MET - Rossini: Armida (Met premiere). Rare must-see gem of masterpiece faithfully played, blandly produced. Triumph for Larry Brownlee. 01.5.10

Regardless how it may turn out, a production of Rossini’s Armida is a great event.

Long before the World Cup, Rossini experimentally wrote a trio for three tenors that the world cup trio, to best of my recollection, never touched. What revivals of Rossini’s Armida there have been have been rare. There was the famous 1952 Firenze revival with Maria Callas, also featuring Mario Filippeschi as Gernando and Ubaldo and a young Gianni Raimondi (in Act 3) as Carlo. Tulsa Opera, of all companies, put it on in 1992, for very unique observation, I recall reading, of Rossini bicentennial that year.

Armida marks Rossini’s only thorough engagement of the supernatural in one of his operas. Third among his Neapolitan opera seria, it served to reopen (after bad fire) the San Carlo in Naples. For this, Rossini expanded upon significantly what he could thus far make an orchestra do. Of the story of a sorceress’s seduction of a Crusades knight, Rossini capitalizes most of all on making this a love story between Armida and Rinaldo. As enhanced by his employ of exotic harmony and color, at peak thus far of intellectual acumen mixed with his passion for Isabella Colbran, who created the part, Rossini crafted this narrative with commanding subtle complexity. Its simplicity of design also becomes arresting to anyone who becomes intimately familiar with this work.

Rossini left open the option of a company having only to hire four tenors instead of six for Armida, by having two tenors double up on available parts. Three of the tenor parts are fiercely difficult, those of Rinaldo, leader of the paladins Goffredo and the jealous Gernando. The Met opted for hiring six tenors and for two earlier performances in the run, had found them. Two cancellations however unfortunately ensued, those of Bruce Ford as Goffredo and then Jose Manuel Zapata as Gernando. John Osborn, here last fall in Houston for other than vocally disastrous Elixir of Love, replaced Ford, cleanly so. Barry Banks added Gernando to being cast as Carlo.

Mary Zimmerman, of last-season La Sonnambula notoriety (for which Natalie Dessay, unqualified, joined her as co-producer) staged this, the Met’s first Armida. Only hinted at, fortunately, was silly post-modern feeling of play within play of Armida, compared with Sonnambula staged as rehearsal thereof. An always mute, cherubic figure in pink, Amor, was first to enter the stage (with sign proclaiming E allora fu), cloyingly becoming annoying right away. Zimmerman gratefully made mostly more deft use of this mute part past the first half hour or so of Armida. Put however two sofas on stage for Act One, set during first Crusade at camp outside Jerusalem, and the set design in light tan with motif of palm trees would be easy to mistake for lobby of a large La Quinta Inn. Deflating so well indeed was the costuming for the maitre-d’ and waiters, oh the knights, to make up Act Onemen’s chorus. The costumes resembled so much quasi plastic thin metal for tank top breastplate over teletubby approximating red flannel. Fortunately solid-with-trim costuming of lead characters, simple along Napoleonic era lines, worked very well, apart from the all slightly loud and coy light magenta among three gowns Fleming wore

Riccardo Frizza, on Met podium with Rigoletto last season, made his Met in HD debut with Armida. Rossini, with very fine orchestra at his disposal in Naples, wrote in much infusion of often exotic color into his scoring to just both good extent for him personally and a little beyond what could be expected at the time, where best serving his purposes both musically and dramatically. It is all by now so subtle to our ears as we hear what was so innovative of him at the time, thus the only sufficient way to listen to Rossini is as though, best we can, with good approximation of how people heard things during his day. Facing what little Frizza saw on stage here, it may have become easy to settle for casual minimum in bringing out the fine color in Rossini’s orchestration.

Frizza led the Met orchestra through this with optimum rhythmic and stylistic clarity for most of it, plus good support for his singers, but often unimaginatively. What he is capable of accomplishing can be heard on recordings of Matilde di Shabran and Fille du regiment (that he also conducted in Houston in 2007). His orchestra in Genoa on Fille du regiment, with horns of Tyrolean flavor, brings out more color than one normally suspects that score calls for.

