The Importance of Being Ernest at ROH

15/06/13

Linbury Theatre

This is being billed as the first "staged" production of Gerald Barry's opera in the UK, but the orchestra is visible on stage, there is no set beyond the props and no off stage area so surely semi-staged is the more apt term if we are using conventional terminology. It's not as if the libretto strongly suggests that there is an orchestra in the background at all times.

Gerald Barry has described his extensive excisions of the original text (it's cut down to a third of the play's length) as an X-ray of the original, noting how strong the play is to have survived such treatment. It hardly needs to be said that Wilde is the patron saint of camp, its highest and most delicious exponent. The music is deliberately unbearable and totally at odds with the libretto - nothing less camp or intentionally charmless than Barry's music could be imagined in its unrelenting brashness, furious yet sparely rendered violence, and motoric rhythmic insistence. The music is itself like an X-ray in its stripping away of anything that might be suggestive of softness, sensuality or beauty of surface. When the body being X-rayed is something like the child of Stravinsky/Xenakis meets a brassband, you're left with a very hard aural picture. This is odd since a large part of Wilde's campness is derived from his status as the most ardent aesthete in the popular imagination; indeed he has become for us the embodiment of that sensibility. (It's also why Strauss' Salome [which also uses a play by Wilde] is such a good fit of librettist and composer.) In the context of Barry's music, Wilde's words emerge not as camp satire, but as manic, almost demented dadaism. The shift in focus is total, and the humour that arises is based on the surreal rather than on wry observation of social convention.

Ramin Gray has updated the piece to the present day, and reinforces many aspects of Barry's setting of the text by mixing naturalistic acting with obvious "set pieces" (quartets, duets etc. delivered facing forwards). Lighting is the biggest indicator of changes of mood and scene, though isn't evocative of time or place, but instead simply indicates a change in circumstances. Maybe the funniest and most shocking sequence is the portion where 40 or so plates are smashed rhythmically in the course of a minute between Gwendolen's angrily articulated syllables, but the rest feels like a dislocated, alienated run through of Wilde's play. I really wonder what it would look like with ultra fussy late 19th century sets and costumes - maybe the score/libretto would be funnier and more revealing that way?

The cast is mostly quite good. One of the best aspects of the score is that Barry has chosen to make Lady Bracknell a bass voice part, making it one of the very few "skirt" roles in opera (that is a man playing a woman). In this production, Lady Bracknell is just a suited man who is incongruously called "mama", "lady", "she" etc. throughout, to absurd effect. On the one hand the lack of drag matches the lack of campness in the staging (and music), but on the other seems like a sadly missed opportunity. As Lady Bracknell, Alan Ewing has a pleasantly rich voice, though his frequent excursions into falsetto were really choked. Ida Falk Winland is impressive in the high coloratura role of Cecily (and it would be good to hear her in something more appetising). The rest are more than serviceable, but it's difficult to really comment much on their voices or interpretation. The Britten Sinfonia play this rhythmically difficult music with confidence, though are underutilised in the sense that the music doesn't call for anything other than accuracy. Conductor Tim Murray has the thankless job of simply beating time.

DVD Review: Dido and Aeneas 2008 L'Opera Comique

Francois Roussillon

Dido: Malena Ernman
Aeneas: Christopher Maltman
Belinda: Judith van Wanroij
Sorceress: Hilary Summers
Prologue: Fiona Shaw

Director: Deborah Warner

Conductor: William Christie
Les Arts Florissants






A wonderful performance of Purcell's only opera which brilliantly balances the comic and tragic elements of the drama - the only thing one regrets is that it is over so quickly. In a DVD extra feature William Christie voices his suspicions that the piece is incomplete and notes points in the score where ad lib is written, as well as known about scenes that have gone missing (e.g. for the Sorceress) and also that much of the separately published libretto has apparently not been set to music. We cannot know because Purcell's music comes to us only through 18th century copies, from sympathetic hands who were determined that this music should last.

