Madama Butterfly at ENO

26/10/13

Anthony Minghella's Madama Butterfly is very popular on both sides of the pond (the Met uses it too), and it's easy to see why. It's an opera production that feels modern in its bright, bold design, balancing spareness and lushness with simple elegance, whilst not messing with the opera's central story at all, or questioning Puccini's taste in tackling this subject matter (or indeed the audience's enjoyment of it). What it doesn't do is try to negotiate the very uncomfortable cultural problems at the work's heart, nor make sense of the work's bizarre psychology and dramatic foundations. Instead it delivers everything that a traditionalist might ask of the experience of a Madama Butterfly.

First then, the design. Michael Levine's set is in essence rather sparse - the black raked floor, slightly mirrored ceiling, and sliding screens offer a neutral backdrop for the extremely colourful items of set dressing, lighting and costumes that fill it. It's obvious that all these elements have been worked on very closely together by the team - the lighting particularly by Peter Mumford makes sophisticated use of the set to create some often extraordinary effects. Hang Feng's costumes can be more problematic, but also raise more questions - some look quite realistic/historical, with their artful prints and elegant cuts. Butterfly's followers on the other hand wear the gaudiest colours and designs imaginable, and with their card board cut out wigs, the inspiration can only have come from Japanese anime cartoons, which had reached a fever pitch in Western popularity when the production premièred. Although the result of the anime influence is jarring and ugly, this cartoonish design matches the cartoony music that Puccini composes in the first scene for the Japanese characters - so obviously trying to capture some surface exoticisms, but wholly failing to grasp the aesthetic or feel of the alien culture. Somehow it works. Pinkerton's Japanese looking costume in the opening scene is a nice touch, especially when contrasted with Sharpless' stolidly European attire - Pinkerton is really getting into playing with this culture, "trying it on", without ever trying to properly integrate trying to understand it. The metaphor is clear.

paper wigs and anime costumes on kneeling followers,
visible lighting (see below)

click on the images for a closer look at what I mean.

The lighting can get very sugary indeed, the stage drowned in a welter of pinks and lilacs, as cherry blossoms, lanterns and paper cranes litter the stage. Whether deliberately or not, the divide between genuine beauty and gaudy kitsch is continually probed, broken and remade in this production, and though the middle act tends strongly towards the latter, I did wonder whether this was a comment on the music and whether we were being subtly played with by Minghella here. There are clues - the lighting from the side of the stage is clearly visible throughout and constantly on the move, so our attention is drawn to it: we always see the means of construction of this luxuriant fantasy land, which in turn invites us to do the same with the score and opera as a whole. Those not inclined to this sort of probing need not pursue this course of reflection, and again, it's difficult to tell whether it's intentional, but I appreciated the fact that it made me think this way - not every directorial choice must be conscious for it to be enjoyed!

Also problematic, but yet again revealing, is the use of traditional Japanese puppets. As well as their use for some minor characters, Butterfly's son is presented to us as a very mobile, semi realistic Bunraku puppet, dressed as an American sailor and waving an American flag. When wrenched from his original cultural/artistic context, Cio Cio San's puppet offspring seems freakish and alien, especially when placed in such close proximity to living, breathing people: the little Homunculus occupies an uncanny valley, where cuteness is mingled with an innate feeling of disgust and revulsion at the human simulacrum. The unnerving effect of this is a psychological rather than a cultural one, but the message becomes confused on the way - is this mild discomfort we feel intentional or not? Exactly how we are meant to relate to this purported piece of Japanese culture is ambiguous and troubling.


Overall, I often wished that the design had been simpler and bolder - the most visually effective and beautiful moments occur when the characters are highlighted onstage against a dark background, and the strong colours aren't washed in a sea of saccharine pastels. The dance scene which opens the production (photos of which are very often used to advertise it) is almost the best part of the show for this reason - the four red ribbons that emanate from the dancer's torso are predictably (but very effectively) mirrored at the end, during Cio Cio San's final scene - in each case the intense focus on the artist creates a spellbinding effect of concentration and attention, something which certainly does seem to be a feature of the genuine Japanese culture that I have encountered.

So it's often beautiful, and as viewers we aren't made to feel guilty about it. Sighs of relief. The story is told well by Minghella, and revival director Sarah Tipple has both the soprano who premièred the production and a fine Suzuki to build her production around. Not all the singers can be coaxed into good acting, but Tipple makes sure that the important emotional scenes hit home.

