Recent CD Reviews

My review of Victoria de Los Angeles's recording of Manon is here.
A precious record of a vanished performance style ...

My review of tuba virtuoso Oystein Baadsvik's latest CD is here.
A disc to enjoy and to challenge ...

And my review of the latest disc from the Quator de Guitar de Versailles is here.
Just sit back and enjoy ...

All three are on MusicWeb Internatioanl

Review of Flavio at the Barbican

Handel seems to have had a fondness for librettos which originated in Venice in the late 17th, century. These librettos were often re-used and re-edited, so his knowledge of a 17th century libretto would have been based on a more recent outing. The typical Venetian format, which was going out of fashion by Handel's youth, mixed comic and serious scenes (think Monteverdi's L'Incoronazione di Poppea. Handel's collaborators usually excised most of the comic characters, but sometimes some survived along with something else, a certain wryness, a slightly lighter, sideways attitude to opera and the plot. The results are not really comedies, Handel does not seem to have done out and out comedy, but in Flavio, Partenope and Serse the plots are just as convoluted as in, say, Radamisto but Handel's music lightens a little and allows us to smile at the situations rather than frown.

Flavio has had some success in London in recent years, having been performed here by both Christian Curnyn's Early Opera Company and the Opera Theatre Company (at the Covent Garden Festival). I think that directors must be attracted to the rather sarcastic way that Handel and his librettist (the original libretto by Matteo Noris was adapted by Nicola Haym) treat the King Flavio and his two senior courtiers, Ugone and Lotario. These latter two get involved in a ridiculous argument which would be completely laughable except that it involves their children in some pretty serious business - a duel and a cancelled marriage contract.

For their concert performance at the Barbican on Thursday, the Academy of Ancient Music had assembled a pretty strong cast. Iestyn Davies was King Flavio, James Gilchrist and James Rutherford were Ugone and Lotario, Robin Blaze was Ugone's son Guido, Karina Gauvin was Guido beloved Emilia, daughter of Lotario, Renata Pokupic was Teodata, Ugone's daughter in love with Vitige, Maite Beaumont.

Handel wrote the opera for a strong cast, Senesino was Guido, Francesca Cuzzoni was Emilia, Marherita Durastanti was Vitige and Anastasia Robinson was Teodata. This casting means that the leading couple, Guido and Emilia, are entirely serious (Senesino did NOT do comedy) and their troubles are musically very dramatically presented. (Guido kills Emilia's father and this rather messes up their betrothal, but all comes out happily in the end). Vitige and Teodata are equally seriously in love, but Teodata catches the eye of King Flavio and Teodata flirts with him, or pretends to, causing Vitige some pretty serious jealousy.

Add to this, the two comic characters, Lotario and Ugone each get a pretty serious, if over the top, aria and you have a really mix of styles.

The first act was relatively low key, amusing in the court scenes and pleasantly amorous in Guido and Emilia's. Handel seems to have found form in Emilia's arias and Karin Gauvin was superbly on form, giving a strong performance. But in Act 1, Guido is simply a man in love and Handel does not seem to have found this inspiring, his arias for Senesino are attractive but do not really hit hard. Robin Blaze did his best and sang at his most beauteous. Iestyn Davies had a great deal of fun as Flavio, being unreasonably imperious, Gilchrist and Rutherford managed to mix wry comedy with some pretty good singing. Maite Beaumont was entirely convincing as the love-lorn Vitige and Renata Pokupic simpered beautifully as Teodata. (Anastasia Robinson did not have the strongest of voices but she did have a very attractive manner; she went on to marry one of the aristocracy).

But in act 2, things get more serious. Guido and Emilia must go through trials and both Blaze and Gauvin responded superbly, both producing stunning held lines and dazzling coloratura by turns. Though this was a concert performance, sung from the score, the cast moved around, sang to each other and reacted, there was even a little comic business. The result was to engage our emotions and attentions even more so that both Blaze and Gauvin created characters with whom we emphasised. We didn't just admire their singing, we were really rooting for their characters.

Similarly Beaumont, with her beautifully plangent, laser sharp voice was superb as Vitige is required to woo Teodata for his master. Pokupic seems to have a nice line in wry comedy, she created a superb flirty character in Teodata, by the end of the opera she had you eating out of her hand, even though you were not sure whether Teodata was flirting in earnest or not. Pokupic's Teodata was well sung, and would be a real handful to any man.

The singers we well supported by the Academy of Ancient Music under Hogwood's excellent direction. The orchestration is relatively discreet, just flute, oboes and bassoons added to the strings, but Handel is never less than interesting and the Academy responded well.

This was an involving and engrossing evening, combining superb singing with some real drama. So engrossing was it that the decision to omit the 2nd interval (a bad habit of the Barbican's) went almost unnoticed.(Given that the opera finished by 10pm I fail to see why we could not have had our 2nd interval).

Next year the Academy will be doing Arianna in Creta, I can't wait

ENO New Season

English National Opera have announced their new (2008/09) season with a total of 15 different production, 10 of them new to ENO. The season is a curious mixture of conservatism and daring.

Regarding repertoire, they include 2 contemporary operas but stick to well tried ones - Adams's Doctor Atomic and Saariaho's Amour de Loin. Though it will be good to see how Penny Woolcock (who directed the film of Death of Klinghofer) responds to Doctor Atomic as its libretto was very much the construction of its first directer, Peter Sellers. It will be the first major staging of Saariaho's popular work in London, though it has appeared in semi-staged concert at the Barbican. No details of the creative team or performers of the Saariaho have been released.

Katie Mitchell will also be creating a new piece of music theatre at the Young Vic based on Purcell's Dido and Aeneas, which might or might not come in to the contemporary category - we'll have to wait and see to be certain.

Regarding earlier repertoire, they are doing new productions of Handel's Partenope (ENO's first ever) and RVW's Riders to the Sea (ENO's first since 1953). But The remainder of the 18th/19th/early 20th century repertoire traverses familiar ground - Cav and Pag, Aida, Boris Goudonov, Magic Flute, La Boheme, Jenufa,Peter Grimes,Cosi fan tutte and Madam Butterfly. Though all these operas are well worth doing, it is a shame that they have not included at least something off the beaten track (Gounod's Romeo and Juliet, some Marschner or a rarer Verdi).

Another puzzling thing is that the La Boheme and Peter Grimes are both being done in new productions. Peter Grimes was last performed at the Coliseum in 1999 in the 1991 Tim Albery production. My memories of this are very positive and whilst David Alden's take on the opera will be fascinating, couldn't they have simply revived Tim Albery's production. Similarly Jonathan Miller is doing a new La Boheme (set in Paris in the 1930's), thus ditching Steven Pimlott's rather striking 1993 production. There might be good reasons for this but the management seem to be rather content to cycle round the same small group of operas, constantly re-inventing their attitudes to them.

The new production of Cav and Pag is welcome because it last appeared at the ENO in 1986 in a rather underwhelming production. It will be interesting to see what Richard Jones makes of it.

Anthony Minghella was meant to be doing Eugene Onegin but that has obviously been cancelled. Instead they are reviving his Madam Butterfly. The new Cosi van Tutte will be directed by the Iranian film director abbas Kiarostami.

Regarding casting, there is a good mixture of interesting young people and old stalwarts. Cav and Pag have a fine set of relatively young singers including Peter Auty and Mary Plazas. Partenope has Christian Curnyn as its musical director and starts Rosemary Joshua, John Mark Ainsley, Patricia Bardon and Iestyn Davies, with Christine Rice in the castrato role of Arsaces. Incidentally Christopher Alden's production is said to be inspired by Virginia Woolf's novel Orlando (why one wonders!).

Tim Albery's new Boris Godunov, in the 7 scene version, stars Peter Rose as Boris. Jonathan Veira makes one of a number of appearances this season as Varlaam.

