Paul Appleby at the Kennedy Center

Vocal Arts DC presented up n' coming tenor Paul Appleby with pianist Steven Blier last night, hot off his run in the Luisi-DiDonato-Urmana Ariadnes at the Met, where he is in the Lindemann Young Artist Development program (you want buzz? at least one parterre chat room lurker called out his Brighella during the b-cast last week).

Appleby boasts a warm, very fresh sounding tenor of moderate weight that is always appealing and frequently striking. In this rewarding program of off-the-beaten-path songs, he also demonstrated a wide ranging musical intelligence. Steven Blier, his voice coach and collaborator (nice profile by Justin Davidson here), served as a robust and fascinating partner at the piano, if the balance was perhaps a shade more competitive than I find ideal.

The opening set presented three unfamiliar Italian songs from Verdi, Mascagni, and Pedrotti. These were hard to dislike, given their natural fit for Appleby's voice and his engaging sense of Italian style. Yet, perhaps a casualty of their lead billing, his sound was also frequently unfocused and and a bit careless. The following two sets, songs by Zemlinsky and Roussel, were the meatiest of the program, and Appleby made a persuasive case--particularly in the anxious eroticism of the Roussel numbers.

Perhaps the strongest selections opened the second half, however--Latin American songs by Carols Guastavino, Carlos Lopez-Buachardo, Pixiguinha, Piazzolla, and Villa Lopez. Here Appleby offered an exquisitely controlled and seductive sound, as well as thrilling climaxes, as in the penultimate showstopper, Villa-Lobos' "Samba Classico". I find, when listening to vocal recitals, that the degree to which I ignore the translations can be a sort of perverse indicator of how well things are going: I can assure you I have basically have no idea what's going on in these Latin pieces.

Unfortunately, the American songs which closed the program were decidedly less successful. The one art song in the set, "Evening Song" by Griffes, was overstuffed and forgettable (not entirely Appleby's fault, to be sure). In the remainder, jazz/standard selections by Gershwin, Porter, Hoagy Carmichael and Thelonious Monk ("'Round Midnight" with appended lyrics) Appleby fell short of the crucial test for opera singers doing pop/rock/what have you: whether a reasonable person can forget they would rather be hearing a native pop/show interpreter doing the song. Appleby's voice didn't stop sounding great, of course, but his interpretations are as yet contrived--jazz/pop affectations artfully arranged rather than attempts at real communication.

Things did not improve in the two somewhat indulgent encores--a rather twee rendition of Bruce Springteen's "Fire" and a take on Paul Simon's "American Tune" that substituted generic pop dramatics for that song's haunting humility.

Update: Here's Downey in the Post with a mixed review (though not so bad as the title implies).

Iphigenie at WNO

WNO pulled out the big guns Friday for an Iphigenie en Tauride that was no doubt the most significant musical presentation of the season (not to downplay the many fine qualities in other recent shows, mind you). I've managed to see it twice before, in that celebrated Met Wadsworth version with Domingo, Graham, and Paul Groves, and the '06 Lyric run with Graham and Groves (which I remember as total dullsville production-wise though apparently I had some kinder words for it at the time)--but I'd venture that this outing made me appreciate anew what an incredible work it is. Some superficial flaws aside, this WNO revival makes an excellent case for the taut drama, involving psychology, and disarming music of Gluck's work. As Charles Downey's preview notes, this is a work that thrives the closer it gets to the sensibility of the Greek drama at its source. Where those afore-mentioned productions sometimes traded in heavy melodrama at the expense of clarity, the WNO production does a fine job of letting the plot unfold on the strength of the characters' own motivations and intelligence, and allowing the audience to really engage with the play.

Racette, in a role debut, sounds glorious in this music, if some of the trickier transitions are as yet a bit clumsy and the top thins a bit. This is a more thoughtful, reserved Iphigenie than Susan Graham's desperate refugee--the stern, almost desensitized authority Iphigienie must project in her public capacity clearly contrasted with her private anguish. The second act was gripping throughout, though I think she has room to dig deeper into the possibilities afforded by Iphigenie's arias in the first act, which were beautiful to listen to but somewhat perfunctory.

Shawn Mathey's Pylade turned in a fine first act, including a soaring "Unis dès la plus tendre enfance" (trans. "Oreste, I am totally gay for you"). He remained pretty committed through the second act (I imagine it is tough for most people not to seem just a bit aloof next to his stage bro), though vocally seemed to hit an increasing number of rough patches and was working awfully hard for it by the end. At his best he delivers a warm passionate sound, and his middleweight (vocal) size is a solid fit for the part, even if I find myself wanting something heavier at times.

And of course, Placido Domingo is onstage. I mean, there's just no getting around the fact that hearing him live continues, against all odds, to be one of the greatest gifts you can give to your ears (love this old Sieglinde post from the 2005 Met Walkure's intimating that the dark arts are at work). But even more than that, one pines for the immediacy of what he does with that big wonderful voice. On a stage of sensitive method actors, Domingo is old-school Hollywood--there's little chance of him disappearing behind Oreste, or Lohengrin, or what have you, but that doesn't mean what he's communicating isn't true. His tortured bravado, and the sad tender moments between him and Racette were the dramatic highlights of the evening.

As noted above, the dramatic action between the principals was well choreographed and communicated, and included some striking visuals like the red fabric representing the altar in the finale and the "blood" pursuing Oreste during his great monologue, though there were also a number of needlessly artsy/fussy moments. As choices go, the first act ballet was one of the more intriguing bits, a creepy interlude performed by four dancers in bathing suits and disco mirror caps plus a guy on hoof-like shorty stilts.

Before the half, the physical production flirted dangerously with the sort of unappealing hodgepodge concept we've been seeing a lot of here. But the second half brought enough successful moments to temper, if not entirely reverse, that assessment. The set is your basic "abstract antiquity" theme which, if somewhat static, gets the job done, and things vastly improved after the shiny black terrazzo wall that dominated the first half was retired. Costuming was a kind of lazy nondescript modern dress, trenchcoats for principals, sequined smocks for the chorus--you fill in the blanks. This sort of aesthetic muddiness doesn't really detract from the overall impact, but doesn't do it any favors either.

Oh and PS, if you are seeing the production, do note the whole aria Pylade does by the light of Marcellus Wallace's briefcase...

Update: Here's Anne Midgette's Post review...and Downey weighs in at DCist...and here's Tim Smith.

Aimard plays Liszt, Scriabin, Berg, Wagner

Had the chance to hear Pierre Laurent-Aimard live for the first time Thursday evening at the 6th and I synagogue. I know calling someone's approach "clinical" can imply you are accusing them of being a robot pianist, but it's really a compliment here, I swear. Aimard's masterful refinement of tone and color allow him to create insightful, intense readings full of precise detail.

Hearing Wagner's non-operatic music is always kind of disappointing in an interesting way (the Siegfried Idyll and to a lesser extent the Wesendock lieder excepted, of course). Aimard's placement of his Sonata in A Flat Major between two Liszt pieces (La lugubre gondola I and Nuages gris) brought those impressions into high relief. The takeaway: while in no way bad to listen to, Wagner's small bore pieces come off more or less like a Wagner-highlight CD, lots of unbearable priddiness and heaving, but very little of the magic that makes people really like Wagner. But played with Aimard's severe commitment, Liszt's pieces start to sound a lot like what Wagner's should, and what makes his operas so great--the sense of suspended time, the visceral power of the smallest detail, the reliance on overwhelming atmosphere rather than statement. The other two highlights of the first half was Berg's Piano Sonata No. 1, from which Aimard extracted many beautiful moments, and Scriabin's Piano Sonata No. 9, the "Messe Noire". Aimard plays Scriabin with little of the ephemeral, shadowy flavor to be found elsewhere, but what is lost in mysticism is gained in clarity.

The second half was devoted to the Lizst B Minor Sonata--my second hearing this Spring after Kissin's March recital. Where Kissin brought forward the Sonata's emotional sweep, Aimard seems wary of layering too much sentiment on top of this beast, and seemed most at home in its blackest most terrifying moments. Also, the finale was ridiculously impressive. No encores after that, though the audience certainly tried...

Update: Here's Charles Downey and Joe Banno in the Post...

The cost disease and classical music

Here's Greg Sandow on the "cost disease" afflicting symphony orchestras:

The principle -- generally accepted by economists -- is simple enough. Suppose you're a company that manufactures things (or, these days, contracts to have them manufactured). As time goes on, the manufacturing process gets more efficient. Productivity rises. So you spend less money to make more widgets.

This happens more or less through the entire economy. So we all (very generally speaking) get richer. (Obviously, I'm leaving out such factors as glaring income inequality, which normally I care a lot about.) Because we're richer, we can have things we didn't have before. Computers. iPhones. More sophisticated cars. More varied clothes and food. We take these things for granted. They're part of our lives. We expect to be paid enough so we can buy them. Which, if we work for a company that shows increased productivity, isn't hard for our employers to do.