But what about what this staging ignores? Pinkerton is painted in a bad light, as is surely the intention of the libretto - he's a Western voyeur, and worse than that a flagrant exploiter. But wait, aren't we also Western voyeurs? And, we are dealing with Geishas here, the marriage contracts are being handed out by the Japanese; no one ought to be under any false pretences about what is going on here. The opera revolves around sex tourism - this was known then, and it's known now. (Whether you want to add paedophilia into the mix or not is up to you). Given that everyone else in Cio-Cio San's society seems to understand this situation, and Cio Cio San doesn't appear to be in a state of madness, isn't there an interesting psychology to be explored here? The story very obviously centres around the conflict between eternal devotional love (Cio Cio San) and fleeting sexual desire (Pinkerton), but wouldn't it be interesting to probe why this conflict has arisen? Is Pinkerton really the party that's in the wrong? I think he is partly, as he's a pure hedonist and should surely realise that Cio Cio San thinks this is something that it isn't, and he certainly also enjoys the power he has over her to a sinister degree. But on the other hand maybe he thinks that she's just acting the part well, and he's just doing what all his friends are no doubt doing too. This is a widespread cultural phenomenon we're dealing with here, not a one off: she is being sold to him, legally, as a temporary wife. No one else misunderstands this but Cio Cio. Why? Her mania of devotion is fascinating, and it's frustrating that so many productions just take this at face value, while so few seem to be interested in the roots of this phenomenon. How does Cio Cio use her experience to serve herself? She constructs a huge edifice of victimhood around which to centre her life; whether she does this consciously or not is a further matter for fruitful exploration. When people question her she either ignores them or threatens them with death. She is a fantasist with an extremely unhealthy attachment to her dreams who uses her fanatical devotion as a crutch against her family, and fall from society (a double fall - it happens both pre and during the opera). Her story is heart rending, but it is also self inflicted. This is key. If we don't own up to this, it seems to me that the desecration of her innocence and suicide are entirely without logic or meaning.

To come to Puccini's music - regular readers will know the difficulties I have with it, but don't worry, I'm not going to bash it again. I actually found occasion to accept and enjoy what I could this time. The strange conceit of opening the opera with a fugal idea, that most Western of formal devices, presumably is an attempt to depict the extraordinary formal control that Japanese culture exhibits, though the fugue soon breaks down into familiar Puccinian strains. A metaphor for the entire work perhaps - and though it should be extremely obvious from the music, it bears saying again - this is not a portrait of Japan; as always with imitation, it tells us more about the imitator than the imitated. This music tells us about a Westerner of the fin-de-siecle's view of the East. To go to the other end of the work, there was a moment which I thought showed surprising restraint (in a weird sense of the word) from Puccini. Following Butterfly's death, the spectacular crudity of the music that closes the opera is a brilliant stroke from Puccini - for once there's no syrupy sentimentality or mock tragedy and the spare, unemotional, unimpressive, entirely ungratifying, and above all, hideous uglyness of the blaring orchestra, decries the squalid meaninglessness of Butterfly's sacrifice. There is far more subtlety to be drawn out of this piece than traditional productions let on.

Mary Plazas makes an excellent Madama Butterfly. Her diminutive stature, and convincingly girlish acting make her believably youthful. It shows that she was the production's original Butterfly - her acting is detailed and nuanced. Vocally she is fine too. In the first scene, when Butterfly needs to sound most youthful, the vibrato felt a bit wide, and there is weakness in the low register, but actually overall this performance is a vocal success, and she gets better as the evening progresses. The problem of balancing in the voice the psychological and physical fragility of Butterfly, against the sheer vocal heft required to ride Puccini's orchestration is probably the role's biggest challenge, and this is Plazas' trump card.

Timothy Richards is often a little underpowered as Pinkerton, but he's very solid vocally and he doesn't at all make an unattractive sound. He is however very blank acting wise in the present company and doesn't really cut a rounded character on stage. One thing in particular jarred, though it was no fault of his own. With Puccini's repeated references to the fact that Pinkerton is not just Western, but American (by the fifth direct quotation of The Star Spangled Banner we rather get the point), and the fact that the ENO singers are singing in English, it's really jarring to hear that sort of RPish generic singers' English coming from both Pinkerton and Sharpless. Once again, on one of those rare occasions where the ENO's language policy could be used to a production's advantage, it is not capitalised on. Whose job is it to notice these things? (As an aside: it also raises the interesting question of what language the characters in the opera are "really" speaking - presumably the answer is English.)