RVW's Riders to the Sea has Patricia Bardon as Maurya. The opera will be directed by actress Fiona Shaw and will be presented with a new prologue. The opera will be performed on its own rather than as part of a triple bill, an interesting and daring idea.

La Boheme has a number of names that are new to me, but Alfie Boe continues his London stage appearances with a welcome return to Rudolfo.Doctor Atomic will have Gerald Finley reprising his rolde as Dr. Oppenheimer. Susan Bickley returns as Dido in Katie Mitchell's extravaganza at the Young Vic.

David Alden's Peter Grimes has a strong cast of returning singer; Amanda Roocroft will be Ellen Orford, with Gerald Finley as Balstrode, Stuart Skelton as Grimes, Della Jones as Auntie (her first appearance here since 1998) and Felicity Palmer as Mrs. Sedley. Interestingly both Skelton and Roocroft worked with David Alden on the recent Jenufa.

Susan Gritton and Fiona Murphy will be the sisters in Cosi van tutte.

In the revivals, Judith Howarth is Cio Cio San, Amanda Roocroft returns as Jenufa with Robert Brubaker as Laca and Tom Randle as Steva, Robert Lloyd sings Sarastro.

Edward Gardner is conducting 3 new productions and 1 revival (Madam Butterfly). The 7 other conductors are all young and talented, interesting names but the roster lacks a sprinkling of major names from the older generation - surely someone like Mark Elder could have been tempted back.
All in all an interesting season, but one which raises many questions.

Noodling along

I've just been listening to a disc of a new piece which includes quite a number of tunes. The composer has included familiar hymn tunes but also mixed in some of his own tunes to create an accessible mix. Not everyone can write tunes, reportedly Michael Tippett was at one point interested in writing a full blown musical but was put off by the fact that he would have to write tunes. One of the criticisms levelled at Stephen Sondheim's musicals is that he does not write tunes (or not many of them). I happen to think he does and am very fond of his music. But it must be admitted that his music is rather more complex than that of Lloyd Webber or Richard Rogers.

Somehow, this ability to write tunes is something that is no-longer a prerequisite of a composer, it is something that we lost during the 20th century. Partly this is the influence of serialism, but even non serialist composers suffer from it. After all, Britten wrote beautifully for the voice, but his operas contain very few BIG tunes; somehow he manages to be vocally expressive whilst retaining complexity and still create an approachable result. The problem comes when composers are not geniuses and the results start to sound like semi-atonal noodling.

This is something that instrumentally trained composers often lapse into when writing opera, the results are undeniably effective as a totallity but the individual vocal lines are often uninteresting and can be unnecessarily difficult. At its worst this style sounds like a radio play with backing music rather than a music drama where the drama develops through the music AND the voices.

Of course, what constitutes a tune is also a moot point. I have always been able to write tunes, but it is not something that I can necessarily do to order. Particularly, the desire to write long breathed melodies is frustrated by the music's need to keep fragmenting into smaller components. But even when I think I am being tuneful, there is a danger that others think otherwise. I have long been influenced by gregorian chant and this influence finds its way into much of my vocal writing, even when it is not sacred. The result is that I can happily noodle along with just 3 or 4 different but adjacent pitches. I usually think the results tuneful and expressive. Those of my friends who similarly respond to chant are positive, but
others feel that the results are not particularly tunes, even if the music itself is not difficult.

That is another interesting thing about the multiplicity of styles in today's musical world; to write with recognisable tunes does not necessarily mean that your music is difficult. The converse is also true, but there are few composers working in complex styles who write melodically with tunes. Perhaps that is what we should be aiming for.

Handel at Home

On Friday, the London Handel Festival migrated from its usual venue (St. George's Church, Hanover Square) to the Wigmore Hall for a concert entitled Handel at Home given by the London Handel Players. Flautist Rachel Brown, a string quartet led by Adrian Butterfield with Laurence Cummings on harpsichord, played a programme of Handel's chamber music and music arranged for chamber forces. The programme included the Flute concerto in G minor, HWV 287 (originally thought to have been an oboe concerto), the Violin sonata in D major, two trio sonatas and a selection of arrangements of arias from Solomon, Semele and Alcina.

The arias were all based on the arrangements published by Walsh during Handel's lifetime, but Brown had made adjustments to these adding extra parts and details from other, later arrangements. Of course, Handel's large scale pieces were not far away in the other items in the programme. The fugue theme in the 2nd movement of the Violin sonata was borrowed from Solomon, the first 3 movements of trio sonata Opus 2, No. 3, are related to the overture to Esther and the trio sonata Opus 5, no. 4 includes a Passacaille which was originally intended for Radamisto.

This was an evening of charming and relaxed music making; the players are obviously all familiar with each other and their interplay was natural and musical. Perhaps the only problem was that the aria arrangements did not quite work as the centre piece of the programme. The transcriptions seemed to be only 2nd best, you longed for the real thing.

The audience seemed to be mainly composed of London Handel Festival regulars, all knowledgeable, they responded with delight to the programme. A response that was rather too audible in the case of my neighbours, who laughed audibly at various points in the proceedings, interrupting the flow of the music for me.

Choruses from Passion 5

"Choruses from Passion" No.5 - Travel Lightly, FifteenB, conductor Paul Ayres, recorded live, February 2008

Next Premiere

Tomorrow, my new verse anthem God be merciful unto us, will be premièred tomorrow. The anthem is a commission for the wedding of a friend and will be performed at the wedding in the church of St. Botolph without Bishopsgate tomorrow. The anthem is written for choir, organ and two soprano soloists and is slightly closer to a strict verse anthem form than my previous anthem. I hope to arrange a public performance of the anthem at a later date.

Oh, do keep up!

About the same time as I found out that we would be missing Thomas Quasthoff at the all Bach concert at the Barbican last week (with Bernarda Fink and the Freiburg Baroque Ensemble), I learned that Sandrine Piau would not be appearing in the forthcoming concert performance of Handel's Flavio (with Christopher Hogwood and the Academy of Ancient Music).

Somehow or other this fact has escaped the notice of the Independent and Michael Church's preview of the Flavio performance at Symphony Hall on Birmingham (on April 15th) is mainly devoted to an interview with Sandrine Piau. Anyone who goes to Birmingham expecting to see her will be disappointed, though the opera still has a very, very good cast.

The Proms!

So the new Proms season has been announced, the first one in which Roger Wright has had some hand. I don't know whether it is because of Wright's involvement or simply because of a happy confluence of anniversaries, but I find that there is much to look forward to in the season.

As might be expected, there is a lot of Vaughan Williams and a lot of Messiaen; in itself a slightly strange confluence, but Wright has not gone all the way and programmed an RVW/Messiaen concert! We are getting 5 RVW symphonies, plus Job and the Piano Concerto (with the wonderful Ashley Wass), in total some 15 works. Andrew Davis is doing the 9th Symphony and A Serenade to Music with an exciting young cast which includes Sarah Tynan as Isabel Baillie (a role taken many years ago by Amanda Roocroft). But we get none of the operas and none of the major choral works; surely the Proms is the ideal place to do Sancta Civitas. Given that other orchestras are doing quite a few RVW symphonies this year, we are getting full exposure to this output without much balancing work.

The Messiaen includes some 17 works including St. Francois d'Assise from Netherlands Opera with Rodney Gilfrey in the title role. Also in the commemoration spot is a goodly handful of music by Stockhausen, just what the proms should be doing. Also, slipped discreetly in to Prom 24 is Dame Ethel Smyth's Concerto for violin and french horn; not, perhaps, her greatest work but nice to have as she was born in 1858.

Rachmaninov and Beethoven seem to be the other composers who get a significant look in this year. Handel is represented by a single work, but it is Belshazzar with Sir Charles Mackerras conduction the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.