But some big players in our economy get left out of this. These are institutions (very typically nonprofits) that don't show productivity gains. Orchestras, for instance. It takes just as many musicians to play a symphony now as it did 50 years ago. Or hospitals. Or universities.

Orchestras, in fact, are less productive than they were, because (see above) they need larger staffs, for marketing and development. And so orchestras fall behind the rest of the economy. Their costs keep rising, just everybody else's do. Just like General Electric, or Ralph Lauren, they have to pay higher salaries than they used to, so their musicians -- and the people on their staff -- can buy computers, and nicely varied food.

A nice summary of the notion, as articulated by its main proponent William Baumol in a 1966 book and subsequent papers, can be found here.

There's something seductive about this idea: a nice graph pops into one's head in which the cost line mercilessly rises past the income line, something like those graphs of Medicare spending if we don't get our shit together fast.

But some things also seem fishy. Like, just how long does this cost-death take, anyhow? Private symphonies and opera companies in some semblance of their modern administrative forms have been around for at least 150 years. Compared to other horror stories of obsolescence by productivity (banister carvers and carriage whip makers anyone?), that seems like a pretty balmy fate. Also, the crux of the cost disease argument seems to come back to the idea that industries which cannot improve the unit productivity past some point are doomed--once you can't reduce staff or increase product volume any further, rising wage costs mean you're dead in the water. Yet we seem to be surrounded by business models that would also fail this test, like any independent urban restaurant that is predicated upon the labor that goes into food production and service, rather than the simple distribution of increasingly cheaper foodstuffs to a larger audience.

Tyler Cowen touches on many of these issues in a 1996 critique of the "cost disease" notion here, focusing on a couple of key points:

1) In economist speak, the "cost disease" hypothesis posits that substitution effects swamp income effects, i.e., the desire to switch away from the low-productivity symphony sector to a higher productivity substitute dominates decisions. But a scenario where increased incomes cause individuals to consume more of the symphony sector, even if it is more expensive, is no less plausible.

2) Why should we assume that the symphony orchestra and other performing arts organizations are fundamentally incapable of increasing their productivity? Baumol's example which Sandow repeats--it still takes the same 50 dudes to play symphony x it did in 1780--seems far too narrow a way to conceive of the musical services a modern arts organization is capable of rendering with the technology available to distribute their product. Recordings, and recent developments in live broadcast, are the obvious innovations, of course. But consider as well the ways that modern travel and communications allow the most modest string quartet to tour the globe. Even the ubiquity of large modern concert halls represent advances in distribution.

3) Finally, Cohen argues that the "cost disease" hypothesis ignores improvements in product diversity and quality and illuminates nothing more than rising nominal costs. Today's orchestra has a few hundred years of extra repertoire to offer relative to that 1780 orchestra, and large improvements in the quality of performance that create real additional value for orchestra consumers--value that can't be easily compared to the 'value' gleaned from cutting the timpani section.

Obviously, performing arts organizations are having a hard time of it right now, and I'm not saying that any of these things are a silver bullet or "prove" that everything is alright. But the cost disease idea and its predictions of inescapable economic annihilation for the performing arts seem just a bit too convenient for those who indulge in classical music pessimism. Blaming the current troubles on theories about the economic exceptionalism of arts organizations rather than understanding them in the context of the larger economy seems counterproductive.

Update: Matthew Guerrieri has a great post on the "cost disease" here (and kindly links to the above)...

The New Walkure

So…about that Walkure premiere last Friday. Not a home run, music wise, but a lot going for it:

Voigt confidently meets the role’s basic demands (this premiere should really silence the shrillest doubters) and, for sheer vocal appeal, is clearly in a superior class than your Gasteens and your Watsons. But if her top notes can still capture that steely purity, further down the staff things grows hollow and pinched. More problematic was the fact that her reading Friday was fairly pedestrian; passages meant to bloom with careful dynamics came off as secure but blunt. Hopefully this is attributable to needing some time to grow in the part (and the run) and not a sign that the level of security she achieves comes at the price of the finesse that really makes the part exciting. Her Brunnhilde wasn’t quite as superficial as fall’s dramatically flat Salome’s in DC, but the overall impression just isn’t terribly authoritative as of yet.

As expected, Terfel is much better served by the Walkure Wotan than the Rheingold one. While that coveted “deity timbre” is clearly not on the table, and the spectre of barkiness can never quite be dispelled, his interpretation offers some undeniable pleasures, like a bitter, haunted Act II monologue and a melting “Der Augen Leuchtendes Paar” that reminded everyone why his casting seemed like a good idea in the first place.

Kaufmann and Blythe are the principles that really deliver without reservation. My small quibble with Kaufmann is that his Siegmund has lots of potential for a great portrayal but would benefit from a bit more freedom and lacked something in the seduction department (Jimmy wasn’t doing him any favors in the pit, mind you). That said, if you see him don’t say anything because with that remarkable voice he should clearly be owning Met Siegmunds for the next decade or so. Blythe is a total pro in this music and offers the complete Wagnerian package—her booming Fricka combined spine-tingling sound with jumbo-sized doses of spite and indignation (I was up against the wall in Fam Circ and could hear her rattling the paneling). Westbroek’s Sieglinde sounded excellent in the first Act but was apparently ill—her fancy cover was Margaret Jane Wray who drove things home with little missed.

Hearing the Met Orchestra play this music with all their exceptional precision and warmth is always a privilege, though Levine turned in a somewhat subpar performance on the heels of his riveting Wozzecks. The problems, as others have noted, were most pronounced in the first Act, which never really managed to catch fire as it should. One can take slower tempos in Act I, of course, provided the payoff is a richer experience of the score, but Levine’s heel-dragging was carried out in rigid four-four time, largely smothering any opportunities for the sensuality and abandon called for. Acts II and III picked up substantially, but I still could have used a little more feeling and sweep in the big Act III moments.

* * *

As far as the production goes: sorry, but I’m out. I wanted to be a good sport about this new Ring, and last night’s Walkure made a much bigger effort than the fall’s Rheingold, but it also proved just what a mess the thing is.

To go back to basics: an opera production follows a certain aesthetic or conceptual frame in order to highlight and enhance intellectual and emotional aspects of the piece in question. In some productions, your Chereau Bayreuth Ring for instance, the visual language helps to articulate a fairly specific interpretation (the industrial revolution setting driving the audience to consider the political and historical currents in the Ring). In something like the New Bayreuth productions of the 50s, severe aesthetic parameters encourage a dialogue with the Ring's past productions and challenge the audience to appreciate it anew without all the baggage.

Even the hyper naturalistic Schenk Ring is far from “neutral” in its production values—it delivers emotional impact by heightening the romantic use of nature that permeates the piece (e.g. Wotan is like an awesome mountain, Siegfried’s puberty is like a sunrise, etc). Its claims to authenticity are as much a konzept as anything, engaging the audience in questions about whether an “authentic” representation brings us closer to or narrows our experience of the piece. And, of course, whether “authentic” is even a worthwhile or possible goal.

The aesthetic of this LePage ring is: “making the big set machine look like whatever we can manage, hopefully pretty”. It is an anti-production, a production without an idea in its head, and unified only by the constant desperation to pull off pleasing looking things within the meaningless parameters of its physical materials. Its most ambitious claim is simply that it can be done—that it will live up to vague promises to astonish. The experience of watching it, waiting Gollum-like for the meager thrill of a spinning plank or fleeting sparkly graphic, is intellectually deadening—an astonishing conclusion to reach while watching a piece so rich with dramatic and intellectual possibility.

Yes, on the surface it seems to be going for some of the same territory as the Schenk production, and there are some nice looking bits to be sure, particularly the trees/snow setup for Siegmund’s opening run through the forest. But any gestures in this direction are just a convenient way to provide some cover for its empty soul. No one really aiming to present beauty and nature onstage—implying an experience that is seamless, elegant, and inspiring to look at—could justify mounting a production which routinely asks the audience to watch the unadorned planks in all their horrible nakedness.

With the needs of the machine reigning supreme, it is perhaps not surprising the extent to which the normal considerations of stagecraft are sacrificed or neglected in this production. The machine generally constricts the singers’ playing space to 10-15 feet between the raised apron and the whirling planks of death, and within this narrow band they are choreographed with a shoddiness embarrassing for such a major stage. Key blocking moments (i.e. the final Brunnhilde/Wotan moment) are played clumsily and have little emotional impact; elegant solutions of routine staging challenges (i.e. how to make Brunnhilde’s getaway at the end of Act II mildly plausible) are simply not attempted (she stares at Wotan’s back for 90 seconds from two feet away before slowly gathering her things and walking off).