There were such highlights here as well, particularly with the ballet music in Act 2, with incisive spring and charm to its rhythms and colors, and atmospherically idyllic introduction to open Act 3 Frizza characterized equally well. Solo winds and jousting antiphony of solo horns (in the Sinfonia) gave always of their very best. Rafael Figueroa got pushed for whatever reason through his Act 2 Rinaldo/Armida duet cello solo introduction, for playing proving anything but sensuous or demure. David Chan was hardly more subtle for parallel concertmaster solo in Act Three. Choral work for the men lacked heft for Rossini’s proto-Trovatore writing assigned them. Good handful among nymphs looked the aging butter-and-eggs variety, sounding it as well If these be nymphs, I divert mine eyes from how the used up may appear. With better than streamlined rehearsal time for drawing out the color in Rossini’s scoring, thereby to infuse this music with consistently driving passion, Frizza could have given it his all.

John Osborn delivered first vocal splendors as Goffredo. He managed to find good vocal placement, showing fine rhythm and rhetorical sense for the brilliant writing in front of him. A hint of steel in his voice fit very well too, with no loss of agility. Rossini with this religiously zealous leader of the paladins subtly reveals in Goffredo’s writing what chinks are in his armor in ability or not to resist Armida’s charms. He also had in Giuseppe Cicimarra a singer who was, according to Richard Osborne, dramatically weak. Rossini had had to compose Iago for him and did so in a way widely considered low-key, with exception of several pages therein. Osborne, however, added in perhaps one or two pieces of ornamentation too many, such that took him through a squeal of a high C – little more sign of weakness than Rossini had in mind. Donald Kaasch, from Pesaro (1992), is still less considerably capable of so much embellishment as he throws in. He and Daniele Gatti are also both too lavish about embellishing Rossini’s rhythms.

Yeghishe Manucharyan made an ideally Mozartean Eustazio. As weak a character Eustazio is – as balance to his brother Goffredo and the furious Gernando – he brought fine measure of dignity to the simple part. Barry Banks, stepping in for Jose Zapata, was the new Gernando, proving two-dimensional at it. For numerous lines that start on low notes and also cover a wide range, Banks invested more snarl than tone. A mildly cracked tone emerged for most of this. When he returned, well rested, for his originally scheduled part of Carlo, Banks then emerged at his lyrical best - good and firm too in showing outrage at Rinaldo; he supported Brownlee very capably for centerpiece of Act 3 - an only now on cusp of familiar trio for three tenors. Filling out the rest of that equation was Kobie van Rensburg, quoted in interview of Ubaldo (like Gernando) having been composed for bari-tenor Claudio Bonoldi, proved musically sensitive, adept, but tonally weak, even slightly cracked for ability to provide optimum support during the trio.

Renee Fleming pleasantly proved still capable of singing the title role, apart from several high notes by now a little tight. As said elsewhere, this was a sorceress on low ebb or smolder - denying even of fully open sensual allure to have debauched more than the most impressionable knight. Together with plethora of glottal stops, light guttural attacks, there was an incipient split-second hesitation before taking on many dauntingly virtuosic lines in this part, including during Act One quartet - moment at which we need Armida to make the strong Circe-like impression with which she should indulge us. Such should ring true also for the mesmerizing theme and variations of Act Two, with which to set down pat a complete seduction of Rinaldo. So many aspirates in coloratura only hint at folly the amount of time Fleming has committed to singing bel canto.

Fleming’s acting of Armida also raised questions. Taken with somewhat verismo vocal means, there is a postmodern glib irony to it all. Even conventionally, Armida makes use of irony in a conniving, manipulative way toward both getting her way and gaining as much control possible over the knights. This however is something a little different. Rossini’s infatuation with Isabella Colbran comes through in the great allure of his writing for the sorceress. As part however of Armida being a star vehicle for Renee Fleming, here is way of playing the sorceress as victim to lace the part with irony as device for merely artistic ingenuity’s sake – to portray being on the defensive. Those evil, plundering Christian knights, it is easy to see why.

