20 Jan 2008
STRAUSS: Der Rosenkavalier
Of Rosenkavaliers on DVD, the classics tend to be lovingly detailed productions, going back to the film of Herbert von Karajan leading an exemplary cast, with Elizabeth Schwarzkopf's iconic Marschallin.
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Le Monde Reviews Lamento
Cela arrive rarement, le souffle coupé dès les premières notes. Une minute entière à retenir sa respiration dans une apnée d’émotion totale pour recevoir la première phrase du Lamento pour contralto, de Johann Christoph Bach, d’après les Lamentations de Jérémie, son ascension douloureuse, ornée de sanglots, puis les deux accords d’une longue plainte instrumentale, avant l’entrée, magique, de la voix de Magdalena Kozena. “Ach, dass ich Wassers g’nug hätte.” “Ah, si ma tête était remplie d’eau, si mes yeux étaient une source de larmes.” L’insouciance a été jusqu’alors votre lot ? Vous, toi, nous tous, pécheurs, allons connaître ce que pèse le lourd fardeau de nos iniquités – et la récompense de cette connaissance : 7 minutes 22 d’une pure splendeur musicale.
MOZART: Le Nozze di Figaro
Recorded in Tokyo on October 23, 1963, this live recording of Nozze di Figaro boasts fine sound, a top cast, and the leadership of a conductor of great skill and experience. The label, Ponto, has joined the ranks of such other companies as Opera D’oro and Gala in making available broadcast and in-house recordings at affordable prices. Sometimes these releases are not even worth the modest price asked for; this one may well have more to offer than higher-priced studio sets. After a slightly hesitant first few moments, the sound quality settles down and becomes admirably strong and well defined. There is relatively little stage noise, the voices have a natural presence without being too forwardly placed, and Böhm’s orchestral control can be relished. His may be an old-fashioned reading, but it never lags or lacks for humor or beauty. The audience can be heard laughing from time to time at the stage antics; applause only interferes with the musical pleasures at the end of Non piu andrai, when unrestrained clapping covers a bit of Böhm’s ironically happy martial send-off.
WAGNER: Tristan und Isolde
Elsewhere on Opera Today readers can find a recent review of a live recording of Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro from the Ponto label, a company that has joined the ranks of Opera D’oro and Gala in offering, at budget price, live recordings of various provenance. At their best, as with that Nozze, these recordings offer in acceptable sound (sometimes better) performances of such quality they rival their more expensive competitors. At less than the best, however, even the budget price becomes exorbitant. This Tristan und Isolde, recorded on January 25, 1967, unfortunately belongs to the latter category. Unless one has a strong personal reason for wanting a keepsake of this company or the artists involved, the recording is unlikely to please most listeners. The primary reason is the sound. While not unlistenable, the recording is clearly an “in-house” affair, and probably from an audience member, as some of the coughing is more up-front than the singing. Worse, during the climax, some audience members are whispering as Isolde enters the Leibestod. One would love for a Jon Vickers to have been present to yell out, “Stop your damn whispering!”
BOLCOM: Songs of Innocence and of Experience
William Bolcom is arguably the preeminent American opera composer of today. His third commission for Lyric Opera of Chicago, A Wedding, recently opened to mostly positive reviews. His previous work in the form, A View from the Bridge, had a successful run at the Metropolitan Opera following its premiere in Chicago.
VERDI: Il Trovatore
Il Trovatore Giuseppe Verdi, music and Salvatore Cammarano and Leone Emanuele Bardare, libretto TDK DVUS-CLOPIT Raina Kabaivanska (Leonora) Fiorenza Cossotto (Azucena) Plácido Domingo (Manrico) Piero Cappuccilli (Conte di Luna) José van Dam (Ferrando) Maria Venuti (Inez) Heinz Zednik (Ruiz) Karl...
BACH: Matthäus-Passion
On an accompanying CD and in the liner notes, interviewer Klaus J. Schönmetzler asks conductor Enoch zu Guttenberg, “Why another St. Matthew Passion?” This is a fair question considering the glut of recordings ranging from the overtly romantic to the idealized “authentic” (and mostly fast) Baroque editions. To his credit, Guttenberg responds to this question by acknowledging an aversion to interpreting Bach overly Romantically while desiring a Baroque sensibility. As a theologian, zu Guttenberg understands an undeniable conviction in Bach’s theology, particularly in the chorales, which he acknowledges can lead to a more Romantic interpretation. Zu Guttenberg’s attempt to capture this devotion coupled with the reality of twenty-first century instruments and performers, produces a St. Matthew stuck in a mediocre middle ground between a Baroque “ideal” and a Romantic interpretation.