Also, the lighting is bad—for long stretches the singers look like they are being illuminated by the Met’s work lights. Even when things are a tad more deliberate, the lighting design does little to evoke the dramatic locale or moment. Consider the Valkyrie horse gimmick: so, yes, the Valkyries each “ride” a plank that bobs up and down kinda like a big horse head. But that’s it. They are bobbing up and down on a uniform brightly lit set that does nothing to evoke a night sky or horses or whatever. The point of this “coup-de-theatre” is not to bring to life this improbable moment onstage—it is to “inspire” the audience to clinically examine the bobbing motion, determine it is like horses, and applaud. Theatrical illusions are supposed to awe by persuading the audience that extraordinary things (helicopters landing, cats flying tires, etc) are happening onstage—LePage’s Ring defines illusion down.

Another complaint: even more so than Rheingold, this Walkure features a number of moments in which one fears for the safety of singers or extras. That’s not to say they are sacrificing singers’ safety for the production—I’m sure everything is on the up and up—but it points to how the design team’s concerns lie with creating apparent thrills rather than real visceral excitement. Audience members may be impressed that you hung someone upside down 30 feet in the air, but if done poorly they don’t actually enjoy it. Take the final scene on the rock: stunt double Brunnhilde is shuffled to the top of the machine, gingerly laid down (attached to some kind of invisible harness) and then very slowly lifted to be upside down and vertical, to get the effect of the audience looking down on top of the mountain, with the whirring planks doing a poor imitation of fire on all sides. By the end of the whole clumsy set up, shown in excruciating detail with little sense of surprise, the audience is simply glad that not-Voigt hasn’t fallen to her death.

But I’ll stop there. I have no problem with a “traditional” Ring, and certainly not a “traditional” Ring that tries to get where it is going with novel means instead of papier-mâché boulders. But there needs to be a destination—some vision for the 17 plus hours of the Ring that gives it a life or meaning that could never be achieved on a concert stage. The disturbing thing about LePage’s Ring is that it isn’t derived from any vision for the Ring, but a narrow vision for a spectacle which isn’t even very spectacular.

Urban Arias III: Glory Denied

Before saying a word about the final Wozzeck performance at the Met last Saturday, I just want to give a shout out to Tom Cipullo's "Glory Denied", the last installment in Urban Arias inaugural season, which I neglected to review after the fact.

Suffice it to say, this was a great way to send off the first round of what promises to be a very enjoyable institution for DC. The piece, for a quartet of singers and chamber orchestra, deals with the story of Jim Thompson, the longest held Vietnam POW, and his wife, Alyce, who left him for another man during his captivity, and is a fine example of the dramatic and musical possibilities of the form. The cast led by Michael Chioldi in a commanding performance, made a strong impression as equal to both the dramatic as well as musical demands of the piece, while the orchestra under the direction of Robert Wood achieved fine balance with the singers without sacrificing the many interesting details in Cipullo's score.

If I could register two quibbles, they would be Jim's bitter aria on his return to a changed country--I'm sure one day the rhyming list of postwar cultural touchstones will be acceptable again but for now its hard to take these things seriously when it just puts "We Didn't Start the Fire" in your head. Here the gimmick seems too glib and out of place with the otherwise earnest, plainspoken libretto. Also, Urban Aria's otherwise efficiently and elegantly staged production suffered from a stream of intrusive, poor quality overhead projections. I get that this is tempting when dealing with quasi-documentary material, but it just never works, people.

Anyhow, looking forward to seeing what next year's season will be...

P.S. For a more detailed discussion of the opera, see this Parterre review of a Chelsea Opera production from the fall.

Urban Arias II: Green Sneakers

So, second evening at Urban Arias, for another piece by Ricky Ian Gordon entitled "Green Sneakers", was decidedly less successful than the first installment, though certainly a well put together production.

The show's problems largely have to do with Gordon's piece itself, a very personal meditation on his partner's death, and honest and serious work that is nonetheless limited by a fundamental mismatch between the content he draws on and how he executes it. The trouble isn't the music--Gordon's musical language here, call it "sentimental Britten" (I mean that in a nice way), is perfectly engaging on its own terms. But unfortunately it is a limited way to convey the dramatic material he is working with, a series of scenes from the period leading up to and following his partner's passing.

I'm afraid there's no way to do this without a lot of bad generalizations, but here goes. The musical language of opera and its derivatives communicates a lot of things well--desperation, ecstasy, what's on deities' minds--a result of opera's closer alignment to abstract music. Opera's strength, first and foremost, is direct communication via music (for this reason, opera librettos can suck pretty hard and not impair the overall effectiveness of a work). Does that mean dramatic content isn't important in opera and we'd do just as well to listen to Traviata with everyone singing solfege? Of course not. But the content exists more to signify a dramatic corollary to the music than engage us directly in its language and details, in the manner of a play.

Which is all well and good, but not very ideal when it comes to communicating highly specific, contextual emotions, like say, the mixture of resentment and pity that derives from being in a stupid mall shopping for athletic wear for your terribly sick partner when you really need to get back to rehearsals for the show you have opening, to take one of the poignant episodes Gordon describes. The image of this scene, not the music, is what is what is primarily memorable, and turning operatic firepower on that image just results in a lot of bluster where there should be simple, effective clarity. Fortunately, we have a whole art form that is attuned to just these situations: the modern musical theater song.

Now obviously there is a wide gray area between these "opera" and "musical" archetypes where the actual art gets made, so I'm not saying that the painful details of Gordon's work would be better expressed through showtunes or crappy imitation rock songs. But on the grand spectrum of drama + music, Gordon has chosen a position that is too abstract for the familiar, intimate details he has gathered, details that a style with greater focus on text and the accessible, specific emotional gestures of modern musical theater writing would excel at bringing forward.

I know there is a lot of baggage wrapped up in these claims and I really ought to go back to office work, but I'll mention one revealing moment near the end of the piece that cemented my thinking: Gordon's character sits at the piano and plays a scrap of piano melody that hews closer to a musical theatre sound than anything we have heard so far, and the emotional impact of the piece seems to click into place immediately, and makes us realize just how emotionally inert the rest of the piece had been up to this point.

Baritone Ian Greenlaw, who sang the role of Gordon's character, offered a likeable stage presence and warm baritone well-suited to the conversational style (although he strained noticeably at the upper end of his range). But in a story like this we need some sort of coherent personality to engage with emotionally, and in large part due to the issues described above, he simply never registered as a credible character. The dramatic effect of this is offputting, as the confessional details of the monologue become information conveyed by a third party, rather than the testimony of a specific person the audience can identify. The Adelphi String Quartet provided a reading of strong Gordon's score that demonstrated a lot of musical interest.

Excited to check out the final Urban Arias installment, "Glory Denied", on Sunday!

Urban Arias I: Orpheus

Imma be late to the party on this one. Saw the last perf of the inaugural show of a very exciting new development: a company called Urban Arias devoted to presenting chamber opera (mind you, this should not prevent anyone from naming their urban demographic-targeted romance novel the same).

So, it probably gets old when reviews of chamber opera always start with some fawning about the joy of hearing big time voices in lil' spaces, but for people who live in places where the motherlode of their operatic experiences occur in auditoriums that could credibly host professional basketball tournaments, the necessity of small-scale stagings like this "Orpheus and Euridice" by Ricky Ian Gordon needs to be acknowledged.

Gordon's piece, for soprano (Euridice), clarinet (Orpheus), and piano is distinguished most by the exquisite writing for its constituent parts--Elizabeth Futral's aching soprano and the remarkable emotional range of Todd Palmer's clarinet weave about each other and combine to thrilling effect. Gordon inhabits the unassuming musical language he lays out with great skill--but is this derivative or lightweight (Midgette makes note of such sentiments here)? One grows tired of interrogating every tonal piece of new music for whether it is sufficiently "hardcore", or *gasp* "Broadway". Suffice it to say that I think Gordon has very little interest in cheap musical appeal in this piece and every commitment to creating something that is both enriching and honest.

Experiencing Futral up close was a delight. This was a very fine vocal performance, but I was particularly struck by the quality of her overall characterization. I know there's been talk about opera singers' acting skills recently. But to some degree, the kind of acting available in a theatre or movie just isn't possible for opera singers, who must work through their voices and through gesture rather than characterization. But Futral demonstrated her ability to give both a compelling vocal performance and the kind of physical acting critical for a production like this.

Moreover, the stage direction (by Kevin Newbury) achieved precisely the level one hopes for in a work like this--understated in accordance with the modest forces but confident and inventive in its stage craft.

