27 Oct 2011
Carmen returns to the Opéra Comique
“Historically Informed Performance” sure has a nice ring — not only does the acronym capture the trendiness of the movement (“HIP”), but one has to admire the subtle put-down the term encapsulates.
Recently in Recordings
Henry Purcell, Royal Welcome Songs for King Charles II Vol. III: The Sixteen/Harry Christophers
The Sixteen continues its exploration of Henry Purcell’s Welcome Songs for Charles II. As with Robert King’s pioneering Purcell series begun over thirty years ago for Hyperion, Harry Christophers is recording two Welcome Songs per disc.
Anima Rara: Ermonela Jaho
In February this year, Albanian soprano Ermonela Jaho made a highly lauded debut recital at Wigmore Hall - a concert which both celebrated Opera Rara’s 50th anniversary and honoured the career of the Italian soprano Rosina Storchio (1872-1945), the star of verismo who created the title roles in Leoncavallo’s La bohème and Zazà, Mascagni’s Lodoletta and Puccini’s Madama Butterfly.
Requiem pour les temps futurs: An AI requiem for a post-modern society
Collapsology. Or, perhaps we should use the French word ‘Collapsologie’ because this is a transdisciplinary idea pretty much advocated by a series of French theorists - and apparently, mostly French theorists. It in essence focuses on the imminent collapse of modern society and all its layers - a series of escalating crises on a global scale: environmental, economic, geopolitical, governmental; the list is extensive.
Ádám Fischer’s 1991 MahlerFest Kassel ‘Resurrection’ issued for the first time
Amongst an avalanche of new Mahler recordings appearing at the moment (Das Lied von der Erde seems to be the most favoured, with three) this 1991 Mahler Second from the 2nd Kassel MahlerFest is one of the more interesting releases.
Max Lorenz: Tristan und Isolde, Hamburg 1949
If there is one myth, it seems believed by some people today, that probably needs shattering it is that post-war recordings or performances of Wagner operas were always of exceptional quality. This 1949 Hamburg Tristan und Isolde is one of those recordings - though quite who is to blame for its many problems takes quite some unearthing.
Women's Voices: a sung celebration of six eloquent and confident voices
The voices of six women composers are celebrated by baritone Jeremy Huw Williams and soprano Yunah Lee on this characteristically ambitious and valuable release by Lontano Records Ltd (Lorelt).
Rosa mystica: Royal Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir
As Paul Spicer, conductor of the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir, observes, the worship of the Blessed Virgin Mary is as ‘old as Christianity itself’, and programmes devoted to settings of texts which venerate the Virgin Mary are commonplace.
The Prison: Ethel Smyth
Ethel Smyth’s last large-scale work, written in 1930 by the then 72-year-old composer who was increasingly afflicted and depressed by her worsening deafness, was The Prison – a ‘symphony’ for soprano and bass-baritone soloists, chorus and orchestra.
Songs by Sir Hamilton Harty: Kathryn Rudge and Christopher Glynn
‘Hamilton Harty is Irish to the core, but he is not a musical nationalist.’
After Silence: VOCES8
‘After silence, that which comes closest to expressing the inexpressible is music.’ Aldous Huxley’s words have inspired VOCES8’s new disc, After Silence, a ‘double album in four chapters’ which marks the ensemble’s 15th anniversary.
Beethoven's Songs and Folksongs: Bostridge and Pappano
A song-cycle is a narrative, a journey, not necessarily literal or linear, but one which carries performer and listener through time and across an emotional terrain. Through complement and contrast, poetry and music crystallise diverse sentiments and somehow cohere variability into an aesthetic unity.
Flax and Fire: a terrific debut recital-disc from tenor Stuart Jackson
One of the nicest things about being lucky enough to enjoy opera, music and theatre, week in week out, in London’s fringe theatres, music conservatoires, and international concert halls and opera houses, is the opportunity to encounter striking performances by young talented musicians and then watch with pleasure as they fulfil those sparks of promise.
Carlisle Floyd's Prince of Players: a world premiere recording
“It’s forbidden, and where’s the art in that?”
John F. Larchet's Complete Songs and Airs: in conversation with Niall Kinsella
Dublin-born John F. Larchet (1884-1967) might well be described as the father of post-Independence Irish music, given the immense influenced that he had upon Irish musical life during the first half of the 20th century - as a composer, musician, administrator and teacher.
Haddon Hall: 'Sullivan sans Gilbert' does not disappoint thanks to the BBC Concert Orchestra and John Andrews
The English Civil War is raging. The daughter of a Puritan aristocrat has fallen in love with the son of a Royalist supporter of the House of Stuart. Will love triumph over political expediency and religious dogma?
Beethoven’s Choral Symphony and Choral Fantasy from Harmonia Mundi
Beethoven Symphony no 9 (the Choral Symphony) in D minor, Op. 125, and the Choral Fantasy in C minor, Op. 80 with soloist Kristian Bezuidenhout, Pablo Heras-Casado conducting the Freiburger Barockorchester, new from Harmonia Mundi.
