LOC 2009-2010: Effervescently charming Elisir (at last) - Cabell, Filianoti, Corbelli, Campanella - January 2010; Season opener Tosca - Deborah Voigt

Dr. Dulcamara has made visitation on yet another opera company in the States, this time Lyric of Chicago. It was here that he would make the sale better than his other two stops on the continent, as performed by one singer – Alessandro Corbelli. The other major company to have had Elisir on over the past year or so has been Los Angeles, with Ruggiero Raimondi instead as Dulcamara (with Nino Machaidze apparently a winning Adina).

Most astute, clear musical preparation went into this Elisir, quite unlike in Houston under Edoardo Mueller or perhaps even under Bruno Campanella himself from San Francisco (starring Ramon Vargas and unsteady Inva Mula there). A working assumption is that Chicago used a mostly traditional production of Elisir d’amore, which is practically just almost always the best way to go about it. Once the charm of this simple comedy goes, then the game is pretty much up - the humor of it all quickly out the back door as well.

Conductor being the same as in San Francisco, I begin to suspect a co-conspirator among team doing the musical preparation for Lyric - Dr. Phillip Gossett. He it was who provided wonderful commentary on Elisir during the broadcast interval. He described eloquently how Verdi intimated Nemorino’s part for an Act 2 duet in how he wrote some of Gilda’s lines. He also spoke of the popular song origin of ‘Una furtive lagrima’ of how Donizetti pleaded with his librettist to be able to include it – in context of a very limited time frame to get things ready for Elisir’s first prima. However Dr. Gossett may have provided a hand just resulted in the most airy sense of lightness, fun, joie de vivre throughout the entirety of this, as though it all could have been played off the cuff. The fruits of preparation so astute and clear on something like Elisir d’amore are just that.

The only detracting thing about this performance was the quality of some of the voices themselves – some tendency to vocal hardness, strain around the break Campanella always made enterprise of finding a way in his accompaniment and for the singers themselves to find ways around it, and succeeded quite often at it. There were any combination of things – encouraging singers to give the rhythms in their vocal lines the bounce they need, to point the text with as much unforced wit as possible, and to caress the lines they sing and shapes within thereof. Of what I have heard this season from the U.S., there simply has been no opera better conducted than this one,

Nicole Cabell made the warm, almost sultry toned Adina. She tended to understate the sarcastic edge, the cold indifference to Nemorino, even some of the early flippancy of Adina in early scenes. Underlying her flirtatious character was a sense of there being a tug on the heartstrings – recognition of how deeply, even hopelessly in love with her Nemorino is. On the other hand, one may have sensed through Adina expressing herself in so much earnest to the audience, a lack of variety in accent, some blandness, but she stopped well short of making anything coy of Adina.

Enormous highlight of the entire performance was the Act 2 duet with Dulcamara, during which Cabell converted Adina’s enhanced concern for Nemorino at this point over much patter goading from the quack into equally joining forces with Dulcamara. His elixir is no match for her wiles toward eventually winning over a Nemorino who has started haughtily affecting that with elixir in hand there is nobody in the village to whom women are more attracted than he. Cabell’s very heartfelt “Prendii, per me sei libero”, even if mildly placed back vocally, was moving. Her command of long lines without taking a breath, subtle rubato infused therein, even if for some ends of phrases, Cabell does not lighten tone to fully desirable extent. Two very minor slips, in getting off cleanest releases for taking breaths during the at once rapid and long-lined cabaletta, were all that betrayed any more insecurity than mentioned already. Compensating for such was Cabell’s very warm low register and fine achievement of both agility across the range and generosity of spirit, so much with which she invested singing Adina.

Giuseppe Filianoti made his Lyric Opera of Chicago debut with Nemorino. His opening ‘Quanto e bello’ revealed a tenor unabashed in giving his lines much full-throated ardor, wile managing to avoid any too obvious strain, except perhaps on one optional high A toward the end of his first aria. For ‘”Una furtive lagrima”, he prudently eschewed attempting to achieve the sublime with this, with in mind first and foremost the simplicity of the aria’s popular origins – with just some hint of mezzo voce a la Alfredo Kraus for starting the second verse to it. It worked beautifully well for him and gave the obvious show-stopper its place within context of the entire comedy and very winningly so. Even if still spending a little too much of what vocal resources lie at his disposal, no effort of the kind unduly intervened on “Una furtive lagrima” this go at it.