Opera is a strong feature this year. We get Monteverdi's L'Incoronazione de Poppea from Glyndebourne, the aforementioned St. Francis, Rimsky Korsakov's Kaschey the immortal (twinned neatly with Firebird from Jurowoski and the LPO, and Janacek's Osud.

Other stray works of interest include Stanford's 2nd Piano concerto from the Ulster Orchestra, Janacek's Glagolitic Mass in Paul Wingfield's reconstruction of his original version with BBC forces conducted by Boulez. And Grace Williams makes a rare Proms performance with her Sea Sketches. Vernon Handley is conducting Nigel Kennedy in the Elgar Violin Concerto, paired with Bax's The Garden of Fand and Andrew Kennedy in Finzi's Intimations of Immortality (one of the essential concerts that one).

The first Sunday is a Folk day, mixing RVW's folk inspired music with much, much else.

In Transposition

Recently I've been listening to a disc of songs where the vocal line is transposed an octave (downwards) from what we normally are used to. Listening to Konrad Jarnot singing Elgar's Sea Pictures made me think, over again, about song in transposition.

If a male singer appropriates female repertoire, or vice versa, the critical comment seems to mainly be about how suitable the appropriation is and how convincing the singer. It is now relatively common place to hear female singers in Schubert's big song cycles and we have even had a man singing Schumann's Frauen Liebe und Leben.

Now my objections, my questioning do not relate to sex but to vocal tessitura, (I'd be quite happy to hear a counter-tenor in Frauen Liebe und Leben or a low contralto/tenor singing Schubert at pitch). My question is related to what the composer actually wrote. When writing songs myself, I have always been concerned about the piano part obscuring the voice, or vice versa, and also it supporting the voice as necessary. I find that when you simply transpose the vocal part up (or down) you completely alter the relationship between the vocal line and the piano part.

Perhaps Schubert or Schumann did not mind this, after all Schubert sang his own songs to his friends. But most song writers take a great deal of care with their songs and I feel that we transpose the vocal parts in a willy-nilly fashion which may not always be suitable. There are moments in the new Sea Pictures where the voice descends to depths which mean that he is barely supported by the piano; a distinctive effect which may not have been what Elgar wanted.

Now most composers are keen to encourage performance so Schumann, Schubert et all might have been entirely happy for this process to happen, if it brought more performances. But surely there is a beau ideal at which we ought to be aiming and that when commentating on a performance which alters the balance between vocal line and piano, we ought to at least comment that this may not be what the composer ideally wanted.

Bernada Fink and Freiburg Baroque Orchestra

Is it the Barbican which has bad luck, or is it me? Thomas Quasthoff was ill, so Saturday's concert at the Barbican had to be re-designed. In the event Bernada Fink sang 2 Bach cantatas and the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra played Bach's Concerto for Violin and Oboe and his Suite No. 2

Fink and the ensemble opened with the cantata "Geist und Seele wird verwirret" BWV 35. Bach's cantatas make slightly odd concert works. They are, admittedly, wonderful works but they are designed for liturgical use. Handel's cantatas were generally written for concert performance and as such have a structural design which reflects this, including usually some sort of rousing finale. Bach has no need, nor interest, in rousing finales as his aims are all related to the sacred aspects of the text. This means that with BWV 35 and with BWV 170, the conclusion of the cantata was a little down beat.

Fink was an admirable soloist, firm of voice, generous and warm of tone, clear expressive German and she was accompanied sympathetically by the conductorless Freiburg group.

The group make a virtue of collegiality, but this does not always pay complete dividends. The performance of Bach's Suite No. 2 included some lovely sprung rhythms and infectious tempi; but I would have liked the flute to be a little more spot-lit. Too often he shadowed the 1st violins in a way which was rather too discreet for my taste. Only in the final movement, the Badinerie, did he come into the spotlight.

The second half opened with the Sinfonia from BWV 209. This was followed by the Concerto for Violin and Oboe with Anne Katharina Schreiber violin and Katharina Arfken oboe, both regular members of the ensemble. Again the issues of collegiality came to the fore. Schreiber's solo violin line, though supremely played, was just a little too discreet. Arfken's admirable oboe tone cut through the textures and was radiantly in charge, but Schreiber seem to play 2nd fiddle rather than the pair being equals. Perhaps I am too attuned to hearing this music on modern instruments and the fault lies not with the players but with my ears.

Fink returned for the final scheduled item, Cantata BWV 170, in another fine performance. Such was the audience enthusiasm that she returned for an encore.

Choruses from Passion 4

"Choruses from Passion" No.4 - If you should die, FifteenB, conductor Paul Ayres, recorded live, February 2008

Choruses from Passion 3

"Choruses from Passion" No.3 - This was the night, FifteenB, conductor Paul Ayres, recorded live, February 2008

April Fool

Music Web International always does a number of spoof reviews for April Fools Day, mine was one of them this year, (link)

Review of Macbeth

My review of Chelsea Opera Group's performance of Verdi's original, 1847 version of Macbeth is here, on Music and Vision.

Choruses from Passion 2

"Choruses from Passion" No.2 - If this were your final day on earth, FifteenB, conductor Paul Ayres, recorded live, February 2008

Choruses from Passion 1

"Choruses from Passion" No.1 - Let us Prepare for Death, FifteenB, conductor Paul Ayres, recorded live, February 2008

The first of my posts from February's FifteenB concert at St. Peter's Eaton Square.

Recent CD Review

My review of the Choir of the 21st Century's striking new version of Philip Glass's Another Look at Harmony, Part 3 is here, on MusicWeb International.
A striking new sound to Glass’s familiar world ...

On Saturday we went to the Queen Elizabeth Hall for the Chelsea Opera Group's performance of Verdi's Macbeth, in the original 1847 version. A review will appear in due course.

Then on Sunday it was off to the Barbican where the LSO, under their Principal Guest Conductor Daniel Harding performed Britten's Spring Symphony and Prokofiev's 2nd Violin Concerto. Victoria Mullova was the soloist in the Prokofiev. She was a fiery and impassioned soloist, with a tougher and rather less upholstered tone than some performers, the result perhaps knocked some of the romantic corners off the work. Surprisingly she played from the music, but placed her stand sideways to the stage so that it did not impede the audience's view of her. Though she was turning the pages, she did not seem to be referring to them much.

In the 2nd half the orchestra were joined by Susan Gritton, Sarah Connolly and Mark Padmore, the LSO chorus and the Tiffin Boys Choir. The stage became very, very full, this was another one of those concerts which ideally would not take place in the Barbican at all but in a larger hall such as the Royal Festival Hall. The Tiffin Boys Choir were placed at one side of the stage, not a particularly advantageous position and this told, in the final movement of the Spring Symphony their singing of Summer is i'cumin in, did not carry as well as it ought. Vocal honours were relatively even but the palm must go to Sarah Connolly for a beautifully controlled rendition of Out on the Lawn. Mark Padmore was wonderfully impassioned and managed to not sound like Peter Pears, which is always an advantage. Susan Gritton was glorious, but I felt that the soprano soloist seems under used in this work. The chorus were on fine form and sang brilliantly, though in the louder moments their tone tended to get a little hard, perhaps the result of trying a little too much.

It was a long time since I have heard the work and this was possibly the first time that I have heard it live. I found it magical and engrossing, and I even got to hear a cow horn.

Recent CD Review

My review of the disc dedicated to the music of Robert Parsons is here, on MusicWeb International.
Enthusiasm, lively vividness and fine musicality ...