The creamy, warm sound, good depth in lower register and bright top, it is good to report still are intact, even for Rossini. The glottal stops, guttural business, though still there, get applied less broadly than how she went about things in Pesaro, but with voice now slightly less free, flexible than surely it had been at time of doing that. Though still in mildly generic verismo manner, Fleming did manage to put her all well into the final scene of the opera to play jilted lover incisively as we expect - except that in her way with Armida, Fleming makes the outcome feel anticipated from considerably earlier in the opera than has Rossini. Curious indeed was the blues bend, blend she and too easily allured head-voiced Lawrence Brownlee gave their brief Act 3 duet ‘Soavi cateni’ – not to mention how much more cute Larry and Renee looked together on stage for this than they had already. ‘Soavi cateni’ now might make newest crossover hit for Captain and Tenneille – might they still be up to it. It is great how Fleming still encourages, promotes careers of young singers so much - singers from such a diversity of backgrounds as highly gifted Tianjin born bass Shenyang to previously, as suggested, Youngstown, Ohio boy Lawrence Brownlee.

I have almost already had to stop myself short of calling the opera Rinaldo for what Brownlee contributed to this. His manner of phrasing, tone color is what one might call little less typical for Rossini than that of Juan Diego Florez, except that Rossini was so diverse in branching out to find color with which to infuse his parts, even outside of bel canto convention - in many instances far from purely so. At 37 years old, nothing is too effortful for Brownlee in this part that, like Pirro, Agorante, Otello, Rodrigo (Donna del Lago) was composed for Andrea Nozzari. Tenore di forza aspects of Rinaldo here might, in comparison with a Bruce Ford or Chris Merritt before, be understated, but Brownlee’s stance in being authoritative with so many lines was still secure. He communicated a wealth of acting, stage savvy to back himself up on too - should variety of tone color not be quite complete for subtly complex assignment as this.

There was nobody on stage who sounded more lyrical Saturday, with sufficient bloom to enhance so well the lilt and ardor that characterizes Rinaldo, over indeed very treacherous terrain, covering a very wide range, with leaps occurring of well over an octave. His manner of embellishing the line was the most subtle, judiciously applied of the entire cast. He made all this happen with fine agility and judiciously again with opening out of much with which one should endow Rinaldo Peter Volpe filled in as drily voiced Idraote - Keith Miller the physically agile and vocally sufficiently even Astarotte.

Producer Mary Zimmerman did intermittently contribute several clever touches. Slow motion swordplay anticipation of Rinaldo and Gernando really having it out worked very well. Though distracting from overall dramatic flow and attention getting for its own sake, the choreography (Graciela Daniele) for the Act Two ballet was incisive, beguilingly complex in pattern for well striped tailed demons creating havoc across the stage. As for the mute parts of Amor and Vendetta - too much diva props during final scene of the opera, Vendetta played by bare chested walking ad for Mens’ Health or Gold’s Gym - the less seen the better. It is better to opt for the good lighting design available here to accentuate Armida’s even willfully quick vacillations between two conflicting emotions so beautifully and dramatically delineated by Rossini than for so much leaning back and forth between two such silly figures on stage. Deflating too is having a wall cut off most of the Met stage behind Fleming for the final scene, as doing so cuts off so much perspective. There is this great uncertainty at which Rossini leaves things, concerning which direction his sorceress will turn to next.

