Tosca, Vienna State Opera, 2 December 2015

Vienna State Opera

Images: Wiener Staatsoper / Michael Pöhn

Floria Tosca – Martina Serafin

Mario Cavaradossi – Roberto Alagna
Baron Scarpia – Michael Volle
Cesare Angelotti – Ryan Speedo Green
Sacristan – Alfred Šramek
Spoletta – Benedikt Kobel
Sciarrone – Hans Peter Kammerer
Gaoler – Il Hong
Shepherd Boy – Bernhard Sengstschmid

Margarethe Wallmann (director)

Nicola Benois (revival director)

Vienna State Opera Chorus (chorus master: Martin Schebesta)

Orchestra of the Vienna State Opera

Dan Ettinger (conductor) 

 

 

 

Tosca is pretty much indestructible, although that does not necessarily prevent opera houses from doing their worst to prove me wrong. Where are the Bieitos, the Konwitschnys, the Herheims, the Katy Mitchells, indeed anyone who might think Puccini and indeed his audiences merit something other than condescension? The Berlin State Opera recently signalled the prospect of something a little more interesting with a new production, conducted by Daniel Barenboim (his first Puccini!), directed by Alvis Hermanis, a director with a mixed record, at best, but at least not renowned for pandering to ‘subscription’ tastes. Whether the staging succeeded, I do not know; given Hermanis’s recent pronouncements, I am unlikely ever to find out. Alas, Dominique Meyer decided, rather than to present a new production at the Vienna State Opera, to reproduce the disintegrating sets and costumes of its existing – I am tempted to say, ‘prehistoric’ – production.

 

That, alas, is precisely what it looks like. Indeed, before I was informed by a friend of Meyer’s strange decision, my thought had been that the sets and costumes reminded me of the horrible if understandable restoration of Dresden’s Frauenkirche. (How much more powerful it was when a pile of rubble: an encounter, from my first visit to that city, I will never forget!) Indeed, what the action, if one can call it that, looked and felt like was really rather curious: some people attempting, without much support, less to ape the manners of the 1950s than to have rediscovered an abandoned set from that period, trying to do something, anything, but not too much, within its confines. Margarethe Wallmann’s production, to our eyes, seems strange, not in an intriguing way, but because the years have hollowed it out of what one presumes once to have been its content. Doubtless a revival director does what she can, and can hardly be held responsible, but a piece of theatre this is not.

 

The answer one often hears to such complaints is that great artists can breathe new life into anything. Perhaps, although I think even Herbert von Karajan and Renata Tebaldi, who featured in its 1957 premiere, might have had difficulty here in 2015. This, at any rate, was not a vintage night in performing terms. Dan Ettinger’s conducting was at best plodding, although there were occasional hints form the orchestra – some gorgeous cello playing in particular – that these were players who might, under a conductor such as Daniele Gatti, produce something world-beating. For the most part, Ettinger seemed content to ‘accompany’: a very odd idea for one of the most symphonic of opera composers. When he did try something, it seemed to be merely to repeat a phrase slower and louder than the last time. This score usually flies by; here, one might have thought it a misfire on the composer’s part.

 

There was better news from the singers – at least until the end (on which more shortly). Martina Serafin is not possessed of the most refulgent of voices, but she did a good deal with what she had, and for the most part proved attentive towards words as well as music. ‘Vissi d’arte’ was, alas, plagued by poor intonation. Roberto Alagna suffered similarly when he first came on stage, but his performance improved dramatically – in more than one sense – thereafter. Indeed, as always, he threw his all into what he was doing, vocally and otherwise. His big aria was beautifully sung, without a hint of playing to the gallery. (Alas, the gallery still responded, holding up what action the production permitted.) Michael Volle seemed strangely, or perhaps not so strangely, out of sorts. He is a great artist, but this is perhaps not his role, or at least this is not his production. His Italian was such that even I found it too Teutonic, and, although he offered greater malice and menace in the second act, the first-act Scarpia seemed oddly avuncular. Ryan Speedo Green was an energetic, dark-voiced Angelotti; I should like to hear more from him.