Next season at Covent Garden (2)

Perhaps one of the most interesting pieces of casting in the 2008/09 season is the appearance of Alfie Boe as the young servant in Elektra. Now this appearance might simply be the result of a stray piece of contracting left over from years back, but I presume not. In which case it would seem to signal an intention on Boe's part of developing his career as an opera singer. Since his appearances in Baz Luhrmann's La Boheme on Broadway, Boe has rather developed the more cross-over side of his career, though he has continued to perform stage roles (and will be singing in The Merry Widow at the Coliseum this year). What the small role in Elektra seems to show, is that he wants to take his voice in directions additional to the matinee idol role; more power to his elbow.
The title role in the opera will be sung by Susan Bullock (Hurrah), Chrysothemis by Anne Schwanevilms and Jane Henschel is Klytemnestra, so that whilst I was not overly enamoured of the production I can see that we will be wanting to re-visit it.

Amongst the other revivals, some highlights of the casting; Diana Damrau will be singing Adina (L'Elisir d'Amore), Joyce di Donato and Simon Keenlyside will sing in Il Barbiere di Siviglia (definitely a pairing to look out for); Renee Fleming makes an appearance as Violetta and Tosca comes back with Deborah Voigt, Marcello Giordani and Bryn Terfel.
None of the above makes me sick with desire, but it does represent some interesting, and worthwhile casting.

Joyce di Donato is also singing Donna Elvira (Don Giovanni) sharing the role with Emma Bell, and Ian Bostridge as Don Ottavio. With Sir Charles Mackerras and Antonio Pappano sharing the conducting, Simon Keenlyside and Kyle Ketelson sharing the title role and Rebecca Evans as Zerlina these revivals of Don Giovanni look promising indeed.

John Sclesinger's Les Contes d'Hoffmann is coming back, with Rolando Villazon in the title role. But the press release makes no mention of the edition being used, so I presume that we are going to get the old traditional version with sung recitative. I think I'll keep this on ice until we get a re-thought musical edition, perhaps they should let Sir Charles Mackerras take charge of a revival.

Anna Netrebko scheduled to sing Giulietta in I Capuletti e i Montecchi, lets hope she does appear.

Anne Schwanewilms crops up again as Elsa, with Johan Botha in the title role of Lohengrin and Petra Lang as Ortrud - another revival to keep an eye on. Semyon Bychkov conducts.

In the new productions, La Calisto will see Sally Matthews, Veronique Gens, Guy de Mey, Dominique Visse and Lawrence Zazzo performing, sounds like a production worth hearing for the cast alone, especially when galvanised by producer David Alden.
And Dido and Aeneas will feature Sarah Connolly, Sara Fulgoni and Lucy Crowe, quite a cast.

Next year at Covent Garden (1)

The Royal Opera House have released details of their 2008/2009 season. It is full of interesting things, but only a few that make me really go wow.

In the main house there are 8 new productions. Of these 4 have appeared elsewhere first - La Calisto (Munich 2005), Matilde de Shabran (Pesaro 2004), Die Tote Stadt (Salzburg 2004) and Dido and Aeneas (Milan 2006). As you can see from the dates, none of the productions is in the first flush of youth, but it is an interesting way of getting new repertoire into the system. La Calisto comes in a production by David Alden, his first at Covent Garden, which is something. Die tote Stadt is frankly one of those operas which it is interesting to encounter occasionally but I can't see it become a staple of the house's repertoire (now I'll be proved wrong). Similarly, Matilde de Shabran which needs the right singers, notably Juan Diego Florez in the lead male role.

Of the other productions, Christoph Loy's Lulu is a co-production with Madrid and the remainder are Covent Garden's Own. Wayne MacGregor gets to create Acis and Galatea to go with Dido (a neat pairing, killing 2 centenaries in one and getting Covent Garden out of the tedium of doing another boring Opera Seria). Leiser and Caurier are doing a new Hansel and Gretel, notable for having Ana Silja as the Witch, Alice Coote as Handel and Elizabeth Connell as Mother. Though being as it is double cast, I'm not quite sure who is singing with whom. Silja is sharing the role of the Witch with Ann Murray (her husband, Philip Langridge recently did the role in New York, not at the same pitch I hasten to add). There is also a new Flying Dutchman with Bryn Terfel in the title role, producer Tim Albury. In another interesting pairing veteran conductor Sir Colin Davis is being paired with Robin Ticciati, a dynamic young 20 year old. I can see I'll have to sample more than one performance.

Of this latter, I can't raise too much enthusiasm. I am rather keen to see the Korngold, but have a vague feeling that reviews of Decker's original production were not too positive. Similarly I am very keen to see the Rossini and welcome it even though I know we'll only get the one opportunity, it is unlikely to be revived.

Also new is a production of Benjamin Britten's Beggars Opera at the Linbury Theatre. This is definitely more of a curiosity than a thing to look forward to. Very much a notch on the bedpost, one of the Britten operas that I've not seen.

Even more tempting is the fact that The Opera Group and London Sinfonietta will be presenting the UK premiere of George Benjamin's Into the Little Hill - and about time too! It will be given as a double bill with Birtwistle's Down by the Greenwood Side. Still in contemporary vein, the ROH and the Britten Sinfonia will give the first fully staged performances of James MacMillan's Parthenogenesis - Katie Mitchell will direct (hurrah).
So, a moderate amount to look forward to in the new productions. I'll come back to the revivals later this week.

Further to my previous post, Patty over at oboeinsight.com thinks I should have been harsher. I think I agree with her! Read her post here

Why Blog?

I recently had an unsolicited email which took me to task for blogging. I quote the email because it made me think, again, why do I write this blog?

WHY, WHY, WHY do bloggers think that anyone is particularly interested in YOUR life or YOUR opinions of whatever arts performances YOU have just seen?? Wow. YOU just fed the cat??? This insane burgeoning of Internet blogsite self-referencing importance is really annoying... and very frightening. It simply endorses egotism and narcissism run amok. Robert, really, you have apparently no end of self-related opinions concerning performing artists who have seemingly STOLEN something from you. You really need to let go of that garbage---and talk to someone.

Regarding the main complaint, my fundamental position is of course that no-one has to read this blog, you can simply ignore it. I have been writing reviews for web sites for quite a number of years. I started the blog as a means of gathering together the links to my various reviews. It expanded because I use it also to additionally review performances which are not covered in my other web-site reviews. Whilst, on the one hand, this can be seen as a form of self indulgence, on the other hand given the preponderance of performances in London it is difficult for any publication (whether print or web) to cover all of them. Take the recent performance of Bach's St. John Passion at the Barbican with Ian Bostridge as the Evangelist. I saw no print reviews or major web reviews of this concert. So web sites such as my own add a layer of critical cover which would otherwise be missing.

This site has, of course, an additional purpose. I am a composer and performer and use the site to record and publicise my compositions and performances. Such sites are useful as a means of promoting my work and also bringing together useful information for anyone seeking to learn more about my compositions. This isn't a personal blog, you won't learn much about my personal opinions, except when they impinge on musical ones; though I do occasionally allow myself the self indulgence of a rant about something in the musical world which annoys me.

If the above quote strikes a chord, please feel free to add a comment, I am always interested in people's opinions. But fundamentally, if this blog is not of interest (and I really hope that it is), you can always not read it!

Recent CD Review

My review of Michael Hoppe's Requiem, is here, on Music and Vision.

National Youth Choir's 25th Anniversary Gala

My article about the National Youth Choirs, arising out of an interview with Mike Brewer last week, is here on Music and Vision. The NYC is 25 this year and celebrating the anniversary with a gala at Symphony Hall in Birmingham on April 13th.

Recent CD Review

My review of the recording of Dufay's Mass of St. Antony of Padua, by the Binchois Consort is here on MusicWeb International.
I defy anyone to listen to this music and not want to tap their toes! ...

Review of St. John Passion

Friday's performance of Bach's Johannes Passion at the Barbican was part of the Homeward Bound series, so that though the passion was conducted by Stephen Layton, tenor Ian Bostridge got top billing. Bostridge sang both the Evangelist and the tenor solos, James Rutherford sang Christus with Carolyn Sampson, Michael Chance and Roderick Williams doing the remaining solos. Layton conducted his own choir, Polyphony, and the Academy of Ancient Music.