What Filianoti had beforehand was the wit he put into so many scenes in-between the two arias – the rambunctious bounce he gave reprise of the chorus with his part in descant to them so early on. Also spot-on was his fulsome ecstasy in discovering the elixir, and insolence to others, as towards Belcore when things only seem to finally be going entirely his way. Filianoti pointed too the ease with which Nemorino can be so easily duped. He made a study in character acting here – requiring that he sing the part well - complete, not to mention very charming. His gently distraught ardor for “Ai perigli della guerra” – part of'Venti scudi' (duet with Belcore) that inspired Verdi’s writing of Gilda’s lines in quartet from Rigoletto, (as Gossett explained well) was most apt.

Gabriele Viviani also made fine casting as the haughty Belcore. With good command of line, he affected noble bearing well for his opening aria, “Come Paride vezzoso”, even the irony of it well. Just mostly to advantage, did Viviani revealwhat fulsomeness of voice he can command. Extra emphasis on bluster invited some strain, but the agility for runs and rapid patter, including in stern rebuttal to Nemorino’s entreaties Viviani clearly made known. Viviani commands a supple line, nuance thereof, especially when most relaxed - evident as Riccardo Forth throughout a Bologna Puritani seen here last year.

Nearly a week after the Puritani, courtesy of Rave and Emerging Pictures, Houston Grand Opera staged its Elisir d’amore, borrowed from Glyndebourne, starring Alessandro Corbelli as Dr. Dulcamara. By and large, let Corbelli be his own stage director, as Jack O’Brien (Met Trittico) and Giulio Chazzaletes have done, and out comes an artist entirely worthy of our trust. This Dulcamara was not only hilarious, but definitively revealed Corbelli’s love for both the part and the character. He even let on about chance of Dulcamara’s quackery catching up with him one day.

Corbelli made up for a little vocal stiffening that comes with age, with tremendous wit with the words. He commanded the stage here from first ‘Udite’ to both finish heralding his entrance and introduce his catalogue of wares and mostly elixirs with great aplomb. The awareness of all the highly varied whim and demand Dulcamara finds out on the street was acute, together with pointed parody of the clientele. Whatever trick might work with any of his clients, even if it is affecting amnesia, as with Adina, or befuddlement upon first meeting Nemorino (as though trying to keep pace with him) there was for us no mistaking it and no self-conscious underlining of the least bit. He even, upon reprise of ‘Io son ricco’ skipped a beat during the tune on purpose to affect catching himself saying something he should not, lest the cat get completely let out of the bag. Here was classic Corbelli, equal to any of the best he has given us in the past. With audience instead on or attentive to so much excess clutter, Corbelli too willingly took a back seat to it all, as he surmised what was demanded of him here in Houston. Such was our loss, but concerning Corbelli, all is definitely (forgotten and) forgiven now.

Guaranteeing that no number in this Elisir might seem least bit insignificant was Bruno Campanella on the podium. Take for instance the quasi-conspiratorial chorus (“Saria possible?’”) of girls, led by “Or Nemorino e milionario” that can so easily become so much marking of time. Between the very saucy Giannetta of Angela Mannino and Bruno Campanella’s highly attentive, but never obtrusive pointing of accents, it all instead turned out as much fun as all the rest of this very witty Elisir. Campanella’s leadership showed some awareness of ‘period’ in keeping string vibrato light, but without encrusting Donizetti with a level of tautology – of which it should never be in any need. While still keeping things a little subdued for it, he had the better shaping of ‘Adina, credimi’ during the finale to Act One than either Patrick Summers or Edoardo Muller. The animated passages that surrounded the moment of poignancy had all the air, lift, bounce, wit they ever needed. There was more detail heard throughout it all than we are most accustomed to hearing, not only for at times just Donizetti’s rhythms themselves – but for so very much that can infuse them with so much life.

The reading between the lines was also so complete, most of all in allowing deft space needed for his singers to make all of their words count – even at a few tempos mildly breezier than usual. All worked as though magically to the singers’ advantage. All backed off from contributing to a situation in which they might strain their voices. Much highly attentive rehearsal, sufficient time for such contributed so much – such that Campanella may have been denied months earlier in San Francisco; performance broadcast from that run did not lift spirits to the level this one did. All effervesced, bubbled here - even preceding excellent flute principal in the sinfonia - to extent as though no effort could have been put into it - indeed why to prepare Elisir so well.