Intermission features for this in-HD Armida turned out dreadful. Lawrence Brownlee walked in, chaperoned arm in arm with Renee Fleming over to Deborah Voigt. For neither any man nor woman is Brownlee house boy in the least. Fleming had already appeared solo before Deborah Voigt. It could have been a bright idea to have entire time taken up by conversation with Phil Gossett - apparently on board for musical preparation here - in company with all three,. What, could have Met staff feared that Gossett might again pull out a funny quote, such as obscenity Rossini inscribed on one page of Otello? Instead we got one big worship-LaRenee-fest for good half of everything. No mention of the San Carlo, Isabella Colbran, Andrea Nozzari, orchestra in Naples, Rossini’s multicultural emphases in his scoring, traditions of ornamentation was made - except for La Renee to compare the latter with blues or gospel improvisation.

All the talk of being a great team player also got annoying fast - scripted partly by the little Napoleon who behind scenes runs everything at the Met. One might think the U.S. now enters its own phase of the old and rightly so heavily derided social realism of forty-plus years ago. What is good for the corporate welfare state is what we should expect as best for the arts we patronize - standard by which the arts should now always comply. That included Saturday promo of the new production of the Ring at the Met that as Debbie explains, just simply tells the story.

All art, theater, recreation of it, is representational. Especially in our day and age, there is really no such thing anymore as just simply telling the story – just so much horseshit – and with the paltry way in which things get rehearsed so often. The Met’s show of playing Armida, sets and costumes wise, on the cheap, was deflating. At least as planned, the casting for this new production however was indeed luxurious.

This was still Rossini’s Armida. One, if not yet, still absolutely must go see it. In the end, all the parody of diva conniption with the small wand that Fleming carries around with her as Armida between her and Voigt was cute, but ultimately just so silly. Fact of the matter, neither one of them has one.

It appeared as though few of the men on Met stage for this Armida had one either.

Met (in HD) - Rosenkavalier of despondent, migrained hausfrau, merely road show quality

I initially with great anticipation awaited seeing Rosenkavalier in hall or simulation thereof conducted again by Edo De Waart. If ever any straw that broke the camel’s back, it was Kurt Moses’s review (American Record Guide).

Growth of the Marschallin in the planning by Strauss and Hofmansthal of what was first to be farce or burlesque, Rosenkavalier in this process gradually took on numerous layers. This included so much what should be to prudent extent read between the lines. This work of a composer having entered middle age, addresses the ephemerality of time, of our lives, all its inherent mystery, while still being the great comic masterpiece it is. Bad performances of Rosenkavalier tend to altogether miss these layers, subtleties. Two now fit the category very well. Those are the Salzburg dvd (Bychkov), worst it being the Robert Carsen production, and this also ineptly re-staged revival of the venerable, decade-ago refurbished Nathaniel Merrill production. Broadcasts of the Merrill go back with me as far as 1973 (Dohnanyi) - often well conducted, staged - well sung too.

What definitively did not rank one of the worst Rosenkavalier’s I have ever run across was here in Houston in 1975, conducted by Edo De Waart, starring Evelyn Lear, Flicka Von Stade, Patricia Wise (Gockley), Michael Langdon, and Derek Hammond Stroud (Faninal) – James Atherton as Valzacchi - that Philips recorded in Holland. The recording made a year later stars four of the above. It is still available in succinct package on Decca (budget line). Sets, costumes were sumptuously beautiful. Von Stade was in best voice she has ever been and Langdon (not on the recording) was the subtle and very well acted Ochs. De Waart conducted toward getting as immaculate and engaged playing from the Houston Symphony more than realistically construed possible.

When the Wortham opened in 1987, it was the 1975 Rosenkavalier - not Porgy and Bess or Treemonisha (Joplin) that made Broadway – of which David Gockley mentioned being most proud, his fifteen years at Jones Hall. De Waart was thirty-three years old, and insisted upon the complete score, just as on Philips – all unabridged, no stage cuts. I knew beforehand I had to swallow there being the standard cuts last Saturday.