Though played on period instruments, the performance fielded far more performances than ever Bach might have been able to; some 28 choristers and a similar number of instrumentalists.

The performance's profoundly serious intentions were signalled from the start by the fact that the passion was being played without an interval and that audience was asked not to applaud until the end. Layton placed significant pauses after each chorale and a long pause at the point where Christ dies. There was also a long pause at the end before the audience could applaud.

Now, unlike Handel's oratorios, Bach's passions are religious works, written for a particular church service. But in giving them in a concert hall, performers surely have to accept that the audience members are there for a musical experience, each brings to the performance a differing set of religious (or non religious) views. Layton's pauses and reverence for the work seemed to be verging on forcing us to consider the concert as a religious experience. In essence, Layton seemed to be saying to us that the best and only way to appreciate the passion was as a religious work. But it is part of Bach's genius that his music transcends this. Layton was apparently supported by Bostridge who, when not singing, mostly seemed to have his eyes closed.

BOstridge was placed at the front, next to Layton, James Rutherford as Christus sat on a high platform to one side. The other soloists sat out of the audience's view and performed their arias on a platform in the centre of the orchestra. In many ways a sensible idea, but it did necessitate some distracting coming and going.

Both Layton and Bostridge are, by temperament, interventionist, so that though the music making was of a very high order, it had a very distinctive character. This was apparent form the opening bars, with Polyphony articulating the words superbly, pointing the music to a degree that was almost mannered with the Academy of Ancient Music playing in a similar manner. In fact this left the AAM sounding uncharacteristically muddy and the choir, though vivid and wonderfully committed, sounded over loud.

This such numbers there was inevitably no attempt to recreate a Lutheran style performance, I did find it worrying that when the choir were singing it was difficult to hear the woodwind.

I have nothing but praise for the choral singers who articulated all of Layton's wishes often at very brisk speeds. But the overall effect was extremely mannered, choruses and turbae were highly articulated, often fast and seemed to be either loud or very soft.

Bostridge seemed to worry at every single word or phrase. The result was often highly dramatic, but by the time we reached the tearing of the veil of the temple, Bach's dramatic writing went for little, as Bostridge's delivery had been over-wrought for most of the evening. Perhaps this style of Evangelist will appeal to some people but for me less is more in this role. Bostridge's delivery of the tenor arias was similarly dramatic, but these would have told more if set off against a less over-wrought Evangelist.

Into this highly charged atmosphere, Carolyn Sampson appeared like a wonderfully cool breeze. Her tone pure and limpid, her technical control superb, you only regretted that she was singing just 2 arias. It is here that you realise having the soloists involved in the choral numbers makes sense as otherwise the soprano and alto are grossly under used.

Sampson's dress was also something of a delight; black, but slit to the thigh, naked flesh covered with an over dress of black voile.

On the other hand Michael Chance, who was standing in for Iestyn Davies, seemed to push the performance closer to the religiose, giving his 2 arias almost with his eyes closed. Chance's voice is not as supple as it once was, but his musicianship is very fine.

Roderick Williams, singing Pilate and the bass arias, performed like Sampson, with aplomb, cool control and enviable technical ability. Williams has a lovely warm voice and brought drama to the role of Pilate without indulging in the over-dramatic interventionist approach.

The Academy of Ancient Music contributed some fine solo playing in the arias. Their overall sound, vivid and highly articulated, matched Layton's vision for the choir.

Overall this was an enthralling and engrossing performance, lasting just 2 hours. The style might not have been ideal for me but the standard of musicianship was very high. And it made me think about what I really want out of a performance of Bach's Johannes Passion

Review of Anna Bolena

My review of ETO's performance of Anna Bolena is here, on Music and Vision.

Alun Hoddinott

Alun Hoddinott died this week, his death was rightly covered extensively in the press, my contribution can be found here on Music Web International.
Less well covered was the death of conductor Noel Davies. The English Touring Opera performance of Anna Bolena was dedicated to his memory, the conductor having worked with ETO a number of times.

Missing intervals

We're off to the Barbican tonight to see Bach's St. John Passion with Ian Bostridge as the Evangelist. They have the admirable facility of being able to view the pdf of the programme in advance. I was glancing at it and noticed that the Passion is being played without an interval - estimated running time 2 hours 15 minutes.

Now you can probably make a very good argument for performing the Passion without an interval. But the Barbican seems to have something of a record for making audiences work hard. In Baroque Opera Seria performances it seems to be norm to have only 1 interval, running the other 2 acts together. This seems very unfair on audiences. I know that one issue is running time. A 3 act baroque opera can have up to 3 hours of music before you include intervals. And the management at the Barbican must feel obliged to have a weather eye on the finishing time. But if you've been at work all day, no matter how uplifting the music, 2 hours without a break can be a bit taxing.

So we will no doubt enjoy the concert, but I think we'd have enjoyed it more if there had been an interval to allow us to return to the second half relaxed and refreshed.

First run through with Horn

Last night we had the first run through with the horn player for my new piece, Do not go gentle into that good night. London Concord Singers are premiering the piece on Saturday at Hampstead Town Hall in concert which features music by John Gardner, Philip Cranmer and Mary Jane Leach.

It is always slightly unnerving having the first run through of a piece. The choir, of course, had had the work in rehearsal since January but last night was might first chance to hear it with a real horn player. The result, I think, works very well and we are all looking forward to the premiere.

Anna Bolena in Hackney

Tonight we are off to Hackney to see Donizetti's Anna Bolena, the start of the spring tour by English Touring Opera. In a highly enterprising programme they are also doing Carlisle Floyd's Susannah and Don Giovanni.

Anna Bolena was Donizetti's first major hit and his earliest opera to keep a hold in the repertoire. Mind you, in the UK if opera companies want a change from Lucia di Lammermoor, they always seem to choose Maria Stuarda. The Royal Opera produced Anna Bolena for Joan Sutherland in the late 1980's, but I don't think it has been seen in the UK since.

Making it large with Handel

Ex Cathedra are celebrating their 40th anniversary with a 3 year project to celebrate Birmingham's musical heritage. The first concert, on Saturday 5th April is a re-creation of the 1784 Messiah performance which launched the Birmingham Triennial Festivals. Ex Cathedra will be assembling a choir of some 100 singers accompanied by an orchestra of 60 provided by the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.

The Handel commemorative performances are important in the history of performance of Handel's music. The 1784 Birmingham performance used a choir of 100, the London centenary performances used a huge choir and this lead to the transformation of Handel's oratorios from relatively small scale works written for the theatre to large scale choral pieces. What's often forgotten about these early Handel commemorative performances is that the large choir was accompanied by an equally large orchestra.

Recent CD Reviews

My review of Ian Bostridge's disc of Handel arias is here.
Bostridge’s admirers will undoubtedly enjoy this but other listeners might be less convinced by his rather personal take ...

And my review of Rossini'sLa Donna del Lago is here. Both reviews on MusicWeb International.
At Naxos prices you can afford to experiment and this is a good set with which to experiment ...

Virgins and Whores

In much 19th century opera heroines are confined to 2 roles, the virgin and the tart. There are of course variants on these, virgins can be led astray but only by being deceived and tarts can have hearts. But, of course, if a virgin is led astray then the results almost certainly have to lead to tragedy and similarly for tarts with hearts. This is particularly true of 19th century French opera where complex roles for women are limited and strong roles barely exist.

This seems to have become codified in the early part of the 19th century when grand opera based on classical myth gradually made way for the French Grand Opera of the type written by Auber, Meyerbeer and Halevy. Halevy’s La Juive has just 2 major female roles, Princess Eudoxie is the coloratura soprano, she is worldly, flirty and not particularly germane to the plot, Rachel is virginal, led astray, pure but misguided in her love and ultimately sacrifices herself. These roles would almost become codified. The first Rachel, Cornelie Falcon, whose soprano voice had a dark mezzo-soprano quality, would become known for her playing of such soiled virgins such as Rachel or Valentine in Meyerbeer’s Les Huguenots.

