Alcina, Royal Academy Opera, 26 October 2016

Hackney Round Chapel

Images: Robert Workman

Alcina – Meinir Wyn Roberts

Bradamante – Hanna Poulsom
Melisso – Richard Walshe
Morgana – Lorena Paz Nieto
Oronte – William Blake
Ruggiero – Emma Stannard

Olivia Fuchs (director)

Yannis Thavoris (designs)
Jake Wiltshire (lighting)
Victoria Newlyn (choreography)

Chorus (chorus master: Ben Glassberg)

Royal Academy Sinfonia

Iain Ledingham (conductor)

 

I can say without any hesitation, still less exaggeration, that this is the best staging and performance of a Handel opera I have seen. Olivia Fuchs’s production takes us to AMNESIA, an S&M club with mind-altering substances – and activities – ready to hand, to foot, and indeed to any other part of the body so inclined or so compelled. Indeed, I do not think I have ever seen quite so much onstage crotch-grabbing, whether auto-erotically, or with partners. The sorcery of Alcina’s enchanted island lends itself readily to such a relocation. In the twinkling of an eye, or the snorting of a line, the transformation of pleasure-seeking fashion-victims into drugged captives perhaps speaks more clearly to us than would a spell that turned heroes into beasts, rocks, trees, or streams. (We still have the libretto, in any case.) I said ‘more clearly’, but perhaps I should have said more deeply, for the underlying evil of the one, especially when assisted by the instruments of sexual domination, is more apparent than it might be in a merely ‘picturesque’ version. Yannis Favoris’s stunning designs and Jake Wiltshire’s lighting – the headrush moment of transformation a memorable flash of inspiration – prove especially provocative, given the location: Hackney’s Round Chapel. It cannot have been quite what nonconformist founding fathers had in mind for their place of worship (at least not openly). All is true to the adventurous spirit of the Baroque, never ground down in futile attempts to recreate its alleged letter.

 

Not that the Konzept becomes too over-bearing; the human relationships, such as they are, become more prominent as the opera progresses. If anything, that is the problem for me: not with the production, but with the opera itself, or rather with my old bugbear of Handelian opera seria. There is some of Handel’s very finest music here, but the requirements of the genre, even when so much of the music is first rate, do tend to tedium, and militate against my ever especially caring about any of the characters. It is certainly not that opera seria must be like that, nor is it that Handel must be like that; in the latter case, one has only to turn to his great oratorios. Perhaps the opera might have been more generously – or ungenerously, according to one’s standpoint – cut. The role of Oberto, created for the boy treble, William Savage, was eliminated completely, but during the second and third acts, the succession of recitative and aria becomes a little wearisome. (Here, the opera was given with a single interval.) How welcome a trio was when it finally came. However, in a production designed as a showcase for splendidly talented young singers, one can understand why not, looking kindly upon the work’s undeniable longueurs.

 

Morgana (Lorna Paz Nieto)

Singers are, of course, often especially drawn to Handel; one can readily understand why. Clean lines, a consummate professional’s understanding of the voice and of vocal types, ample opportunities for display, with sometimes hair-raising coloratura: those qualities and more were all on offer from an exceptional cast. Ebb and flow between the characters, dramatic as well as musical, was well conveyed, Lorena Paz Nieto’s Morgana quite rightly shone most brightly in the first act, seductive in her cruelty. Emma Stannard and Hanna Poulsom traced the transformations of Ruggiero and Bradamante with considerable emotional depth. William Blake’s Oronte likewise very much came into his own as his character did too; he makes a highly credible doorman too. Richard Walshe made the most of his role as the tutor, Melisso; his bass as sharply focused as it was dark of tone. If, earlier on, Meinir Wyn Roberts’s intonation was not quite what one might ideally have hoped for in the title role, that should not be exaggerated; her performance grew in stature as the evening progressed, both emotionally and technically. There was, moreover, something of a Sutherland-like edge to her tone, which certainly helped mark out the role and its performance history. Members of the chorus, whether individually or corporately, impressed greatly throughout.

Alcina (Meinir Wyn Roberts)

The orchestra, too, was on excellent form, certainly the finest I have heard in a Handel opera staging. Warm, stylish, never precious, it was conducted with deep understanding, lightly worn, of Handel’s protean demands by Iain Ledingham. Tempi were varied, without exception well chosen, and with a fine appreciation of how individual numbers might contribute to a greater whole. The contribution of the solo cellist to his obbligato aria was simply outstanding; I could have listened to him all night. A rollicking pair of horns truly invigorated proceedings, very much as recorders would soothe them. Three cheers, then, once again to a Royal Academy Opera performance of the highest order.

Coote/Britten Sinfonia - Purcell, Tippett, Handel, and Britten, 22 November 2012

Wigmore Hall

Purcell – Abdelazer, Z570: ‘Rondeau’

Purcell-Muhly – Let the night perish (Job’s Curse), Z191
Purcell-Stokowski – Dido’s Lament
Tippett – A Lament from Divertimento on ‘Sellinger’s Round’
Handel – Alcina: arias
Britten – Prelude and Fugue for eighteen-part string orchestra, op.29
Purcell-Britten – Chacony in G minor
Tippett – Little Music for Strings
Britten – Phaedra, op.93

Alice Coote (mezzo-soprano)

Britten Sinfonia

Jacqueline Shave (director/violin)

Richard Hetherington (conductor).

I was a little puzzled to start with when I noticed that this concert was announced as celebrating Britten’s ninety-ninth birthday. Any excuse for a party, I supposed, but it might not have made sense to wait a year? Then I read a little further, to discover that it was launching a year’s events at the Wigmore Hall, to culminate in the centenary itself – also St Cecilia’s Day, by the way. As something less than a paid-up Brittenophile – some works I respond to far more readily than others: The Turn of the Screw I find a masterpiece, whereas Peter Grimes I obstinately continue to find grossly overrated – I suspect that I shall be more selective than some. Next year, after all, is Wagner’s, for better or worse, though in many respects I fear the worst. However, if any of the Britten performances I hear next year are at this level of distinction, I shall be fortunate indeed. (The Turn of the Screw from Sir Colin Davis and the LSO looks a good bet already...)

 

This programme played into an aspect of Britten’s career for which I have almost unbounded admiration, namely Britten as performer. Though I certainly do not share his antipathies – Brahms most notoriously, Beethoven too – I cannot help but admire so ardent a Purcellian, especially when his conducted performances of Purcell were, without exception in my experience, outstanding. The Rondeau from Abdelazar, famously chosen by Britten as the theme for the Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra, set the tone impeccably. Spirited, robust even, without a hint of carping, inhumane ‘authenticity’, this performance from the Britten Sinfonia, led by Jacqueline Shave, managed also to convey a hint of melancholy that stands at the heart of so much great English music from Byrd to Birtwistle.

 

There followed three pieces offering different sides of creation, re-creation, and thematic inspiration. Alice Coote joined the strings for Nico Muhly’s ‘realisation’ of Let the night perish, or Job’s Curse.  If truth be told, Muhly’s part in proceedings pertained more to ‘effect’ than anything more substantial. (How unlike Britten’s own Purcell realisations!) Techniques employed – sudden high violin notes, cello tremolandi, etc. – might sound ‘clever’, but they are easily accomplished enough and seemed strangely unmotivated by text or music. Performances, however, were first-class, Coote’s part in proceedings exquisitely shaded – and what a way with words she has! There seemed more kinship with the Sorceress than with Dido, which, given the subject matter, makes sense. And the chilling diminuendo upon the final ‘grave’, would have implied the word even if her diction had been less impeccable than it was. Stokowski’s arrangement for strings – I say arrangement, but it verges at times upon transcription, though subtly so – of Dido’s Lament came next. Following on from Coote, one expected words, but one that loss was dealt with – very quickly in practice – we heard a deeply felt rendition of a deeply felt tribute, both when the richly expressive strings were heard orchestrally and in the poignant solo spots: violin ‘Remember me’-s especially.

 

Then came Tippett’s contribution to a composite work commissioned for the 1953 Aldeburgh Festival, each movement of which was to include a reference to Sellinger’s Round. Tippett’s piece is preoccupied at least as much with Dido’s ‘Ah Belinda’ as with the traditional dance tune. Purcell’s aria emerges fantazia-like, though with a sense of compositional refraction not so very different in principle from Berio’s orchestration of a Purcell hornpipe, though with an ineffable Englishness quite foreign to the Italian composer. Ornamentation, if that be the word, is expressive, not merely decorative, still less ‘effect’. One senses a pull already towards the Tippett of the symphonies. Once again, the Britten Sinfonia’s performance was compelling indeed.

 

Three Handel arias – there is a wonderful, indeed the most wonderful, recording of Handel Ode for Saint Cecilia’s Day by Britten – completed the first half. Alcina is one of his finest operas; these arias were certainly gems even within that context. The warmth of the orchestral playing struck me immediately; this was not at all unlike the English Chamber Orchestra of old, Britten or Raymond Leppard at the helm. What a life-enhancing change from current fashion, in which so much as to utter the word ‘vibrato’ is to be discounted by the ayatollahs of authenticity! The Britten Sinfonia players, led as throughout by Shave, showed keen understanding of harmonic rhythm, above which Coote offered an imploring performance of ‘Mi lusinga il dolce affetto’. Careful attention to words never detracted from roundness of phrasing. The B section was allotted to single strings (and harpsichord from Maggie Cole), reverting to fuller forces for the da capo, a similar practice being followed in the repeated lines of ‘Verdi prati’, which received a dignified, moving performance. ‘Stà nell’Ircana’ fairly brought the house down. The change of pace brought alert, exciting and thoroughly musical performances – again, no silly ‘effects’ – from all concerned. Coloratura was brilliantly but also meaningfully despatched, owing to Coote’s keen command of the words and their implications. There was welcome flexibility in the middle section. And what glorious horn playing from Stephen Bell and Chris Davies! I am not sure that I have heard a more ecstatic response from a clearly exhilarated Wigmore Hall audience.

 

Britten’s Prelude and Fugue, op.29, opened the second half. Written for the Boyd Neel Orchestra’s tenth anniversary, it is very much a Wigmore Hall work, having been premiered there on 23 June 1943. I wish I could say it convinced me as a piece. The Prelude works better, and received once again a rich-toned performance, thanks both to the fine acoustic and to the players. A sweet-toned violin solo from Shave found itself set against Shostakovich-like harmonies. Perhaps inevitably, given the forces, the fugue sometimes sounds like watered-down Bartók. It nevertheless received a committed, vigorous performance. I am not sure that it hangs together very well in formal terms though.

 

Britten’s realisation – call it what you will – of Purcell’s great G minor Chacony is an example to all who would follow. The players clearly understood and – just as important – communicated the nature of the form and its implications, in a performance that was as finely shaded as it was unfussy. This is a masterpiece and sounded like it, even if nothing, not even BernardHaitink’s recent LSO performance, can quite match Britten’s own with the ECO. Tippett’s well-nigh neo-Classical Little Music for Strings, if not a masterpiece, is certainly a handy addition to the string orchestral repertoire. None of its four movements outstays its welcome; indeed, the finale wittily leaves one wanting more. The Prelude oddly seems determined to launch into the National Anthem, but never does. Counterpoint was throughout, not just in the Fugue, clearly and vigorously handled in a performance of great energy.

 

Finally came the real Britten, in his late cantata for Dame Janet Baker, Phaedra. This performance, conducted by Richard Hetherington, immediately thrust one into a sound-world which, unlike the earlier Prelude and Fugue, was unmistakeably Britten’s own – a sound-world, moreover, of the opera house. This is clearly the composer of The Rape of Lucretia, of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, most darkly, of Death in Venice. Performances once again were exceptional; I really could not, even if so inclined, find anything to fault. From the alert cello and harpsichord continuo of the first recitative through the savagery of the drums, to what sounds very much like a ghost of the Berg Violin Concerto in the interlude between the Recitative to Oenone and the Adagio to Theseus, the players of the Britten Sinfonia played as if their lives depended on it. Coote’s performance was simply outstanding. An early highlight was the colouring of ‘murderer’ in the first recitative (referring to Aphrodite and Phaedra’s mother), so as to impart a sense of a grey veil being cast over proceedings. There was a magnificently hieratic quality to the performance of the Presto to Hippolytus. And the final Adagio told us that, whilst we might be helpless in the face of the gods, we can evince a humanist pride too, one that belongs as much to Phaedra as to Prometheus. Whilst quite unlike Dame Janet’s recording, Coote had nothing to fear with that most demanding of comparisons.