Short work here can be made of the Tosca that followed. Andrew Davis’s conducting just about thoroughly missed it in line, sostenuto, and in sufficient necessary buildup, maintenance of dramatic tension. Past the dryly enunciated opening ‘trionfar’ on solo horn more color and nuance emerged for much of Act Three – taken less draggy overall than Act One. Even the dryly enunciated Scarpia chords opening Act One (with urbane manner for much of the rest of this Tosca) showed incomplete understanding of their import, even of the harmonic progression itself. Davis applied so much elision to in effect override scene of Scarpia’s murder that, as a result, he thoroughly deflated it. No, the heavy grind he made out of resuming the dirge that has moments before accompanied Scarpia’s writing of the safe-conduct did not help matters. Deborah Voigt could hardly be blamed for not knowing what to do with ‘Avanti a lui’, except to just do it by rote.

Deborah Voigt, in caressing so many lines, showed a very welcome feminine, even girlish vulnerability as Tosca that helped obscure some hollowness of midrange and wiry strain on top. It became a little too evident, however, during ‘Vissi d’arte’ a lack of grandeur of expression, but of course a very opposite way of playing the Roman diva has seldom worked well either. A little of such glibness carried over into Act Three, but not enough to ruin matters. The fear, anxiety in Voigt’s voice during tense moments with Scarpia rang true, especially as far as through the interrogation scene.

Vladimir Galuzin was out-and-out disastrous as Mario Cavaradossi – all thick bluster and little else, and even in effect, with as thick a wobble as he could let out, gave off ability to hit a good several pitches at once (at crest of 'Trionfar', for instance). It is such at which Buddhist monks in remote parts of Mongolia are adept - to depict varied states of nature, as host of PBS travelogue let us see probably the same Saturday afternoon this broadcast. First of two ‘Vittoria’s in Act Two wobbled out of control, followed by second one that seemed to get stuck on its second syllable. Number of sub-phrases Galuzin managed to sing softly could be counted on the fingers of one hand. There was little meaning to Cavaradossi’s defiance of Scarpia or of his circumstances, as so many lighter, more ardent passages contained the same bluster as well.

Garnett Bruce, for this restaging of the Met Zeffirelli production, spoke of the Russian pessimistic view of the final scene, regarding Cavaradossi, for Cavaradossi to be telling Tosca, ‘Don’t worry, honey. I will look good’ – in response to coaching of how to handle supposedly simulated situation at hand. One can not doubt Galuzin’s ability to look good, act well and have some feeling for Cavaradossi, but a much more relaxed approach to all this is necessary for any of it to come across vocally.

James Morris, seen soon thereafter as a disastrous Fiesco for Met revival of Simon Boccanegra, showed unerring command of the words and of even some of the gravitas of Scarpia, not to mention the to-be-feared aspects of this character. Voice was too dry to sustain well the legato for ‘Ella verra’, but he made much of the declamation in the Te Deum and of so many lines, playing off the vulnerable sounding Deborah Voigt, both in his Act One interview of Tosca and throughout the interrogation scene in Act Two.

Among supporting cast, John Easterlin (Spoletta), Paul Corona (Sciarrone) and sonorous jailer of Sam Handley distinguished themselves most, but weak Angelotti (Craig Irvin) and extra-buffo, vocally weak Dale Travis as the Sacristan less so. Angela Mannino made ideal a picture of boyish wistful innocence, as treble-toned Shepherd to help open Act Three.

LOC Brief Encounter with Alban Berg's Lulu

The title of a new opera starts things off in reviewing a now past season performance of one of the greatest classics of the twentieth century, and perhaps for good reason. For one, I only listened through Act 2 of the Saturday broadcast from Chicago Lyric. What was heard thus far did not do Alban Berg’s score adequate justice.