Pamela Helen Stephen is a consummate actor-musician, making the absolute most of the famously thankless role of Suzuki. I recently asked on twitter whether mezzos actually enjoyed playing this part, and it seems that many do. In the 90's Helen Stephen was a pristine Mozartian (see her wonderful Cherubino on youtube [how could the Countess resist?]), and if the voice has lost its former purity, it maintains its attractive basic timbre and is now capable of a much wider palette of colours and can tackle more dramatic writing without strain. If all operatic acting were as committed and simple as this, the artform would be unstoppable.

George von Bergen's Sharpless is a bit of a caricature dramatically, all awkward moustache twitches and concerned glances into the middle distance. Vocally he is powerful and accurate, but the voice can become uncomfortably hard when put under pressure. Gianluca Marciano doesn't do anything particularly out of the ordinary in the pit, but he doesn't do anything wrong either: balance is good, and the stage and pit are well synched. The ENO orchestra sound well focussed and big boned.

Certain productions and certain operas seem to find "fetish" words attached to them, usually derived from an early review, then endlessly repeated in the press and marketing for the production, and eventually leaking into all subsequent reviews. This production's fetish word is "sumptuous". It occasionally is, but for me the "sumpture" becomes plain "sump" often enough that I wouldn't say that it is the production's main attraction. The biggest boon of this revival is the excellent singing and acting of the two females at the centre of this story.


Photos (c) ENO/Clive Barda/Thomas Bowles

Turandot at ROH

09/09/13

After my previous Puccini experience I vowed not to go to any more Puccini. But curiosity got the better of me and amazingly I actually enjoyed this Turandot quite a lot! Andrei Serban's production, revived here by Andrew Sinclair, is a totally silly and really fun romp, that scrapes the surface of the piece, to reveal more surface. There's a certain grotesqueness to everything, Sally Jacobs' designs included - the hideous crudeness of the costumes, the cartoonish avoidance of realism in all of the acting (Ping, Pang and Pong look and act like they are rehearsing for a panto. I'm not exaggerating one iota), the total lack of intimacy in any of the relationships. The chinoiserie in the design is so over the top and vulgarised that it seems to be a parody of the traditional approach to in some way represent China on stage - Serban seems to be showing us that the truly demented psychology, saccharine emotionalism and furious bombast of the score is all Puccini and not ancient China. Musically it makes sense too - the ubiquitous pentatonics are barely even a point of stylisation for Puccini - they are absolutely a hallmark of his writing in all his most characteristic work. The orchestration too, amongst Puccini's very best, always seems more Puccinian than self consciously "exotic" in the manner of the French impressionists when they want to conjure up "the orient".

Ping, Pang and Pong, with the heads of two previous contenders for Turandot's hand, illustrating 
what I mean about the panto grotesquerie, and how it's not at all trying to look like actual China.

Turandot is fascinating because it seems as though Puccini is virtually unfiltered in terms portraying what he loves. He deliberately produces the most violent, unsympathetic, self obsessed and callous central romantic couple in all of opera, taking every opportunity to alienate us from them - if anything Calaf is more unpleasant than Turandot, whose fractured mental state is perhaps ascribable to her oppressive, warped and neurotic upbringing.

