English Touring Opera are delighted to announce a season of lyric monodramas to tour nationally from October to December. The season features music for solo singer and piano by Argento, Britten, Tippett and Shostakovich with a bold and inventive approach to making opera during social distancing.
This tenth of ten Live from London concerts was in fact a recorded live performance from California. It was no less enjoyable for that, and it was also uplifting to learn that this wasn’t in fact the ‘last’ LfL event that we will be able to enjoy, courtesy of VOCES8 and their fellow vocal ensembles (more below …).
Ever since Wigmore Hall announced their superb series of autumn concerts, all streamed live and available free of charge, I’d been looking forward to this song recital by Ian Bostridge and Imogen Cooper.
Although Stile Antico’s programme article for their Live from London recital introduced their selection from the many treasures of the English Renaissance in the context of the theological debates and upheavals of the Tudor and Elizabethan years, their performance was more evocative of private chamber music than of public liturgy.
Evidently, face masks don’t stifle appreciative “Bravo!”s. And, reducing audience numbers doesn’t lower the volume of such acclamations. For, the audience at Wigmore Hall gave soprano Elizabeth Llewellyn and pianist Simon Lepper a greatly deserved warm reception and hearty response following this lunchtime recital of late-Romantic song.
For this week’s Live from London vocal recital we moved from the home of VOCES8, St Anne and St Agnes in the City of London, to Kings Place, where The Sixteen - who have been associate artists at the venue for some time - presented a programme of music and words bound together by the theme of ‘reflection’.
'Such is your divine Disposation that both you excellently understand, and royally entertaine the Exercise of Musicke.’
‘And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven … that old serpent … Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.’
There was never any doubt that the fifth of the twelve Met Stars Live in Concert broadcasts was going to be a palpably intense and vivid event, as well as a musically stunning and theatrically enervating experience.
‘Love’ was the theme for this Live from London performance by Apollo5. Given the complexity and diversity of that human emotion, and Apollo5’s reputation for versatility and diverse repertoire, ranging from Renaissance choral music to jazz, from contemporary classical works to popular song, it was no surprise that their programme spanned 500 years and several musical styles.
The Academy of St Martin in the Fields have titled their autumn series of eight concerts - which are taking place at 5pm and 7.30pm on two Saturdays each month at their home venue in Trafalgar Square, and being filmed for streaming the following Thursday - ‘re:connect’.
The London Symphony Orchestra opened their Autumn 2020 season with a homage to Oliver Knussen, who died at the age of 66 in July 2018. The programme traced a national musical lineage through the twentieth century, from Britten to Knussen, on to Mark-Anthony Turnage, and entwining the LSO and Rattle too.
With the Live from London digital vocal festival entering the second half of the series, the festival’s host, VOCES8, returned to their home at St Annes and St Agnes in the City of London to present a sequence of ‘Choral Dances’ - vocal music inspired by dance, embracing diverse genres from the Renaissance madrigal to swing jazz.
Just a few unison string wriggles from the opening of Mozart’s overture to Le nozze di Figaro are enough to make any opera-lover perch on the edge of their seat, in excited anticipation of the drama in music to come, so there could be no other curtain-raiser for this Gala Concert at the Royal Opera House, the latest instalment from ‘their House’ to ‘our houses’.
"Before the ending of the day, creator of all things, we pray that, with your accustomed mercy, you may watch over us."
The doors at The Metropolitan Opera will not open to live audiences until 2021 at the earliest, and the likelihood of normal operatic life resuming in cities around the world looks but a distant dream at present. But, while we may not be invited from our homes into the opera house for some time yet, with its free daily screenings of past productions and its pay-per-view Met Stars Live in Concert series, the Met continues to bring opera into our homes.
Music-making at this year’s Grange Festival Opera may have fallen silent in June and July, but the country house and extensive grounds of The Grange provided an ideal setting for a weekend of twelve specially conceived ‘promenade’ performances encompassing music and dance.
There’s a “slide of harmony” and “all the bones leave your body at that moment and you collapse to the floor, it’s so extraordinary.”
“Music for a while, shall all your cares beguile.”
The hum of bees rising from myriad scented blooms; gentle strains of birdsong; the cheerful chatter of picnickers beside a still lake; decorous thwacks of leather on willow; song and music floating through the warm evening air.