 

Despite my reservations, I was a little surprised when no one came to receive applause. Eventually, a member of staff came forward to make an announcement. Serafin had fallen awkwardly when making her leap from the ramparts and was unable to return onstage. After that, although the rest of the cast then took their curtain calls, the evening fizzled out, a state of affairs which, alas, did not seem at odds with the staging. I do not doubt that, in 1957, when Wallmann’s production, if we can still call it that, was first seen, with Karajan and Tebaldi, there might have been much to enjoy scenically, as well as musically. Now, however, it would surely be kinder to Wallmann, to Puccini, to the singers, to the audience, to grant it an honourable retirement. As another, supremely theatrical composer, alongside Schoenberg (later) surely the most beneficial influence upon Puccini, once put it: ‘Kinder, macht neues!’

 

Tosca, Royal Opera, 10 May 2014

Royal Opera House

Cesare Angelotti – Michel de Souza

Sacristan – Jeremy White

Mario Cavaradossi – Roberto Alagna

Floria Tosca – Oksana Dyka

Baron Scarpia – Marco Vratogna

Spoletta – Martyn Hill

Sciarrone – Jihoon Kim

Shepherd Boy – Michael Clayton-Jolly

Gaoler – Olle Zetterström

Jonathan Kent (director)

Andrew Sinclair (revival director)

Paul Brown (designs)

Mark Henderson (lighting)

Royal Opera Chorus and Extra Chorus (chorus master: Renato Balsadonna)

Orchestra of the Royal Opera House

Oleg Caetani (conductor)

 

Scarpia (Marco Vratogna) and Tosca (Oksana Dyka)
Copyright: ROH/Catherine Ashmore

 

 

All in all, a dispiriting evening, this. Jonathan Kent’s 2006 staging of Tosca, revived again, as last year (!), by Andrew Sinclair, certainly does not reveal greater subtleties of meaning with further acquaintance. Indeed, it makes little or no attempt at conveying meaning at all, be it subtle or otherwise. There is nothing wrong in principle with setting the work when and where specified in the libretto, just as there is nothing wrong with reimagining it, though an over-exposed opera such as this more or less cries out for some element of rethinking. But irrespective of the relatively unimportant question of setting, there needs to be something, or rather a great deal, more to a production than that. Not only is there no sense, as I wrote last time, of dialogue between Puccini’s time, our own, and the time at which the opera is set; there sadly is no sense of drama beyond the gunshots in the third act. Paul Brown’s large scale sets might have imparted a welcome impression of menace, of claustrophobia, but again they could hardly do that on their own. I have no idea how much or how little rehearsal was permitted, but interaction between the singers was often so rudimentary as to suggest none whatsoever (which cannot have been the case).

 

Roberto Alagna at least offered energetic commitment on stage, unlike his Tosca and Scarpia. Alagna’s first act was shaky vocally; indeed his opening suffered from wild intonation and vocal constriction. Later on, however, he improved, though cleaner lines would often have been welcome. Such matters are, however, partly a matter of taste, and on his own terms, the second and third acts were reasonably impressive. Alas, Oksana Dyka’s vibrato was so wide as often to encompass the best part a minor third; her acting skills on this occasion were well-nigh non-existent. Perhaps it was as well that she simply strolled off the battlement rather than attempting anything that would vaguely qualify as a ‘leap’, but it hardly made for much of a climax. Marco Vratogna’s Scarpia also suffered from dryness and constriction in the first act, proving more focused in the second. His acting, however, matched that of his Scarpia; would that the Carry On element of his demise had been born of irony. The smaller parts were generally well taken, however. If only we had seen and heard more from Michel de Souza’s dynamic Angelotti, Jeremy White's characterful, bumbling Sacristan, or Martyn Hill’s nasty Spoletta.

 

The orchestra played well enough, though the strings sometimes tended towards thinness. However, Oleg Caetani’s inconsistent conducting proved a considerable break upon the flowering or, more plainly, the progress of the score. He seemed undecided what he thought of it and therefore unable to make it cohere. The first act’s lack of sentimentality was to be welcomed, but instead it was brutalised; hard-driven rather than riven with menace. Phrasing throughout was short-breathed, instances of a longer line standing out awkwardly, given their lack of relation to what surrounded them. Alas, as with so much of what we saw and heard, what might have passed muster in a small, provincial theatre wedded to the repertory system simply was not good enough for a world stage, upon which this Tosca was presented as a major revival. All with ears to hear will have praised the Royal Opera House to the skies for its recent, superlative performances of Die Frau ohne Schatten; if a work which it performs so incessantly as Tosca is to be performed again any time soon, it needs to be done with similar care and attention. This spoke more of cynicism than of having ‘lived for art’.  