This opera is seriously troubling and problematic when viewed through the lens of serious art. But by not requiring the singers to act (much less interact) Serban absolves the audience of the responsibility of taking the opera seriously as drama - no attempt is made to untangle the extremely disturbing character psychology or message of this piece, and having all the characters stand around doing stock gestures draws attention to what a silly and fun piece of Italian opera it is if Ping, Pang and Pong are accepted as the work's norm, rather than taking the Calaf/Turandot saga at face value. This is a risky business, approaching as it does almost a parody of Italian theatre, but Serban has made it visually engaging enough that it's never boring for a first timer like me. And you have to admire a director who makes the tenor wear what appears to maternity clothes during Nessun Dorma. I wouldn't choose to see it again however because the sole virtue of the show is spectacle. Kate Flatt's extensive choreography is attractive, feeds the eye, and again is mercifully free of orientalisms. The famous "problem ending" is ironically underlined as Liu is paraded in front of the happy couple on a hearse. The vertical red ribbons that we saw at the beginning of the show are dropped again, and this time pool on the floor like rivers of blood. The theatrical tenor of the rest of the show has not been dark, so it seems like a macabre and blackly funny illustration of what we've witnessed. In another context it would be chilling. I've yet to see a production that fully owns up to the psychotic cruelty of both romantic leads in a non panto way, but this production was really not aiming at that. It's just pure entertainment. You could almost call it: Turandot!

the red "blood" ribbons

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Eri Nakamura as Liu

I know we don't really do "season opening" over here like they do at the Met, but this first production of the season was conspicuously unstarry. Eri Nakamura was vocally the most interesting cast member as Liu, a role traditionally cast as the juiciest lyric soprano around, and despite the fact that timbral beauty is not Nakamura's strong suit, she did well in the role. Her torture porn death scene contained probably the best singing of the evening, soaring as it did with power and conviction.

Lise Lindstrom's Turandot is a harsh decibel machine - a huge sound without colours, like cold steel. The voice is built like an inverted pyramid with its stentorian top, large middle voice, and rapid disappearance below the stave, but Lindstrom really can pack in the volume when required. Marco Berti's Calaf is not quite as huge, but it's still a big dramatic tenor, and as described already is short on dramatic or musical nuance. Again I enjoyed the fact that both voices were loud but totally unsexy as it drew attention again to the weirdness of the erotic content in this opera. Oddly great casting.

Conductor Henrik Nanasi led a powerful and driven account of the score, though perhaps disappointed in a few of the "high points" such as in "In questa reggia" which felt a little unclimactic. In other places, a little more delicacy and lushness would also have been appreciated, but balance and accuracy was good throughout.


All photos (c) Tristram Kenton/ROH

La Rondine at the Royal Opera House

05/07/2013

La Rondine should be one of Puccini's greatest operas, and though it does contain some ravishing music, an actual encounter with the work disappoints. Why should it be great? Although Puccini had pretensions to melodrama and tragedy, it's not actually his most natural habitat, and despite (or more likely because of) his love of cruelty (and technical limitations notwithstanding), he doesn't actually have the artistic means to represent it wholly seriously in art: the plush upholstery of his orchestral writing and arching eroticism of the vocal lines reveal a sensual gratification in pain that blends the two inseparably, giving us an insight into this important partnership, but one which is pornographic in effect because it's so manifestly for his and the audience's pleasure. His other big turn on, sentimentality, is brought to a perfect head in La Boheme and is the main reason why that piece is so successful - he's not only working totally within his area of expertise, but also wholly within his means, and the result is without question his masterpiece. La Rondine is the only post Boheme opera of his that intentionally returns to the exquisitely finished light café-music schmaltz that he is most at home with, and indeed there are several moments which are directly comparable in the two pieces - see for instance the bustling orchestral opening, the bon-homie of the first scene, the bristling colours of Act II, the soupy love duets. La Rondine then is beautifully made, with its endlessly tinkling, humming, pentatonic orchestral canvas, which at times flows with greater ease than anywhere else in his output, and as ever there are also gorgeous arias in their way unmatched by his contemporaries. But despite these passing beauties, the totality doesn't quite convince: we get the feeling that his heart is only half in it. (Is it cruelty that's missing after all?) The libretto by Giuseppe Adami may be to blame for the lack of true comedy - this is meant to be an operetta, but the jokes are very thin indeed, and the "numbers" such as they are, rather tame dramatically and musically and sometimes even bland by his own luscious standards. Despite the evident mastery, ease and fluency, something vital (in both senses of the word) that was present in its slightly more naive predecessor is simply absent here.

Nicolas Joel's now well travelled and well known production sets the action in 1920's Paris, but with Art Nouveau designs (by Ezio Frigerio) which look like they date from about 35 years before that. The fun and dazzle of 20's living combined with the decadence of a Lalique/Mucha aesthetic is an indulgently heady combination and totally in line with the sound of the score. Unfortunately the direction is largely very static which is not good when the libretto is already so undynamic. I found it difficult to be too engaged, though that must also be partly to do with the performances.

