awareness of her derived from two recordings on the Archiv label of rare 17^th century works: Cavalieri’s La Rappresentatione di Anima e di Corpo and Stradella’s Cantata per il Santissimo Natale. During the 1960s, she also recorded several important Bach works, as well as Handel’s Dixit Dominus.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsWxrCp82FE

Zylis-Gara was already 35 when she broke through into international opera prominence beginning with Octavian at the 1965 Glyndebourne Festival opposite Montserrat Caballé. Two years later she starred in a new production there of Don Giovanni, and Donna Elvira would become her signature role for the next decade. It served for her debut at the Salzburg Festival, the San Francisco Opera and the Met, all in 1968! This rich period also saw the release of what may be her most memorable studio recording as the Komponist in the Rudolf Kempe Ariadne auf Naxos.

The Met would be her primary company for the next decade-and-a-half with whom she’d perform over 230 times, including 20 Saturday broadcasts. Donna Elvira remained her most-often performed role, and while one might not necessarily think of Zylis-Gara as a Puccini singer, she sang 90 performances of six of his doomed heroines—Mimi, Cio-Cio-San, Liù, Angelica, Tosca, and Manon Lescaut—with the company.

Her only new production came early—the 1972 Franco Zeffirelli Otello with James McCracken and Sherrill Milnes conducted by Karl Böhm. The day after that premiere run ended, she unexpectedly found herself on the Met stage again for what remains—50 years later–one of her most memorable appearances.
For the gala marking the end of Rudolf Bing’s tenure at Met General Manager, Zylis-Gara replacing Renata Tebaldi, performed the Otello love duet with Franco Corelli. Its inclusion in the gala’s television highlights provides us with a special souvenir of the soprano at her peak. For many, Corelli may be the main attraction, but the soprano’s ravishing Desdemona gives ample indication as to why she became a beloved artist at the Met.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHQl7H-jxMg

I only got to hear Zylis-Gara in person in concert: twice at the 1980 Cincinnati May Festival. First, she performed under James Conlon in the Dvorak Requiem (a work she recorded with Armin Jordan). A week later, the soprano joined Marilyn Horne, Neil Shicoff and John Cheek for Verdi’s Requiem. That evening was the first time I heard James Levine conduct; 37 years later it would prove to be the last work I’d hear him lead.

Zylis-Gara’s opera appearances with other US companies were surprisingly few: After her US debut there as Donna Elvira, she’d only return to the San Francisco Opera fourteen years later for Tchaikovsky’s Lisa.

Her sole engagement with the Chicago Lyric was in 1973 as Massenet’s Manon with Alfredo Kraus. He’d return to Chicago a decade later as Des Grieux to another unexpected Massenet Manon, Renata Scotto. Zylis-Gara also performed Adriana Lecouvreur in both Miami and New Orleans; it was a role the Met only cast her in on tour, never at Lincoln Center.

There are many audio clips of Zylis-Gara on YouTube so I’m posting today only pieces otherwise unavailable. Besides the Bing Gala Otello duet, I could only locate one film of the soprano in performance: a pirate video of her Andrea Chenier Maddalena from Marseille in 1991 when she was 61 and near the end of her stage career.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGU8U9I878Q

Norman Bailey, Zylis-Gara’s colleague in the Tippett work, also died in 2011. Be warned that the sound quality of several of these audio clips isn’t the best.

Tchaikovsky: Pikovaya Dama—In Italian

RAI Torino
7 October 1971
Broadcast

Lisa: Teresa Zylis-Gara
The Countess: Marianne Radev
Pauline/Milovzor: Birgit Finnilä
Prilepa: Luciana Palombi
Governess: Anna di Stasio
Ghermann: Ljubomir Bodurov
Count Tomsky/Zlatogor: Ladislaus Konya
Prince Yeletsky: Assem Selimski
Chekalinsky: Gino Sinimberghi
Surin: Boris Carmeli
Naroumov: Renzo Gonzales
Chaplinsk: Tommaso Frascati
Major Domo: Mario Carlin

Conductor: Boris Khaikin

Tippett: A Child of Our Time

Symphony Hall
January 1978
Broadcast

Teresa Zylis-Gara
Lili Chookasian
Alexander Stevenson
Norman Bailey

Tanglewood Festival Chorus

Boston Symphony Orchestra;

Conductor: Colin Davis

Mozart: Die Zauberflöte—exc.

17 January 1970
Nroadcast

Pamina: Teresa Zylis-Gara
Conductor: Stanislaw Skrowaczewski

Mozart: Le Nozze di Figaro—exc.

11 April 1970
Broadcast

Countess Almaviva: Teresa Zylis-Gara

Conductor Josef Krips

Wagner: Lohengrin—exc.

January 10, 1980
In-house recording

Elsa: Teresa Zylis-Gara
Ortrud: Mignon Dunn
Lohengrin: Siegfried Jerusalem

Conductor: Giuseppe Patanè

Other examples of Zylis-Gara’s art on Trove Thursday include the final scene from Donizetti’s Anna Bolena (in German); Mathilde in a complete Guglielmo Tell plus a special favorite of mine, the Benvenuto Cellini duet with Franco Boniisolli, who is also her Arnoldo in the Rossini; and Szymanowski’s gorgeous Stabat Mater.

Today’s Zylis-Gara material can be downloaded by clicking on the icon of a square with an arrow pointing downward on the audio player above and the resulting mp3 files will appear in your download directory.

In addition, more than 400 other podcast tracks are always available from Apple Podcasts for free, or via any RSS reader. The archive which lists all Trove Thursday offerings in alphabetical order by composer was up-to-dated late last year.

“I think I was born stubborn”

Thu, 20 Jan 2022 12:43:23 +0000

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=Br3AipG2bbU

On this day in 1967 Colin Davis made his Metropolitan Opera debut conducting Peter Grimes, with Jon Vickers, Lucine Amara and Geraint Evans in the cast.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqRA9qd09XM

Birthday anniversaries of composer Sebastián Yradier (1809), composer Ernest Chausson (1855), conductor Garbriele Santini (1886) and conductor Antonio de Almeida (1928).

Happy birthday to parterre box mainstay Harry Rose.

SF Opera's 2022-2023 Season

Wed, 19 Jan 2022 22:42:50 +0000

September 9 2022: Opera Ball: The Centennial Celebration with Nadine Sierra, Michael Fabiano, Pene Pati, Lucas Meachem, and Eun Sun KimSeptember 10–October 5 2022: John Adams' Antony and CleopatraSeptember 25–October 14 2022: Eugene OneginOctober 15–30 2022: Dialogues of the CarmelitesNovember 11–December 3 2022: La TraviataNovember 15–December 1 2022: Orfeo ed Euridice June 3–July 1, 2023: Madama ButterflyJune 4–28 2023: Die Frau ohne SchattenJune 13–30 2023: Gabriela Lena Frank's El último sueño de Frida y DiegoJune 16 2023: 100th Anniversary Concert General Director Matthew Shilvock announced San Francisco Opera's Centennial Season today. The season includes two new operas, one of which is a world premiere by John Adams, and many new productions. Press Release | Official Site

O mother, where art thou?

Wed, 19 Jan 2022 08:12:04 +0000

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jzW5SMnF7I

On this day in 1984 bass Samuel Ramey, conductor Mario Bernardi and director Frank Corsaro made their Metropolitan Opera debuts in Handel’s Rinaldo.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=nepYa_0e–g

Birthday anniversaries of writer Edgar Allan Poe (1809), conductor and composer Albert Wolff (1884), bass-baritone Hans Hotter (1909).

Happy 67th birthday conductor Simon Rattle.

Eyesight to the blind

Tue, 18 Jan 2022 14:00:02 +0000

Which much-lauded gem of an American artist is about to emerge from retirement?

I’m like a bird

Tue, 18 Jan 2022 07:35:19 +0000

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cj6YFAGZ1cE Happy 76th birthday soprano Katia Ricciarelli. //www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQY3bqFMXfk On this day in 1907 the Metropolitan Opera premiered Puccini’s Manon Lescaut with the composer in attendance. Lina Cavalieri and Enrico Caruso were Manon and DeGrieux. //www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHb8m0e-k1Q Birthday anniversaries of composer Emmanuel Chabrier (1841), composer Berthold Goldschmidt (1903), conductor János Ferencsik (1907), and soprano Marianne Schech (1941).

“I’ve always been multicultural myself”

Mon, 17 Jan 2022 06:59:26 +0000

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFmqcf6zhtg

On this day in 1960 tenor Jon Vickers made his Metropolitan Opera debut as Canio.

Robert Sabin in Musical America:

At this performance (a benefit for the West Side Institutional Synagogue), the Canadian tenor Jon Vickers made his debut at the Metropolitan, in the role of Canio. Mr. Vickers had made an excellent impression at his New York debut, on Nov. 20, 1956, when he sang the role Florestan in the American Opera Society’s concert performance of “Fidelio.” He is an intelligent and sensitive artist, which (believe it not) is a great help in giving a good performance as Canio. We were spared excessive sobbings and rantings, and shown genuine heartbreak, instead. Vocally, Mr. Vickers strained a bit on top tones, but this may well have been debut nerves. At all times, his singing was well phrased and dramatically alive. One looks forward to hearing him in artistically more rewarding roles.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ucX26tyntc

Birthday anniversaries of composer Wilhelm Kienzl (1857), dramatist and writer Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860) and actress Betty White (1922).

Martin Luther King Day 2022.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=gU-pb8GeY3g

Voices of Mountains

Sun, 16 Jan 2022 20:18:12 +0000

The COC’s latest on-line offering is now available on-line. It’s called Voices of Mountains and the video is just shy of an hour long. Only about half of that is music though. The rest is introductions, artist statements and a 10 minute piece about the Land Acknowledgement installation created for the lobby of the Four Season Centre by Rebecca Cuddy and Julie McIsaac. It looks very interesting but, of course, one can’t visit it.

The recital itself features mezzos Rebecca Cuddy and Marion Newman with pianist Gordon Gerrard performing in the RBA. Some of the footage is inter-cut with video of Aria Evans dancing in various Toronto locations. It kicks off with a new duet by Ian Cusson with text by Joy Harjo called Fire. (text below). Like all Ian’s songs it’s very apt to the text and t’s nicely set up as a duet. There’s more music from Ian later in the program with Rebecca singing a setting of one of Marilyn Dumont’s very witty but moving poems; The Devil’s Language. (The text for this one is also below in full, though the song only sets verses 2 and 3).

There’s the language lesson duet from Brian Current’s opera Missing too. It’s the first time I’ve heard it since rather shockingly this opera has yet to be performed in Toronto. I now understand the rather cryptic comment Brian made to me a few years ago to the effect that Missing wasn’t going to win him any awards from academic composers! It’s straightforward and moving. One can see how it fits in the opera but it’s not very Currenty!

There’s music by Fauré, Elgar and Offenbach too, chosen by the performers. Who knew Marion was an Elgar fan? I want to see her at Last Night of the Proms! It’s all nicely done and a thoroughly competent recital.

The technical production is pretty well done too though we had a few glitches with getting it to play smoothly. Not the first time I’ve had that issue with Vimeo. My only real gripe would be that I’m not convinced that body parts in close up are ever a good way to film dance. YMMV.