Butterfly at VA Opera

So, DMV opera companies (or at least 2) seem to be all about redeeming themselves with solid Butterflies this spring. And with the cherry blossom madness upon us (as indicated by the crappy traffic by the river and the chicken "cherryaki" on the Old Ebbits menu) what can one do? VA Opera served up a satisfying version yesterday, as driven by an excellent cast.

Sandra Lopez does not hail from the school of Cio-Cio San's concerned with producing a sound that always comes from a beautiful place, such as the Cio-Cio San Catherine Naglestad presented at WNO earlier this year (sorry, going to be that kind of review, its in my head). That means that her first act included a bit of a rocky warm-up and a Love Duet that was solid but not especially notable. But about three minutes into Act II, one realized how fully she was to own the emotional center of this show (as your Cio-Cio San should, of course, but there's a big difference between "should" and really doing it). With her chief weapon a throbbing, commanding upper register that fully embodies the tortured emotional swells of Puccini's score, Lopez created the kind of high stakes vocal (and emotional) intensity that Butterfly thrives on. I quibbled that WNO's Act III dragged a tad, but there was little danger of any dragging when Lopez was onstage--she is a vocal actress to watch.

Brian Jagde, heard at SFO in Vec Makropoulos in the fall, brought the most luxe voice to the cast, distinguished by a velvet middle and secure, passionate top, even if the journey up there is still a bit eager. His sound is a pleasing middleground between your slightly less than credible barnstorming Pinkertons and your super sweet lightweight Pinkertons--a combination of vigor and plushness that makes me eager to hear his Alfredo or Edgardo. I only wish his characterization had incorporated a bit more of the self confidence justly earned by that killer voice.

The rest of the principals were also noteworthy. Levi Hernandez offered a fine, lyrical Sharpless, and Magdalena Wor's rich mezzo imbued her Suzuki with the necessary gravity. The high musical standard was matched by the pit, where Joseph Walsh led the orchestra (members of the Richmond Symphony) in a reading that credibly plumbed both the sensitivity and savagery of the score.

If the WNO's Butterfly (sorry again) production exemplified the Butterfly-by-the-numbers aesthetic at its most elegant, the VA Opera was generally that same approach at its most serviceable, and risking garishness at times with great washes of pink and turquoise on the all white surface of the set. The periodic introduction of a large cherry blossom branch added some much needed texture.

Dramatic direction was solid, particularly in the choices of the blisteringly staged climax: Suzuki mans up and ends up handing Butterfly the knife, who doesn't kill herself until after Pinkerton's cries. He then runs in, rips down a screen, and finds her slumped over. But some of the more substantial indulgences didn't hang together. Points are due for allowing an actual curtain between Act II and Act III, and for the thoughtful choice of staging the instrumental opening of Act III as Butterfly's dream during the night. But the dream sequence didn't have much to offer in terms of interesting stagecraft--instead we get Trouble, and a dude in a suit billed as 'Future Trouble', chasing butterfly props (groan). The piece gives us just about enough of opera's most famous child prop to tug at our heartstrings without becoming total tripe--I'm afraid any more time spent pondering his fate just serves to dilute the main drama.

Pinnock Plays Landowska Tribute Show at LOC

I am trying to start this review without some dull generic observations about "the harpsichord" but that is proving difficult, so... It strikes me that it is very hard to lie on a harpsichord, which is a good thing. Yet the harpsichord as solo instrument suffers much the same fate as the organ in its accessibility to modern ears, i.e. neither gets a fair shake on record. To get into the harpsichord at length, you really need to hear it live, whereas a modern piano recording, if not the same as a live performance, is pretty persuasive on its own.

As for the program...Trevor Pinnock is just a delight, and peppered the concert with background on Landowska and fascinating introductions to the works. His playing is infectious and charming in a DIY sort of way. He finds the singing or dancing line in a piece and lets the rest coalesce around it. Also, he is not about to let a little gold leaf deter him from doling out the punishment that bad keyboard deserves.

Highlights of the program included a Handel Chaconne and Variations opener, picturesque pieces by William Byrd and contemporaries (Bells, Birds, that sort of thing), and a mid-17th c "Lamento" of Jonah Froberger that evaporated into an exuberant reading of the Bach French Suite No. 5. The second half featured some elegant French numbers and three Scarlatti sonatas, austere and grave on the harpsichord in a manner quite different from their usual impression on the modern keyboard.

Also onstage was one of Landowska's own pleyel harpsichords, a beast of an instrument with *4* sets of strings (the extra is basically a 17th c subwoofer) and somewhere between 6 to 14 pedals below. Like a harpsichord but with teeth. Pinnock demonstrated the instrument at the close of each half, and had a good chuckle with the audience over a number of false starts from difficulty maneuvering his feet (good sketch fodder for the nerdiest variety show ever, mind you). The effect when he eventually got it right was quite special though, adding additional dimensions of depth to the sound, to which he attributed some of the "grandeur" Landowska communicates in her recordings.

Update: Migette's review here, also check this very instructive matchup she posted of Landowska and Pinnock playing Bach. Downey has great resources here.

Brewer!

Christine Brewer, last noted for her much lamented disappearance from the last Schenk Ring cycles in 2009, and last heard doing some paint removal at Lyric Opera in their 2007 Frau Ohne Schattens, presented an extraordinary recital with Craig Rutenberg at the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater Wednesday.

This was really a highlight of the year, I think, so apologies in advance for any unpalatable fawning. The sheer splendor and depth of her voice, which, impressive from the back of the opera house, is exhilarating at close range, makes this a rather different experience than your regular thoughtful, tasteful recital. Brewer's pleasures are maybe just a bit passe: she delivers great art to be sure, but a key vehicle for that is the sheer visceral thrill of her generous instrument.

The program was an interesting mix of American songs. I loved the first selection, Gian Carlo Menotti's Canti Della Lontananza, though the interpretations did not always seem as polished as selections later in the program and there was some finding of footing during the first pieces. Rutenberg's playing was especially distinguished in the lovely piano part here, and by the final two songs Brewer had arrived in force. The other cycle in the first half was a knockout. The work, by a contemporary composer, Alan Smith, uses texts from the love letters of a soldier killed in World War II, and Brewer delivered a chilling and deeply moving performance. One moment that will not soon be forgotten: the text of the final song is a transcription of the telegram that announced the soldier's death to his wife--the sound that Brewer unleashed on "Secretary of War" is something very few singers are capable of, I think.

The second half had some trouble competing with the wrenching drama of the first, with more of a grab bag program. Rutenberg offered a nice selection of the piano music of Virgil Thompson as a segue to the final aria from Thompson's "Mother of us All", of which Brewer offered a towering, account. Then some Ives songs, by turns sublime (Shall we Gather at the River) and nutty (the Operahouse song).

The program closed with selections from a new Brewer CD, a tribute to encore numbers favored by divas past, i.e. Flagstad, Traubel, Farrell, etc. Some of these were a bit slight, but all fairly hard not to like. The bluesy Harold Arlen number, "Happiness is Just a Thing Called Joe" was perhaps the highlight, demonstrating Brewer's substantial abilities in theater/non-classical/etc songs. This kind of thing is so hard to do in a way that would ever convince a reasonable person they wouldn't rather be hearing a theater voice do it. Given all the firepower at her disposal, Brewer would be about the last singer I'd imagine successful in this material, but she pulls it off through some skillfull modulation of her sound and deep instincts about how to properly communicate these songs. This was confirmed in her second encore, a charming and remarkably unaffected rendition of "Mira" from the musical Carnival. The other encore was Ives' arrangement of "In the Mornin'."

Update: Midgette nicely captures what a pleasant and relaxed affair the whole thing was here.

More update: BTW, not sure where Midgette was going with her last graf quibble about this being a "not altogether stirring" evening in the review above. An inconsistent presentation, I'll grant you, but if this doesn't qualify as stirring for a vocal recital I'm not sure what does.

Downey has no reservations about what's up, and includes a ton of great links and context for the interesting selections on the program...

Boston in DC, sans Levine

Very nice program from the Boston Symphony Saturday despite Jimmy's unfortunate absence--Roberto Abbado did guest conducting duties instead, and Peter Serkin joined as a soloist for a program of Haydn, Bartok and Beethoven (a wholesale revision of the Levine program, I believe, but I'm not going to go digging out my old WPAS mailers). Hearing awesome orchestras that one has never heard before is always a treat, and Boston did not disappoint. Everything that separates the men from the boys was on display here: a distinguished sound with great depth, unerring balances, consistently fine winds and brass across the board, and skillz to spare when it comes to executing precision moves.

I find my reasons for liking or disliking lead-off Haydn (No. 93 in this instance) somewhat mysterious, but this I liked. Perhaps it was largely just my first chance to really hang with their sound for a while, but the whole thing had a gravity and deliberateness that was hard not to admire, though Abbado maybe let things get a bit four square at times compared to the more organic Haydn to be had elsewhere.