What does remain is of course magnificent, an ultra condensed, intense drama that is one of the most brilliant instances of the genre composed before Mozart. Christie is brave in fleshing out the ad libitum parts, and crafting a short Prologue with director Deborah Warner. Actress (and now sometime opera director) Fiona Shaw takes on this role, reciting portions of Ted Hughes' Echo and Narcissus, T.S. Eliot's the Wasteland and the famous Yeats poem "Aedh wishes for the cloths of Heaven". In common with most authentic Baroque prologues it's not directly relevant to the opera, but it proves an interesting opening. Fiona Shaw's skill in declamation and obvious knowledge of vocal resonance can only be compared with operatic singing - the utilisation of vocal registers and colours is unerring and virtuosic. Occasionally the voice cracks from too much pushing, and also she's more at home with the storytelling than the poetry, but she is engaging and sets the tone admirably.

Deborah Warner's production takes as its starting point the story that Purcell composed this opera for a girls school in London, and so there is a huge sea of little faces that invade the action at certain moments. The chorus are in modern dress at the sides of the stage, observing and commenting on the action and occasionally interacting, and the central characters are all in 17th century costume and mostly act on a slightly raised central stage like in a Noh play. The whole thing appears to take place in a 17th century courtyard. It's understated but visually very striking and evocative of all the layers that are being combined here. Quite an achievement.

But what is even more impressive is the knitting together of the disparate dramatic styles to create a cohesive whole that entertains and moves at every point. Malena Ernman is a magnificent Dido, vocally beautiful, with a rich chest register and a beautifully pure soprano like top. She is also a superb actress, one of the most natural and subtle that I have ever seen in opera and her interactions with the equally superb Christopher Maltman as Aeneas are worth the price of the DVD alone. Maltman could also simply not be bettered either dramaitcally or vocally - the vibrato is maybe a teensy bit wide at times, but the text is beautifully articulated and his acting again a model of sensitivity and nuance. His character registers far more fully than normal and in some ways is the linchpin of the production. Very special indeed.

On the comedy side, Hilary Summers is a really fantastic sorceress, her acting hilarious and commanding, and her trademark timbre, hollow, androgynous and eerie, quite unlike any other singer's that I have heard, is quite ideal for the role. Deborah Warner makes her as contrasted as possible from Dido, removing any sense of grace or elegance by giving her aggressive and manly mannerisms and a terrifyingly capricious sense of humour. She does not neglect the character's central sadness either, and one is most frustrated that her part isn't bigger. Her assistant witches are maybe the only slight weakness of the production and they can become a little irritating, but not enough to spoil anything.

The contribution of the choir and orchestra of Les Arts Florissants and William Christie is as faultless as ever, and if I wouldn't quite put this alongside their absolute best ever work, it would be difficult to name people who could do it better.

This is probably the best version of the opera on DVD then as Connolly is scuppered by the terribly boring ROH production and the Hickox/Ewing 1995 one is an "opera film", a genre which I have a very hard time enjoying. Highly recommended.

George Benjamin Day at Wigmore Hall (Into the Little Hill)

06/04/13

© Michiharu Okubo

The Wigmore Hall's "George Benjamin day" was actually comprised of just two concerts because (as the composer claimed in an interview) he has composed so few pieces where the performers would fit on the Wigmore's stage. That is to say that he has thus far largely composed for orchestra, and I have to say that generally, I think the orchestra is the medium in which Benjamin's special gifts are most obviously revealed. There are in fact are a few other pieces which might have been played - the wonderful Viola, Viola (1997) for instance, the early Octet, and a few other piano pieces. The first concert showcased some of his instrumental and chamber works starting with a very early Sonata for violin and piano (1977) which he composed before he left school. In every way an ambitious work, it's a sort of multi movement virtuoso showpiece for both instruments which has an old school first-half-of-the-twentieth-century seriousness and lyricism, while revealing something of the older composer's ear for sonorous detail and invention. I would happily cite Carolin Widmann's violin playing as a model of great string playing - perfect control, great sense of line, endlessly varied tone colour, total conviction and passion, a beautiful fundamental sound and all completely without ego. A wonderful treat. 