Renee Fleming was the Marschallin for both Met runs this season. I, wee hour Saturday, reminisced by putting on, in aging voice, Evelyn Lear. Her intelligence with text and musicality are now legend, but lack of entirely secure technique as well. Her Desdemona a year later here was slightly more conspicuously unsteady than her Marschallin on stage here.. Lear is so prudent, tasteful, musical, ever so vigilant for De Waart, for the Strauss, that to hide vocal lapses, she keeps voice both light, as supported as possible. She thus emphasizes the words for rich subtleties they convey. All then comes across with illusion of all being very beautifully connected, even if often not quite so.

The odd question jumped to mind - whether Renata Scotto ever sang the part, with as an aside the heavy emphasis on projection in how she coaches singers - one can pick up from handful already coached by her. One gets the very forward placement with on the surface the music and character, regardless the cost to good intonation, line, or vocal purity. Scotto tried Klytaemnestra in Baltimore not long ago. What could’ve it been like to hear her Marie Theres’?

Renee Fleming Saturday figuratively started to answer this question. This was less heavy-handed a Marschallin than she sang here in 1995, but here it was her role debut and conducted by Eschenbach, whose tempo for Intro and Pantomime (Act 3) and other decision making changed from night to night. She was paired with an especially opaquely produced, sounding Octavian; that only when free of interaction with her, was she able to free up to momentarily lighten her voice. Listen to Berlin New Year's Eve gala with Abbado (Sony), where she joins Von Stade and Battle for final trio (and duet) to hear how not long before she had picked up just about entirely the right idea in mind. One could pick up from the Met, even if vaguely this time, that Fleming had effectively again somewhere already lightened her approach to handling both music and text. So much left unrehearsed, the Met treating Edo De Waart on this occasion as their house boy, the green light was back on for lingering bad habits to be given full rein.

Kurt Moses spoke of ‘in the throes of first love affair’ schoolgirl - the way Fleming acted this, but while upbraiding Octavian in early scene, La Renee also sounded peevishly matronly hausfrau. As phlegmatic, reticent, only halfway attentive to nuance the Met orchestra sounded, under-rehearsed under leadership that may have halfway given up, Fleming’s voice turned unforgiving, inflexible as such, in being able to well maintain tonal center and shape to line. However, in ironic banter with Ochs especially, Fleming achieved a light touch and momentarily an easily achieved top.

Low notes however were often grunted and barked, especially during final scene of Act One. Acting between Fleming and Susan Graham sounded as though they perhaps have walked the boards together in this opera a few too many times already. It all more than began to sound all smug, all-knowing – almost to contradict Kurt Moses just fleetingly here - in wrong way from both, and as working with Met orchestra on autopilot. What pathos should come across did so self-consciously - lacking light hand toward anything for there to exist any Marschallin.

All this reminds in a way of Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, but Fleming taking it on so heavily now - poor man’s Schwarzkopf - the neuroticism of Betty's interpretation very studied, thought out, but still affected. Fleming’s is also near so affected, but also dampened, depressed, in perhaps good need for shot of Prozac, as tear-laden opening of the final trio sounded. She did make something of the line in Act 3 about having something against men; her barked reproaches however to the Baron lacked authority. So did the heavily gulped, almost choked ‘Ja, ja’ at the very end, It is now, we all know, often crudely done yet a different way (i.e. Stemme, Pieczonka on dvd).

Susan Graham was indeed the Octavian, certainly energetically enough coltish, but clearly middle-aged here, going phoned in through all the usual expected antics as Mariandel. One could hear a valiant effort put forth to sustain staying on pitch during early phases of Act One; later, when out to pour it on, the pitch sagged badly. There were no special insights to offer here, lest generic response to everything be satisfactory. Graham equally compromised Octavian’s ardor for Sophie with painfully flat G-sharp making it into duet coda with Sophie midway through Act 2. Given the parlous condition in which Christine Schafer sounded Saturday, Graham overpowered her some with supporting line underneath - also earlier intermittently overpowering Fleming. She helped make the Act 3 Trio sound more opaque than it would have without her.