One of the reasons that Bizet’s Carmen caused such a stir was the fact that Carmen failed to conform to the tart with a heart sort of role; Bizet and his soprano, Galli-Marie made Carmen a far more realistic, sympathetic and tragic figure.

Because of the stratified nature of the Paris Opera establishment, the French Grand Opera became almost codified, a librettist like Scribe could almost write librettos to a formula. In Italy there was less codification, but there is still a tendency for heroines to fit the virgin/whore mould.

A quick glance at the heroines of Bellini’s operas confirms this tendency. In La Sonnambula is only a comedy because the heroine is revealed to be sleepwalker and all stain removed, in I Puritani Elvira goes mad when she believes Arturo to be false. But frequently even falsely accused women usually end up in tragic circumstances, Beatrice di Tenda dies even though falsely accused, Romeo and Giulietta die, La Straniera does not die but has to abandon all hope of personal happiness.

A glance at Donizetti’s serious operas reveals a similar count. This is very much a 19th century development, one that seems to go hand in hand with the development of Romantic Opera. After all Rossini’s operas include strong women such as Semiramide, and even Elena (La Donna del Lago), Zelmira and Anna (Maometto II) are no pushover . And even Rosina is hardly a shrinking violet. Some of Rossini’s operatic heroines fit into the fainting violet role, but some don’t; considered as a whole Rossini’s operatic heroines are a pretty varied log.

In the later 19th century Massenet particularly seems to have bought into this view of women, perhaps it was endemic in men who worked in opera. After all, consider Degas images dancers, these seem to be completely realistic and give us a glimpse into the Parisian stage world, but behind these images consider that the many dancers would be expected to give favours to particular important men after the show. To be a woman on the stage in the 19th century was to be just one step from a whore.

Many Massenet’s best heroines seem to come into the tart with a heart category. Manon is considered by many to be his finest opera, but it only works if you are prepared to be charmed and teased by the heroine. If, like me, you find the heroine of the opera simply vapid and stupid then the charm is lost. What is fascinating is that in operas such as Manon, Thais and Sapho, the plot would not work in 19th century terms if the roles were reversed. It is here that we can see how much of 19th century opera is shaped by the attitudes to women of the male creators of the form. Imagine an opera where the plot is that of Manon or Thais but with the roles reversed. A male Manon figure, in love with pleasure, seducing a female Des Grieux figure; interestingly it is Massenet who comes closest to this. In Werther we have a plot where an upright female figure is tempted by the Romantic love of an impulsive man. Of course, Werther is an archetypal Romantic Young Man he is not a dissolute lover of pleasure. And Charlotte can still be seen as the transgressive virgin, she does love Werther but marries her boring husband because of her dying husband’s wishes.

It is only when we look at the operas of Verdi that these archetypes start to break down. There is nothing virginal or whore-ish about Abigaille and Odabella, Lady Macbeth is certainly transgressive but is neither virgin nor whore. These are strong roles, complex roles, in his treatment of women Verdi starts to hark back to the more rounded treatment of Mozart. Verdi does use the archetypes, after all Gilda and Leonora (La Forza del Destino) are examples of the transgressive virgin. Leonora shows enough strength of mind to go off on her own and try and expiate her ‘sin’. Violetta is a fascinating example of the tart with a heart, but Violetta is far stronger than we might expect her to be, she’s definitely stronger than Alfredo and the libretto has to make her ill in order for her to faint and expire in the requisite manner.

Of course, an opera us (usually) greater than the sum of its parts so that a piece like Manon can tell us a lot more than what Massenet’s attitude to women was. But this rather partial representation of women in 19th century opera helps you understand why modern directors such as David Alden have such extreme visions of these operas.

Review of The Adventures of Pinocchio

Jonathan Dove and Alasdair Middleton’s new opera, The Adventure of Pinocchio, is in many ways a follow up to their previous Christmas piece The Enchanted Pig. Like its predecessor, Pinocchio is aimed at a family audience but in such a way as to provide a piece to which both adults and children can respond. The Enchanted Pig was written for a mixed cast of actors and opera singers, but the new piece is a fully fledged opera written for Opera North. The premiered it in Leeds in December last year and are currently touring it, fetching up in London last week (we saw the opera on Friday 29^th Feb. at Sadlers Wells).

Dove and Middleton have gone back to Collodi’s original for the plot rather than the Disney re-working. This means that the piece has a great deal of plot to get through with a large number of characters. The only large role is Pinocchio himself (Victoria Simmonds) who is on stage virtually all the time. All the other characters are on stage a relatively short time. Pinnocchio’s father Geppetto (Jonathan Summers) and the Blue Fairy (Mary Plazas) have the largest supporting roles as their characters crop up in a number of scenes. The rest of the cast double and triple their appearances to cover the 25 named roles.

The opera has to be seen as Pinocchio’s gradual learning process; so that all the characters are really only seen in relation to him, they hardly develop a life of their own. But Dove’s music helps to flesh out the characters, dialogue blossoms out into small arias, so that by the end of the opera we feel we have come to know some of the smaller characters as well, such as Geppetto, the Blue Fair and Lampwick (Allan Clayton). This is also due to the strong playing from the singers, even when they’ve been away from the stage you don’t feel that they have been away, they bring some sort of emotional continuity.

But the whole structure, though it is true to Collodi’s book, is extremely dependent on the singer playing the title role, Victoria Simmonds. Here director Martin Duncan and his team have found a singer who brilliantly incarnates the wooden puppet whilst at the same time making us feel that he is a real person. In the same way that Massenet’s Manon only works if you find Manon charming, attractive and sexy, it is essential that the audience empathise with Pinocchio; the story depends on us finding him a loveable scamp rather than a tiresome child, we have to want him to become a real boy. I must confess that at first I found myself rather resistable to Pinocchio’s charms but well before the end of the opera I found that Simmonds had captured my emotional interest.

Dove’s music is tuneful, with one or two big tunes, though the economy of Middleton’s libretto means that there are not many occasions for Andrew Lloyd Webber moments. Dove has evidently gone to some trouble to produce musical characterisations for the different characters (the Blue Fairy has her own scale); whilst this may not be obvious to the general listener, it is something that their ears can pick up on and help them to differentiate the details of the plot.

For the more up tempo moments, Dove seems to have been channelling John Adams, with the dramatic impetus of his repeated chords and dynamically propelled melody lines. This meant that the big scenes were often exciting and had wonderful propulsion which helped keep the drama going.

Duncan’s production was based in a simple wooden box (designer Francis O’Connor) which was transformed for each of the short scenes (11 in act 1 and 9 in act 2). O’Connor came up with some simple but effective solutions to the transformations required of him. Pinocchio’s nose extending alarmingly when he tells lies to the Blue Fairy and the set was transformed simply but effectively from the sea to the belly of the whale.

One of the great strengths of the production and the opera was that the darker side of the story was not shirked, Pinocchio and his father) really do go through some difficult times. Though the violence and the villains are a little cartoonish, Dove takes the situations seriously and writes some dark music. All this helps make sense of Pinocchio’s final transformation and his becoming a helpful little boy is rendered all the more understandable.

The piece was slightly too long (each act lasted around 75 minutes) and I particularly felt that the ending could be pruned so that we reached the conclusion rather quicker. At a certain point it become obvious what the conclusion is going to be and I think Dove and Middleton do not really gain anything from delaying this.

Dove’s orchestration is, by and large, respecting of the singers and there was little sense of them having to strain over the orchestra. In this they were helped by David Parry, very much a singers conductor. That said, from where we were sitting in the front of the upper circle the diction was very unsatisfactory. The piece was rightly played without surtitles but I often had to strain to apprehend the words, perhaps it would have been different lower down in the theatre.