Marino Formenti at the piano proved to be more problematic. Formenti's mouth is a lens through which every musical gesture must pass before it can be relayed to audience - if the facial contortions were the only manifestation of this affectation it might be bearable, but in addition we get an unending accompaniment of snuffles and growls that seriously distracts from the music - after the concert it was all I heard people comment on. It's a real shame, because he partnered Widmann with sensitivity, and he is clearly committed to the music. Unfortunately the solo piano work Shadowlines (2001) felt grey and dull, quite unlike the luminous mysteriousness that Pierre-Laurent Aimard's imbues them with on his CD performance. The three studies for piano (1982-85) which closed the concert, are more naturally appealing works. The first is a chiaroscuro study of pace and rhythm; the second, created from notes that spell out Haydn's name, conjures a quiet halo of pellucid sound around the piano; the final one feels like one of Ives' studies for piano with its frequent excursions into ragtime between more abstract episodes. Although more convincingly rendered than Shadowlines, I felt the outer movements were a bit splashy, lacking the precision that seems essential to Benjamin's music, and my enjoyment was once again marred by Formenti's very invasive groaning and heavy breathing.

In between these we got Benjamin's solo flute piece Flight (1979), which is an engaging traversal of the expressive colouristic and timbral qualities of the flute, ably dispatched by Adam Walker. Walker also played Heaven’s Chimes Are Slow by young composer Christian Mason, which sadly paled in the context of the works that surrounded it. Carolin Widmann made a welcome return in Benjamin's Three Miniatures for Solo Violin (2001) which again were played with verve and great gusto by this superb musician. 

In the evening concert larger forces were mobilised as the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group played three works by different composers with Benjamin conducting. Francesco Antonioni's Ballada for string octet is an entertaining romp, explosively exploring a huge array of string techniques and sounds in a quasi tonal framework. The sheer vitality of the noise was at times pleasurable enough in a piece that perhaps does not plumb the depths, with the players clearly relishing the huge sonorities resounding so powerfully in the Wigmore acoustic. David Sawyer's Rumpelstiltskin Suite was laughably poor, but sadly also painfully long and so a real blot on the evening. The best I can say of it is that it sounded entirely professionally composed.

After the interval all sins were quickly forgiven and forgotten, as we got Benjamin's Into the Little Hill (2008). My god the quality of this score announces itself in the first bar and simply doesn't diminish in its entire 40 minute duration. The libretto is by Martin Crimp, the same librettist as Benjamin's recent opera Written on Skin, and some of the hallmarks of the more recent text are present here too - the frequent self narration of the characters, the simplicity and economy of the poetry, and the uncluttered dramatic momentum. Benjamin responds with a score of dark brilliance, infinitesimally nuanced in timbre, unflinching in invention and inspiration, and the drama seems to come as much from the musical tensions as the textual ones. In its fractured blackness and density it is quite different from the slow motion, floating diaphanousness of Written on Skin; I for one preferred the earlier piece as a dramatic and overall musical experience.

The playing of the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group was brilliantly detailed, and Benjamin's direction impossible to fault. The soloists were of commensurate quality. Hilary Summers's voice is pleasingly distinctive, possessing one of the most androgynous timbres I've ever heard, her diction is excellent, and if it's hardly the most luxuriant voice and doesn't have the normal depth of sound that you expect a contralto to offer, I simply can't imagine a more apt rendering of this vocal part. Susanna Andersson (replacing the originally advertised Rebecca Bottone) was if anything even more impressive, with her gloriously beautiful soubrette timbre, light in colour yet full and firm, offering superb accuracy and solidity in the high lying tessitura, and equal commitment to diction and characterisation. Surely a likely candidate for the role of The Woman in future revivals of Written on Skin. Superficially Andersson is similar to Barbara Hannigan (who premièred that role and sung it also at the ROH) sharing all of her positive qualities, but she has a voice of greater warmth, colour and beauty and lacks Hannigan's mannerisms. 

A truly wonderful performance of a wondrous work that on its own validated participation in the entire day. Pure pleasure!