Angela Gheorghiu is undoubtedly the principal reason that this production is being mounted, and is also the biggest problem with it. She currently only sings four roles it seems (Magda, Tosca, Mimi, Adriana Lecouvreur) of which I have seen two live at the ROH, and she simply does not have a large enough voice for them. Whether this is by choice, or the manifestation of some vocal problem is debatable (I lean towards the former explanation), but for the first two acts she was rarely sufficiently audible (even on high notes) always delivering the wispiest little line of sweet sound. Intonation is OK, but not as good as it used to be. The vocal cover makes it very controlled but also very unexciting, and the chest voice is nonexistent and even middle voice quite weak - the impression in the theatre is of the lightest of lyric soprano timbres. In the last part of the last act she was finally singing out more, and at least was consistently audible, which suggests that she can in fact do it, but by that stage I just didn't care any more as she had totally failed to deliver a character in sound, and the self regarding acting, apt for this character perhaps, is not engaging enough to compensate. Up close in live and studio recordings the sound can still be marvellously full and beautiful, but it's an illusion in the sense that it doesn't project in the theatre. Is it vocal preservation? A lack of generosity? Simply because she can get away with it and still be hired? I don't know how much longer it can realistically go on - since the repertoire is so small, and she's been doing this for a number of years, it surely can't be too much longer that people will tolerate it...

The rest of the cast seemed purposely chosen not to show up Gheorghiu volume wise, though at least one could usually hear them throughout. Sabina Puértolas is a weak Lisette, but Charles Castronovo as the love interest Ruggero has a very attractive and remarkably dark lyric tenor voice, and he seemed in much more comfortable territory here than in Die Zauberflote earlier this season. It's not a big voice, and I'm not sure how many of the other major Italian roles would suit, despite the heroic colouring: I wonder if he's artificially darkening the voice (though if he is, he's doing it well!). The rest of the cast are all adequate, and Marco Armiliato delivers a respectful, beautiful, but perhaps slightly restrained traversal of the score.

I left the theatre quite disappointed - that Gheorghiu was so inadequate for a title role at the ROH and that the staging failed to make something viable of this likeable but flawed piece.

Tosca with Kristine Opolais at ROH

23/03/2012

I do try hard with Puccini. It's been three years since I last saw Tosca live, and though I have avoided it since due to my lack of enjoyment of it then, in music I find it interesting how tastes evolve and what exposure to other music, the passage of time and personal reflection does for expanding personal horizons. Unfortunately I liked it even less this time than I did before, and have realised that I just can't go to see Puccini's operas any more. I'm pretty certain they'll survive without my patronage. That said, I have already booked to see the upcoming Gheorghiu Rondine and then next season will certainly see the Manon Lescaut (I actually quite like this one, and don't mind Boheme either), but I just can't spend my evenings like this - being bored by the music, situation and characters.

What do I find so distasteful? I've explained partially before, but in general, the appalling music (excepting the often exquisite arias, everything else is banal padding finished to a high degree of surface polish, but repetitive, simplistic, vulgar, kitsch, maudlin, dull), lifeless characters, every event manipulatively designed to wring some emotion from you whilst lacking a coherent dramatic arc or genuine insight into dramatic material, the unflinching and unapologetic shallowness in all aspects and the combination of cruelty and sentimentality which permeates everything. The ultimate reason though for my extreme distaste must be the first reason given: simply that I find the music to be very poorly made (excepting the aforementioned arias, and once again, admitting a certain well polished professionalism in the surface). These things are common to everything by Puccini post La Boheme, but there are special features/failings in Tosca which struck me whilst watching that bear mentioning.

The first thing that I find difficult to stomach is the unlikeable couple at the heart of the piece. Cavaradossi is one of the dullest heroes ever sketched, lacking any character traits rendered in the music except his nauseating supplication towards Tosca. Truly hard to watch. And what in the first act makes us care about what will happen to Tosca? Her narcissism, constant challenging behaviour, desire to control Cavardossi and petty jealousy positively scream her subconscious desire for Cavaradossi to be a man and stand up for himself, but it also makes her very unlikeable. I think we're meant to care about her because of what happens in the rest of the piece, but her one dimensionality makes it very difficult indeed. The political subplot is paper thin: a plot device to set the characters up for the second Act's extremities that is clearly of no interest to Puccini in and of its own. The ultra crude use of leitmotifs introduced here in Act I and continued throughout the opera is risible and disrupts the flow of the music because Puccini so roundly lacks the required skill in counterpoint to make proper use of the technique (c.f. his contemporary Strauss who goes to the other extreme, where the technical facility is so great that everything can easily descend into an endless mush of undifferentiated themes and thence game playing).