The Bartok piano concerto No. 3 was certainly the most eagerly anticipated thing on the program, but I'm not sure if it entirely succeeded. The first movement unfolded with a romantic heaviness that seemed at odds with the work--one need more of that mercurial Bartok flavor to really capture the flickering textures of the music. The second movement was closer to the mark--Abbado's glacial pacing and Serkin's solemn reading nicely capturing the elemental qualities of nature or folk people and stuff tapped into here. The finale was exhilarating to be sure, with some truly astounding playing by Serkin, though again, the propulsion seemed derived from sheer force of will, not Bartok's babbling rhythms.

After the half was Beethoven 5, and, well, you really can't go wrong with a great orchestra playing that, now can you? I will take this opportunity to reprint a bit of that famous E.M. Forster passage in case you haven't seen it in a while (extended passage at Sandow here):

"No; look out for the part where you think you have done with the goblins and they come back," breathed Helen, as the music started with a goblin walking quietly over the universe, from end to end. Others followed him. They were not aggressive creatures; it was that that made them so terrible to Helen. They merely observed in passing that there was no such thing as splendour or heroism in the world. After the interlude of elephants dancing, they returned and made the observation for the second time. Helen could not contradict them, for, once at all events, she had felt the same, and had seen the reliable walls of youth collapse. Panic and emptiness! Panic and emptiness! The goblins were right. Her brother raised his finger; it was the transitional passage on the drum.

For, as if things were going too far, Beethoven took hold of the goblins and made them do what he wanted. He appeared in person. He gave them a little push, and they began to walk in a major key instead of in a minor, and then--he blew with his mouth and they were scattered! Gusts of splendour, gods and demigods contending with vast swords, colour and fragrance broadcast on the field of battle, magnificent victory, magnificent death! Oh, it all burst before the girl, and she even stretched out her gloved hands as if it was tangible. Any fate was titanic; any contest desirable; conqueror and conquered would alike be applauded by the angels of the utmost stars.

And the goblins--they had not really been there at all? They were only the phantoms of cowardice and unbelief? One healthy human impulse would dispel them? Men like the Wilcoxes, or ex-President Roosevelt, would say yes. Beethoven knew better. The goblins really had been there. They might return--and they did. It was as if the splendour of life might boil over and waste to steam and froth. In its dissolution one heard the terrible, ominous note, and a goblin, with increased malignity, walked quietly over the universe from end to end. Panic and emptiness! Panic and emptiness! Even the flaming ramparts of the world might fall. Beethoven chose to make all right in the end. He built the ramparts up. He blew with his mouth for the second time, and again the goblins were scattered. He brought back the gusts of splendour, the heroism, the youth, the magnificence of life and of death, and, amid vast roarings of a superhuman joy, he led his Fifth Symphony to its conclusion. But the goblins were there. They could return. He had said so bravely, and that is why one can trust Beethoven when he says other things.

The first three movements were played beautifully, if without too many distinctive touches, besides perhaps a grittier sense of the drama in places. But Abbado's breakneck finale (with the BSO hardly breaking a sweat) was simply fantastic, irrepressible music-making, reminding all how much visceral power there is in this music, no small accomplishment given its familiarity. Walking out of the auditorium, I realized that the version on my ipod for a while now is some burnished Karajan snoozer and well, after hearing Beethoven like this, that just won't do.

Update: Downey a shade less enthusiastic about both the band and Abbado here. Given the comparison he draws with the NSO and BalSO ("the playing remained at a very high level...although not so far above our two local orchestras as one might have expected"), I would add that "boys" above is general and not meant to impugn any local teams. Downey also suggests that the problem might not have been less Bartok flavor, but rather inferior Bartok product.

Midgette is a more admiring of the Bartok and likewise measures Abbado's professional readings against Eschenbach's more emotionally involved approach here...

Goerne, Eschenbach, NSO in Zemlinsky

A quick note on last night's Lyric Symphony with Matthias Goerne, Twyla Robinson, and the NSO. And I shall only speak about the second half because I mistook the early start time for a 7:30 rather than a 7, and missed Eschenbach playing and conducting Mozart piano concerto something or other. I find the penalty box only barely acceptable for opera, and it is beneath consideration for something like a concerto, so I enjoyed a cocktail and the nice weather on the KC terrace.

The audience was on board, judging by some kind of encore that turned a half hour Mozart appetizer into a 50 minute first half, but I'm thinking Eschenbach is going to be around for a while, so there should be other chances to hear him play. And not that anyone is listening, but the unfortunate practice of programming Mozart as the least interesting thing on the program continues unabated. I get it, of course, and the reportedly abysmal attendance at last week's un-partnered Messaien just goes to show that unfamiliar works all by their lonesome continue to be box-office death. But I feel no good can come of making audience members attracted by more ambitious programming come to disdain Mozart because his works are the price of admission just to get to what they really came for.

Anyhow. Zemlinsky's Lyric Symphony is being presented as part of the Maximum India Festival which wraps up this week, as the texts for baritone and soprano are taken from a German translation of the Bengali poetry of Rabindranath Tagore. As you probably know, the musical language is right in that sweet spot of lush German early 20th century tonality, high on drama and sweep, with that big everyone-gets-to-play approach to orchestral texture akin to Mahler and Strauss. Eschenbach and the NSO certainly got the precision and depth of texture, but there was something lacking in the drama. I was sitting pretty close, I'll admit, but there was something a bit static in the dynamics and a tendency to drive the volume and pace rather than letting things play out naturally that detracted from the impact.

The biggest hook for the evening was Matthias Goerne, recently forced to bail on the upcoming Met Wozzecks for knee surgery, much to everyone's chagrin. Goerne needs no introduction of course, he brings a unique combination of vocal beauty and artistic intelligence to his work, and this is a great piece for him, showcasing his interpretive skills in a great range of settings, from the despondent opening song to frenzied heights and back again. Yet he remained credible and involving throughout while offering a number of beautiful moments. And of course, where many other fine baritones would descend into shoutiness in material like this, that Goerne magic keeps things buttery and on point all the way through.

Soprano Twyla Robinson was a strong partner, with an inviting sweetness to her voice and power where required. Her bio highlights work in Strauss and it was easy to hear how this would be a natural fit. She was less than convincing in places, particularly her first number about the "junge Prinz" but standing next to one of the preeminent recitalists of our time and dealing with kind of weird subject matter is not a recipe for success. I appreciated that she tried to incorporate some idiosyncratic effects to heighten the characterization, though some might not...

Update: Takes from Downey (including an appraisal of Eschenbach so far) and Midgette...

Kissin at the Kennedy Center

Evgeny Kissin brought some of the old-time magic to the Kennedy Center yesterday, in the all-Liszt program he is touring with (here's John von Rhein's take on the Chicago stop). One goes to a Kissin show expecting technical brilliance, of course, but comes away with so much more. In their finest moments, his concerts let you experience the overwhelming possibilities of the instrument in a way that no one, at least that I've heard live, can.

Kissin excels most in the work of the composers who are the true keyboard animals--hence his association with Chopin, and here, Liszt. This was a program to upend the preconceived notions of the Liszt averse, skeptical and indifferent alike. Kissin demonstrates the extraordinary breadth of this music and is able to exploit its reaches like few can, from surging rage to heart melting poignance.

He kicked things off with an aching Ricordanza from the Transcendental Etudes, followed by the main event--the B Minor Sonata--a consuming voyage that brought shivers and some less than dry eyes in the house, as well as some terrifying climaxes that no doubt ensured some overtime for the Kennedy Center piano tuner. The second half-opener Funerailles perhaps lacked some of the blackest recesses to be found elsewhere, but I was sold by the end. A deeply felt Valse d'Obermann followed, and was probably a personal favorite of the afternoon. Regulation play ended with three selections from Liszt's Venezia cycle, perhaps the least ambitious Liszt on the program, profundity-wise. Kissin demonstrates however, that if you're not utterly charmed and seduced by these pieces, someone is doing it wrong.

I was going to crib the identities of the encores from someone else but the reviews are slow in coming so I'll just have to admit that I can only call the last and most obvious one off the top of my head: a tender, valedictory Liebestraum.

Update: The coverage is starting to come in...here's Thomas Huizenga (NPR)...Tim Smith...Downey (who notes the other two encores as Liszt's arrangement of Schumann's "Widmung" and a movement from his "Soirees de Vienne")

Opera at the movies: Aida from La Scala

Caught that 2008 Zefferelli Aida w/ Bobby, Violeta Urmana, and like 10,000 other people at the West End Cinema here last night. It's on DVD here.

