Madama Butterfly, Deutsche Oper, 29 March 2015

Deutsche Oper, Berlin

Cio-Cio San – Hui He

Suzuki – Jana Kurucová

Kate Pinkerton – Stephanie Lauricella

Pinkerton – Fabio Sartori

Sharpless – Elia Fabbian

Goro – Gideon Poppe

Prince Yamadori – Jörg Schörner

The Bonze – Marko Mimica

Imperial Commissiner – Carlton Ford

Official Registrar – Thomas Lehman

Mother – Martina Metzler

Cousin – Saskia Meusel

Aunt – Keum-Shin Kwon

Child – Birte Weigelt

Pier Luigi Samaritani (director, designs)

Gerlinde Pelkowski (revival director)

Chorus of the Deutsche Oper, Berlin (chorus master: William Spaulding)

Orchestra of the Deutsche Oper

Yves Abel (conductor)

For an evening off from the Staatsoper’s Festtage, I walked a little further up Bismarkstrasse to the Deutsche Oper, to see a revival of Pier Luigi Samritani’s Madama Butterfly. There is obviously no point in comparing the first night of a new Parsifal with such an instalment of the Deutsche Oper’s ‘Puccini weeks’, but by any standards, this very different evening did not do badly at all. There is not a great deal to say about the production; it looks very much like the other two productions I have seen of the work. (How I should love to see something different: say, Calixto Bieito’s staging for the Komische Oper!) But it does its job well in ‘traditional’ terms, and on this occasion, its 137^th performance (!) since the premiere, benefits from keen revival direction by Gerlinde Pelkowski. Lovers of what might be called ‘conventionally beautiful’ Puccini stagings will be delighted, and doubtless will have been already. I am less sure about the use of sheets – often a device in such productions – which tends a little towards the bathetic, but it is not difficult to live with, even so.

Attention, then, is focused firmly on the musical performance, and especially on the singers. Yves Abel conducted the orchestra ably, without making any particular points. It was not the most symphonic Puccini I have heard, and certainly not the most modernistic, but by the same token, continuity was achieved. The orchestra could hardly be faulted, and I have no desire to try. When really given their head, the strings sounded gorgeous, the perfect compliment to a decidedly ‘traditional’ starring couple.

By that, I mean that these were big voices, employed to general audience delight. Hui He’s Cio-Cio San offered enormous dynamic range, sensitively deployed, although in the spirit of charity, I shall pass over her diction. Fabio Sartori’s Pinkerton was similarly ‘old school’, perhaps still more so. He will certainly win no prizes for his acting, but he showed that, in such repertoire, he would not be shamed by comparison with the starriest of Italian tenors. The first-act duet was, in musical terms, close to everything one might reasonably have hoped for. Jana Kurucová’s Suzuki was subtler, offering welcoming relief: a credible, indeed sympathetic character portrayal in its own right. Elia Fabbian’s Sharpless presented equivocation through musical strength: not the easiest achievement to bring off. Gideon Poppe’s Goro showed an alert stage as well as musical animal. I suspect we shall hear more from Stephanie Lauricella, the Kate Pinkerton. (I know she has little to sing, yet always find myself surprised by quite how little!) A highly creditable evening, then, for all concerned. I only wish the opera itself were a little less offensive and a little more ambiguous…

La traviata, Royal Opera, 8 July 2010

Royal Opera House, Covent Garden

Violetta Valéry – Angela Gheorghiu
Alfredo Germont – James Valenti
Giorgio Germont – Željko Lučič
Baron Douphol – Eddie Wade
Doctor Grenvil – Richard Wiegold
Flora Bervoix – Kai Rüütel
Marquis d’Obigny – Changhan Lim
Gastone de Letorières – Ji-Min Park
Annina – Sarah Pring
Giuseppe – Neil Gillespie
Messenger – Charbel Mattar
Servant – Jonathan Coad
Ladies and Gentlemen, Friends of Violetta and Flora, Guests, Servants

Sir Richard Eyre (director)
Bob Crowley (designs)
Jane Gibson (movement)
Jean Kalman (lighting)

Royal Opera Chorus and extra chorus (chorus master: Renato Balsadonna)
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Yves Abel (conductor)

This was my first Verdi performance in the theatre for thirteen years or so: I must have been the least jaded of critics for the opening night of the revival of Sir Richard Eyre’s La Traviata. Benjamin Britten was said to listen to the music of Brahms once a year, to remind him why he loathed it. (Oddly, however, there is a recording of the op.52 Liebeslieder Waltzes from Aldeburgh.) In a similar spirit, although on a considerably broader timescale, I considered that it would do me no harm to put my prejudices or judgements to the test.