Act II is by far the strongest dramatically and probably contains the best music. Most interesting for me, just before "Vissi d'arte", Scarpia, by far Puccini's most interesting character and in some ways surely an artistic self portrait, utters words which might be Puccini's artistic credo: "Che importa?! Spasimi d'ira... spasimi d'amore!" (Literally: What does it matter! Spasms of rage ... spasms of love!). Puccini is turned on by both equally, and when taken together all the better. It's clear whose side Puccini is on, and the opera becomes entirely flaccid once Scarpia meets his demise.

Act III is one of the worst final acts ever: shockingly tedious, with so little happening musically or dramatically: the endless musical repetitions of the opening, minimally atmospheric, the pointless boy soprano solo, a dramatically pointless Cavarodossi aria, an extremely discursive meeting between Tosca and her lover in which very little is relayed or expressed. Then the last four minutes in which we have a bizarre fake execution which turns out to be a real execution (both predictable and anticlimactic because the highly unusual situation of a fake execution just turns out to be the normal situation of a real execution), then 30 seconds of ludicrous action where the heroine, still in ballgown, shuffles off to a ledge and leaps to her death. Where's the tension? Bizarrely bad pacing considering that everyone says he's such a man of the theatre.

I have little to say about Jonathan Kent's production. It attempts a sort of realism with detailed "period" sets, but the lighting gives it an unnatural Disneyish edge (perhaps mostly resembling Beauty and the Beast) and there's an awkward cramping of the stage space and visual overstuffing with extraneous paraphernalia. In this revival characterisation was in general very undetailed, Yonghoon Lee's admirably sung Cavaradossi hampered by stock acting, and Kristine Opolais's Tosca exaggerated and hammy. The exception was Michael Volle as a very good Scarpia, dramatically committed and superbly sung, though overall he strikes me as too sensitive a singer for this role. Can we get him at the ROH in something German? His Mandryka is close to ideal. Opolais was the cause of some excitement in London as Butterfly two seasons ago and probably the reason why these three Toscas sold out this time round (certainly the reason why I came to see it again). She has a large voice that has been touted as ideal for Puccini, and while the sound production is even and the voice attractive, the chest register is nowhere near developed enough for this role, and there's very little variation in timbre. I was a little bored by her Vissi d'arte which is probably not a good sign.

Maurizio Benini generates truly stentorian sounds in the pit and shapes and colours everything as ideally as I imagine Puccini fans could hope for.

La Boheme at Glyndebourne

01/07/2012

I didn't feel moved to write a full review of this at the time, and nor will I now: McVicar's now decade old updating is fine but not all that interesting, and though I think this is probably Puccini's finest opera it's not one I particularly love.

The entire cast were very decent, but I'll just talk about a few singers here.

Nahuel di Pierro's Colline was absolutely incredible - the richest, chocolatyist lyric bass-baritone sound you can imagine, beautifully produced and apparently effortlessly too. I have no idea why he wasn't in a more major role in this festival but I'm keeping my fingers crossed for next festival - maybe a Figaro, or a luxury Harlekin in Ariadne? Does he have the high notes?

Irina Iordachescu's Musetta was very interesting - she has the timbre of a mezzo, but seems to have an easy upper extention, and I liked the husky darkness of her voice in this role - it gives her a mildly grimy, seemy edge that contrasts wonderfully with Scherbachenko's Mimi and was entirely appropriate for this production.