This is a sumptuously sung production. Urmana's virtues are well known, but the beauty of her voice here manages to awe nonetheless, demonstrating a creaminess that just don't quit. Unfortunately, her Aida is a tad whiny. Not that I don't want pathos, but when she starts to be a BUMMER I'm out. As for Bobby, I think we should all just agree that for whatever reasons "Celeste Aida" brings out the worst in his voice and that it doesn't matter because that is not really a great song anyway and everything that comes after is pretty spectacular. The shadow of that uncontrolled pingless hooty sound may lurk, but in stretches of riveting, unflagging passion like his 3rd and 4th Act scenes here it is all but forgotten. Ildiko Komlosi, who I don't know at all, offered a womanly, regal Amneris, and a great Act IV monologue and scene with Radames did some preemptive thunder stealing from the death scene.

The production is the Zefferelli joint that opened the 2008 season and it is some good red meat spectacular for the most part. But you know, there IS a line between opulent and busy, and this time out you find yourself somewhat desperately looking for the casino exit about 10 minutes before the end of Act II. I don't object to the shininess of the sets, though things do get a tad claustrophobic at times. The really berserker part is that Zeff decides to hang these metallic horizontal bars to frame the whole set, because, apparently, the absence of sparkly shit in the 40 feet above people's heads could not be allowed to stand.

The big dance numbers are...labor-intensive, but kind of a drag on video. This being Italy, they go all in for the black face, which is neither here nor there for the most part, but starts getting a bit absurd in the big Act II showpiece featuring legions of "Africans" in complicated masks and bodysuits. It looks a little something like this:

But then! Amidst all the mildly racist dullness, Roberto Bolle appears--no bodysuits need apply--and the next 10 minutes become the Roberto Bolle's rockin' bod show, ultimately scoring him bigger applause than any of the lumpy ol' singers:

The overall video production is superb quality, though as many have mentioned, there are a lot of "artistic" moments cut in of flowing drapery and soft focus closeups of all the fake-ass golden Phthah tchotchkes. I don't object to these shots when used judiciously, but it often gets ridiculous, as during the final scene, when the camera can't keep its attention focused on the oh so boring shadowy tomb set for more than 10 seconds at a time without switching to some supernumerary's gold lame arm netting. That annoying tic aside, however, the camera work offers a nice balance of closeups and full-stage views so you can soak in/OD on the magic.

Butterfly at WNO

Props to WNO for giving great Butterfly this evening, in what is definitely its most consistent production so far this season, due in great measures to a very exciting A-cast. Mind you, with two full casts of the main principals, plus another cast for the Young Artist program, this effort is veering close to La Boheme on Broadway territory, and future iterations may not fare as well--but whatever: tonight's lineup was the real deal.

Catherine Naglestad gets both thoughtful AND ravishing points for her Butterfly. This is a great voice for the part: she maintains a sweet edge and easy, very pure sound even when pushing the volume. But she also knows how to deploy great fx where appropriate, and had the audience in pin drop mode with her pianissimos on several occasions. If there are some money transitions missing here and there, she gives every reason to think they'll be added in time. Particularly appreciated the lovely, restrained reading of "Un bel di" and some very credible coquettishness.

Her fine partnership with Alexey Dolgov set the standard for the evening. Dolgov offers an awfully attractive light n' easy sound that makes for an extra insidious Pinkerton. I mean, it's one thing when Pinkerton is basically Cavaradossi in nice fitting trousers and belts you into submission--but an irrepressible, urgent, youthful sound like Dolgov's is the more devastating. At the curtain calls, the audience couldn't help but respond with some tongue-in-cheek boos. Michael Chioldi's Sharpless and Margaret Thompson's Suzuki were both first-class as well, rounding out a principal cast with nary a weak link.

Philipe Augin led the WNO Orchestra in a lush, sensitive reading, with energy only flagging a tad in the beginning of the Act III before recovering for a wrenching finale.

The elegant, tasteful production, from San Francisco, is really about all one needs in a Butterfly before one gets into the puppet children/floating lantern/Butterfly as space hooker territory. There are thoughtfully choreographed screens, a priddy raining petals moment, a big scrim in the back that does a dawn effect after the humming chorus and then goes red when she kills herself--it may sound like Butterfly by the numbers, but it is done with nuance and skill and the overall effect is fully satisfying.

One particularly nice touch is the slightly more explicit eroticism of the Love Duet. The screens part to reveal a starry sky and a modest twin bed--Pinkerton's classy contribution to the marriage chamber--and the blocking revolves around Pinkerton, in an increasing state of undress, sweetly cajoling her to get in the bed. It's a gentle choice but it makes the scene richer and more honest. With a chaste Love Duet, the sequence can seem false, given what the libretto clearly tells us about Pinkerton's motives, and you know, him being a douche and all. But the erotic moment has its own truth, and Puccini's rapturous music fills in the space between the naked facts of the story and the fleeting emotional world of the characters to create something real and poignant, even if we can already see the tragedy in motion. Also--when the Americans get back they are hanging out in the room with the bed which must have been REAL awkward for Kate.

Anyhow, very strong showing from the company tonight!

Nixon at the Met

Clearly a bit tardy on this, but wanted to say something for Internet posterity about Nixon in China, because it really is a marvelous thing. My familiarity with "new" operas is far from encyclopedic, but it's the first time I've seen an opera successfully use the language of the modern American theater--and the effectiveness of that marriage was something of a revelation.

Here is all the casual avant-gardism, fluid treatment of time, space, and relationship to the audience, artful synthesis of found and created text, and voracious historical appetite that defines so much new theatre in all but most retrograde Broadway enclaves. Language dominates this approach--it drives the imagery and atmosphere of the work and asks the audience to wrestle with not just a script but a text. Yet the song-based musical theatre, which prizes concision and surgical deployment of ideas, is not ideally suited to this medium. An operatic score, on the other hand, is a perfect complement to a dense, meandering text and can develop the complex, long form structures that serve such a fractured narrative.

Judging from some of the commentary, its interesting how frequently the piece's deliberate artifice is misunderstood--a symptom, I think, of a hesitance to accept opera's ability to perform at this level of sophistication. Opera's place in the modern musical theatre is strange in this respect: the most notoriously "artificial" of art forms is assumed captive to the dullest sort of naturalism (but, you know, with singing).

But Nixon takes seriously the possibilities of opera to go beyond simple narrative and allow its characters to describe a rich inner landscape and Goodman, Adams and Sellars use these possibilities to interrogate a very particular emotional space. The work tracks its characters as they turn inward in the face of a fundamentally artificial and impossible cultural confrontation. The fluidity of the operatic form allows for the constant disintegration and dissolution of the political and performative spaces they occupy. See the remarkable first Act scene between Mao and Nixon, in which Nixon's pragmatic American sympathies are dwarfed by Mao's all-consuming politics, scored by Adams with increasing grandeur and dread. Or the inspired gesture that closes Act II, in which the boundaries of the noxious propaganda ballet directed by Mme. Mao break down and the Nixons enter the performance, rendered bewildered and helpless by the alien politics and history they have stepped into. But the surprising third Act upends this dynamic--taking us into a fully interior space where the characters drift away from the political towards their personal histories.

The effect of the evening works on several levels--a provocative window into public and personal history, a meditation on our attempts to understand the world through politics, and a deeply affecting emotional observation of the central characters' humanity (not all good, obviously). In short, it demonstrates unequivocally how intellectually and dramatically rich a modern opera can be, and for that deserves what will hopefully become a permanent place in the Met's repertoire.

To digress for a second: so why did Dr. Atomic, a work with similar aspirations, suck so hard? First and foremost, there is the vast gulf between Goodman's carefully wrought Nixon libretto and Sellar's lazy hodge-podge of found sources for Dr. Atomic. Again, the text is dominant in a work like this, and the moment it sounds phoned in, or strikes a false note, as was the case with all that tangentially relevant Renaissance poetry Oppenheimer and Kitty kept singing to each other, the whole thing falls apart. Dr. Atomic also failed to have the courage to sustain the kind of non-naturalistic architecture of a work like this. Instead, Dr. Atomic kept returning to fairly standard "scenes" with arias that tried to advance the timeline of the story, wedged into a bunch of unconnected choruses and half-monologue type things. But this kind of hedging results in the worst of both worlds: a drama with little urgency, and a lot of elements that are confusing outside of an integrated whole. Finally, there is a certain postmodern-y sensibility that is key to this kind of work: a willingness to allow the audience to "discover" individual voices and histories as they emerge, and make their own connections. That's not synonymous with political even-handedness, as some have charged Nixon, but with the integrity of what is being presented. But Dr. Atomic violated that sensibility repeatedly with its morass of didactic messages (the nadir being that scolding Native American nanny, of course). A heavy moral hand is good for say, Tosca, but its death to a work that is trying to deal honestly with historical themes.