Taking Risks with Barbara Hannigan
A Louise Brooks look-a-like, in bobbed black wig and floor-sweeping leather trench-coat, cheeks purple-rouged and eyes shadowed in black, Barbara Hannigan issues taut gestures which elicit fire-cracker punch from the Mahler Chamber Orchestra.
Alfredo Piatti: The Operatic Fantasies (Vol.2) - in conversation with Adrian Bradbury
‘Signor Piatti in a fantasia on themes from Beatrice di Tenda had also his triumph. Difficulties, declared to be insuperable, were vanquished by him with consummate skill and precision. He certainly is amazing, his tone magnificent, and his style excellent. His resources appear to be inexhaustible; and altogether for variety, it is the greatest specimen of violoncello playing that has been heard in this country.’
Those Blue Remembered Hills: Roderick Williams sings Gurney and Howells
Baritone Roderick Williams seems to have been a pretty constant ‘companion’, on my laptop screen and through my stereo speakers, during the past few ‘lock-down’ months.
Bruno Ganz and Kirill Gerstein almost rescue Strauss’s Enoch Arden
Melodramas can be a difficult genre for composers. Before Richard Strauss’s Enoch Arden the concept of the melodrama was its compact size – Weber’s Wolf’s Glen scene in Der Freischütz, Georg Benda’s Ariadne auf Naxos and Medea or even Leonore’s grave scene in Beethoven’s Fidelio.
OPERA TODAY ARCHIVES »
Recordings
After all, any conductor who doesn’t follow the practice would seem to be tagged as “historically ignorant.”
At its start some decades ago, the “HIP” movement focused on baroque and early classical era music. It has since branched out, and that branch is impressively extended with the recent DVD of Sir John Eliot Gardiner conducting his Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique at the Opéra Comique in an historically informed performance of Georges Bizet’s Carmen. Besides employing instruments of the era, this production aims for authenticity from the ground up — or “the stage” up. For Carmen debuted at the Opéra Comique, infamously receiving a less than ideal reception that many conjecture added to the stress which culminated in the composer’s early death from heart disease. Stage director Adrian Noble strives to freshen the action while keeping to a libretto-bound conception of the story and characters. This is still, therefore, a Carmen who sits with legs splayed, and who sashays with one hand on a hip. That said, Noble does have his Don José plant a kiss on Micaela in act one that goes beyond the usual pallid interaction.
Set and costume designer Mark Thompson, however, seems of two minds. The costumes are very traditional, though nicely done — almost everything is in a spectrum of light beige through dark brown, and the clothes look truly worn. In so many a Carmen, everyone looks as if the local dry cleaner is working overtime. Thompson’s uniset, however, surely looks nothing like whatever the Opéra Comique used in 1875. Act three, for example, gives only the barest indication of a mountain pass. Instead, we have a sort of elevated walkway at the rear which slopes to stage level, and a circular platform just off mid-stage. Apparently the cigarette factory is subterranean, as the girls take their break by clambering out of the platform. For act 4, Noble and Thompson clear the stage for the intense action of the last scene.
There are moments in the recorded performance where one can almost imagine, however, that one is watching — if not the authentic first performance — something rawer and more authentic than many another recorded Carmen. Sir John and the artistic team use an edited version of the score (by one Richard Lanhman-Smith) that has spoken dialogue, as Bizet originally intended. And under Noble’s direction, a committed cast delivers strong performances — honest and stripped-down to essentials. Anna Caterina Antonacci’s Carmen has already been recorded in an acclaimed Covent Garden performance opposite Jonas Kaufmann. Her comfort in the role allows her to perform even the most stereotypical gestures and movements with relaxed conviction. Oddly, the only times that her singing reflects any discomfort with the role is at the higher range — which one might think unusual for a singer with a career as a soprano. Perhaps in adjusting her voice for the reliance on the middle range, Antonacci loses a bit of security at the top. It’s a very minor compromise in an otherwise strong performance.
Her Don José does a fine job right up until his big second act aria and continues to be fine thereafter. But Andrew Richards is not able to deliver the “Flower Song” with the security and confidence the moment requires. It’s all the more unfortunate as his Don José is so believable — a man of modest attraction, overwhelmed by the chance to share the passion of Carmen, and then devastated when it is withdrawn. The supporting cast makes more routine impressions, with Anne-Catherine Gillet giving us a Micaela even mousier than usual, and Nicolas Cavallier too smug for his own good as Escamillo.
As for Gardiner and his orchestra, they often play fast, as one might expect, and there are patches of roughness than either attest to the authenticity of the performance or suggest a deaf ear to musical sophistication — depending on one’s attitude towards HIP. Gardiner’s most regrettable choice is the Nehru jacket. Un-HIP.
The packaging is remarkably handsome but not without compromises. Your reviewer prefers removable booklets to one bound to the spine. The two discs are visually nearly identical, with text almost impossible to read. Figuring out how to dislodge the discs from the casing also took more of your reviewer’s ingenuity than he would have liked. The bonus feature is a rather routine 20 minute set of interviews, but as the booklet has nothing but credits and synopsis, anyone wanting a little more insight into the performance will have to view it.
Not a “hip” Carmen, then, but this HIP Carmen does have historical appeal and a strong performance of the title role.
Chris Mullins