Can we still remember what press Gywneth Jones got for her recorded Octavian with Leonard Bernstein? There may be with Jones slightly less even line a few places, where Graham is more firm (if still not in tune). Jones’s intonation is still better than that of Graham. Dame Gywneth apparently had participated with Bernstein in Vienna earlier as Octavian in 1968, but waited until having entered a bad patch vocally to record it.. Today, all is forgiven. As much as we were as an aside reassured from backstage at the Met on ‘Meg and Ira’ that the cast and staff had listened to the old Philips recording instead, I would have guessed, if not knowing recording dates, that Jones might have instead. Gywneth Jones knew somewhat better than Graham that if one lands a pitch on sustained note a bit sour, to fix it as quickly as possible. If Jones could still sound today as she did in 1971, I’d immediately call her back if put in control of the Met. In context of what got said then, no sense can be made at all of what press Graham has received.

Christine Schafer, once a great Lulu, achieved perhaps the worst Sophie - including very choppy Presentation of the Rose with ugly break in legato between, first, C-sharp and higher A-sharp on “Wie himmlisches” – I have yet heard. Everything got produced so very wrong. Schafer’s capture of the rebellious teenager, even naughtiness, certainly came across incisively, but as two-dimensional. The almost constantly hooty tone and pitch so bad as to be hard anymore to discern eviscerated any semblance of charm.

Icelandic bass Kirstian Sigmundsson started out a witty Baron Ochs, but of rather dour frame of mind and of Nordic accent. It was a little confusing though, that as the Baron’s ox gets gradually more and more gored, that Sigmundsson appeared glib through the whole ordeal. He was said to be good at acting the part - probably the best of four leads on this outing. It sounded too, given that his low register could turn a little rough that he might have been down with a cold last Saturday. Same might have been true for Schafer. Sigmundsson genuinely conveyed more warmth, certainly more than last two mentioned female leads, as opposed to as any contrivance. Except for increasing incidence of a chuckle to end so many lines, whether it fit or not, Sigmundsson was in earnest about occupying his character for this.

Thomas Allen, forthright enough, sounded both worn vocally and too stern in intent as Faninal. Among four supporting tenors, Ronald Naldi (Faninal’s major domo) and Tony Stevenson (Innkeeper) were best. Rodell Rosel (Valzacchi) lost all distinction to his character by delivering all his lines in far too tight, needle-thin a sound, enough at times to set one’s teeth on edge. His countenance, vocal quality to have so much edge as to lose all slyness, effective cunning of what Valzacchi is about, came across impotent. Eric Cutler, glibly accompanied, made little of ‘Di rigori armato’ except for very bleated acuti and for rushing into second verse of it to be left hanging on high B’s or through them in as expeditiously short a time possible. All intended grace, charm went out the window. Erica Strauss was the pert, incisive Marianne, all of one piece as such, except for minor unsteadiness around break - and high C on which she wimped out – by releasing it early - at fever pitch peak of turmoil at the Faninals.

Wendy White was the insinuating then convincingly forthright Annina. Jeremy Galyon the serviceable Police Commissar, with his part somewhat severely cut. James Courtney was the highly caricatured asthmatic notary, when funnier, more subtle, to point out the generally common tics, mannerisms of being a notary - especially as one hired on by an eccentric. The three women as orphans during levee made complete wobble fest out of their trio; four lackeys, waiting on Marie Theres’ were clearly not together at all. Bernard Fitch effectively played major-domo to the Marschallin.

Edo De Waart clearly gave of much less than his best on this occasion. Certainly, the hints were all there of a stronger interpretation of Der Rosenkavalier, even such through his still wittily pointed intricacy of woodwinds parts. Most worthy of note were still the very familiar passages from the suite, such as certainly robustly led grand waltz for the exit of Ochs in Act Three, pristine sonorities during Presentation of the Rose, and much intricacy, especially in runs for flutes, other woodwinds during Introduction to Act Three. Interaction with, support for singers frequently sounded belabored or reticent, so disengaged or glib in response to lines being sung on stage, in attempt to interact with all that – most notoriously for extended finale to Act One.

