tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11336161.post3231198374888243650..comments2024-03-06T15:42:42.589+00:00Comments on Planet Hugill: Pia de'Tolomei: rare Donizetti brought convincingly to life on stage in HackneyAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05139360579883837086noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11336161.post-79089283984403659252016-03-17T08:13:27.710+00:002016-03-17T08:13:27.710+00:00Thanks, we did see the same performance as you, an...Thanks, we did see the same performance as you, and were impressed; sorry if my article didn't convey that. To watch early 19th century bel canto opera, you have to accept that the plots are not naturalistic, and that the prime mover for Donizetti was a sequence of scenes which provided some strong emotional content. He was less worried about how the characters got there, and the operas are certainly far more condensed than contemporary French operas or Baroque operaAnonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05139360579883837086noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11336161.post-31114255852935882402016-03-17T08:10:32.812+00:002016-03-17T08:10:32.812+00:00Thanks, will correct the Dante reference.
Whether...Thanks, will correct the Dante reference.<br /><br />Whether the plot is ideologically uncongenial really depends whether the piece is written from Pia's point of view or not. To a certain extent the plot has its sympathies with her, and though it explains Nello's behaviour it does not entirely condone it. The production went some way, but I would be interested to see the work directed by a woman director such as Olivia Fuchs.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05139360579883837086noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11336161.post-59789184373066060012016-03-16T16:32:33.617+00:002016-03-16T16:32:33.617+00:00March 10th was the first night, so you must have s...March 10th was the first night, so you must have seen it on the same date. I also thought Xanthoudakis was excellent, and overall the opera gained much from being in the hands (or should I say in the mouths) of a set of singers who seemed to have a real sympathy with the bel canto tradition and what needs to be done vocally in order to make it work. As someone who finds early nineteenth-century Italian opera one of the least congenial aspects of the medium, I was, nevertheless, impressed.<br /><br />The plot is of course ideologically uncongenial, but sometimes one just has to accept that the past had different values and accept them provisionally for the duration of the work in order to engage with it.<br /><br />One correction to the original review: Dante's Pia is in the Purgatorio, not the Inferno.Alexanderhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11481021049223934533noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11336161.post-83779317951064678902016-03-12T21:27:39.610+00:002016-03-12T21:27:39.610+00:00Fine review, although I’ve been surprised by the s...Fine review, although I’ve been surprised by the space Robert Hugill, and other critics, have given to the plot which, with its irredeemably outdated male-supremacism, has nothing to say to we who live in C21. Never mind, he identifies the excellent singers in this singers’ vehicle of a show, even if he fails to notice the conducting of John Andrews with its fascinating precision, von Karajan-like yet mixed with flexibility. <br /><br />Grateful though I am that Mr Hugill has given us such a well-informed assessment of this production of Donizetti’s rarely played Pia de’ Tolomei, I’m not sure he was as enchanted by the performance of Elena Xanthoudakis as I and my companion were. Perhaps we were lucky to see her on a night, 10 March 2016, when she was on top form. She was outstanding, a coloratura soprano who conquered a role encumbered with a frighteningly large range of notes while having to act in scenes of increasingly risible melodrama. <br /><br />Luciano Botelho, Grant Doyle and John-Colyn Gyeantey gave us huge pleasure (in, incidentally, a rather unresponsive house) and we want to hear them again, and again. But Xanthoudakis; well, I have a feeling I have seen in my home town of Hackney a talent that will take her to theatres beyond my budget. What a privilege.<br /><br />David Altheerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13055234699670585242noreply@blogger.com