The Adventures of Pinocchio is a beautifully constructed opera, very much in the traditional mould which means that it fits very well into the schedule of a company like Opera North. The opera also seems to fulfil its roles as a family piece, the performance we went to was full of parents and children all of whom seemed to enjoy the piece and it kept their attention until the end.

If I came out, at the end, charmed rather than overwhelmed by a masterpiece, then that is not necessarily a bad thing. The Adventures of Pinocchio is very much a useful piece and I can forsee it having a long history of Christmas performances.

A little bit of history

Some months ago (and more) I was approached by The Pink Singers with an enquiry as to whether I had any information etc. relating to my time as Musical Director of the group (from 1983 to 1988!). Over Christmas we spent a lot of time re-organising the ever growing pile of files in our attic, sorting out the collection of concert programmes going back to 1976. I came across the Pink Singers box and decided to sort it out. The group now has a selection of archive photos etc.

But I also had a group of scrap books charting the group's history from '83 to '88 and felt that it might have interest to those interested in Gay History. One of the singers in the group at that time was also a volunteer with the Hall Carpenter Archives, these have come to rest at the Archives of the LSE. Yesterday I took my Pink Singers scrap books to the LSE archives where they will be accessioned and become part of the collection. A little bit of history

From this month's Opera

Gleanings from this month's Opera Magazine.

In an inteview with John Treleaven the tenor makes the interesting point that by Act 3 Tristan is meant to be dying, whereas in Act 3 of Siegfried the character is bright and fresh, which makes it harder for the tenor. Amazingly
he is the first British tenor to have tung Siegfried at Covent Garden since Alberto Remedios in 1982. (And I can testify that Remedios and Gwynneth Jones made a knock out combination, especially in Siegfried Act 3). Treleaven seems to be the only Cornish Tristan in operatic history.

Treleaven's musical start in life is slightly curious, he used to sing to himself when swimming in the harbour and was overheard by a teacher who invited him for lessons! Evidently for the last 10 years he's been studying with Jean Cox, a tenor whom I remember standing in for Alberto Remedios when ENO toured their Ring in the 70's. Treleaven is a prime example of the virtues of not starting out in the Wagner repertoire, I can remember him from his days with ENO doing Verdi and all sorts.

In Vienna, Franz Welser-Möst has been doing Die Walkure with the Staatsoper, Christopher Norton-Welsh describes it as 'one of the quietest performances I have heard'. Certainly a performance worth investigating.

Over in Lyon, Laurent Pelly has reached La Vie Parisienne, though the reviewer found the dialogue difficult to understand, despite a Francophone cast; quite a disappointment. Nadja Michael, Covent Garden's current Salome, was singing Marta (Tiefland) in Berlin but her voice was described as developing a wild vibrato, which is worrying; hopefully not a case of too much, too soon.

An interesting pair of viewpoints cropped up when Peter Mussbach's production of Don Giovanni cropped up in Berlin having first appeared at La Scala.
Giorgio Gualerzi dismissed the La Scala version (openly provocative), whereas Carlos Maria Solare simply found the Berlin incarnation boring. Still in Berlin, Dessau's Trial of Lukullus, a work that it would be interesting to hear over here.

In Dublin Opera Ireland gave Turandot in version set in Mao's China, with a chorus half of whom were from the Xinghai Convervatory of Music, and with a Chinese Calaf and a Japanese Turandot. In Amsterdam Strauss's Daphne received its first ever staging. In Madrid they performed Rossini's Tancredi, enterprisingly giving performances of both the endings. I must confess I've always preferred the jolly, upbeat Venice version as this, though less remarkable than the tragic Ferrara ending, seems to fit the rest of the opera better.

Having heard Barry Banks as Edgardo in London, I noted that he has been doing Tonio in La Fille du Regiment in Houston. How about getting the chance of hearing him in the role over here? In New York, another favourite of ours Alice Coote was doing Hansel, with Philip Langridge no less as the Witch. Hansel and Gretel was also on the menu in Hexham, where Opera North's Education Department alighted. Evidently their education is working as the show seems to have attracted mainly family groups. The opera will be returning to Covent Garden next season in a new production by Caurier and Leiser with Anja Silja and Felicity Palmer (as mother and the witch).

New Sussex Opera have been doing Idomeneo; we'd hoped to see it but dates and locations did not work out. It was conducted by the young conductor Nicholas Jenkins and the Idomeneo was his father, tenor Neil Jenkins. Rather appropriate for an opera which hinges on parental relationships. At 62 Neil Jenkins is evidently still 5 years short of Anton Raaff's age when he created the title role.

On DVD, Hartmann's Simpliciu Simplicissimus appears set in Harmann's Munich appartment. But most notable for me was the fact that Marcia Haydee appears in a spoken role. Haydee is forever associated in my mind with Kenneth Macmillan's ballet's, notably Requiem and Song of the Earth. And we have a fascinating book about Sullivan's Ivanhoe, but still no decent recording!

In We hear that.., Bryn Terfel is due do a new Dutchman at Covent Garden next season, directed by Tim Albery; don't hold your breath.

Alfie Boe is returning to La Boheme, this time in a new Jonathan Miller production at ENO (why another new production?).

Danielle de Niese is singing Galatea to Charles Workman's Acis at Covent Garden next season, and Natalie Dessay is doing her first Cleopatra in a new production in Paris of Giulio Cesare directed by Laurent Pelly (hmmm).

Gerald Finley is doing his first Hans Sachs for Glyndebourne in 2011, now that I really want to hear.

ENO is opening 2008/2009 with a new Cav and Pag directed by Richard Jones.

Over at Grange Park, Claire Rutter is doing Norma in 2009.

Saturday's concert

On Saturday we did our second concert at St. Peter's Church, Eaton Square. The programme (Hugill:Annunciation; Haydn:Music for musical clocks; Haydn:Little Organ Mass; Hugill:Choruses from Passion; Andriessen:Theme and Variations for organ; Hugill:Crossing) was very well received by the audience and much enjoyed by the choir as well. Annunciation, a new piece setting the biblical text for soprano, tenor and organ, proved very striking and was a notable success. It was lovely to hear Crossing performed with a large, bold organ as accompaniment. The concert was recorded and we look forward to hearing the results!

Review of "The Testament of Dr. Cranmer"

From the CHURCH MUSIC QUARTERLY:

Robert Hugill is a mainly self-taught composer who has written charming music which is easy on the ear. Much is linked to chant, something that the composer was brought up with during his time with catholic church choirs. This disc comprises 77 minutes of music for vocal octet, tenor and strings, as well as octet and organ. Much has been specifically re-arranged for this recording.

The tenor soloist in The Lord bless thee and What is Man? is Christopher Watson. His beauty of sound appears effortless, yet he brings the impassioned moments directly to our attention with style. The eight voices of the ‘eight:fifteen’ vocal ensemble produce a radiant sound that is full of potential. Octets are notoriously difficult for achieving balanced and blended results, but there are only occasional lapses, which do not come close to distracting us from the many superb things we hear. Brough capably directs the two very different groups of musicians with considerable aplomb.


This is a disc of initial unknowns, but the end result is delightful.
Will Dawes

Review of Tito Manlio

(A slightly late posting I'm afraid, we've been rather busy preparing tomorrow's concert at St. Peter's Eaton Square)

Considering his popularity in other areas, Vivaldi's operas have still not made it into the mainstream of baroque opera going. I can remember the Camden Festival staging one of his works, but that was the oratorio Juditha Triumphans. The Accademia Bizantina's visit to the Barbican on Tuesday 16th February bringing a concert performance of Vivaldi's opera seria Tito Manlio gave us Londoners a rare opportunity to hear one of his major opera serias live.