Most damaging, horribly distracting, past mention of many ensemble problems uncharacteristic to extent occurring here for De Waart, was cut of a full two thirds imposed upon “Da lieg’ ich” (Act Two – Baron Ochs). No authorized cut to this passage exists; even if there was, it would have been much smaller. The idea got lifted from early 1980’s Karajan Salzburg - with which De Waart never had ties. A little more then of the burlesque scene with the police commissiar got cut than ever should be. Not much, but the entirety of it, with what touches of humor could occur, had a streamlined quality to it - very uninspiring. The congestion motif (strongly hinting at very same with Klytaemnestra) certainly made its mark, but Sigmundsson's coarse roaring of 'Leupold, wir geh'n' was way too broad - and ineffective. Ira Siff on the Meg and Ira show pointed out that both composer and librettist meant the humor in Rosenkavalier to be very broad, not just to win ear-to-ear smiles from the hall, but uproarious laughter through it all. It is much funnier, by the way, to do police commissar scene complete, instead of letting all rely upon broad formula alone.

The ‘yes, I agree with you’s’ during ‘Meg and Ira’ were so excessive it could have instead been Mister Rogers. Had I been caught unawares, I might have expected in silver cape and jacket either Daniel the Tiger or King Friday the 13th to bear rose to Sophie instead. Sophie and Ochs would then have to be married happily ever after, that is if Sophie wanted any better experience of married life than to a torso. With all the cuts demanded of De Waart, had the Meg and Ira show been any longer than the 37 minutes a piece the twice it came on, ten minutes each in overtime, then relevant it would have been to pick up broadcast reminiscences of Francois Clemmons and John Reardon, even as Singer and Faninal, respectively. And then there was what static Meg gave us about how we should - being addressed as bevy of sixth-graders - be affected by the mature experience, wisdom of the Marschallin. Such insight perhaps most of all indicated how sensitive Peter Gelb is about anything of his facing criticism.

Furthermore, Meg and Ira started parroting Peter Allen - betraying that he was ultimately of slightly less class than Milton Cross before him in his citing for special praise an obviously pension hungry and increasingly wobbly Met chorus. Meg and Ira now spoke so very patronizingly of the Met orchestra (while in unrehearsed state). It has sunk this low, should this all keep up. De Waart returned the favor, by openly struggling during interview as to whether ‘marvelous’ could have been the right word for them, to perhaps half-intended humorous effect.

Renee Fleming, while perhaps not yet an ideal Marschallin - few there have been - achieved near enough to definitive interpretative, much better in tune profile of Marie Theres’ a year ago at Baden-Baden (now on dvd). She also achieves numerous true pianissimo, flexibly supported by Thielemann. Equally could have been so with De Waart, if with orchestra less glib and loud. An air of cool mysticism to Wernicke’s production very skillfully envelops Fleming, toward convincing atmosphere, world in which the Marschallin should be seen. Such a world captures so well in full something usually latent about her near despair, loneliness - such as Fleming has spoken of her.

What is morbidly self-conscious about, for example, “Die Zeit im Grunde” in Fleming’s hands fit this time as part of such a complex world that here – so much more flexible vocally - it is hard to distinguish from the very psyche the Feldmarschallin fully inhabits. ‘Leicht will ich’s machen, so dull, plodding Saturday to have been very easily missed entirely, was still in Baden-Baden a bit too heavy to make complete sense. Very favorably, Baden-Baden allowed Fleming to get lost a good three-fourths the time into her character; Fleming appears on screen very content this way.

Very seldom have I heard work of someone, caliber of De Waart, be so misrepresented. If the Met really wanted results achieved here, why not have hired Colaneri, Claus Peter Flor, Summers, Carl St. Clair or Eschenbach instead? For stark contrast, check out the Philips (now Decca) recording of thirty-four years ago.