Lamento with Magdalena Ko
The imposing figure of Johann Sebastian Bach has loomed large for Magdalena Ko ená throughout her career. It was her first disc of Bach arias on Deutsche Grammophon’s Archiv label that brought the golden-voiced mezzo to the attention of the music world as early as 1997. Word then quickly went round that Magdalena was the perfect choice for Bach recordings. ”This disc that started my international career also was my introduction to the great Baroque conductors, including the wonderful scholar and musician Reinhard Goebel, with whom I’ve worked on my new disc, Lamento.” Although the title may suggest wailing and gnashing of teeth, this is a sublime and eclectic mixture of music by J. S. Bach, his relations and contemporaries. ”There’s a very optimistic feeling to this CD,” says Ko ená. ”Although all these pieces are about how horrible it is on this earth, they are really celebrating how great it will be afterwards. There’s a message of hope throughout.”
Gramophone Reviews Le Comte Ory
Colour, wit and life abound with a star turn from the Rossini tenor of the moment Comte Ory Le Comte Ory is the first great French-language comic opera. A late work (Paris, 1828), sensuous, witty and exquisitely crafted, it has...
Bullfrog Films' Don Giovanni: Leporello’s Revenge
Don Giovanni: Leporello's Revenge Mozart's opera presented from the point of view of Don Giovanni's servant, Leporello. 55 minutes Color / Stereo Copyright Date: 2000 ISBN: 1-56029-885-5 Mozart's Don Giovanni is arguably one of his most complex, politically controversial, and...
Le Monde Reviews Verdi's Falstaff from Andante
Deux "Falstaff", à vingt ans d'écart LE MONDE | 27.12.04 | 14h05 Les amateurs d'opéra ont, généralement, un fort penchant pour l'écoute comparée des interprétations. L'éditeur Andante les comblera. Dans un somptueux livre-CD (224 pages avec notice et livret en...
ROSSINI: Zelmira
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AMOR: Richard Strauss — Opera Scenes and Lieder
French soprano Natalie Dessay sings three roles, all quite different in character and personality -- from Zerbinetta in "Ariadne" to Zdenka in "Arabella" and Sophie in "Rosenkavalier." It is a delicious way to sample the pleasures of this great singer....
RAUTAVAARA: The House of the Sun
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VERDI: A Masked Ball
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STRAUSS: Der Liebe der Danae
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Myto Releases Spontini's Agnese di Hohenstaufen
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Myto Releases Ernani
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Myto Releases Otello
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ARG Reviews Mercadante's Emma d'Antiochia
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Fanfare Reviews Jenufa
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Recordings
Carlos Kleiber, in a live stage recording, fronts a top-notch ensemble in a gorgeous staging that seamlessly weds the rollicking humor to misty-eyed sentimentality and romance.
The 2004 Salzburg Festival Rosenkavalier, directed by Robert Carsen, takes its place at a very distant and frigid polar extreme from the warmth of those earlier incarnations. Sets and costumes boast as much expensive extravagance, but in the service of a concept that seems to originate in a loathing of the characters and the story. As Gottfried Kraus's excellent booklet essay relates (as translated by Stewart Spencer), Carsen and set designer Peter Pabst place the opera in "the decadent, valedictory atmosphere of the dying Hapsburg monarchy."
For act one, the long Salzburg stage is split into three rooms, with servants traipsing through. The realization impresses visually, but it also puts a distance between the characters. Act two takes place in the Faninal's dining hall, with most of the action played before an extended table that could seat dozens and dozens of guests. In a touch more out of a Zefferelli production, Octavian makes his entrance on a steed. After that equine interpolation, the setting quickly returns to its austere dictates. Act three is not just a disreputable inn, but a house of prostitution, with much nudity and even simulated copulation. The innkeeper is a drag queen. Now, why would Baron Ochs's proposed seduction of a maidservant, before his marriage, so shock people who cavort in such an establishment? No matter. By this point, the staging is not about the characters anymore, and more a picture of a dissolute, arrogant society. Carsen caps this off by using an adult Mohammed, then finishing the evening with the appearance of a severe man in military get-up - the Field Marshall himself? The luscious haze of the trio and sparkle of Mohammed's music is poisonously clouded by the image.
Act two, somewhat surprisingly, comes off best, with Franz Hawlata really hitting his comic stride. Adrianne Pieczonka never really gets to settle into the regal self-involvement of the Marschallin. Angelika Kirchshlager remains a mostly feminine Octavian throughout, especially in her reverse "drag" appearance in act three, where she is directed to act as a slut whose prim objections to the Baron's seduction are clearly only perfunctory. Miah Perrson, even in this unconventional staging, remains a conventional Sophie. In his brief appearance, Piotr Beczala brings handsome tone even to the high-lying passages of the Italian Singer's aria.
Semyon Bychkov leads the orchestra in a sharp, if unsubtle, reading of the score. Carsen's Rosenkavalier, then, turns the opera's chuckles into grim snorts, and its romance into transparent delusion. While stunning to look at it many ways, the production is very far from a pretty one. If that is the kind of Rosenkavalier any Opera Today reader has been awaiting - the wait is over.
Chris Mullins