Ekaterina Scherbachenko's Mimi was a mixed - in the first act, she did not sound good at all, with a rather harsh tone, and nary a phrase would pass without serious intonation issues. She improved throughout the evening though, and was already better in Act 2, and then better again in Act 3, and by Act 4 was making some really lovely sounds and her tuning was immaculate. Strange thing. She's not a natural actress and seemed a bit lost amongst all the other larger than life characters, but s

The Glyndebourne orchestra sounded absolutely fantastic under Kirill Karabits to an almost show stealing extent - the orchestral colours glowed and danced under the voices with a sweep and naturalness that carried the action along beautifully. One of the great boons of there being such a long rehearsal period at Glyndebourne, and also the runs being so long is surely the benefit to the orchestra - the ensemble, rapor, accuracy and detail is just so much better than can be expected from the working conditions necessitated by the way the ENO or ROH are organised and run. Magic stuff.

ENO's 2012-2013 Season

Here's what I'm most excited about.

Julietta by Martinu is an absolutely glorious score. It's maybe his best work - fizzing with nervous energy, it's a febrile, shifting mental landscape, with stretches of music that are extraordinarily beautiful too. It's not as lush as many of the concertos and smaller pieces, but it is a fascinating work.

Yoshi Oida stages Pilgrim's Progress for the first time since 1951. It's Vaughan William's most ambitious score, and perhaps (perhaps) his greatest. It's certainly very beautiful - much of it was recycled into the 5th symphony, his most personal.

The Traviata is the ultra stripped down and ultra detailed Konwitschny production. The entire set is one chair. Sounds very interesting to me.

Bieito's Carmen - he's always controversial (often to the point of tedium) and occasionally very interesting. Ruxandra Donose as Carmen too.

Charpentier's Medea is new to me, so I'll have to check it out. It's the older Charpentier - from the 17th century. Sarah Connolly as Medea. And it's being directed by David McVIcar. Cool.

Wozzeck. It's Wozzeck. Hasn't been done in London for a while. A must.

Sunken Garden actually sounds quite intriguing from the clips of the composer's I've heard - London hasn't exactly had a great record with contemporary opera in the last couple of years, so lets hope!

And Death in Venice. This is an extraordinary opera, Britten's last. One of my favourites, so pared down, so personal, so strange. So glad it's being done.






A few other notes:


-Queen of the night not yet cast for The Magic Flute.

-In that production, gay Don G Duncan Rock will be singing Papageno. He's also Morales in Carmen.

-Emilie Renard who is one of my young singers to look out for is playing three small roles in Julietta.

-Lucy Crowe is in Barber of Seville, and I've never yet seen her. Very intrigued.





Here's the new season in full.


The Magic Flute, Mozart, opens 13 September 2012

Julietta, Martinů, opens 17 September 2012

Julius Caesar, Handel, opens 1 October 2012

Don Giovanni, Mozart, opens 17 October 2012

The Pilgrim’s Progress, Vaughan Williams, opens 5 November 2012

Carmen, Bizet, opens 21 November 2012

The Mikado, Gilbert and Sullivan, opens 1 December 2012

La traviata, Verdi, opens 2 February 2013

Medea, Charpentier, opens 15 February 2013

The Barber of Seville, Rossini, opens 25 February 2013

Sunken Garden, Van der Aa, opens 12 April 2013

La bohème, Puccini, opens 29 April 2013

Wozzeck, Berg, opens 11 May 2013

The Perfect American, Glass, opens 1 June 2013

Death in Venice, Britten, opens 14 June 2013

Madama Butterfly at the Royal Opera House

Madama Butterfly General
22/06/2011
ROH

OK. Madama Butterfly. We'll get into the review in a second but oh dear. Oh dear. Where to start? The music is just poor. Not as poor as Tosca, and certainly not as bad as Turandot, which for me is the worst opera in the standard repertoire. But poor it is - breathtakingly crude, vulgar, simplistic (though not simple) treating a plot of undeniable dramatic potential in an amazingly crass and emotionally manipulative way. The basic musical fabric is dull more than anything, but I won't deny that the big moments, as in all of Puccini's operas, are astonishing creations. Un Bel Di Vedremo, Vissi d'arte, Nessun Dorma and virtually every one of his other famous arias are exquisite, achingly beautiful creations of nostalgic erotic kitsch which make incredible vehicles for amazing singers. But if he's capable of this level of quality and detail, then why is the norm of his work so uninteresting, banal and boring?

Puccini's depiction of Japan is embarrassing of course, that much should be clear to everyone (though the embarrassing orientalism is worse in Turandot, so maybe I shouldn't complain too much. Though maybe Butterfly is worse after all because the story is contemporary and not mythical). But basically this opera deals with sex tourism, with the underage Cio-Cio-San working as a dancer and geisha (how is she still so innocent and trusting of men?) before being bought by some rich, smooth talking, uncaring American sex tourist (of course he's a lieutenant in the navy... I bet they all say that) and then abandoned as soon as he leaves the port. The set up in the libretto is almost laughably poised towards a "tragic" ending (not tragic in the classical sense, tragic in the verismic sense) with Cio-Cio-San's endless talk of love and rapture and staying true, and Pinkerton's endless talk of money, betrayal, lust etc. etc. Not subtle. It's only in the second act when we realise she's had a nipper that Puccini starts pulling at the heart strings, and then in act three he's playing you like a harp. Of course such a painful human story is going to elicit tears - but isn't it repulsive to sentimentalise it to this extent?

I find it extremely difficult to understand how people can seriously consider Puccini's art next to Mozart's, Verdi's and Wagner's, let alone Janacek and Berg and even Strauss, his near contemporaries. Apart from the arias, in every parameter, his operas are embarrassing compared to these composers.

People have assured me that I will grow into liking Puccini as I get older, but presumably that entails that at some point in my 50s or 60s, as well as my looks fading, my jawline disappearing, my gut expanding and control over my bladder becoming ever more perilous, I will also take leave of my critical faculties and will begin to mistake tawdry, maudlin lyric melodrama, for the "real thing". I shudder at the thought, but everyone assures me it is coming, so like ear hair, back hair and liver spots, maybe I should just accept it and start worrying about other things (full disclosure: I'm not going to accept it).

This production is very simple, and is basically completely traditional. All the action goes on in one room, with a screen at the back constantly sliding up and down (noisily) to reveal the garden, the harbour or the Bonze. Other than that it's rather static and not exactly a feast for the eye and I did get a bit bored. The lighting is appalling, with big blocks of bright colour scattering across the stage almost at random. It's often too difficult to make out what the actors are doing in the gloom, and evocations of evening and night are generally clumsily segued into. I don't like the way that Pinkerton barely registers in the third act in this production, and although Cio-Cio-San is rightfully the centre of the action, we need to remember that Pinkerton has also aged 3 years and the regret he feels is due to his maturing in that time (at least nominally, he no longer seems to be a playboy). In this production he just starts sobbing and then runs off. The right dramatic/emotional triggers are all in place to make this a sob fest, but somehow it doesn't quite work, probably because act I doesn't work to make Cio-Cio likeable enough.

Patricia Racette can look lovely on stage, but Kristine Opolais, who has replaced her, is silly pretty. The looks don't quite transfer across the theatre though, but she'll look amazing on film no doubt. Even more striking perhaps is the American tenor, James Valenti who could be a model (he's so pretty! Men aren't even my bag and I still would! I strongly suspect that this was a big part of why he was cast) and this time the looks carry. He is absolutely ideal for douchebag B.F. Pinkerton - he acts it with just the right sort of nonchalance and sneering casualness. I think it'll probably look amazing on screen. But is he overparted? Again it'll be fine when recorded up close, but it wasn't always easy to hear him. This was a general though - would be good to hear from people how he does on opening night.

The singing is pretty good actually. Neither of the leads did much for me vocally, but it's all in place, in tune, without wobble, and with a few exceptions, easily audible. Not that exciting though it has to be said. Robin Leggate is the most powerful vocally, but in this case there's quite a bit of wobble in the tone, though it doesn't jar in this old serious man role, like it usually does. Suzuki is not a grateful mezzo part (not a single aria!) but Helene Schneiderman makes the most of it. Everyone seems to be a decent actor, which bodes well for the filming.

The filming is for an upcoming 3D cinema presentation of this show (ooh 3D, I've never seen opera in 3D before), and apparently the cameras will be there to film it again twice in the run (on the 8th and 15th July. Don't quote me). Whether it'll be as intrusive as it was here I don't know (at least four cameras in front of the stage at all times including a MASSIVE crane which requires 20 or so stalls seats to be removed).

UPDATE: You can quote me after all - the 8th and 15th July are the correct dates, and additionally, on those two dates, the maximum ticket price will be £37.50. http://www.roh.org.uk/whatson/madamabutterfly3d.aspx