Using equally the Friedrich Cerha completion of Act 3 was a broadcast of Lulu from Lyric twenty years ago, starring Catherine Malfitano and Viktor Braun and conducted by Dennis Russell Davies. I was, going in, a bit apprehensive of what might lean toward being too dry or academic. If anything needed to help, it certainly was the frisson that producer Yuri Lyubimov somehow brought to the stage, even infusing such a line as ‘Der Teufel’ from a dying Dr Schon with acerbic wit. Somehow Rodney Milnes (in review I looked up last weekend) found the production altogether humorless, but I hardly at all believe him. Up next to what I heard Saturday, the Davies performances were positively orgiastic; this Lulu had its very deeply affecting moments too. Saturday, by way of contrast, there were numerous instances in which the singing actors pointlessly hammed up their lines or worked the hall. I do not surmise that this is what passes for humor to Rodney Milnes, as I usually very much respect his judgment.

In terms of pretty good knowledge of the score, Sir Andrew Davis is someone I certainly find efficient enough, for instance being able to hold things together and for having a pretty good superficial understanding of what essentially goes on musically here. Beyond that, still keeping in mind that the Lyric orchestra plays this music well, I heard little that made any difference. Gilding phrase endings of passages of musical romanticism in this and (in effect just partly to help singers sustain strenuous high notes) clipping other passages or note values for modernistic effect do not really cut it, as toward giving a unified feel to Lulu. Even in the context of smoothly enough handled transitions and what have you, it still is lacking.

The coloring, nuance Davis did provide, it is insufficient for sense of the overtones in the complex motivic and harmonic language of this music. It is most definitely in some of that most certainly lies the soul and even the spirituality of Alban Berg's music, and as revealing the character of Lulu herself. The internal engine for the frisson a good producer can add to theatrical proceedings is found in the substance of the music itself.

There is the dialectic in how the system by which Lulu was composed seriously undermined the system of overtones we have with diatonic or what we call tonal music. Berg further expanded upon things, the dialectic, by re-introducing diatonicism into the mix of composing in tone rows. If not a convincing and completely thought out romantic view of the work – or even a completely thoroughly worked out balance between all romantic and modernistic elements as one might get from Metzmacher – why not then a convincing modernistic take on it, such as we’ve heard already from Boulez and Davies? With Andrew Davis, there was instead little of any point of view conveyed here at all.

An assured smugness, self-satisfaction has taken over with Andrew Davis that Saturday one had to wait until 'O freiheit' in Act Two, Scene 2, for any sense of the heat being turned up to anywhere near the level at which some of this music is written. Here it merely seemed that Davis got carried along by Marlis Petersen, in one of her best moments in the broadcast. There is also so much need for contrast between sections in music so immersed in the classical tradition as Lulu is - with its beautifully crafted adaptation of sonata and rondo forms - for the chamber music sections, with its beautiful woodwind concertato writing. Fact remains too that some of the best comic relief scenes – mix of high and low comedy – in this opera occur with these passages. Clarity of much of Berg's writing was good, but the reason why any of it should be so clear, anymore than Previn's facilely crafted spinning and re-spinning over and over again of seventh and ninth chords in Brief Encounter here, hardly existed at all.

The buhnemusik sections (for jazz band) seemed to be coming, instead of from where the noise of audience applause from very back of stage for Act 1, Scene 3 (back-stage scene) is, to be coming from the orchestra pit. I decided then to investigate the Glyndebourne dvd, as also conducted by Andrew Davis. Graham Vick has set up a brick-wall cyclodrome, which in his conceptualization seems to be blocking off of any notion that anything should or might be such to ever happen behind it, except for a couple of apertures in it through which characters can enter and exit - so aurally the effect on the dvd was pretty much the same as heard from Lyric.. The production at Lyric was by Paul Curran, not Graham Vick, so what might have been the excuse here? Frankly, what may have been the excuse either time? This is by far cutting corners way too much on what the composer wrote. It is especially to be cutting corners if the special instrumentation for the jazz band is not fully included; the temptation to cut back thus is so much greater with this music played in the pit, including for those who will follow this example.

Marlis Petersen spoke very sympathetically of the character of Lulu at second intermission, right before I tuned out. She tended however to overplay Lulu as a malicious vamp in the early scenes of the opera. While being just a bit weak with low notes, her voice showed the flexibility to meet most of the demands of the music, but let it perhaps be churlish to say that notes above the staff tended to tighten much, and thus she became a little easily compromised by some of the most cruel demands the music makes on the upper part of the soprano range. Compromising her best efforts was the failure of any really truly complete support from the podium.