The video and full program is available here and it will be available until July 15th.

Fire by Joy Harjo

a woman can’t survive
by her own breath alone
she must know
the voices of mountains
she must recognize
the foreverness of blue sky
she must flow
with the elusive
bodies
of night winds
who will take her
into herself

look at me
i am not a separate woman
i am a continuance
of blue sky
i am the throat
of the mountains
a night wind
who burns
with every breath
she takes

The Devil’s Language by Marilyn Dumont
1.
I have since reconsidered Eliot
and the Great White way of writing English
standard that is
the great white way
has measured, judged and assessed me all my life
by its
lily white words
its picket fence sentences
and manicured paragraphs
one wrong sound and you’re shelved in the Native Literature section
resistance writing
a mad Indian
unpredictable
on the war path
native ethnic protest
the Great White way could silence us all
if we let it
its had its hand over my mouth since my first day of school
since Dick and Jane, ABC’s and fingernail checks
syntactic laws: use the wrong order or
register and you’re a dumb Indian
dumb, drunk or violent
my father doesn’t read or write
the King’s English says he’s
dumb but he speaks Cree
how many of you speak Cree?
correct Cree not correct English
grammatically correct Cree
is there one?

2.
is there a Received Pronunciation of Cree, is there
a Modern Cree Usage?
the Chief’s Cree not the King’s English

as if violating God the Father and standard English
is like talking back(wards)

as if speaking the devil’s language is
talking back
back(words)
back to your mother’s sound, your mother’s tongue, your mother’s language
back to that clearing in the bush
in the tall black spruce

3.
near the sound of horses and wind
where you sat on her knee in a canvas tent
and she fed you bannock and tea
and syllables
that echo in your mind now, now
that you can’t make the sound
of that voice that rocks you and sings you to sleep
in the devil’s language.

Cancer Statistics 2022

Sun, 16 Jan 2022 19:00:07 +0000

Every January the American Cancer Society publishes Cancer Statistics based on the most recent data available. The abstract from the report is immediately below. The entire report is available at the end of this article.

Abstract: Each year, the American Cancer Society estimates the numbers of new cancer cases and deaths in the United States and compiles the most recent data on population-based cancer occurrence and outcomes. Incidence data (through 2018) were collected by the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results program; the National Program of Cancer Registries; and the North American Association of Central Cancer Registries. Mortality data (through 2019) were collected by the National Center for Health Statistics. In 2022, 1,918,030 new cancer cases and 609,360 cancer deaths are projected to occur in the United States, including approximately 350 deaths per day from lung cancer, the leading cause of cancer death. Incidence during 2014 through 2018 continued a slow increase for female breast cancer (by 0.5% annually) and remained stable for prostate cancer, despite a 4% to 6% annual increase for advanced disease since 2011. Consequently, the proportion of prostate cancer diagnosed at a distant stage increased from 3.9% to 8.2% over the past decade. In contrast, lung cancer incidence continued to decline steeply for advanced disease while rates for localized-stage increased suddenly by 4.5% annually, contributing to gains both in the proportion of localized-stage diagnoses (from 17% in 2004 to 28% in 2018) and 3-year relative survival (from 21% to 31%). Mortality patterns reflect incidence trends, with declines accelerating for lung cancer, slowing for breast cancer, and stabilizing for prostate cancer. In summary, progress has stagnated for breast and prostate cancers but strengthened for lung cancer, coinciding with changes in medical practice related to cancer screening and/or treatment. More targeted cancer control interventions and investment in improved early detection and treatment would facilitate reductions in cancer mortality.

Several comments about the data as presented are warranted. The ACS has in recent years stopped reporting age adjusted mortality rates which are the most useful way of analyzing cancer deaths. This year they report mortality as the number per 100,000 people. This reporting is not as informative as is age adjusted mortality because a cancer death at age 90 compared to one at age 50 has obviously indifferent implications. The society is also backsliding into considerable discussion of of survival times. As they discuss themselves later in the report, this type of data is replete with bias from differences in the time of diagnosis. If you have an incurable cancer which will kill you in 10 years and it’s diagnosed one year after onset, your survival time is 9 years. If diagnosed after 9 years survival time is 1 year even though you die at the same age. Hence survival intervals tend to increase as diagnostic techniques become more focused and precise even if there is no improvement in treatment. The ACS should back off from reporting survival times and return to giving age adjusted mortality rates. Three figures below show where we are with our current management of cancers of various types.

As you can see, the biggest decrease in cancer mortality is that of lung cancer. This fall is almost entirely due to the cessation of smoking by most of the population. An interesting phenomenon is the virtual disappearance of deaths from stomach cancer which back in 1930 was the leading cause of death from malignancy. The reason for this precipitous decline is not known. It’s not due to better treatment as there has been no improvement in the management of stomach cancer. It has become a rare disease.

There are two cancers which also are declining – breast and colon. The decrease in breast cancer deaths is most likely the result of better treatment, most likely the result of improved treatment. Though not discussed here, mammography appears to have played little or no role in the improved survival of patients with breast cancer. Early diagnosis, especially of premalignant colon polyps, does seem responsible for the better numbers of colon cancer deaths.

The final figure (from the American heart Association) below compares deaths from cardiovascular disease to those from cancer. As you can see we’ve done much better with heart disease than with cancer.

As indicated above, here is the complete ACS report:

Cancer statistics 2022 Download

Dieses Küß der ganzen Welt!

Sun, 16 Jan 2022 16:31:26 +0000

It’s July 29th 1951; the opening night of the first Bayreuth Festival since the end of the war. Noted anti-Nazi Wilhelm Furtwängler will conduct the Festival Orchestra in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony from the Festspielhaus. It will be broadcast live by Süddeutsche Rundfunk(*) and will be relayed by stations in Germany, Austria, France and Sweden. You are sitting in front of your valve radio because commercial transistor models are not yet on the market. You can’t record it to listen to little because tape reorders are almost as rare in 1951 as transistor radios.

You can feel the buzz in the applause as Furtwängler ascends the podium. In the first movement the conducting is almost metronomically regular. The second movement too but the third is gorgeous; very slow but so delicate. There’s something deliberate again about the opening of the fourth movement as the expectation builds. And there’s a longish pause before Otto Edelmann breaks in with the opening lines of Schiller’s An die Freude. Then he’s joined by Elisabeth Schwarzkof; whose every syllable oozes an aristocratic, almost disdainful, elegance, Elisabeth Höngen and Hans Hopf. And, of course, the Festival Chorus. It’s quite thrilling.

Well, now one can almost relive the experience. BIS records have released the entire broadcast based on a mono tape held in the archives of Swedish Radio. It hasn’t been touched up. It’s as close to what somebody with a decent radio would have heard in 1951 as one can get. It’s even got the original announcements and credits and even the original dynamic range which is really a bit wider than one might expect or wish. That said, overall it sounds really, surprisingly perhaps, good. Oddly the physical release is a hybrid Hi-red CD/SACD release but I can’t imagine that the technology adds much to the standard res files I listened to. There’s good documentation as a bonus.

(*)On which station I made an appearance much closer in time to 1951 than to now.

Passions Discovered: Werther from the Opéra national Montpellier Occitanie

Sun, 16 Jan 2022 14:20:19 +0000

Massenet – Werther

Le Bailli – Julien Véronèse
Charlotte – Marie-Nicole Lemieux
Sophie – Pauline Texier
Werther – Mario Chang
Albert – Jérôme Boutillier
Schmidt – Yoann Le Lan
Johann – Matthias Jacquot

Chœur Opéra Junior, Chœur Dames Opéra national Montpellier Occitanie, Orchestre national Montpellier Occitanie / Jean-Marie Zeitouni.
Stage director – Bruno Ravella. Video director – Andy Sommer.

Opéra national Montpellier Occitanie, Montpellier, France. Thursday, May 20th, 2021. Streamed via Operavision.

This Werther should have been the highlight of the 2020 – 21 at the Opéra national de Montpellier but, like so many shows over the past two years, the run was curtailed and it was given a single performance in front of the public. Fortunately for us, the show was recorded and has been made available thanks to Operavision until June on their website. This production was also notable for giving us Marie-Nicole Lemieux’s prise de rôle as Charlotte, alongside Guatemalteco tenor Mario Chang, under the baton of Lemieux’s compatriot Jean-Marie Zeitouni, and a remaining cast made up of Francophone singers.

Photo: © Marc Ginot

Bruno Ravella’s staging, here revived by José Dario Innella, is certainly handsome to look at. The action initially takes place in an attractive drawing room, designed by Leslie Travers, where the ceiling becomes a magnificent starry sky in that first glorious duet between Werther and Charlotte. Similarly, Ravella gives us a sense of the world outside, with Schmidt and Johann singing down at Werther trapped in the room as they celebrate Sunday. In the later acts, the room becomes a dark space with a lengthy corridor appearing to lead off to a brighter place, thereby emphasizing the characters’ isolation and despair. It certainly makes for an interesting visual framework and Andy Sommer’s camera work gives us a consistent close-up on the action, even if perhaps sometimes we would benefit from a more distant perspective, simply to get a fuller sense of Ravella’s stage pictures. The benefit of the close-up camerawork, however, was the opportunity to see the intricacies of the individual performances. While there was a fair bit of standing and delivering, in Lemieux’s Charlotte one could see a progression from a playful woman, to a devastated soul who had felt she had lost a chance of happiness that fleeting. The costumes (also by Travers) allowed us to reflect on a time where morality and keeping up appearances would take precedence over any chance of happiness.

Photo: © Marc Ginot

Chang’s Werther was certainly prone to serious introspection combined with passionate outbursts. He had clearly worked carefully on the language and his French was comprehensible. Some of the diphthongs were a little inconsistent in pronunciation, but this was undoubtedly a creditable effort. Werther is a massive sing and Chang acquitted himself well. He pulled back on the tone and shaded it with great beauty in Act 1, while also opening up and pouring out some golden ardent tone. As the evening developed however, it became clear that the role is perhaps a size too big for his current vocal estate, with intonation coming in and out of focus, and the top not quite spinning in ‘pourquoi me réveiller’. His is a most attractive tenor and while he sang with deep feeling and beauty of tone, this is a role that I hope he will eventually grow into.

Photo: © Marc Ginot

Lemieux, however, is already there as Charlotte. Incredible to think that this was a role debut as it seems she had been born to sing this role and had been singing it all her life. She also understands her instrument and wasn’t afraid to allow those cries of despair to ring out with almost terrifying abandon. She sang ‘va! Laisse couler mes larmes’ with an almost paradoxical combination of poise and supressed emotion desperately wanting to come to the surface, not to mention the generous warmth of her chest register. Her letter scene was sung with commanding generosity, with introspection and yet with depth of feeling in the way she coloured the text. In the final scene, Lemieux found an ecstasy in the way she finally felt able to confess her true feelings for Werther that was utterly compelling. A major assumption of this iconic role.