The Accademia Bizantina, under Ottavio Dantone, have recorded the opera as part of the impressive ongoing Vivaldi edition on the naive label. Tuesday's cast though had only 1 or 2 singers from the recording.

Though Vivaldi did write operas for Venice, he found himself at odds with his audience and accepted a post in Mantua where the Landgrave of Hesse was the Austrian Governor. Vivaldi wrote a series of operas for performance in Mantua under the Landgrave's patronage and Tito Manlio was the 2nd of these.

It was planned as part of the Landgrave's wedding celebrations but when these fell through, the planned staging was shelved. Though the opera might have been given in a simplified form. The libretto, by the Neapolitan writer Matteo Noris, was a pre-existing one which Vivaldi adapted. Based on an episode in Livy it describes the family struggles between the Roman consul Tito Manlio and his son, during the early days of the Roman Republic.

The opera was presented as part of the Barbican's 'Great Performers' series and as such programmes were free. They did contain an excellent article on Vivaldi and the circumstances of the opera's gestation. But there was not plot summary. This was a grave disadvantage in an unfamiliar opera. Luckily there were surtitles, admirably comprehensive; also the performers had taken the precaution of having the female singers who played male characters all wearing trousers.

The plot covers the struggle between Romans and Latins; the opera opens with consul Tito Manlio (Carlo Lepore) proclaiming that every Roman must vow to support Rome and not the Latins. This causes trouble in his own family as his son Manlio (Karina Gauvin) is in love with a Latin, Servilia (Ann Hallenberg), and Tito's daughter Vitellia is in love with another Latin, Servilia's brother Geminio (Mark Milhofer). Another Latin, Lucio (Roberta Invernizzi) is also in love with Vitellia.

For the first act and the opening of the Act 2, Vivaldi manages to fit in an enormous amount of plot, there are numerous familial comings and goings as some family members support the vow and others not. Tito sends his son to treat with the Latins; Manlio meets Servilia's brother Geminio who baits him. Act 2 opens with Manlio's return to Rome and his admission that he has slain Geminio. His sister Vitellia is furious as is his lover Servilia. His father too, insists that Manlio has broken the law, having been instructed not to fight or provoke the Latins.

Manlio is clapped in irons and put into jail. For the remainder of the opera (a further 90 minutes of music) the plot, such as it is, centres around the conflicted reactions of Manlio and his family to his imprisonment.

Writing for a celebratory occasion, Vivaldi uses a wide instrumental palate with trumpets, horns, oboes, recorders and a kettle drum. The arias are all richly and brilliantly orchestrated and many have substantial instrumental obbligatos. The Accademia Bizantina under Ottavio Dantone played the music brilliantly and were a constant pleasure to listen to.

Vivaldi seems to respond to voices in a similar instrumental fashion. His vocal lines are often brilliant, virtuosic and well nigh impossible to sing. Dantone was blessed with a cast who seemed to be able to make light of the virtuoso difficulties.

Karina Gauvin as Manlio was brilliant. In the first half of the opera she seemed under used, but in the 2nd half she had a series of brilliant arias. Gauvin coped superbly with Vivaldi's impossible writing as did Robert Invernizzi as Lucio. The remaining cast members were not quite as impressive but still pretty incredible. Ann Hallenberg, as Servilia, had quite a soft grained voice which came into its own in the long aria Servilia sang to the sleeping Manlio in his prison cell. As the majority of arias in the opera were short, up tempo numbers, it seemed strange for Vivaldi to choose to dwell at such length on an aria not at all germane to the plot.

Marina De Liso, standing in for Sonia Prina, sang Vitellia's arias well enough though she never made me care for the character's suffering. And in the second half Vivaldi seems to lose interest, Vitellia simply comes on periodically and stomps about raging at Manlio, the killer of her lover, but she rages to no effect.

Vitellia's servant, Lindo (Christian Senn) has no significant plot function but gets a series of almost buffo arias which comment wryly on the activities going on around him; rather an old fashioned device by the time Vivaldi wrote the opera. The role was well delivered, in dead pan manner, by Christian Senn.

Carlo Lepore made an impressive tyrant of Tito Manlio, though Vivaldi gave him some remarkably jolly music; Tito Manlio is a character who seems to find great joy in his role in life!

By the end of the opera, some three hours, we had heard some stunning music, and stupendous singing. Many items could be taken out and stand well on their own. The combination of Vivaldi's instrumental vocal writing with his own orchestration was irresistible.

But frankly, I am not sure it quite added up to drama. There were slightly too many jolly up tempo numbers. And the prison scenes, though attractively pathetic, never quite moved me. I kept thinking of what a composer like Handel or Mozart might have made of the situation. By concentrating the 2nd half of the opera on Manlio's imprisonment and the plight of him and his family, Vivaldi would have needed to deliver music of profoundly moving depth and pathos. This he didn't do, seemingly content to charm and please.

Ottavio Dantone, the Accademia Bizantina and his singers coped brilliantly with Vivaldi's taxing music, creating a wonderfully enjoyable evening. Any faults were Vivaldi's, not theirs.

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Review of Lucia di Lamermoor

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Susan Graham - concert review

There is a sense that, with an artist of the stature of Susan Graham, they can perform whatever and wherever they want and still get an audience. Judging by Saturday February 9th's performance at the Wigmore Hall, close communication with her audience is important to Graham. So it was not surprise that she was performing in the Wigmore Hall rather than a bigger venue such as the Barbican, which she could undoubtedly have filled.

Accompanied by Malcolm Martineau, she presented a programme which took few prisoners - an extended peregrination through French song from Gounod (Ou voulez-vous aller?, 1839) to Poulenc (La Dame de Montecarlo, 1961). In one sense the programme was unchallenging, the material was all attractive, well written and melodic. But there were few undoubted masterpieces and many excursions into the by ways of the repertoire. Much depended on the quality of the performance and the audience's willingness to follow Graham and Martineau, to make connections and pick up the threads between the works suggested by Gerald Larner's excellent programme notes.

There were eccentricities, neither Faure (2 songs, one a vocalise), nor Debussy (2 songs) nor Ravel (one song) were represented by examples of their greatest works.
Poulenc completed the journey with his scena La Dame do Montecarlo.

The programme was presented roughly chronologically. This meant that in the first half, a generous 12 songs from the 19th century, there were slightly too many attractive encore type pieces, such as Paladilhe's Psyche (popularised by Maggie Teyte and Grace Moore) or Bachelet's Chere nuit (written for Melba and popular with singers such as Nan Merriman). But Graham was on excellent form, caressing each item with her lovely voice, giving each song its own distinctive dramatic presentation. And in items like Debussy's Harmonie du Soir, giving much more.

For the 20th century group a welcome element of wit and cleverness crept into the songs. Few songs were quite as comfortable as their 19th century counterparts, even Ravel's La Paon, with its vivid depiction of the Peacock. Perhaps Graham tried a little to hard with Satie's Le Chapelier, where he combines of Rene Chalupt's poem about the Mad Hatter with a melody from Gounod's Mireille - surely the joke should be in understated here rather than over-done. But Honegger's Trois Chansons de la Petite Sirene were perfect.

For the 2nd half Graham and Martineau gave us 11 songs, quite a respectable content and I'm sure that everyone would have been happy if the concert finished there, many distinguished divas have got away with performing few songs in a recital. But Graham and Martineau gave us Poulenc's substantial La Dame de Montecarlo, a brilliant tour de force in conclusion.

But it was in pieces such as the Poulenc where Graham's glorious voice could almost be said to be something of a limitation, there were times when I wanted less voice and more word.

Having sung Hahn's Tyndaris during part 2, Graham and Martineau gave us his A Chloris as a further treat as an encore. Graham followed this with Noel Coward's song about the 'filthy' French. Here, as in the Poulenc, I wanted more word and less voice.

Graham was well supported by Malcolm Martineau, surely becoming one of our finest contemporary accompanists. