Platée, Semperoper Dresden, 16 April 2019

Semperoper

Images: Semperoper Dresden/Ludwig Olah
Platée (Philippe Talbot), La Folie (Inga Kalna)

Platée – Philippe Talbot

Cithéron, Satyr – Giorgio Caoduro

Jupiter – Andreas Wolf

Junon – Ute Selbig

Mercure, Thespis – Mark Milhofer

Momus – Sebastian Wartig

Thalie, Clarine – Iulia Maria Dan

La Folie – Inga Klana

Amour – Tania Lorenzo

Two Menads – Katharina Flade, Hyunduk Na

Rolando Villazón (director)

Harald Tor (set designs)

Susanne Hubrich (costumes)

Philippe Giraudeau (choreography)

Davy Cunningham (lighting)

Kai Weßler (dramaturgy)

Dancers

Sächsische Staatsopernchor Dresden (chorus director: Cornelius Volke)

Säschsische Staatskapelle Dresden

Paul Agnew (conductor)

I did not ever think I should live to hear the Staatskapelle Dresden play Rameau, let alone with such verve and sensitivity, such vigour and style as here. Outside France, occasions are still relatively rare to see Rameau’s operas staged: far rarer than they should be for the pre-eminent opera composer of his age. In the present climate, to hear them performed on modern instruments – let alone on modern instruments that are not attempting, pointlessly, to sound as if they were ancient ones – is a further, well-nigh insurmountable challenge. Bravo, then, not only to Dresden’s Semperoper for staging Platée, but for presenting it with such conviction, under Paul Agnew, himself by now something of a veteran both in the title role and as conductor. Agnew’s direction proved not the least virtue of this evening, his tempi judicious both in themselves and in relation to one another, a keen ear applied to balances within the orchestra and between orchestra and stage. Rameau’s woodwind solos in particular shone with all the ravishing beauty one might have hoped for from these players. Warm yet incisive strings combined with expert continuo (Gerd Amelung on harpsichord, Simon Kalbhenn on cello) and, just as important, a fine cast and duly provocative production to have one think as well as feel. This was the fourth performance in the run since the premiere earlier this month: it seemed by now to have all the advantages of having ‘bedded in’, without retreat into the over-familiarity (and under-rehearsal) of ‘repertoire’.

Rolando Villazón’s production surprised me. Initially it seemed needlessly over the top, in danger of collapsing into ‘punk Baroque’ cliché, but it soon became apparent that a keen, playful mind was at work, playing with the strange, ornate parodies of this singular ballet bouffon (or should that be comédie lyrique)? The Prologue takes place, with apparent incongruity, in a bar full of characters who either are schoolchildren or, more likely, dressed as such. (Or is it a drunken schoolroom? There may be no difference.) This is, after all, the morning after the night before – something surely not lost on the first audience at the Dauphin’s Versailles marriage festivities in 1745. (The 1749 version was given here.) What ‘should’ be a Greek vineyard is – more or less – but with the additional insight, criticism, call it what you will, that the gang of Thespis, Momus, Amour, and Thalia are themselves acting as obstreperous teenagers. Their creation of the drama to be set before us for their and our amusement has little empathy, will mock gods and mortals alike, yet ultimately will serve the higher, comedic end of reconciling Jupiter and Junon.

And so, the events at the foot of Mount Cithaeron unfold, keenly aware of the highly unusual form this satire is to take. Who are its objects? In a sense, everyone: perhaps including Rameau, the great lyric tragedian, himself. And nothing is off bounds, sexually or otherwise. Some members of the audience seemed more than a little discomfited by Mercure’s use of an obvious bodily orifice for storage purposes, but that was surely the point. Here one should be invited, even compelled, to reconsider what might be taken for granted, not only about this opera, but about opera more generally. Mark Milhofer’s twin assumption of Mercure and Thespis was certainly not the least of the quicksilver joys and thrills of the evening. But it was Philippe Talbot’s Platée, of course, who stood – and sang – centre-stage, gloriously repulsive in what must surely be one of Rameau’s higher haute-contre parts, originally taken by Pierre de Jélyotte. Talbot captured the swamp-nymph en travestie’s absurdity – we feel less uncomfortable, perhaps, given the Italian device of drag, highly unusual for French opera – in a keenly observed performance whose every detail contributed to the greater whole.

Jupiter (Andreas Wolf) and Platée

Another delightful incongruity was provided by Inga Kalna’s Folie, her apparition again very much a star apparition from another world (Italian opera, once again, but something beyond that in the particular scheme at work here). Her coloratura thrilled yet also warned. Why should we listen to her, apart from wanting to do so? Perhaps that was enough. Other highlights included the performances of a darkly menacing, yet not-too-menacing, Giorgio Caoduro (Cithéron), a properly narcissistic Jupiter (Andreas Wolf), and a rich-toned Iulia Maria Dan (Thalie, Clarine). But the company and the controlled riot in performance it wrought were the thing. Opera, of whatever genre, is a curious thing. This Platée not only knew that; it played with that, rejoiced in it, and asked us what we thought of it, and why. Its strangely ‘un-operatic’ interjections, verbal and musical, were both relished and reconciled, its conventions likewise. The more one listened, the more one watched, the more – and the less – one ‘understood’. Dance and song, voice and instruments, even comedy and tragedy: can they, should they, be separated? Such, after all, may be one of the ultimate lessons learned in and after the drunken schoolroom and/or children’s bar of the Prologue.

L'incoronazione di Poppea, Staatsoper Unter den Linden, 10 December 2017

Staatsoper Unter den Linden

Images: Bernd Uhlig
Nerone (Max Emanuel Cencic), Poppea (Anna Prohaska)

Fortuna – Niels Domdey

Fortuna, Damigella – Narine Yeghiyan

Virtù – Artina Kapreljan

Amore, Valletto – Lucia Cirillo

Amore – Noah Schurz

Nerone – Max Emanuel Cencic

Ottavia – Katharina Kammerloher

Poppea – Anna Prohaska

Ottone – Xavier Sabata

Seneca – Franz-Josef Selig

Drusilla – Evelin Novak

Liberto, Lucano – Gyula Orendt

First Soldier, Lucano – Linard Vrielink

Second Soldier – Florian Hoffmann

Tribune – David Oštrek

Nutrice – Jochen Kowalski

Arnalta – Mark Milhofer

Eva-Maria Höckmayr (director)

Jens Kilian (set designs)

Julia Rösler (costumes)

Olaf Freese, Irene Selka (lighting)

Mark Schachtsiek, Roman Reeger (dramaturgy)

Akademie für Alte Musik, Berlin

Diego Fasolis (conductor)

The Staatsoper Unter den Linden is now reopen for good. That re-reopening, as it were, has taken place with two new productions of two favourite works of mine: Hänsel und Gretel (which I shall also review shortly) and L’incoronazione di Poppea. I wish I could offer a wholehearted welcome to this production of Poppea, not least as my final instalment in rather a wonderful Monteverdi year, the highlight of which was surely an RIAS Kammerchor Vespers, conducted by Justin Doyle (see also interview here). Eva-Maria Höckmayr’s production offers, alas, little in itself, almost a non-production, whilst the musical performances were somewhat mixed.


Let us start, however, with the good news, which was very good news indeed. In what I believe was her first role in a Monteverdi opera – madrigal performances and much other early music notwithstanding – Anna Prohaska truly shone in the title role. She can certainly act, and did, called on, like much of the cast, to be onstage for an almost absurd proportion of the evening. There was, then, no doubting her stage presence; but nor was there any doubting her vocal presence. Never forced, ever audible, increasingly imbued with darker, richer tones than I recall when first hearing her, without any sacrifice to clarity and cleanness of line and words, Prohaska surely offered a performance that would have made anyone wish to hear her again, whether in Monteverdi, Nono, or somewhere in between. Her Poppea, moreover, was no one-dimensional schemer, no mere sex-kitten, although she certainly offered plenty in the way of allure and manipulation; this was a woman reclaiming a woman’s role, certainly not apologetic, yet unwilling simply to have as a male projection – be that Monteverdi’s, Giovanni Francesco Busenello’s, ours – might have her act.

Seneca (Franz-Josef Selig), Nerone

Her leading men, as it were, also offered intelligent, multi-dimensional performances. Max Emanuel Cencic’s Nerone was occasionally a little on the squawky side, yet only occasionally. Otherwise he judiciously, even provocatively, balanced the character’s vanity and sexual allure, for if Poppea is to be more than merely a male projection, then surely the other characters, male and female, need to come more into their own. Ottone is, more often than not, a thankless role – almost a Don Ottavio for the seventeenth century. Xavier Sabata, though, gave him depth and greater ambition and nastiness of his own than one often encounters – without that diminishing his helplessness in the arms of Fate. Jochen Kowalski, who has had a long, distinguished career not only as a countertenor, but as a countertenor in Berlin, tended, alas, to suggest that that career should probably draw to a close. Perhaps it was just an off-night, but here he was barely capable of singing countertenor at all, proving more successful when giving up that good fight to sing instead as tenor. He still had stage presence; for the most part, that was all.

Rather to my surprise, Katharina Kammerloher’s Ottavia proved variable, less sure – or indeed beautiful – of line than most performances I have heard from her. Franz-Josef Selig, as ever, offered a thoughtful performance as Seneca, alert to the character’s irritating side – not only as seen through the eyes, or heard through the ears, of Nerone and Poppea. Evelin Novak’s Drusilla impressed too, as did Mark Milhofer’s deliciously camp – yet crucially, eminently musical – Arnalta. Gyula Orendt rose above his announced ailment to give notable performances, which doubtless could have been finer still, as Liberto and Lucano. Most of the smaller roles were well taken, often by members of the company. Quite why children were engaged to double the gods in the Prologue I have no idea; moreover, whilst it is certainly a tall order to ask children to sing Monteverdi at all, let alone on stage, the audience probably deserves to hear voices that are vaguely capable of remaining in tune.

Poppea, Ottone (Xavier Sabata),
Amore (Lucia Cirollo)

Diego Fasolis made heavy, unvaried weather of the score. Many current ‘Early Music’ clichés were present, including the irritating addition of ‘colourful’ percussion. It was a relatively large band for Monteverdi in all: nothing wrong with that in principle, but it did have me wonder why we were hearing period instruments. I do not think I have heard a more dully conducted account, closer to a failed attempt to copy Nikolaus Harnoncourt than to something livelier, whether at the ‘period’ or – one can but hope – the Leppard end of the spectrum. Might it not, moreover, have been an occasion to look to a composer’s realisation of the score, say Krenek’s or Dallapiccola’s, or to commission a new one? The Staatskapelle Berlin would certainly have been a vocal sight for sore ears, much of what we heard resembling – although it certainly is not – acres of dullish recitative. Why, moreover, in this version credited to Fasolis and Andrea Marchiol, did we hear material interpolated from elsewhere, such as L’Orfeo? It was hardly ‘authentic’, in any sense, offering little more than a longer evening. Poppea is not a short opera; here it felt far longer than it should.

As for Hockmayr’s production, I struggled for the most part to find one, beyond a cursory nod to a threadbare metatheatricality that has degenerated into mere fashion. From Jens Kilian, a single, undeniably impressive golden set, with intriguing geometrical possibilities – circular and otherwise – promises much, as does Julia Rösler’s ‘punkish Renaissance-Baroque’ costumes, Nerone and Poppea perhaps more, yet not entirely, contemporary (to us). I had the sneaking impression, though, however erroneous, that the singers had largely been left by Hockmayr to get on with it. There is, at least for me, no obvious concept, other than the characters being all as bad as each other: hardly original, and actually rather dull. Yes, they all have their flaws; neither Ottone nor Ottavia is a paragon. There is surely room for greater differentiation, though, differentiation which need not lead to moral judgement. And so, in the final scene, Poppea’s sudden trauma at her elevation, unforgettably portrayed by Prohaska, seems to come out of nowhere. Likewise the frankly silly twist that has Nerone wander off with Lucano. Yes, of course the two are close, and will remain so, sexually and otherwise: the orgy has shown us that. But surely to have Nerone already opt so obviously for another rather than to remain omnivorous seems little more than an unprepared cop out. Perhaps Hockmayr had thought this all out and either it did not come across very clearly, or I was missing something. Perhaps.

Orfeo (Rossi), Royal Opera, 23 October 2015

Photographs by Stephen Cummiskey; copyright: Royal Opera and Shakespeare's Globe.

 

 

Sam Wanamaker Playhouse

(sung in English, as Orpheus)

Orfeo – Mary Bevan/Siobhan Stagg

Euridice – Louise Alder
Aristeo – Caitlin Hulcup
Endimione/Caronte – Philip Smith
Venere – Sky Ingram
Amore – Keri Fuge
Satyr/Pluto – Graeme Broadbent
Giove/Aikippe/Momo – Mark Milhofer
Aegea – Verena Gunz
Talia/Himeneo/Clotho – Lauren Fagan
Euphrosyne/Lachesis – Jennifer Davis
Aeglea/Atropos/Bacco – Emily Edmonds

Keith Warner (director)

Nicky Shaw (designs)
Karl Alfred Schreiner (choreography)

Orchestra of the Early Opera Company

Christian Curnyn (conductor)

 

 

 

Romain Rolland crops up in all manner of musical situations. His appearance here is owed to his discovery in 1888, in Rome, of the music for Luigi Rossi’s Orfeo; it would subsequently feature in his doctoral thesis, ‘Les Origines du théâtre lyrique moderne. Histoire de l'opéra avant Lully et Scarlatti.’ As well it should, and thank goodness he did. For this opera, long regarded as ‘historically important’, is also – the two do not always go together – a very attractive, interesting work for modern audiences too. It is ‘historically important’ both musicologically – the first opera written for Paris, with all that entails – and more politically, as part of Cardinal Mazarin’s Italianisation of the French court, on the eve of the Frondes. Moreover, in its musical quality and variety too it questions some of what remain the more commonly held teleologies of musical history, which is all to the good.

 

Euridice (Louise Alder) and Aristeo (Caitlin Hulcup)

None of those matters is especially evident in Keith Warner’s production, which concentrates not upon the metatheatrical but upon the immediate theatricalities of presenting an entertaining and often surprising three hours in the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse from Francesco Buti’s challengingly wide-ranging libretto. There will always be losses – at least in a work worth performing – in such an enterprise, but I suspect most of us can live, especially in a production not really concerned with such matters, with the loss of the Prologue and Epilogue. So out go the large-scale – twenty-four French solider – choruses of military victory, Mercury’s promise of immortality to the young Louis XIV, the god’s post hoc explanation that Orpheus’s lyre represents the fleur-de-lys, and so on. What we have is a non-pedantic, non-fetishistic period-ish look – not unreasonable, given the location – which concentrates upon creation of character, interaction of characters, and a good deal, perhaps too much, of unsuspected comedy. Christopher Cowell’s excellent English translation – if we must have one, it should be good – perhaps errs on the ‘humorous’ side too, but that is more a matter of taste than anything else. Warner and Cowell, along with Nicky Shaw’s sumptuous costume designs and, of course, the hard, often overlooked work of the costume makers from the Royal Opera House and Shakespeare’s Globe, bring alive a version and view of the work that may be partial – what is not? – but which, by the same token, and in far smaller surroundings than the Palais Royal gives a sense of its multi-faceted nature.

 

Satyr (Graeme Broadbent)

I have it on good authority that the Playhouse acoustic is a nightmare for singers. One would not have known, given committed performances from all concerned. Mary Bevan’s indisposition left her acting the title role with Siobhan Stagg singing from the gallery (with the orchestra). The ‘compromise’ did not come across as such at all, at least to my eyes and ears; it offered musico-theatrical commitment of a very high order and introduced – to me, at least – a soprano of considerable musical gifts, showing clarity and warmth to be anything but antithetical. The same could be said of Louise Alder’s Euridice, here allotted a larger role than one often encounters, not least because of the business involving Aristeus’s love for her and Venus’s attempts to further that forlorn prospect. Alder is, I hear, a Rosenkavalier Sophie, and, on the basis of this, is likely to prove more interesting in the part than many ‘whiter’ exponents. Caitlin Hulcup’s portrayal of Aristeus showed an artist apparently born for trouser roles (although doubtless not just for them), with a winning, convincing line in melancholy vulnerability. There was, crucially in an opera with so many duets and ensembles, a true sense of theatrical company from all concerned, with sensible doublings – and more – adopted. Standing out from the rest of the cast for me were Sky Ingram’s sexy, self-aware Venus, Keri Fuge's lively, mischievous Cupid, Graeme Broadbent’s earthy Satyr, and Mark Milhofer’s comedic, Cavalli-esque turn as Alkippe (Venus as crone).

 

Venere (Sky Ingram)

 

 

The acoustic also seemed to favour the Orchestra of the Early Opera Company, warmer and far less variable in intonation than it had been for the Royal Opera’s Monteverdi Orfeo at the Roundhouse. Players and conductor, Christian Curnyn, seemed in their element, the continuo group rich and varied, and the strings sounding lighter of foot and considerably less parsimonious of expression than one generally hears with ‘period groups’. Curnyn’s tempi seemed both sensible and dramatically quickening (perhaps in more than one sense). The orchestra was very small: not remotely on the scale of the French court’s Vingt-quatre Violons du Roi, but then the performing space was not the Palais Royal either. The authenticke lobby makes it up as it goes along, of course. There is nothing especially wrong with that, except if the claim of ‘authenticity’, be made, overtly or covertly. However, imagine the outcry from the period ayatollahs if a modern-instrument performance were so flagrantly to disregard antiquarian circumstances. There would certainly be calls to send a latter-day Raymond Leppard to The Hague (‘crimes evincing a semblance of humanity’ perhaps). Except there would not, since the chances of our being permitted to hear such a performance are – well: choose your own absurdist simile.

Amore (Keri Fuge)

 

 

This was, all in all, an excellent evening, yet I could not help but wonder what delights a larger-scale, arguably more ‘authentic’ performance and production – sets of parks, gardens, caves, Hades made quite an impression in 1647 – might have brought on the Royal Opera’s main stage itself. (Not that I resented the opportunity to spend an evening in this beautifully reimagined playhouse.) Perhaps with a newly-commissioned reorchestration. Berio would once have been the man for it; there are many composers who would surely relish the opportunity. Such dreams aside, however, three cheers to the Royal Opera for expanding its repertoire in such a stimulating direction.