Photo: © Marc Ginot

The remainder of the cast was indeed very satisfactory. Jérôme Boutillier sang Albert with a firm baritone, his breakdown during the Act 4 prelude utterly devastating to see a once proud man diminished. Pauline Texier sang Sophie in a bright, crystalline soprano and managed to make her character much more sympathetic than we often see. Julien Véronèse sang Le Bailli in a resonant bass, while Yoann Le Lan and Matthias Jacquot sang Schmidt and Johann with admirable clarity of diction. The children’s and ladies’ choruses pealed agreeably in their interjections, although their pitching was slightly approximate.

Photo: © Marc Ginot

The house orchestra was on superb form for Zeitouni. He led a reading that was sensibly-paced, allowed the textures to surge romantically, but also gave his singers room to phrase with generosity, although there were occasionally some dips in tension throughout the evening. Due to the sanitary precautions in place, the orchestra was placed surrounding Zeitouni on the ground floor of the auditorium. He obtained playing that combined both darkness of texture, with a deep pile carpet of warmth in the lower strings, and extreme delicacy where required.

Photo: © Marc Ginot

Thanks are most certainly due to Montpellier and to Operavision for giving us the opportunity to see this production and making it available more widely. Dramatically, it has much to offer, Ravella’s staging provides a visual framework for the action that provides some memorable stage pictures, but also makes us aware of the morality of the period and need to present outward respectability. Musically, it offers significant rewards – Chang’s Werther is bravely sung and the supporting cast is extremely satisfying. Zeitouni’s conducting brings out both passion and introspection and is superbly served by the orchestra. Yet, it’s in Lemieux’s Charlotte that this staging finds its heart and soul, a woman desperate to allow the floodgates of her emotions to open, sung with deep feeling and constant textual awareness. A very special interpretation indeed.

Nothing to hit but the heights

Sun, 16 Jan 2022 08:04:46 +0000

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ILjHSBBSK4

Happy 87th birthday mezzo-soprano Marilyb Horne.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ua6VdPKWvW4

Birthday anniversary of soprano Pilar Lorengar (1928).

Happy centenary of the birth of heldentenor Jean Cox.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9qN3URZBAs

On January 15:

On this day in 1958 Samuel Barber‘s Vanessa had its world premiere at the Met.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJm-fWr-3Wk

On this day in 1942 conductor Sir Thomas Beecham made his Metropolitan Opera debut conducting a double bill of Phoebus and Pan (Bach’s Cantata Der Streit) and Rinsky-Korsakovs Coq d’Or.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKAd_wS5kK8

Bavouzet/Shishkin: Debussy, Liszt, Bartók, and Ravel, 13 January 2022

Sat, 15 Jan 2022 22:32:37 +0000

Wigmore Hall

Debussy, arr. Ravel and Kocsis: Nocturnes
Liszt: Concerto pathétique, S 258
Bartók, arr. Kocsis: Two Pictures, op.10
Ravel: La Valse

Jean-Efflam Bavouzet, Dmitry Shishkin (pianos).

A difficult choice, this: Jean-Efflam Bavouzet and Dmitry Shishkin in a fascinating programme of two-piano music at the Wigmore Hall, or Lise Davidsen and Leif Ove Andsnes in Grieg, Strauss, and Wagner at the Barbican. It is difficult to imagine those attending the latter having been disappointed; at any rate, having tossed a coin in favour of the former, I was not.

First, we heard Debussy’s Nocturnes. I honestly would never have guessed the opening of ‘Nuages’ had not been written for two pianos, rather than transcribed by Ravel, had I not known: testament, surely, both to arrangement and performance. (I am not sure we need worry in this context about differences of meaning between ‘transcription’ and ‘arrangement’.) We heard a wonderful freedom within metre. Darkness of ambiguity seemed, if anything, enhanced by the sound of two Yamahas rather than orchestra. Dynamics, tempo, balance, shaping: all convinced and had one think they could not have been improved on. ‘Fêtes’ sounded more different from the original, more ‘transcribed’, but that was surely the nature of the material, rendered into piano monochrome. It was a sharp, lively performance, occasionally percussive, having me think at times of Bartók. ‘Sirènes’, which Ravel also transcribed but which he admitted to having found especially difficult, was here given in a transcription by Zoltán Kocsis. I did not realise this until afterwards, but I admit to having first found the arrangement sound closest to Ravel himself (so much for my ears!) and thereafter the most enigmatic of all, which is doubtless as it should have been. In performance, there was languor enough, though it always sounded directed.

The genesis of what we heard from Debussy, Ravel, and Kocsis was not entirely straightforward. Essentially, Ravel transcribed ‘Sirènes’ first, to accompany the first two movements, as already transcribed by Raoul Bardac. Then, eight years later, Ravel added his own versions of ‘Nuages’ and ‘Fêtes’, whilst Kocsis’s ‘Sirènes’ dates from seven decades later. However, Liszt’s Concerto pathétique is arguably more complicated (not atypical, for a composer who tended to move on quickly, creating multiple versions, rather than chiselling away at a single work). At any rate, having passed through two solo piano workings of this material, the latter far closer to the two piano version than the first, Liszt rightly settled on two pianos as offering the superior medium for the concerto contrasts of this material. Such was clear from the grand, even grandiloquent, virtuosic opening dialogue; but it was also readily apparent in melting towards more tender sounds. The sheer weight of sound impressed at times, though even then it was never monolithic. Bavouzet and Shishkin imparted a strong sense that Liszt’s music might readily have been orchestrated, but also kept one happy that it had not. It sang too, as only Liszt can. If the roulades sometimes stand on the edge of absurdity when heard for two pianos, they were despatched with conviction, glitter, and crucially, heart. Sometimes, it was difficult to credit that there were only two pianists at work. From a pianistic standpoint, this was little short of stupendous, Liszt’s rhetoric harnessed and sublimated.

Bartók himself arranged his Two Pictures, op.10, for solo piano. Kocsis extended the idea to two pianos. It was quite a revelation to hear: imaginative and faithful, above all pianistic. ‘In Full Flower’, the first picture, sounded, just as much as in orchestral guise, as though it were well on the way to Bluebeard’s Castle, in a performance of sad nobility. Both muscular and tender, often both, it did Bartók and Kocsis proud. ‘Village Dance’ was thrillingly responsive—and responsorial. This performance captured to a tee so many facets, melodic, harmonic, metrical, and more, of Bartók’s style and meaning. Lisztian and other inheritances were refracted, remoulded, even bent to new ends. ‘New wine demands new bottles,’ as Liszt once put it.

La Valse rumbles in a different yet no less ‘authentic’ way in its two-piano version. It was fascinating to hear that opening in the aural light of Bartók. Bavouzet and Shishkin conveyed with relish Ravel’s inflections of Viennese lilt, not necessarily as one would expect with an orchestra, but on their pianos’ own terms. Perhaps there was greater extremity here; there were certainly different sounds and implications. And what a feast, again, of pianism. As an encore, we heard Ravel’s early Sites auriculairesin two short movements. A slinky ‘Habanera’ prefaced a barnstorming ‘Entre cloches,’ its spatial qualities splendidly realised.

Tosca

Fri, 14 Jan 2022 23:52:46 +0000

Streaming and discussion begin at 6:55 PM. Photo: Ken Howard / Met Opera

I am your Bebe now

Fri, 14 Jan 2022 15:29:39 +0000

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=OD07bJGGDaA

On this day in 1900 Puccini’s Tosca premiered in Rome.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLR3lSrqlww

Birthday anniversaries of bass Ludwig Hofmann (1895), mezzo Grace Hoffman (1921), tenor Jean Cox (1922), baritone Louis Quilico (1929).

Happy 82nd birthday baritone Siegmund Nimsgern.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVjrjcPnbck

Happy 66th birthday tenor Ben Heppner.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1oR3btluSY

Songs for a mad world

Thu, 13 Jan 2022 16:08:07 +0000

There’s no shortage of pandemic inspired music out there but I figured I wanted something that more closely evoked the sheer madness of life in Ontario right now. So, I turned to a 1969 piece by my fellow Manc Peter Maxwell Davies. It’s his Eight Songs for a Mad King inspired by that nutty old Hanoverian George III. The genesis of the piece is quite complex. It involves a music box, once owned by the king but by 1968 in the possession of the historian Steven Runciman. Once used by the king in an attempt to teach bullfinches to sing, it provides the inspiration for the eight “tunes” that make up the Eight Songs. The libretto is largely drawn from the king’s own words and other contemporary sources.

The piece is scored for vocalist, flute, clarinet, violin, viola, piano/harpsichord and percussion. The vocalist represents the king while the flute, clarinet, violin and cell perform in cages to represent the four bullfinches though they are also addressed by the king in other guises; for example a lady-n-waiting and the river Thames. Both the vocal and instrumental writing involves a variety of different styles and seriously extended technique. The results are often very weird indeed like in No.7 Country Dance which mashes up a jazzy little dance tune with a weirdly distorted version of Handel’s Comfort Ye.

This recording was actually made by baritone Kelvin Thomas with the Manchester based Psappha ensemble at the University of Salford in 2012 for an 80th birthday celebration (2014) release on the Psappha label.. This time it’s being released through NMC Recordings as a limited edition of 500 vinyl discs with a larger vinyl rerelease and digital edition to follow. I listened to it as 44.1kHz/16 bit .wav files and it sounded just fine. I don’t do vinyl anymore. There’s a disc insert (rather than a booklet!) with very good notes and full texts.

This isn’t going to be to everyone’s taste but if you need some sympathetic magic against the craziness of Fordlandia this might just do it.

Are you there, God? It’s me, Margared

Thu, 13 Jan 2022 15:00:57 +0000

If anyone remembers Lalo’s opera today beyond its unique name, it’s for the aria “Vainement, ma bien-aimée” which has been embraced by tenors from Gigli (the Met’s only Mylio to date) to di Stefano to Bergonzi and Kraus. Most recently the Aubade has shown up at concerts by Juan Diego Florez and Javier Camarena.

Another teno—-Roberto Alagna—resurrected Lalo’s final opera Fiesque in Montpellier in 2006.The following year Toulouse presented a rare staging of Roi d’Ys starring Charles Castronovo and Sophie Koch as Margared, the sister whose jealousy propels the plot. The fiery role was written for Lalo’s contralto wife Julie de Maligny who did not, however, perform it at the opera’s 1888 premiere.

Despite its being a low-lying part, Rosa Ponselle took on Margared in the Met’s 1922 run of Roi d’Ys opposite Gigli and Frances Alda as Rozenn. Those six performances were it for the Lalo at the Met. Opera Orchestra of New York however did revive the work in 1985 with Barbara Hendricks, Cleopatra Ciurca and Tibère Raffalli.

Today’s cast features several who rarely performed in the US. Guiot, who died last year of COVID at age 93, might be best remembered for her Micaëla on the Callas recording of Carmen. She sang Marguerite in Faust at Lyric Opera of Chicago (opposite the Valentin of Massard) in 1963. The only instance I can track down of her performing in New York City was with the American Opera Society as Mme Lidoine in Dialogues des Carmélites opposite Denise Duval in 1965.

In 1960, the glamorous Rhodes made one of those odd one-off Met debuts as Carmen, one of her signature roles. She returned the following season for a longer stay: four outings as Salome, though the Strauss broadcast during her month-long engagement went instead to Brenda Lewis. And that was it.