There would be many worse ways of doing so than seeing Angela Gheorghiu as Violetta. I had not actually heard her in the flesh before and was a little surprised as to how small her voice is. She made it work though, so that it could be heard perfectly well even when singing pianissimo. Her coloratura was, so far as I discerned, flawless, no mean feat. I recall watching this production on the television as a schoolboy, the first run under Solti which really made Gheorghiu’s name. She obviously does not look – or sound – so young now, but this remains still a fine vocal performance. In terms of playing herself on stage she is also clearly without peer; Angela Gheorghiu is a role one is tempted to think she was born to play. Certainly one had the impression, rightly or wrongly, that her movements, her expressions, pretty much everything she is doing – all these are very much her own thing.

Given the conservatism of Eyre’s production, and especially of Bob Crowley’s designs, that is not necessarily so bad thing. Zeffirelli with a slightly lower calorie count doubtless appeals to some even on this side of the Atlantic, but there is suspension of disbelief and then there is the size of Violetta’s bedroom in act three of this production. Otherwise, the costumes look beautiful and so forth, but it is really only the presence of the soprano that grants any sense of theatre at all: ironic, since that then reinforces the idea that opera should be about star singers and therefore about works like this, and a vicious, doubtless highly commercial circle ensues. I can only assume, moreover, that some deal had been struck with the Association of Consumptives, for the state of the audience made poor Violetta seem hale and healthy.

James Valenti looked good as Alfredo and sang ardently, but often wavered in intonation. There was strength in the singing of Željko Lučič as Germont père, though his stage presence was somewhat wooden (how much is the production at fault here?) and his style sounded just a touch incongruously Slavic. The choral singing was excellent, for which thanks must once again go to Renato Balsadonna and of course the Royal Opera Chorus itself. And the orchestra played beautifully, Yves Abel directing unobtrusively but not without character.

There remains the work itself. I tried, but the esteem in which it and Verdi’s œuvre in general are held continues to baffle me. Puccini can be mawkish, Rossini can be shallow, but there is a degree of craftsmanship to be heard and admired there. Verdi seems to combine the worst aspects of both, standing perhaps slightly above Donizetti, but that is all. The orchestration is often rudimentary – though, as I said, the orchestra made the most of what it had. Harmony is uninteresting and the accompaniments – the word for once is apt – are often so derisory. And then there is the ‘tart with a heart, transfigured’ tale: does it go beyond the level of a women’s magazine story? I fail to see how – and it now seems utterly dated, not least in its attitude towards gender. Just when one thinks there might be some psychological insight, the music of the pizza parlour returns. The ‘tunes’, memorable because one hears them so often, are rarely integrated into the musical texture, such as it is, let alone into the drama, such as it is. Given the lack of musical interest, surely a more adventurous production might alleviate the ennui. Regietheater seems a necessity here. Were this a neglected work, one could understand someone thinking it worth a try, but a staple of the repertoire? Some people might, for a variety of reasons, dislike Wagner; but being something other than Wagner is not in itself a guarantee of anything. As Pierre Boulez once put it, Verdi is ‘picture-postcard music’. He said that he would prefer to see a whole landscape; the same goes for me.