![Corinne Winters as Tatiana [Photo courtesy of Arizona Opera]](http://www.operatoday.com/dam%20onegin%203.png)
Arizona Opera presented Eugene Onegin during and 1999-2000 season and again on February 1 of this year as part of the 2014-2015 season. In this country Onegin is not a crowd pleaser like La Bohème or Carmen, but its story is believable and its music melodic and memorable. Just hum the beginning of the “Polonaise” and your friends will know the music, if not where it comes from.
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky wrote the opera Eugene Onegin together with librettist Konstantin Shilovsky. They followed Alexander Pushkin’s verse novel of the same name very closely and retained a great deal of his poetry. Shilovsky’s contributions included the verses sung by the French speaking Monsieur Triquet in Act II. The composer wrote the text for Lensky’s Act I arioso and most of Prince Gremin’s Act III aria. Nikolai Rubenstein conducted Moscow Conservatory students at the premiere in March 1879.
Tatiana’s Act I “Letter Scene” defines the soprano. Corinne Winters’ Tatiana was naive, girlish and far too honest when she wrote and sang of her true feelings for her somewhat older, attractive and worldly neighbor, Eugene Onegin. Sung by David Adam Moore, the letter’s recipient was not impressed by the young girl’s expression of first love, and instead reproached her for her lapse in protocol. Thus, Moore’s character began as a cold cynic. Only much later did he realize what he had lost. Winters sang with powerful floods of silvery tone that wafted across the Music Center as she whirled around the room with excitement over her letter. Only when Moore addressed her as a wayward child did she regain decorum. He sang with artful phrasing and stern tones as he pointed out her folly.
“Dueling Scene,” Act II
Act II opened at a ball and the orchestra played the famous Polonaise. Onegin asked Tatiana’s sister Olga to dance knowing it would irritate his best friend, Lensky, who was in love with her. In a jealous rage, Zach Borichevsky as Lensky sang with colorful dramatic tones as he challenged Onegin to the duel, which became the opera’s main tragedy. Lensky’s aria, “Kuda, kuda vy udalilis” provided some beautiful light moments in this otherwise dark work. Act III takes place many years later. Onegin has traveled around Europe and on his return he finds a very different society. He sings about the emptiness of his life and his remorse over the death of Lensky. Prince Gremin, a warrior who came home some time ago, expresses his love for the wife who brightened his life, Tatiana. Nicholas Masters was an impressive Gremin whose excellent vocalism extended down to very low but still powerful bass tones. Having long since grown out of her naiveté, Tatiana has become a faithful wife to the older Prince. Onegin meets her and asks her to run away with him. She admits that she fell in love with Onegin as a young girl and, in fact, still loves him. She loves her husband more, however, and she pushes Onegin away. At the end, he is left alone to contemplate what might have been.
Mezzo-soprano Robynne Redmon and contralto Susan Schaefer created believable characters as Madame Larina, the mother of Tatiana and Olga, and Filipievna, their nurse. Beth Lytwynec sang a sweetly resonant Olga and provided smooth harmony in her duet with Tatiana. Andrew Penning offered a charming interlude as M. Triquet while Calvin Griffin was an efficient, dark voiced Zaretsky.
Director Tara Faircloth told her story in a most realistic manner and each of the leading artists was able to create a realistic character. Scenic designer Laura Fine Hawkes was somewhat less successful because some of her pieces utilized only one side of the stage. Conductor Steven White began with a rather slow tempo, but he offered faster tempi and packed more tension into the music of the second and third acts. Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin is a great masterpiece and Arizonans were lucky to be able to enjoy it at home.
Maria Nockin
Cast and production information:
Eugene Onegin, David Adam Moore; Tatiana, Corinne Winters; Lensky, Zach Borichevsky; Olga, Beth Lytwynec; Prince Gremin, Nicholas Masters; Madame Larina, Robynne Redmon; Filipievna, Susan Schaefer; Monsieur Triquet, Andrew Penning; Zaretsky, Calvin Griffin; Conductor, Steven White; Director, Tara Faircloth; Scenic Designer, Laura Fine Hawkes; Lighting Designer, Douglas Provost; Chorus Master, Henri Venanzi; Choreographer/Dancer, Gabrielle Zucker; Dancer, Spencer Smith.