As a kid I remember seeing often seeing at the library the name “Jane Rhodes” on a Westminster LP of The Fiery Angel in French, the language of its 1954 concert premiere. I never checked the Prokofievout though.

Rhodes’s Met combination of Carmen and Salome inevitably brought to mind Maria Ewing who died earlier this week and was also well known (for better or worse) for both roles. Trove Thursday will remember Ewing in an upcoming installment.

Lalo: Le Roi d’Ys

Salle Pleyel, Paris
10 September 1973
Broadcast

Rozenn: Andrea Guiot
Margared: Jane Rhodes
Mylio: Alain Vanzo
Le Prince Karnac Robert Massard
Le Roi d’Ys: Jules Bastin
Saint-Correntin: Pierre Thau

Chœur & Orchestre Radio-Lyrique de l’ORTF

Conductor: Pierre Dervaux

Roi d’Ys can be downloaded by clicking on the icon of a square with an arrow pointing downward on the audio player above and the resulting mp3 files will appear in your download directory.

Massard (still with us at 96!) can be heard in his only (?) NYC appearance on a previous Trove Thursday post of Massenet’s Hérodiade with Régine Crespin, Rita Gorr (a notable Margared in Lalo’s opera) and Guy Chauvet.

Guiot appears as Lidioine in a Buenos Aires Dialogues, again opposite Duval,

Vanzo (a favorite, needless to say) can be heard on numerous past Trove Thursdays as Nadir in Les Pêcheurs de Perles, in the title role in Don Carlos, , in Bizet’s Don Procopio (along with Massard, Bastin amd Mady Mesplé),as Des Grieux to Beverly Sills’s Manon, and in Werther opposite Tatiana Troyanos.

In addition, more than 400 other podcast tracks are always available from Apple Podcasts for free, or via any RSS reader.

The archive which lists all Trove Thursday offerings in alphabetical order by composer was up-to-dated recently.

Photo: Jane Rhodes

All the news that fits…

Thu, 13 Jan 2022 12:25:04 +0000

There is news. The COC has cancelled “in person” performances of Madama Butterfly. Instead it will be “made available as a free digital presentation to current 2021/2022 COC subscription holders who are continuing to support Canadian opera through the donation, exchange, or credit of tickets.” How that works I have no idea.

Also at the COC, they are taking a rather interesting approach to land acknowledgements. You can learn more about it in this ten minute video.

But, as things stand, Opera Atelier is going ahead with a live show at Koerner on February 19th and 20th. It’s a 75 minute staged show featuring OA regulars, Tafelmusik and the music of, among others, Purcell, Rameau and Debussy. Details and tickets here.

Finally the Harold Green Jewish Theatre Company and the Likht Ensemble are presenting a Holocaust Remembrance Day concert featuring music from the ghettos of Lithuania. Most of this music has never been recorded. It’s streaming at 7.30pm on January 27th. It’s free but requires registration. Link to more info and registration.

And remember, always look on the bright side of life…

Mademoiselle will do

Thu, 13 Jan 2022 05:42:52 +0000

Born on this day in 1905 actress Kay Francis.

Weep no more, my lady

Wed, 12 Jan 2022 11:30:51 +0000

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hrw4fQl5BXA

On this day in 1912 Pietro Mascagni’s Lodoletta had its United States premiere at the Metropolitan. Geraldine Farrar and Enrico Caruso sang the leads.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2DKI2iQMfI

Pitts Sanborn in the World:

There was diverting matter for the curious spectator in “”Lodoletta,” the third new opera of the season of the Metropolitan Saturday afternoon. There was a vision of Holland – a canal and windmills always mean Holland – not as the land of the tulip, but as a region where roses blow and blow and clamber, and even wreathe the tallest tree tops. And such gifted trees. Before their efficient draperies arboriculture is abashed, diminished, dumb.

Then you marveled at a northern climate in whose beneficent embrace native and stranger behaved out of doors in glum November just as they did in merry May. Why lament the absent symbol of the Edam cheese when you could watch Miss Lodoletta, up with her namesake the lark, putting gaily to rights her American sleeping perch? Why complain this Lodoletta, tottering like a China-woman in her wooden shoes, was untrue to the simpler fashion of Dutch gaity? Why insist the Dutch discard such encumbrances on the doorstep or even wear them in a sleeping porch? O pedantry, though that killest the profits and stonest them which are sent unto thee!

If you had witnessed a dress rehearsal and wondered whether spotted fever had attacked the backdrop of canal and windmills or a plague of gnats fastened itself on Holland, you discovered measure had meantime been taken to clean the drop and clear the brave Dutch air. Never in the memory of the present scribe has Paris on a New York stage looked so nearly Paris on the Seine as the last act of this “Lodoletta,” and with an exquisite solitude for the verities of the compass the snow fell to nor’ard in larger flakes and thicker bunches than to south-ard, It was pleasant to see in the winter night shadow pictures of the dancers within waltzing across Flammen’s window shades – Mrs, Castle seemed to be of the party. But or course no Paris crowd on New Year’s eve would ever have let Lodoletta perish in the snow – that just couldn’t have happened except in an opera.

Seldom, indeed has the nameless and unsuspected malady that claims so many a hapless lady of the lyric stage seemed more gratuitous in its attack than in the case of Lodoletta. Surely it was quite enough for the good, old foster-father to suffer a fatal fall from a peach tree in Act I, while showering the rosy blooms on little children rejoicing over Lodoletta’s birthday, and then for the good wives of the village to drive the children from an innocent young girl in Act II because of an intrigue with a painter which never occurred, without handling her this sorry New Year’s blow in gay Paris. Really, that is just a bit too much! Mimi, Cio-Cio-San, Violetta, Gilda – none of that unhappy sisterhood but has her interlude of heaven. Even Lucia of Lammermoor, hounded relentlessly by the librettist, is allowed by the composer to lead the best sextet in opera and given a form of madness that brings the public up to her knees before she is at last consigned to the Ashton family tomb.

No, it really is quite too sad a good tale of “Lodoletta,” but so perhaps not quite so sad as Mascagni’s music for it. That is all hovering on the teary smile of “La Bohème,” then suddenly remembering itself, and resolutely ascowl whining a dour plaint into Othello’s fateful handkerchief, Mascagni seems to have made up his mind on no account to rewrite “Cavalleria Rusticana” only to lose himself hopelessly in a maze of treacherous Puccini shallows flanked by frowning cliffs of Verdi.

However, the music of “Lodoletta” is not pretentious, and that is perhaps the kindest thing that can be said about it. The first act, with its genuine simplicity, its pretty song for the caroling children, its soaring tenor phrases, would probably, despite the insistence on Antonio’s funeral march, seem to an opera customer not gorged with frequency to be very nice indeed. The same customer might find that second act a trifle tedious, but the third he would be sure to enjoy.

Theatrically the third is the best act of the work. The orchestra waits for Flammen’s silhouetted guests, the festive music from the street, and set off against these, the pathetic monologues for tenor and for soprano make this an effective opera act even if wanting in originality or special ingenuity. It is on this act that must hang the main success of the work, together with the fact that the rôle of Flammen is so divined that Mr. Caruso can sing it with complete ease and decidedly thrilling results.

He lived up to his opportunity on Saturday in a way that won him deafening applause from an audience which packed the house to bursting. He also looked so slender and played so naturally as the great painter from Paris that one saw in him a perfectly presentable Julien, if the Metropolitan ever gets around to producing that far worthier opera of love and painting, “Louise.”

The ingenious Lodoletta gives Miss Farrar one of the parts in which she can look and act unsurpassably, recalling by more tokens than a death in the snow the Goose Girl with which she used to beguile the drab boredom of “Königskinder.” Only her very Chinese pedestrianism of the wooden shoes marred an exquisite impersonation. The high notes of the part which are not few, she sang with more substantial and better focused tone, than has been her wont. Lower down her voice often sounded weak and reedy. Still in phrasing and expression her singing was generally commendable. An admirer balked the no-flowers rule by throwing her a bouquet from a box.

Birthday anniversaries of composer Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari (1876), baritone Julius Huehn (1904), conductor Leopold Ludwig (1908), baritone Theodor Uppman (1920), composer Morton Feldman (1926) and baritone Vicente Sardinero (1937).

Drums

Wed, 12 Jan 2022 02:49:58 +0000

The beat of a drum stirs some ancient center deep in our psyches. Opera presents numerous opportunities for percussionists. Alas, anemic conductors often fail to realize their impact. Here are a few excerpts in which the drum(s) plays an important part.

First, three by Verdi. Everybody knows the Anvil Chorus from Il Trovatore. The struck anvils alternate with the drums, but typically so loud are the anvils that you don’t notice the drums. On this recording from London’s Royal Opera House you can clearly hear the drums. There’s a video of this performance, but it’s too goofy to reproduce here.

In the Act 2 scene 2 of Aida (The Triumphal Scene), Aida’s father Amonasro, who is the captured Ethiopian king, is recognized as her father, but not as the king. He implores her (Aida) not to reveal his identity. He tells the Egyptians that the king is dead. This false assertion is punctuated by a dramatic beat of of the drum. It should jolt the listener, but often is rather feeble as in this example.

Verdi depicted the end of the world in the Dies Irae section of his Requiem Mass. You won’t have to search for the drum part. It almost knocks your head off. There’s a rousing Rataplan in Act III scene1 of La Forza Del Destino. Rataplan is defined as the sound of the beating of a drum.

There’s an interesting Ratap l an in Act III of Meyerbeer’s Les Huguenots. The drums are not as prominent as in the Verdi iteration.

Puccini made great use of drums in two of his operas. In Act II of Madama Butterfly Sharpless tries to read Pinkerton’s letter about Butterfly to her, but he hasn’t the heart to reveal its true contents. When he asks her what she would do if Pinkerton never returned, she says it would be better if she died. This statement is followed by the portentous thud of the drum. It’s intended to shock the audience into the reality of Butterfly’s situation. A lot of conductor’s make little of it. Not so Karajan in this recording. Maria Callas is terrific in this excerpt. The complete scene tears your heart out. Alas, Italian opera died with Puccini in 1924.

There’s just one strike of the drum in the Butterfly scene, but Puccini uses a battalion of then at the end of Act 2 of La fanciulla Del West. This is the scene in which Minnie cheats at Poker to save the life of her lover. Halfway through the scene the drum starts to beat, increasing in intensity as the scene plays out. A tympanic tour de force. Poker scene

Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci opens (after the prologue performed in front of the curtain) with the beating a drum announcing the arrival of Canio and his troupe of players; the Calabrian locals are invited to attend a performance at dusk. This is the show where everything goes murderously wrong.

The Japanese are famous for an athletic style of drum beating – Taiko drumming. Taiko is the Japanese word for drum. Early taiko drumming goes back about 1500 years. “The art of kumi-daiko, performance as an ensemble, originated post-war in Showa 26 (1951). It was created by Daihachi Oguchi, a jazz drummer who serendipitously stumbled across an old piece of taiko music. Wondering why taiko were never played together, he broke with tradition by forming a taiko drum ensemble. More recently, taiko has enjoyed not only a resurgence of interest in Japan, where there are over 4,000 taiko ensembles, but also transplantation and evolution in North America.”

The video below is a good example of Taiko. But nothing comes close to the impact this percussion playing has when heard in the flesh. It’s a raucous rush that will stay with you for a long time.

Drums have led soldiers to war for thousands of years. As shown immediately below the Brits are very good at it.

Gene Krupa (1909-73) is considered “the founding father of the modern drumset”. His drum solo on Benny Goodman’s 1937 recording of “Sing, Sing, Sing” elevated the role of the drummer from an accompanying line to an important solo voice in the band. This extended version of the number was made more than a decade after the famed Carnegie Hall concert.

Buddy Rich (1917-87) is thought by many to be the greatest drummer of all time. His techniques is awe inspiring. He often appeared with Krupa; they even made a record together.

Electrifying

Tue, 11 Jan 2022 21:07:24 +0000

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=PAHmq6-7sWU

Hubbard Hutchinson in The New York Times:

Mme. Lehmann’s voice is not immense in volume as operatic voices go, yet she used it so beautifully that it seemed far larger than it is. Her pianissimo, of exquisite quality, carried to the farthest corner of the house; her fortissimi pierced without difficulty the climaxes of the orchestra. At the beginning of the scene with Siegmund, and indeed well into the middle of Act I, it was not a warm voice and there were moments of slight departure from pitch, and apparently slight forcing at the top, as in the final apostrophe to Siegmund.

But if her first act was of a sort to startle the critical faculty into sharp attendance and admiration, her performance in the second had an electrifying quality that swept that faculty away for once and made even the guarded listener a breathless participant in the emotions of the anguished Sieglinde.

Born on this day: composer Reinhold Gliere (1875), bass Tancredi Pasero (1893), soprano Gertrud Bindernagel (1894).

Maria Ewing 1950=2022.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=THQz06l-W-c

LSO/Rattle - Anderson, Mahler, Rott, Webern, and Dvořák, 9 January 2022

Tue, 11 Jan 2022 18:20:02 +0000

Barbican Hall

Julian Anderson: Suite from Exiles
Mahler: ‘Blumine’ movement for Symphony no.1 in D major
Hans Rott: Symphony in E major: Scherzo
Webern: Six Orchestral Pieces, op.6
Dvořák: Symphony no.7 in D minor, op.70

Siobhan Stagg (soprano)
London Symphony Chorus (chorus director: Simon Halsey)
London Symphony Orchestra
Simon Rattle (conductor)

Images: Mark Allan

Two or three weeks ago, it did not seem especially likely this concert would happen. It did—and very well it went too. To hear as large an orchestra as that fielded by the LSO here under Simon Rattle remains unusual during our current troubles. We now perhaps ascribe greater worth to every artistic and social occasion, all too well aware of general precarity. I certainly relished the sheer richness of orchestral sound, the unquestionable commitment from all on stage and (London Symphony Chorus) up in the balcony, and something close to a full house for an appreciative audience.

It seems that Julian Anderson’s Exiles has, one way or another, been a victim of the dread virus. Two of its five movements were given by the LSO and Rattle in September; here they were joined by ‘La République des Lettres’ for soprano and a cappellachorus, then impossible to perform. When the final two will come is unclear, yet on the basis of this ‘Suite’ and its reception, they will be eagerly awaited by many. The new movement—to the world, that is; all were new to me—pays tribute to the American diplomat Varian Fry who assisted many under threat from Nazism into exile. Here, several of them are named, from Bohislav Martinů via Darius and Madeleine Milhaud and Betsy Jolas to the Hungarian animal photographer Ylla (Camilla Koffler). That was the work of half the chorus, initially syllabic, though not in a ‘difficult’, Nono- or Lachenmann-like way. The other sang from Psalm 46: ‘God is our hope and strength: a very present help in trouble…’. Dialogue between soprano Siobhan Stagg and choir added to the responsorial sense. If the writing were largely homophonic, there was a splendid, again psalm-like freedom to its metre, Rattle finely shaping an heroic performance from all.

First we had heard ‘le 3 mai’, Anderson’s setting of an e-mail from the Moroccan-French composer Ahmed Essyad to other composers from 3 May 2020, telling of his coronavirus isolation and nonetheless greeting them: ‘internal’ exile. The soprano I head first, followed by orchestral sounds that to me evoked a sense of electronic communication—latterly both bane and saviour of our lives. Anderson’s orchestration here and later proved typically ‘French’ in sonority, bells perhaps evoking an inheritance from Messiaen as well as Debussy and Ravel. The darker turn taken upon ‘Je vous embrasse tous,’ leading to climax at the end of the same line of the text, ‘sans covid’, repeated, would doubtless have moved irrespective of the words set; however, we heard it with them, and could hardly fail to think ‘if only’. The sign off ‘Ahmed’ returned us to the exile of electronic communication.

‘Tsyion’, heard last, sets for chorus words from Psalm 137, the Jews in Babylonian exile, by those famous waters, and from Horatiu Rădalescu on that archetypal exile Ulysses, whilst the soprano sang other words above, from Rădalescu on ‘Exile’ itself. Stagg’s exultant melismata again provoked memories of Messiaen, but Anderson’s music throughout offered a compelling harmonic language and, more broadly, combination of that with melody, rhythm, and timbre never to be reduced to mere ‘influence’ or parallels. Solo horn at one point seemed to encapsulate the wistfulness of exile; there was more to it than that, though. Anderson’s fantastical imagination suggested to me opportunity and, at the close, through a mass of solo violins, a secularised chorus of birds. There is hope out there, as Essyad realised in contemplating a mountain he could not yet visit.

Next up was the discarded ‘Blumine’ movement from Mahler’s First Symphony. There could be no doubting the composer via sentiment or language, nor the specific identity of the Mahler of that symphony, though in many ways it sounded, quite rightly, earlier still: late Romantic rather than modernist, even ‘late early Romantic, Mendelssohn as well as Wagner apparent, Mahler taking his leave from the world of Das klagende Lied. Rattle had Mahler’s song sung with simplicity, never audibly moulded as has seemed the case with much of his more recent Mahler. There was darkness, but only moments of darkness in a fine, unexaggerated performance. And what it was to hear both the excellent solo trumpet and a full LSO at the movement’s climax. This was truly affecting music-making, all the way to a magical final harp chord.

The scherzo from the E major symphony of Mahler’s friend Hans Rott received here an outstanding, spacious, altogether generous performance, whetting the appetite for what one must hope will one day be a performance of the whole work. One need not be starry-eyed about it, as some are, to recognise its music, anticipations of Mahler and all (any ass can see that…) as intrinsically worthy of listening. The LSO’s sound hovered, like Rott’s music, somewhere between Bruckner and Mahler, with a little Berlioz at times too, not least in its trippiness. A sort of deranged jollity with disquieting echoes fascinates; and if sureness of direction is not altogether Rott’s thing, his music’s sheer originality offered something quite compelling both as work and performance.

With Webern’s op.6 Orchestral Pieces we are in different territory: one of the supreme masterpieces of twentieth-century orchestral music. Rattle and the LSO offered them as the repertoire pieces they demand to be: without apology and through intimate knowledge and understanding. Free choice might not lead one naturally to the 1928 revision, but its smaller forces doubtless enabled the work to be performed at all. Heard after that first half of Anderson, Mahler, and Rott, the first movement’s lyricism emerged all the lovelier and more longing. Rattle ensured here and throughout a balance that invited comparison with conductors such as Abbado and Boulez. In this narrative, crucially, every note counted for a multitude in so much other music. The second movement’s response sounded as inevitable as I can recall, in a vision less haunted than propelled by anger, fear, violence, and yes, wonder. Longing was intensified in the third piece, here sounding intriguingly close to Berg. The German Sehnsucht came to mind. Ominous tread and progress through the funeral march fourth encapsulated a Mahlerian world in itself. Music lay between the notes as well as in them, in a requiem of defiant hope whose roaring climax duly shattered. Heard in aftershock, the fifth seemed to say, stealing from the future of Webern’s teacher Schoenberg’s Piano Concerto, that life must go on. It witnessed yet sparkled. And what expressive depth we heard in the closing ‘Langsam’ movement, each chord speaking as if it were a page or two at least of Mahler.

It is doubtless too easy to speak of performing Dvořák via Webern, but it was difficult, at least at times, not to hear it that way. An aural lens of motivic concision and well-nigh Schubertian melodic profusion did no harm at all to its opening ‘Allegro maestoso’. I was fascinated to hear the LSO strings sound more ‘old German’, akin to Daniel Barenboim’s Staatskapelle Berlin, than I ever heard the Berlin Philharmonic under Rattle. It worked, in any case, as the LSO really dug into Dvořák’s score. A purposeful yet flexible account of this first movement was far from deaf to the beauties and meaning of detail, yet integrated them rather than having them stand out. Here, again, music lay between as well as in the notes. The slow movement was taken slowly, surely more than the ‘poco’ of the composer’s ‘Adagio’ marking; a somewhat Tchaikovskian performance nevertheless worked well on its own terms. Rattle loved it doubtless, but not, I think, too much. There were rhetorical underlinings, yet they worked to shape a musical drama. The scherzo flowed via, rather than despite, its engineered tensions, metrical and more. Its trio was, I felt, moulded a little too much. Likewise the finale: impassioned, yes, but not always clear where it was going. That said, Rattle’s conception of something akin to an enigmatic tone poem in its own right had much to be said for it. His remains a questing musical imagination, as seen in programming and heard in performance.

Midwinter marriage

Tue, 11 Jan 2022 15:27:40 +0000

Golda Schultz, Lucy Crowe and Ryan McKinny stood out among an uneven, yet engaging cast, but matinee’s hero was, as he had been just a week earlier at the premiere of the new Rigoletto, conductor Daniele Rustioni.

He led a buoyant account that resulted in an irresistibly cohesive performance of the always-miraculous score. His bracing yet always apt tempi made the three-and-a-half hours fly by with an alluring transparency which allowed for some gorgeous wind-playing by the inspired orchestra.

I attended the Opening Night premiere of Sir Richard Eyre’s new Nozze production; it fell flat, despite superb portrayals by Marlis Petersen and Peter Mattei as Susanna and the Count. The late Music Director’s usually fine touch with Mozart eluded him, and Eyre’s 1930s vision which consciously evoked the then-current hit television series Downton Abbey felt heavy and over-busy.

This time around, overseen with a lighter touch by revival stage director Paula Williams, the whole emerged much more relaxed and appealing though Rob Howell’s enormous trellised, revolving set remains a dark ugly eyesore.

Isabel Leonard, the only veteran of that 2014 premiere, returned yet again as the randy page. The final performance of this series on January 28 (several weeks before her 40th birthday) will be her 40th Met Cherubino, so maybe a good time to drop the role.

Her plush mezzo has grown bigger and darker, and her once charming portrayal has now become overdone gawky schtick. On the other hand, Erika Baikoff, her sweetly unaffected Barbarina, gave notice that one should watch for this member of the Lindemann Young Artist Development Program.

Of the three interfering conspirators, Maurizio Muraro as Dr. Bartolo sounded robust and rested and altogether better than I’ve heard him in ages. The same could not be said for the usually robust Elizabeth Bishop as Marcellina or Giuseppe Filianoti. whose lately reimagined career as a character tenor isn’t going so well. based on Saturday’s matinee.

However, Filianoti’s handsome, much younger-than-usual Don Basilio brought a surprisingly erotic frisson to the first-act trio with Susanna and the Count. Adam Plachetka’s often seething and brutal interpretation of that nobleman made it even harder than usual to root for the Countess’s unshakable devotion to her lecherous husband.

The Czech singer has become a near-ubiquitous presence in the Met’s Mozart-da Ponte performances since his debut as Masetto in 2015, but I usually find little pleasure in his inelegant style and gritty bass-baritone. Admittedly he was often riveting as the Count, and one did feel that he might really do violence to his wife during their anxious second-act confrontation.

Returning to the Met after more than six years, the strapping (yes, that adjective can now be rehabilitated) Mckinny brought a warmer, rounder bass-baritone to his energetic Figaro. What his schemer lacked in pre-revolutionary danger, he made up for in good-natured wiliness and a palpable affection for his busy fiancée. His fleeting suspicions about her revealed themselves in a fiercely biting “Aprite un’po quegli occhi.”

Ideally, there would have been more vocal contrast between Mckinny and Plachetka, but one was delighted to discover another side to the former’s artistry beyond the Britten/Wagner repertoire he had previously sung at the Met.

Some may have wondered about the casting of Schultz. Although I imagine the South African soprano would also excel as Susanna, her youthful and vibrant Countess made a welcome change from the dignified grande dame approach one often encounters. One felt little time had passed since she was the minxish Rosina one encountered in Il Barbiere di Siviglia.

Schultz had exceeded my expectations with her marvelous Agathe in the Dmitri Tcherniakov Der Freischütz streamed from Munich last year, and her fresh, golden soprano reveled in the pathos of “Porgi amor” and the melancholy, then hopeful “Dove sono.” Her wistful forgiveness of the (unforgiveable) Count was sublime.

If one also wanted more contrast between her and Crowe, they blended ravishingly in the Letter Duet. While Schultz’s soprano displayed an attractive fast vibrato, Crowe’s beguiled with a purer glow. Her sexy, industrious Susanna paired with Mckinny’s besotted Figaro made the pair instantly sympathetic.

Despite singing scads of music all afternoon, any Susanna is inevitably, if perhaps unfairly, judged by her “Deh vieni, non tardar” in the final act, and Crowe’s was heaven-sent, slyly seductive and tenderly wrought.

Lucky New Yorkers will have more opportunities to catch both Schultz and Crowe after the Nozze run. Next month, the former will perform Richard Strauss’s Brentano-Lieder with the New York Philharmonic,, before returning to the Met for Anne Trulove in The Rake’s Progress.

After her acclaimed Morgana in Alcina in both Los Angeles and Berkeley last fall, Crowe performs more Handel in early May at Carnegie Hall, this time Romilda in Serse.

Photos: Ken Howard / Met Opera

Davidsen and Andsnes do Greig

Tue, 11 Jan 2022 14:55:02 +0000

If one is a young Norwegian singer or collaborative pianist Greig’s songs offers a particular challenge. It’s music that one grows up with and the canonical recordings will be familiar. It’s a particular challenge too because, in some ways, Grieg’s approach to song is very modern. In particular, his approach to the piano part is quite different from classical German lieder. The piano rarely accompanies the singer. Its role is independent and often seems primary. Finding an approach that works then for both singer and pianist is non-trivial. Certainly treating the works as “vocal showpieces” won’t work as it would completely unbalance the music.

I was especially interested to see how soprano Lise Davidsen and her collaborator Leif Ove Andsnes would approach this music in their recently released CD titled simply Edvard Grieg. Davidsen has a very beautiful voice but it’s big. I’ve heard her, both live and in recordings, with orchestra and was really curious to see how she would deal with much more intimate music. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the answer is very well indeed. She’s very subtle most of the time though quite capable of producing drama when (rarely) appropriate. It reminds me of hearing Franz-Josef Selig up close and personal in the RBA. She also has a lovely range of colours from really dark (apparently she started life as a mezzo) to light and bright and she has terrific control of dynamics. Being a native Norwegian speaker doesn’t do any harm either. Andsnes is equally impressive. He’s definitely not playing second fiddle and is appropriately assertive when he needs to be.

So what of the music itself? There are 28 tracks on the CD providing a very generous 80 minutes of music. First up and crucially is Haugtussa (The Mountain Maid). It’s Greig’s only narrative song cycle and for Norwegians is Die Schöne Müllerin and Winterreise rolled into one. It’s very much an exercise in Norwegian cultural nationalism. The tale of the maid and her lover is a kind of rural idyll, where the “rural” could only be Nordic, infused with the sort of “mysticism” that still half (at least) believes that there is a troll under the next bridge. It’s also in Landsmål (nowadays known as Nynorsk); a dialect based Norwegian created in opposition to more formal Danish derived Norwegian. Obviously there’s a narrative arc but the mood of the eight songs is varied. There is elegy, there is darkness but there’s also playfulness and humour. Davidsen and Andsnes skilfully navigate these varied moods.

The other substantial Norwegian set on the CD is Digte (Poems) Op.69 where all five songs are given. These range from the dramatic and sinister to the very funny (advice to a snail). There are also a bunch of selections from other settings of Norwegian poems including, we are told, the ones that are practically compulsory in a Grieg recital. There is also the Lieder Op.48 which sets six German poems. Here we are, textually at least, in more familiar territory with roses, dreams and the inevitable Nachtgall.

The recording was made last September in the Stormen Konserthus, Bodø, Norway. It’s very good indeed. The standard CD release is 44.1kHz/16 bit but a digital hi-res (96kHz/24 bit) is available. The difference is pretty small but I think the overtones on the piano come over a tad better on the hi-res version. The standard res version though is clear and well balanced with a very natural sound. The booklet has informative notes and full texts and translations.

This is a very worthwhile release. It’s music that any art song lover should explore and it’s beautifully performed and recorded.

Young as we are

Mon, 10 Jan 2022 13:00:05 +0000

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=d3vGoj2AwZI

Happy 87th birthday baritone Sherrill Milnes. Metropolitan opera debut as Valentine in 1965, farewell as Amonasro in 1997.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGexPuxT5ZE

Happy 75th birthday bass-baritone James Morris.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pTaH8USQH4

Happy 71st birthday tenor Rockwell Blake.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhW3xAkOF10

Patriarchal Oppression: Lucia di Lammermoor at the Staatsoper Hamburg

Sun, 09 Jan 2022 22:43:03 +0000

Donizetti – Lucia di Lammermoor

Lucia – Nina Minasyan
Edgardo – Ioan Hotea
Enrico – Alexey Bogdanchikov
Raimondo – Tigran Martirossian
Arturo – Seungwoo Simon Yang
Alisa – Renate Spingler
Normanno – Collin André Schöning

Chor der Hamburgischen Staatsoper, Philharmonisches Staatsorchester Hamburg / Leonardo Sini.
Stage director – Amélie Niermeyer.

Staatsoper, Hamburg, Germany. Saturday, January 8th, 2022.

Amélie Niermeyer’s new staging of Lucia di Lammermoor was to have premiered in March of last year. However, due to lockdown, it was given a virtual premiere, available to view all over the world. I saw it at the time and it certainly looked intriguing. It was then given a premiere in front of a live audience, with a similar cast to the original broadcast, in November last year. I finally got to see Niermeyer’s staging in person tonight, with a different cast and conductor to those involved in those first performances.

Niermeyer opens the evening in the most arresting way. A video of a group of women is shown of them dancing, while accompanied by a rap in Italian that accused the audience of being murderers and rapists, while also taking aim at the hypocrisy of religion and patriarchy. Surprisingly, it actually seemed to work well, segueing into the murky musical opening of the opera itself. Presumably, this was in place since Niermeyer wanted to highlight the plight of women today in forced marriages or subjugated by religion – two themes central to the opera itself. The video reappeared at various points throughout the evening, projected over the set in the Act 2 finale and in the mad scene. Indeed, the Act 2 finale was accompanied by visuals of the dancers in front of various Hamburg landmarks. The downside of this was that it felt heavy-handed – however laudable the intention. Rather than using the cast and music to drive the action forward, to allow the audience to empathize and relate with Lucia, instead it felt that we were deprived of the opportunity to think for ourselves and, in turn, robbed the performance of its impact. As Lucia sang ‘spargi d’amaro pianto’, the German and English surtitles, rather than translating the original, said ‘the murderer is you’. The outcome was that Niermeyer’s staging felt cold and confrontational. I couldn’t help but think of how Bieito, for instance, would approach a scenario like this. I have no doubt that he would send us out into the night wanting to change the world and right wrongs, whereas Niermeyer made it feel that the world is unremittingly bleak.

That said, there are some good ideas in her staging. The sight of Lucia locked in her room as Edgardo mourned her death below, unaware she was still up there, was haunting. Similarly, the sight of Raimondo celebrating with Enrico when it seemed the wedding would be going ahead, was a stark reminder of the malicious combination of religion and patriarchy. And yet, the fact that the set would often move while characters were singing, distracting from individual performances, or that so often, direction of the principals revolved around stock operatic gestures to the front, rather than using interactions between the cast to drive the narrative forward, betrayed a seeming unwillingness by Niermeyer to allow her singing-actors to live out their own stories.

Perhaps, it was due to pandemic-related precautions that Christian Günther’s chorus was placed in boxes on either side of the stage, while a group of actors engaged with the action onstage. Under Leonardo Sini’s direction, stage-pit coordination was spot on all night. What was also notable was the precision of the chorus’s tuning. Sini led a reading full of bel canto lyricism, with lively tempi and sharp attack throughout. The playing of the orchestra, was notable for a unanimity of approach, with silky strings, while the virtuosity of Philipp Marguerre’s glass harmonica cast a ghostly pallor over the textures.

Nina Minasyan gave us an impressively-sung Lucia. She’s the owner of a fabulous technique, with a significant number of the bel canto tools at her disposal. She has an easy top and indulged in frequent excursions to the stratosphere. Her ability to float the high-lying phrases with a pianissimo that still carried through the house was impressive. That said, the range of tone colours Minasyan was able to exploit felt relatively limited. It did mean that her glassy tone blended quite hauntingly with the glass harmonica in the mad scene, however. A notable technician, undoubtedly, if perhaps with some way to go as an interpreter.

Her Edgardo was Ioan Hotea. His is a bright, well-placed tenor with good ping on top. Hotea’s sunny tone is ideally matched the role and he clearly has a promising future as a very useful artist in this repertoire. In his big closing scene, he had a tendency to give a little too much, with the result that tuning went in and out of focus. That said, his easy lyricism and warmth of tone gave much pleasure. Alexey Bogdanchikov sang Enrico in a firm baritone with a big, penetrating top. The middle is inclined to graininess and occasionally there’s a tendency for the line to be slightly aspirated. However, he definitely has musicality to spare and the top is indeed impressive. Tigran Martirossian sang Raimondo in an inky bass, with good resonance. Renate Spingler sang Alisa enthusiastically, while Collin André Schöning sang Normanno in a feather-light tenor, and Seungwoo Simon Yang sang Arturo in a similarly well-placed Italianate tenor.