Carmen, Deutsche Oper Berlin, 8 March 2009

Images: © Bettina Stöß

Carmen – Angelika Kirchschlager
Frasquita – Anna Fleischer
Mercédès – Julia Benzinger
Micaëla – Michaela Kaune
Don José – Massimo Giordano
Moralès – Andrew Ashwin
Zuniga – Ante Jerkunica
Escamillo – Raymond Aceto
Remendado – Thomas Blondelle
Dancaïro – Jörg Schörner
Lillas Pastia – Marek Picz
Andres – Jan Müller

Peter Beauvais (original director, 1979)
Søren Schuhmacher (revival director)
Pierluigi Samaritani (staging and costumes)
Ulrich Niepel (lighting)

Children’s Choir of the Deutsche Oper Berlin (chorus mistress: Dagmar Fiebach)
Chorus of the Deutsche Oper Berlin (chorus master: William Spaulding)
Orchestra of the Deutsche Oper Berlin
Yves Abel (conductor)

This was to have been a new production of Carmen at the Deutsche Oper, the first since 1979. Sadly, illness on the part of director, Jürgen Gosch intervened, so the house was compelled to revive, under Søren Schuhmacher, Peter Beauvais's thirty-year-old production, with not so much as a Konzept in sight. Reactionaries and cynics would doubtless wish, or at least claim to wish, that such a setback might happen more often, but I am afraid that the prettified naturalism of the sets looked, unsurprisingly, tame and dated. Maybe I have been corrupted by my experience, good or otherwise, of more adventurous modern productions; this, however, seemed more akin to the world of musical comedy – and not in the original sense of the Paris Opéra Comique. Nothing was harmful; by the same token, there was no especial insight afforded into the work. The production had its moments. Costumes, particularly the soldiers’ uniforms, were well designed. The dark mountain setting for the third act was considerably more effective than the other mises-en-scène. I thought the crowd scenes ably directed, something one certainly cannot take for granted in terms of contemporary stagecraft. It was good to have no apology made for twin bêtes noires of liberal fascism: cigarettes and bull-fighting.

The management of the Deutsche Oper had of course been place in an impossible position; this course was certainly far preferable to cancellation. Those who lament current directorial trends could do worse, however, than sample a few precursors and to recognise that it takes a producer of true genius – Patrice Chéreau springs to mind – to present something that will not quickly date. Better this, however, than the mindless populism of Francesca Zambello’s ‘West End spectacular’ approach for the Royal Opera; quite apart from the latter’s sheer untimeliness, at least with respect to anywhere east of the Met, it inflated Bizet’s opéra comique into something quite alien. There was, in general, an intimacy to the Beauvais-Schuhmacher production that worked well on its own terms.

Angelika Kirchschlager’s Carmen would, I suspect, have been the principal attraction for much of the audience, even had this not been a revival. There were a few moments in which she let her acting get the better of her vocal skills, but hers remained a keenly observed portrayal. Indeed, for the most part, stage presence and singing could not be disentangled, which is just as it should be. There was sexiness aplenty in the first two acts, without ever descending into a loss of dignity. Moreover, one could feel keenly the fatal transformation in Carmen’s character by the fourth act. Massimo Giordano projected both ardour and weakness as Don José. His is an impressive voice although, in repertoire such as this, he would do well to suppress the Italianate sob that too frequently intervened here. Still, one could readily relate to his anguish, even if it occasionally veered a little close to melodrama. Michaela Kaune offered a beautifully sung Micaëla. The smaller roles were generally well taken, Andrew Ashwin proving an especially winning Moralès; his career should be one to watch. And the children’s chorus was deservedly cheered; this was an estimable contribution indeed. The only real disappointment was Raymond Aceto’s Escamillo. Although he had a certain swagger on stage, it was never matched by his generalised vocalism and sometimes uncertain intonation. It was difficult to understand why Carmen might have chosen him.

Yves Abel handled Bizet’s score well, if without the fire that marks out the more notable interpretations. Care had clearly been taken to make the orchestra sound credibly French, not least when it came to some delectable woodwind solos. A notable instance was the flute solo in the second entr’acte, although sadly a sustained barrage of coughing ruined what should have been a truly magical atmosphere. Abel showed sound judgement in eschewing Ernest Guiraud’s once fashionable recitatives in favour of the original spoken dialogue. The conclusion, however, was disappointingly low-key, seeming rather to fizzle out from exhaustion. This was not a Carmen for the ages, but it marked an impressive debut for Kirchschlager and, especially given the difficult circumstances, should be accounted a success for the company.