Wolfgang Schone made a good, conventional Dr Schon, that showed too some growth into the part since performing it at Glyndebourne fifteen years ago. Willliam Burden made a somewhat light-voiced but at the same time refulgent enough Alwa to be at least very close to fully credible in the part, instead of for instance being cast as the Painter (capably sung by Scott Ramsay). A chesty sounding Jill Grove somewhat underlined the butch aspect of Geschwitz a little much for my tastes, but otherwise served the part adequately well. Thomas Hammons, being light in voice for Schigolch, relied a little heavily on broad cliche to put across such a mysterious character as Schigolch, thus one got little or considerably less feel for what Schigolch is about certainly than one should. Some of that may have to be chalked up to failure on part of the dramaturgy behind the Paul Curran production - regardless the praise for it I have read.

Other reviews have remarked upon the clarity and ease with which Marlis Petersen sings the title role of Lulu. One however only has to remember just back as far as Christine Schafer to find a true ideal - and for who so effortlessly acts the part that she is practically indistinguishable from the character herself. Vick however does so little to work with the singer toward bringing out how she might be able to give a little of her own insight and as such not to quite interfere much at all with whatever Vick's lofty ideas or ideals might be, that is, if there exist any. Vick tends to work best with singers being on stage with just one other singer, but his putting Norman Bailey as Schigolch at one point in poistion of humping Lulu does absolutely nothing, absolutely nothing at all, but confuse whoever is watching as to what is going on. It is not even risible in any outré way; it is just boring - but we must see that it is his way instead of that of the top Lulu in the world (no pun intended) and one of the top Wotan's of the 1970's as Schigolch.

The necessity of having the Lulu from Glyndebourne is indeed the vocalism and complete artistry of Christne Schafer. Andrew Davis, here with a London Philharmonic that seldom ever goes the second mile in revealing the harmonic depths of Lulu, is less interpretative, affected, or obfuscating of musical form than how I found his work from Lyric. The inner rhythmic vitality of the music comes across on the dvd performance better as well. When one reaches 'O freiheit' towards the end of Act Two however, one still has to ask, 'is that all he or they can give?'

Graham Vick curiously also cheats us of feeling sympathy for other than Countess Geschwitz (sung eloquently by Kathryn Harries). The buildup of manic obsession in Dr Schon, that can get clichéd too much the other way, is such from Vick that Wolfgang Schone is mostly left to fend for himself toward finding it, and while a too little and especially too late, he does halfway through Act Two, Scene 1. Having David Kuebler, incisive as Alwa, play the artist son of Dr Schon a bit wild-eyed all the time, undercuts some how Alban Berg may have found some of his own persona in Alwa Schon.

What got undercut through most of this is the music of Alban Berg, so at once ornate and meditative on the psychology of what drives these characters (especially of about five of them).that both implicitly and openly admits to there being greater secrets to the characters we can only start getting to know. Anymore than that we must unearth ourselves. Such is the very beauty, even the aesthetic of Alban Berg's Lulu.

Whatever loss was encountered - there was much - it is good to remake the acquaintance of such a good friend as this score, that Saturday upon better unearthing its riches, is such that may not be able to stop paying back. However inadequate a performance, it is only so far that one can take away from such genius. Perhaps when we return - in attempting perhaps to rescue Mozart from the Glyndebourne tradition more than some have tried so far - to doing Mozart the justice his music deserves, we will eventually also in a more deep and satisfying way find Alban Berg. For all the ‘glutinous’ layering on of rallentandi at the ends of numbers in Nozze di Figaro, conducted by Andrew Davis, almost in simultaneous run with the Lulu of 21 years ago, Rodney Milnes found the Nozze to be in ‘sanctimonious Victorian’ mode so much of the way.

Could not have Lyric instead lured Markus Stenz, Jonathan Nott, Ingo Metzmacher, Kazushi Ono, Kent Nagano, Edo De Waart, Ilan Volkov, or even Dennis Russell Davies again to their podium for this? It has been mentioned that the score of Lulu, such as could be said of Mahler 6, is in effect a dirge, though inculcating such a variety of both instrumental and vocal forms. Whereas there may be much death over which to suffer loss, there should be some or at least a little more semblance of life to have made it noticeable or a little more so than was made evident Saturday.