Tonight, was an evening that was musically extremely satisfactory. The house forces were on superb form, it was conducted with innate bel canto sensibility, and it was satisfyingly sung across the board. Niermeyer’s staging has an important message, but ultimately lacks theatrical impact because she doesn’t appear to trust her singers to tell their own stories, or the audience to empathize and feel with the characters – even if, at times, she does bring some interesting insights. A bold evening theatrically, if perhaps one that doesn’t live up to its initial promise. The Hamburg audience gave the cast an extremely generous ovation.

Lovely wonderful thoughts

Sun, 09 Jan 2022 19:42:09 +0000

On this dayin 1956 an encore live TV presentation of Peter Pan starred Mary Martin.

“You just have to think naked”

Sat, 08 Jan 2022 20:21:30 +0000

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYxwDn6KhrQ

Born on this day in 1926 soprano Evelyn Lear. Metropolitan Opera debut and world premiere Livinia in Levy’s Mourning Becomes Electra in 1967, farewell as the Marschallin in 1985.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNmxbIhO6NE

Birthday anniversaries of bass-baritone Karl Dönch (1915), basses Giorgio Tozzi (1923) and Yevgeny Nesterenko (1938), composer Benjamin Lees (1924) and director Elijah Moshinsky (1946).

Yesterday, January 7:

On this day in 1955 contralto Marian Anderson made her historic Metropolitan Opera debut

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=mf-d02XdqaI

Miles Kastendieck in the N. Y. Journal American:

Marion Anderson’s debut on January 7 became one of the historic moments in the Metropolitan Opera’s 71-year-old story. For her it marked the realization of a childhood dream. For the Metropolitan it not only broke tradition but also set a precedent for including Negroes in future casts. For all it created an emotional occasion out of tribute to her as a singer and out of recognition that to her should fall this signal honor of opening the door for singers of her race.

Though she made a relatively brief appearance as Ulrica in the second scene of Verdi’s “The Masked Ball,” Miss Anderson graced the stage through force of personality, dignity of stage presence, and vocal artistry. At the start her voice wavered tremulously quite understandably. An ovation had greeted her on the rise of the curtain and it was some time before she brought her singing under control.

The dark quality of her voice fitted the opening aria; so did its brilliance as it warmed into the rest of the scene. She achieved effectiveness at the climax of the scene, though in general her performance needed more dramatic emphasis. She was thoroughly dedicated to giving as forceful a portrayal as possible, but later appearances will undoubtedly bring the characterization more into line.

Fire Shut Up in my Bones

Sat, 08 Jan 2022 16:27:19 +0000

Yannick Nézet-Séguin; Will Liverman (Charles), Angel Blue (Destiny/Loneliness/Greta), Latonia Moore (Billie).

What Really Happened in Wuhan – Book Review

Sat, 08 Jan 2022 16:12:23 +0000

Australian journalist Sharri Markson has written a book that seeks to find the source of the corona virus that has afflicted the world for more than two years. The subject has been so politicized from the very start such that any attempt to define its source will trouble many readers. Never has a medical and scientific problem been so afflicted with bias. subterfuge, obfuscation, and naked prevarication.

The infection emerged in Wuhan in the vicinity of the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). The WIV was known for some time prior to the outbreak of COVI-19 to have lax safety standards. So what was blamed for the origin of the disease? The nearby wet market. It’s a place that, as near as can be determined, never sold any of the animals said to have harbored the virus. A virus that putatively jumped from bats or pangolins to humans and whose native habitat was more than 1,000 miles from Wuhan.

The WIV has been studying corona viruses for years. So when a virus like or identical to those studied by the institute infects humans an unbiased observer should have had an initial hypothesis that the virus came from the lab known to harbor closely related viruses. Whether it leaked out accidently or on purpose is unknowable on the basis of the available evidence – see below for more. But that’s not what happened. The “experts” immediately looked away from the lab and embraced the wet market as the source of the new virus, SARS-CoV-2. The media gullible to its core accepted this explanation and spread it throughout the galaxy.

Why did such an outlandish explanation for this disease meet with approval and why was any alternative viewed as disinformation and a conspiracy theory? [An aside, “conspiracy theory” and “an abundance of caution” are sure signs that malarkey is about to be dispensed.] The answer to the question just posed is twofold. First, Donald Trump was (and still is) so hated by the press and medical establishment that anything he said was immediately opposed. He could have declared gravitational acceleration of an object in a vacuum near the surface of the Earth as 32.17405 ft/s² and the NY Times would have quoted a gaggle of physicists who said he was off by at least one order of magnitude. Second, was that the experts, who were either most often interviewed or in charge of the government’s response to the pandemic, were tainted by conflicts of interest which they hid or denied.

Gain of Function GOF research (altering a virus to make it more lethal or contagious) was banned by the US government in 2014 during the administration of Barrack Obama. It was allowed again by the US in 2018 during Trump’s administration, though he likely knew nothing about the resurgence of this research at the time. The ban was waived by the NIAID’s director Anthony Fauci. The NIH was a long time supporter of research at the WIV as was the USAID, the NSF, and the UT Galveston,. The NIH money was funneled to Wuhan via the EccoHealth Alliance headed by Peter Daszak.

Fauci adamantly denies funding GOF at the WIV, but this denial is disingenuous. When you fund a lab for any study you indirectly fund everything else going on in the lab. More money received by a lab allows it to pursue all sorts of studies that may be unrelated to the reason for the grant. Anyone who ever received support from the NIH knows this fact. Fauci obviously does as well. If he was sending money to WIV and if they were doing GOF research, then he was supporting it. One can easily understand why he didn’t want any scenario to surface which placed the origin of the pandemic at a lab which he was supporting. Fauci was not a disinterested commentator on the virus’s possible relationship to the Wuhan lab.

Daszak was equally a a potentially compromised source of information about the virus. Both he and Fauci did not wanted to be seen as somehow complicit in the genesis of the disease. Daszak even engineered a letter that was published in the Lancet in February 2020 that condemned the lab-leak theory. He did not reveal to the journal’s editors that he had a conflict of interest. Other medical journals, such as the New England Journal of Medicine and Nature also did everything they could to downplay the lab-leak theory. Much of the medical press has been contaminated by bias for some time. They should have led the search for the source of the novel virus rather that being in the camouflage business. As recently as a few weeks ago outgoing NIH Director Francis Collins called the lab-leak hypothesis a discretion.

Markson details in great depth the work of the ‘bat woman” at WIV – Dr Shi Zhengli. This investigator has spent her entire career investigating bat viruses and others similar to SARS-CoV-2 . She had the expertise required to manipulate the viruses that were kept at her lab. What she actually did is impossible to know as the Chinese government erased all the data about the lab’s work from its web site. The government also stifled any discussion of a lab-leak to the point where people disappeared. The army took control of the lab and any information as to what happened has been rendered as transparent as anthracite.

Markson has been criticized for not going to China to directly examine what happened onsite. Of course, the Chinese government would never let her in. They allowed a short visit by “experts” sent by the WHO. These “experts” were not given access to the essential data concerning the virus, were onsite for only a few days, and included people with potential conflicts of interest.

Markson has talked to a lot of bio-scientists who are very knowledgeable about corona viruses. Many, but not all, strongly suspect that SARS-CoV-2 is a manipulated virus that somehow escaped from the WIV. Markson’s book provides as much evidence about the current pandemic as can be assembled given the Chinese government’s dictatorial shutdown of information about the origins of the disease. A shutdown that makes Goebbels look amateurish. She freely admits that no one outside of China can know for sure what happened in Wuhan. But she believes that the available evidence strongly favors the lab-leak hypothesis. The data she has collected in this volume should make any impartial observer reach the same conclusion. If you want the best available evidence about the emergence of SARS-CoV-2, What Really Happened in Wuhan is the right place to find it. The book has much more information than I’ve mentioned in this review. Its well written save for an occasional breathless passage. Also, she describes TB as a viral disease near the start of the book. Not a good beginning for a tome about medicine. Quibbles aside, Markson’s effort is on target and highly recommended.

If your looking for a villain the Chinese government tops the list. if you seek a dupe the governments of the West will do. Both their analysis and plans of action have been spectacularly bad.

Better late than never ! New Year 2022

Sat, 08 Jan 2022 14:34:00 +0000

Still the same here... Still no hope to get to live performances around here... Trains are back three times a day... last one 5.30pm from Aix -en -provence.... Certainly not aimed at daily workers commuting to Aix or Marseille... So I only hope the younger generations will not have dark memories of this rather long Covid 19 pandemic global period. I am posting some simple symbols to share during these painful days, everlasting happy memories from my last journey to Rome with my two grandchildren in Spring 2019.Everlasting happiness like 'Les Pins de Rome'!

Offenbach - La Vie Parisienne

Sat, 08 Jan 2022 13:42:00 +0000

Théâtre des Champs Elysées, Paris, Tuesday January 4 2022

Conductor: Romain Dumas. Production, sets and costumes: Christian Lacroix, assisted by Laurent Delvert and Romain Gilbert. Choreography: Glyslein Lefever. Lighting: Bertrand Couderc. Gabrielle: Jodie Devos. Gardefeu: Rodolphe Briand. Bobinet: Marc Mauillon. Le Baron: Franck Leguérinel. La Baronne: Marion Grange. Métella: Aude Extrémo. Le Brésilien/Gontran/Frick: Eric Huchet. Urbain/Alfred: Philippe Estèphe. Pauline: Elena Galitskaya. Clara: Louise Pingeot. Bertha: Marie Kalinine. Madame de Quimper-Karadec: Ingrid Perruche. Joseph/Alphonse/Prosper: Carl Ghazarossia. Madame de Folle-Verdure: Caroline Meng. Les Musiciens du Louvre – Académie des Musiciens du Louvre, in partnership with the Atlantique youth orchestra. Namur chamber choir.

Photo: Vincent Pontet

The Palazzetto Bru Zane has been doing some great work ('doing the Lord's work', as a darling old lady in New York put it just the other day, after enjoying the present show on TV) over the past few years restoring and/or reviving opéra bouffe, and I try to keep up with their efforts. Rediscovering Hervé has been a particular pleasure. This time, they're presenting a new, reconstructed edition of the original 1866 five-act version of La Vie Parisienne (leading to a tussle over precedence with Jean-Christophe Keck, who insists the Palazzetto's claims of novelty are exaggerated) in its original orchestration, and a production by fashion designer Christian Lacroix, his first I believe. So I struggled back from the UK after Christmas and the New Year, squeezing arthritically through all the Covid-induced hoops international travel now entails, to be there on Tuesday night.