Musically, the Met performance left a bit to be desired but was generally very fine. Adams led a grand, persuasive reading of his score, though one left feeling some of its full power was not exploited. I'm still not clear on what the amplification situation was, but the balance between singers and orchestra was way off for much of the first Act. Maddalena started out with the vocal issues everyone has talked about, but they were a small price to pay for the kind of authority and depth he brings to this part. Kathleen Kim nailed the difficult Mme. Mao part but with some cautiousness which, from the old recording sounds, like it is part for the course in this role. I don't know if it is feasible, but I'm adding a Mme. Mao who can sing the part like the best Brunnhildes as an addition to my fantasy list. The rest of the cast was uniformly strong...

Joyce DiDonato at the Kennedy Center

Joyce DiDonato's KC recital last night reiterated (for anyone who has been living in a cave for the last couple years) that she is the real deal--a compelling interpreter and stage presence armed with an exceptionally pure voice and assassin-like technique.

She and collaborator David Zobel designed an interesting and well paced program that reminds one of the unique and refreshing programming freedom that vocal recitals enjoy. This was not to be a program based in the operatic repertoire with which she has taken so very many names (I like this flabbergasted Maury account of her 2009 Carnegie Hall show) but a song recital with operatic shout-outs that highlighted a broader set of skillz.

She kicked it off with some gauntlet throwing--the "Scena di Beatrice" by Haydn--that showcased the full range of her operatic abilities, sans opera. I suppose these sorts of pieces never fully satisfy in recital, but it was nonetheless a marker to be reckoned with. Next up was the first salvo in a series of selections showing off lesser known but very fine works of Rossini, which seemed aimed directly at any haters in the audience (guilty). Here was a lovely, thoughtfully observed quartet of Rossini songs, which DiDonato brought out with some knowing characterizations and beautiful phrasing. Here's Freni in the first selection, "L'invito":

She also dazzled in the next set, selections by a turn of the century French composer, Cecile Chaminade, especially the beautiful "Viens, mon bien aime!" and this virtuosic one about summer and birds (you can imagine).

The second half opened with some more unexpected and amazing Rossini: the treatment of the Willow Song for his Otello. This is a completely gorgeous sequence--what even is the rest of this opera like??? This selection probably included the most seductive music making of the evening--the tightly (but not excessively) controlled, successively quieter final passages had the whole house in rapt silence. Now, I don't want to sound like I'm making a lame reference to her Midwestern roots...but...arg here it comes...the thing about DiDonato is that her vocal power comes from a very pragmatic place. That means that things like soft high notes don't have the kind of head-swimming glamour they might elsewhere; instead there is a forthright precision that shocks in the coloratura stuff she is known for, while that earnest immediacy wins you over in things like the Composer (see below).

Everyone was excited for the following Reynaldo Hahn sequence about Venice, but these might have been the least persuasive. Not sure what the right approach is here, but she was taking a casual, veering close to pedestrian, tack that didn't offer much to draw one's attention. The final trio of Serenades (Pecci, Leoncavallo, and Di Chiara) demonstrated DiDonato's considerable charms--recital funny business is no easy task (combining as it does the terrifying nakedness of the art song recital AND standup comedy) and if not as carefree as her comedy on the big stage, she definitely pulled it off.

Zobel had what I think is the ideal touch for a collaborator in any recital setting. Ever aware of the need to complement the other instrument on stage, he never let the piano drift into the harsh tones and excessive dynamics which always turn jarring and distracting when competing with the solo voice. Not that the piano was static by any means, he drew a wealth of elegant colors to complement DiDonato.

She didn't get into the familiar operatic territory until the first encore, the last aria from Donna del Lago. Having already disarmed the Rossini skeptics in the audience with those interesting late songs, she reminded everyone why she is so (uniquely?) celebrated in this work--the ridiculous technique of course, but also the seriousness and dignity that she imparts to Rossini's music. The final encore was "Over the Rainbow", a gesture to the anniversary of Vocal Arts DC, which was about 75 percent deeply touching and 25 percent maudlin, which are pretty good odds for that kind of thing.

She also peppered the evening with a steady stream of earnest, endearingly twee banter, such that I'm thinking DiDonato may have a second career as an opera-show version of Delilah, which now that I think of it, seems to be all I've ever really wanted from the radio. Maybe the Sirius channel should start diversifying...

Update: Downey and Midgette also enthusiastic (she doesn't really inspire a wide range of opinions)...

NSO with Radu Lupu: Smetana, Beethoven, and Tchaikovsky

Heard the recent NSO program Thursday night. The bookends for this series, Smetana's Overture to The Kiss and Tchaikovsky's Manfred suite (yes, THAT Manfred) were robust if somewhat static demonstration opportunities for the orchestra, but more about them later. The Beethoven Piano Concerto #3, with Radu Lupu, was the real highlight of the evening.

What is that Lupu magic? One couldn't help but be taken aback by his first entrance--that distinctive sound, in which each exquisitely balanced chord says so much, immediately changes the terms of the performance from something satisfying yet familiar to something elusive and mysteriously beautiful. I struggle at times to really hear Beethoven's piano music afresh, and Lupu is a precious if very specific antidote to that problem. If others seek a mountain-traversing clarity in their Beethoven (or at least one that always has mountains on the brain), Lupu's strolls through the woods, ambivalent about weightier landscape issues.

But if that made for a fascinating central performance, it did not necessarily make for an integrated whole, with the NSO doing its part solidly but not really complementing the deep thoughts going on downstage. Lupu's engagement in return was sporadic, at times conducting a tad, at others suddenly picking out a woodwind with which to share a passing moment.

The opening Smetana piece was not terribly interesting, and I'll agree with Downey that the driving approach was not doing it any favors. I was pleasantly surprised by how engaged I was on the Tchaikovsky, though. It's a concert piece organized around some 19th century claptrap that's seriously risking irrelevance. The program notes seemed to be having a good time with this, helpfully offering some choice quotes from the original scenario, i.e., how the second movement illustrates when "the alpine fairy appears to Manfred in the rainbow of the waterfall" and then how the third brims with the sounds of "the life of Alpine hunters, full of simplicity, good nature and a patriarchal character" (I'm thinking they vote Republican). But 21st century snark was no match for Tchaikovsky's skill in writing irresistible theater music. And Noseda, who clearly brought some of the abilities that have distinguished his work in the opera house to bear, led an earnest, relentless reading that was hard to dismiss in all but the most indulgent passages.

Flatness

I was lazy about mentioning at this time, and moreover, I wasn't at a live show so what do I know--but it looks like Sieglinde protested here and here against all this ragging on SRad for being flat and I feel compelled to provide some solidarity.

Look, people: ragging on singers for being flat who otherwise give great performances is just lame. Are you Sondra Radvanovsky's rehearsal pianist? Do you have to sit next to her at choir? No. Then I guarantee whatever minor, subjective flatness you're hearing is not that big a deal to you. Obviously, I'm not saying that noone has pitch problems, but there's a difference between pitch problems that are obvious and pitch problems that only you and a handful of other people with magic bat ears like yours can distinguish. Pointing out the former is fair game, but one should think long and hard about how maybe so-and-so's voice just sounds like that before going to press with the latter.

WNO Announces

Hrm. I guess we'll just agree to call this a retrenchment season:

• Tosca (Dallas): Racette/Ushakova, Porretta/Hughes Jones, Held/Hendricks; Conductor Domingo/Gursky
• Lucia (ENO): Coburn/Petrova, Pirgu/Dolgov, Chioldi/Mulligan, Palazzi/Pecchioli; Conductor Auguin
• Così ("Seattle"): Futral, Pokupic, Prieto, Tahu Rhodes, Shimell, Kemoklidze; Conductor Auguin
• Nabucco (New): Vassallo, Boross, Panikkar, Chauvet; Conductor Auguin
• Werther (TBD?): Meli, Ganassi, Foster-Williams, Robbins; Conductor Villaume

On the rep and personnel front: it looks like the one A-lister of the season will be Pat Racette in the opener (at least out of the pit--I guess for consolation we get more time with Plastico on the baton). Slightly less boldface names include a welcome Alan Held as Scarpia and Futral and Teddy Tahu Rhodes in Cosi--I find Futral solid and look forward to hearing TTR in person so that's cool. I also note that Sean Pannikar who did a great Narraboth in the fall is back in a bigger role for Nabucco. Have really been enjoying Auguin so far so it will be nice to hear him conducting so much. Rep choices obviously leave some variety to be desired: all Italian with just the mildest respite in Werther (and Cosi).