Carmen, Royal Opera, 16 December 2013

Royal Opera House, Covent Garden

 

Moralès – Ashley Riches

Micaëla – Verónica Cangemi
Don José – Roberto Alagna
Zuniga – Nicolas Courjal
Carmen – Anita Rachvelishvili
Frasquita – Simona Mihai
Mercédès – Rachel Kelly
Lillas Pastia – Caroline Lena Olsson
Escamillo – Vito Priante
Le Dancaïre – Adrian Clarke
Le Remendado – Stuart Patterson
Guide – Jean-Baptiste Fillon

Francesca Zambello (director)

Duncan Macfarland (revival director)
Tanya McCallin (designs)
Paule Constable (lighting)
Arthur Pita, Sirena Tocco (choreography)
Mike Loades, Natalie Dakin (fight director)

Actors, Dancers

Royal Opera Chorus and extra chorus (chorus director: Renato Balsadonna)
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House

 

Alas, a depressing evening, of which the worst culprit was for once perhaps not Francesca Zambello’s West End musical ‘approach’ to Bizet’s opéra comique. Zambello’s production does its job, I suppose, in as non-intellectual a way as you could imagine: something for those for whom Miss Saigon is a little too challenging. But, except for the inappropriate scale – which, to be fair, is a problem large houses will always struggle to overcome – it does not really get in the way. The donkey – ‘Polyanne the donkey, supplied by John McLaren and Linda Chilton of Island Farm Donkey Sanctuary – still walks on for no discernible reason, yet it had, or seemed to have, the intelligence and grace to look as bewildered by its appearance as we were. As for the absurd Madonna – this is no probing of Spanish religious practice, but, as with Zambello’s Don Giovanni, an appearance that remains at the level of mere religious tat – it continues to be wheeled on too, remaining stationary whilst a priest blesses Escamillo and Carmen. And why does the fourth act’s opening chorus continue to be omitted? (It surely ought to offer the director plenty more dubious opportunities for display.)

 

I shall not go on, for that, as I said, was not really the greatest problem. Daniel Oren, I am afraid to say, offered what must be a serious contender for the title of worst conducting I have endured in a major house. (I am tempted to delete the word ‘major’, so atrocious were the results.) The first act came off worst of all. After a blithe and bouncy opening – one could see him, blithely bouncing, too – the rest of the Prelude ground to a halt. Yet that was nothing compared to the disjunctures between pit and stage, the inability to maintain any tempo whatsoever – and certainly not on account of judicious rubato – and the apparent lack of rehearsal throughout. Indeed, it sounded as though Oren had never seen the score before, let alone rehearsed it. The orchestra occasionally sounded good on its own terms, but one could hardly blame it for times when it seemed less than wholly committed. I should be tempted to describe Oren’s contribution as hack work, were that not a gross libel to hacks across the world. If anything, his conducting was even worse than it had been in Robert le diable. I cannot imagine why the Royal Opera continues to engage him; it is not as if there is a shortage of conductors for a work such as Carmen.  Constantinos Carydis did a fine job last time around, in 2010, but it would be difficult to know where to start with a list of possibilities.

 

In that context, it is, I think, wise to be charitable to the singers as well as to the orchestra. That said, and all allowances made, it was anything but a vintage evening in that respect. Nicolas Courjal was the sole surviving cast member from 2010. What I wrote then applies with at least equal force now: he ‘made a more virile impression as the lieutenant, Zuniga, than either of the two principal men’. For Roberto Alagna, as Don José, was sometimes wildly out of tune and proved in general, especially before the interval, coarse in his delivery. At best, he sounded as if he were singing Puccini in French. Vito Priante was better as Escamillo, though there was nothing especially memorable to his assumption, which might well have fared better in a smaller theatre. (The horse, of course, does not help.) Anita Rachvelishvili has an attractive voice, but it was difficult to feel that it was right for the role. Not only was her French unidiomatic, but vocal strength was very much tied to the lower end of her range; I could not help but wonder whether she would have been happier singing Tatiana, or even Olga. It did not help, moreover, that she looked more like Escamillo’s mother than lover; the moment when she awkwardly sat upon Don José was unfortunate in every respect. Verónica Cangemi had her moments as Micaëla; indeed, her third-act aria was the only time at which I was remotely moved. Nevertheless, there were too many moments of vocal harshness. Two Jette Parker Young Artists  made excellent impressions in smaller roles, however: the Moralès of Ashley Riches and Rachel Kelly’s Mercédès both had one looking forward to hearing more from them. Next time, all being well, in a more involving production and with a conductor who at least approaches a level of basic competence…