Lacroix's production is opulent (the costumes in particular, not unexpectedly) but fairly conventional. For a first effort, it's certainly better than it might have been, but, as is often the case in my experience when people embark on their first opera, not without a fair dose of déjà-vu. It has a single basic set: an open steel structure recalling Paris's old market buildings, and a two-storey tower on the left with a lift in a red cage to the fore and a spiral staircase behind. Projections at the rear, fabrics or printed sheets lowered in and props carried on and off à vue enable changes of setting: railway station, apartments, a circus-like space with garlands of flags and merry-go-round horses representing the restaurant in the final act. There are a few deliberately anachronistic touches, such as a 70s vinyl chair, but basically we're under the Second Empire. The curtain and some of the printed sheets seem inspired by the recent vogue, in the art world, for photographs of grand but decaying buildings - derelict theatres in particular. The lighting is low (too low?) and warm.

Offenbach

The directing and declamation is largely in the exaggerated, noisy style of French popular comedy, the Théâtre de Boulevard - I had a message on WhatsApp from a friend saying 'Saw bits on the telly (...) and all that boulevard theatre shouting and screaming made me turn off' - but without descending, as Jérôme Savary used to do, into vulgar pantomime slapstick. Extending the switching of roles that are a mainstay of the plot to gender, comme il se doit these days - though in Offenbach it's been done for decades - the male dancers sometimes wear tutus and, at one point, in perilous red stilettos, parody the weird loping gait, one foot crossing the other, shoulders back and looking grim, of anorexic models on a catwalk.

The dancers are usually dressed in fairly simple black and white. But the singers' costumes are exuberant in the extreme and instantly recognisable as Lacroix's: tartans clashing with tartans, cascades of da-glo chiffon tumbling out of tweeds, stripes, polka dots, crinolines, leg-of-mutton sleeves, ruching, unmatched stockings, exaggerated wigs, hats of all shades and sizes, magnificent weeds for the widow and an equally magnificent red-and-cyclamen décolleté gown for Métella... And the plot and its characters allow Lacroix to run riot through a kaleidoscope of references to folk costumes from around the world, beautifully executed in gorgeous fabrics, some of them no doubt among the most beautiful - and in some cases charming - costumes I've ever seen.

However...

It isn't easy for any director to fabricate the kind of good-natured giddiness, the 'franche gaîté', Offenbach requires, and to me Lacroix only half succeeded, relying heavily on the experience of Eric Huchet and Franck Leguérinel, seasoned veterans of Pelly's unforgettable Grande Duchesse with Felicity Lott. It might have helped if the director had insisted on Broadway-musical smiles from the dancers; as things are, they look disguntled and sneering, as if they find the show ringard or beneath their dignity, and are only there for the work. Also, I agree with Forum Opéra that strong individual characterisation of the rest of the principals gets somehow drowned in the mass of costumes, greasepaint, wigs and whiskers. I admit I wasn't always sure who was who. And for a production that's already travelled before arriving in Paris, it took an awful long time to warm up. An eminent contributor to a US blog mused 'maybe the whole thing is better oiled by now?' Well, oddly, no. Oddly, too, in the end the production felt dated, as if Lacroix's designs took us back to his 'Ab-Fab' heyday, the early 90s.

It isn't easy, either, to find a cast of singers with the right vaudeville mix of singing and comic-acting skills. Again, Huchet and Leguérinel knew exactly what they were at on both counts. jodive Dvos was a charming, convincing Gabrielle, and Aude Extrémo's dark, gravelly Métella, while quite weird, was interesting. Others navigated the score with greater or lesser ease. The orchestral sound, where I sat, wasn't especically crisp, but I got the impression they played with less distinct personality and less active participation than under Minkowski. Romain Dumas has assisted him and conducts opera regularly, but without his predecessor's vim and vigour: this sounded to me like a parlour performance, not true bouffe and when Dumas came on stage for his calls, he looked curiously out of place, like a vicar stumbling on an orgy in the vestry.

The great thing was still to hear the full work - quotations from Don Giovanni included. I disagree with those who complain of 'longueurs': there are none. The composer and his score (and the spectacular costumes) are the stars of this show.

No problem with 'franche gaîté' here: Maestro Wenarto leads his usual troupe of willing youngsters.

It’s beginning to look a lot like March 2020

Fri, 07 Jan 2022 17:40:10 +0000

So, it’s cancellation time again. Everything is off as far as “live” is concerned until at least January 26th in Ontario. That means that a whole raft of concerts at the RCM are postponed/off including Gould’s Wall and Gerry Finley. Morgan Paige-Melbourne and Eve Egoyan are going ahead as livestreams. Check the RCM website for details. The COC has suspended single ticket sales for Madama Butterfly until things become clearer. Meanwhile the rest of the world, mostly, is getting on with it. I’m told it’s called the 0 micron variant because that’s roughly the diameter of Doug Ford’s brain.

Mad Max

Thu, 06 Jan 2022 15:00:47 +0000

Sadly, we rarely get Weber operas in this country, but Freischütz is still regularly done in Europe. After its composer died at 39, there was enough interest in Freischütz that the Paris Opéra longed to produce it, but the spoken dialogue proved a stumbling block. So Berlioz, a Weber fan, put together sung recitatives and then added his own orchestration of Aufforderung zum Tanz (a piano piece by the late composer) to the work for the ballet required by the Opéra.

Those who’d like to compare this French take with the original can listen to Jonas Kaufmann’s one-and-only Max from the 2004 Edinburgh Festival partnered by Hillevi Martinpelto and John Relyea conducted by Charles Mackerras here.

Trove Thursday has also offered Euryanthe with Anne Schwanewilms and Lauren Flanigan in a performance from the Glyndebourne Festival featuring a period-instrument orchestra conducted by Mark Elder, as well as Oberon in Italian (its premiere was at Covent Garden in English) led by Vittorio Gui with the glorious Rezia of Anita Cerquetti.

I’ll take this opportunity repeat my request to impresarios/record producers worldwide that they should produce Oberon with Lise Davidsen and Michael Spyres!

Weber: Le Franc-tireur (French Version by Berlioz of Der Freischütz)

Paris, Salle Pleyel
16 February 2002
Broadcast

Agathe: Michaela Kaune
Annette: Annick Massis
Max: Clifton Forbis
Gaspard: José van Dam
Ottokar/Kilian: Marc Barrard
Un ermite: Carsten Stabell
Kouno: Jean-Philippe Courtis
Samiel: Jean-Claude Drouot

Chœur de l’Orchestre de Paris
Orchestre de Paris

Conductor: Christoph Eschenbach

Franc-tireur can be downloaded by clicking on the icon of a square with an arrow pointing downward on the audio player above and the resulting mp3 files will appear in your download directory.

In addition, more than 400 other podcast tracks are always available from Apple Podcasts for free, or via any RSS reader.

The archive which lists all Trove Thursday offerings in alphabetical order by composer was up-to-dated recently.

Enter, stage right

Thu, 06 Jan 2022 13:00:39 +0000

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=GgsQr4Kbhrg

Born on this day in 1412 martyr and saint Jeanne d’Arc. How many theatrical, cinematic, operatic interpretations of her life? I’ll start:

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlBC1ftGxbI

Birthday anniversaries of composer Max Bruch (1838), bass André Pernet (1894), conductor Maurice Abravanel and soprano Mafalda Favero (1903) and baritones Francesco Valentino (1907) and David Ohanesian (1927).

Persistent Physical Symptoms Among French Adults During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Thu, 06 Jan 2022 04:28:53 +0000

Association of Self-reported COVID-19 Infection and SARS-CoV-2 Serology Test Results With Persistent Physical Symptoms Among French Adults During the COVID-19 Pandemic is the prolix title of a study just published in the JAMA Internal Medicine. The paper’s abstract is below. Basically, it says that if the patient believes that he has been infected with the coronavirus he is likely to have long-term symptoms which he attributes to the virus. This perception includes people who never had the infection. The authors gently suggest that so called long covid may be a somaticized effect of a perceived illness which may or may not have afflicted the patient with persistent symptoms. They never use the terms psychosomatic or hysterical to characterize the complaints they studied, but that’s clearly what’s on their mind – mind is the key word here.

It’s always tempting to say that poorly understood symptoms are all in the patient’s mind; but as Oscar Levant remarked, “What a terrible place for to to be.” Also, there is always the possibility that the physician who diagnoses symptoms as imaginary can be missing something more substantial, but thus far unmasked. As so much of the world’s response to this epidemic can best be described as hysterical, we might as well attribute some of the cases of long covid to hysteria.

Because this paper is not behind a paywall and is available to everyone, I have attached a pdf copy of it below the abstract.

Abstract

Importance After an infection by SARS-CoV-2, many patients present with persistent physical symptoms that may impair their quality of life. Beliefs regarding the causes of these symptoms may influence their perception and promote maladaptive health behaviors.

Objective To examine the associations of self-reported COVID-19 infection and SARS-CoV-2 serology test results with persistent physical symptoms (eg, fatigue, breathlessness, or impaired attention) in the general population during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Design, Setting, and Participants Participants in this cross-sectional analysis were 26 823 individuals from the French population-based CONSTANCES cohort, included between 2012 and 2019, who took part in the nested SAPRIS and SAPRIS-SERO surveys. Between May and November 2020, an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay was used to detect anti–SARS-CoV-2 antibodies. Between December 2020 and January 2021, the participants reported whether they believed they had experienced COVID-19 infection and had physical symptoms during the previous 4 weeks that had persisted for at least 8 weeks. Participants who reported having an initial COVID-19 infection only after completing the serology test were excluded.

Main Outcomes and Measures Logistic regressions for each persistent symptom as the outcome were computed in models including both self-reported COVID-19 infection and serology test results and adjusting for age, sex, income, and educational level.

Results Of 35 852 volunteers invited to participate in the study, 26 823 (74.8%) with complete data were included in the present study (mean [SD] age, 49.4 [12.9] years; 13 731 women [51.2%]). Self-reported infection was positively associated with persistent physical symptoms, with odds ratios ranging from 1.39 (95% CI, 1.03-1.86) to 16.37 (95% CI, 10.21-26.24) except for hearing impairment (odds ratio, 1.45; 95% CI, 0.82-2.55) and sleep problems (odds ratio, 1.14; 95% CI, 0.89-1.46). A serology test result positive for SARS-COV-2 was positively associated only with persistent anosmia (odds ratio, 2.72; 95% CI, 1.66-4.46), even when restricting the analyses to participants who attributed their symptoms to COVID-19 infection. Further adjusting for self-rated health or depressive symptoms yielded similar results. There was no significant interaction between belief and serology test results.

Conclusions and Relevance The findings of this cross-sectional analysis of a large, population-based French cohort suggest that persistent physical symptoms after COVID-19 infection may be associated more with the belief in having been infected with SARS-CoV-2 than with having laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 infection. Further research in this area should consider underlying mechanisms that may not be specific to the SARS-CoV-2 virus. A medical evaluation of these patients may be needed.

Association of Self reported COVID 19 Infection and SARS CoV-2 Serology Test Results With Persistent Physical Symptoms Download

Queen bee

Wed, 05 Jan 2022 18:05:41 +0000

Also on this day in 1977 soprano Edita Gruberova made her Met debut as the Queen of the Night.

Rigoletto

Tue, 04 Jan 2022 19:40:54 +0000

Baritone Michael Chioldi jumps into the title role for tonight’s performance.