On the production front: I'm personally looking forward to seeing Nabucco and Werther on stage for the first time. Speaking of Werther, that TBD production is ominous--this company WILL get a production to the stage by any means necessary but "Werther: IN CONCERT!!!" just doesn't sound as fun. The Nabucco production is by the team who did Hamlet the other year, which is not hugely promising. There were some intriguing moments in that show but the more I think about that production the more I feel like it was exercising its freedom to look cheap and ugly without any real ideas to redeem it (and no, updating to a nondescript fascist period is not an idea anymore). The Cosi is that modern-dress Jonathan Miller production that has been making the rounds for years (much to the chagrin of some people). If the company can overcome any alleged suckiness in the production and bring the same sense of humor and light it brought to Nozze last year, that could be a season highlight.

So, no obvious stinkers to leave out of a subscription (better than this year for me--I am still on the fence about Pasquale). That said, I think its safe to say DC isn't going to be a destination city for opera travelers next year. People seem willing to get on board with some curtailed ambition for the time being (i.e. Midgette is more forgiving than I would have expected) but WNO PR Department, please use this season as an opportunity to get everyone juiced up about future seasons, m'kay?

BSO at Strathmore (Haydn/Sierra/Brahms)

Saw the Baltimore Symphony Orch (for the first time actually) at Strathmore last night--no Marin Alsop tho, the conductor was Spaniard Juanjo Mena.

The first offering, Haydn's "La Reine" symphony was what it was. Nicely put together, priddy, and ample opportunity to think about what I was going to eat after the show. The kind of Haydn that makes me think impolitic thoughts about how maybe our HIP commissars are right and this kind of thing should really only be performed by their approved bands.

A new work, "Sinfonia. No. 4" by Roberto Sierra was quite promising. Sierra trades in rewarding, densely clotted textures driven by a disjointed momentum which uses Latin-identified rhythms for its raw material. The third movement, with its haunting combination of piano and woodwinds was especially memorable. The boisterous finale, in which the percussion came to the fore, was plenty satisfying, but I fear at times Mena wanted it to "groove" more than was really warranted. Much of the power of Sierra's work lay in the tension between these rhythmic fragments, while by the end Mena seemed all to eager to lay down a backbeat and be done with it. Oh, and the brass sounded a little anemic for what one would want in that go-for-broke finale.

The Brahms violin concerto was less convincing, I'm afraid. Mena and the BSO seemed to fall victim to that surest death for all Brahms concertos: treating the orchestra like mere accompaniment. Because when you go to a Brahms concerto, and the man is throwing all the weight of the previous century of concerto making into one big 1000 ton statement, you want to see a fight, right? Well this was more of a polite accord. The big foolproof moments couldn't help but inspire some awe, but otherwise the orchestra always seemed a hair too slow or marred by four-square conducting that leeched much of the life out of the piece. Soloist Augustin Haedlich proved on several occasions that he was capable of the right sensibility (including a badass Paganini encore) but these were isolated incidents. Not sure if the tempo was holding him back or what, but in this piece you need to DIG IN and he never quite DUG.

The paranoid style in cultural commentary

Probably the most offensive thing about this column by Neal Gabler is simply that such an amazingly lazy column could make it into a paper. The argument, about how grassroots democrats are throwing off the shackles of elite taste dictums by not keeping the new Jonathan Franzen book on top of the bestseller list, and how this is also a victory against the tyranny of booooorrrinnggg classical music, or something, is ably and justly busted by both A. Ross and A.O. Scott.

So no need to pile on anymore there. But it is a nice reminder of the strange bedfellows inspired by this kind of thinking. Gabler, judging by writings like this, is no conservative, and I expect he would see little common cause with the dominant conservative rhetoric about "elites", with its suspicion of science, other cultures, vegetables, and of course, pervert art. The disdain Gabler is tapping into (albeit rather clumsily) is left-identified, rooted in an anti-authoritarian impulse to upend the fusty dominant culture that seeks to assert its superiority as a means to suppress authentic experience.

But that doesn't make it any less problematic. People on the left are supposed to have a real analysis about culture and power, but it doesn't work when you just substitute a bunch of posturing and neutered carping about culture you don't enjoy, while blaming a bunch of people that have little actual control. Indeed, Gabler is trafficking in the same rhetoric that allows conservatives to redefine class as a simple matter of aesthetics and cover for the social, political and economic interests who have a real incentive to define culture. Not helpful.

Dept. of nice use of opera similies

Josh Marshall, on liberals' tendency to view politics as an inconvenient sideshow to "real" policy debates:

Democrats often console themselves that even when they don't win elections, usually their individual policies are more popular than those of Republicans. Too bad you can't elect a policy. It's true for instance that Health Care Reform -- which still has more opponents than supporters -- is pretty popular when you ask people about its individual components. But why is that? It's not random, because that pattern crops up again and again. It's another one of the examples where liberals -- or a certain strain of liberalism -- focuses way too much on the libretto of our political life and far too little on the score. It's like you're at a Wagner opera reading the libretto with your ear plugs in and think you've got the whole thing covered.

Mattila on Marty

If you've ever spent time trolling the Internet for Mattila content, you've probably come across this 2003 interview. Love this little digression on what she finds interesting in Slavic characters, esp. in light of her triumph as Emilia Marty:

CV: You have sung to universal praises a lot of strong and interesting female roles from Slavic operas.

KM: Pardon me for interrupting, but Slavic female characters are weak as well as strong. They are simultaneously weak and strong. What I admire in them is that their strengths and weaknesses can be so openly performed and conveyed and needn’t be hidden or covered by a veil of simplicity, innocence and purity. They do not act as others expect them to. Everybody is able to create decent characters which are extremely boring from a performer’s point of view. It is difficult to create true characters and what I admire in Slavic female roles is the truthfulness of their strengths and weaknesses. There are also various open endings which the audience must sort out when they return home from the opera house, such as in Jenufa. I enjoy this unfinished quality in movies and theatre plays too.

Mattila in San Francisco

Finally getting around to saying a word about the last performance of SFO's splendid Vec Makropulos, as my extended "telework" Thanksgiving has resulted in a lot of karmic retribution in the form of office work (which is surely the cruelest karmic retribution of all).

Mattila as, um, Floria Tosca (hope audiences weren't confused when EM didn't stab anyone).

But first a very special thanks to the SF blogger contingent I got to meet before the show (in attendance were the respective authors of Reverberate Hills, the Standing Room, and Civic Center), all on account of Lisa Hirsch's hosting skillz. Meeting, in person, those regular civilians who have wowed and touched you over the years with their prose is a particularly enjoyable and special phenomenon of the Blogging Period of the Internet Era, I think.

And speaking of special phenomena...

So, until I heard it was happening, the idea of Mattila doing Emilia Marty hadn't really crossed my mind for some reason. My only reference was the Anja Silja DVD, and that kind of thing doesn't really inspire daydreaming about who else would be good in something.

My b.

I think I've read this in every review, but it is such a visceral impression for those who like their Mattila that it bears repeating: this part is an obscenely good fit for her talents. The unifying motives of innocence and penance found in the damaged ingenues of Jenufa and Ka'ta are absent here. Half the time, Marty doesn't know why the fuck she does what she does. After 300 years, she is a clutter of emotions and impulses, a junkyard of wants and reactions. Mattila owns this madness, bringing all the gross schizo stuff celebrated in her Salome to bear on the Second Act sequences. Yeah, and the whole thing is done in this ridiculous harlequin outfit and skullcap. Please future productions, never let her do this in a cocktail dress.

But Mattila's great advantage lies in the number of ways she has of unifying characterization and voice, the number of ways she has of being on the stage. After watching Marty flail against the world, her remarkable turn in the third act, to reject further life, is simple, modest, and radiant. It doesn't hurt either that we get one of the most glorious unbroken stretch of Janacekian lyricism to be found in any of his works, which just happens to lie in the sweet spot of her voice.

It's exciting to think how much more she might grow into the role between now and the New York shows. The chatty first act material is not yet quite natural, I think, and polishing things like this will round out what is already a bona fide triumph.

Great accolades should go to SFO (and the Finnish National Opera) for mounting such a strong production around her. The singing and acting throughout the rest of the cast was very solid, though there was a lot of variation in ability to cut through the full-throated level maintained by the orchestra through many of the chaotic group scenes. Miro Dvorsky made a passionate case for the great Janacek tenor role of Gregor, though I would like to hear someone in the mode of a warmer-voiced Steva type in the part. Gerd Grochowski also stood out as a commanding Prus.

The production is a handsome black and white number with good functional solutions for the three settings, especially the first act law office. As mentioned above, Mattila's costuming is genius--when not in the harlequin getup, she looks normal amazing, particularly the evening gown in the last act.

Finally, we must note the great playing in the pit under Jiri Belohlavek, the same man who made Mattila's last Jenufa run so memorable. Precision of texture, lusty momentum, and great emotional pathos were all delivered as hoped.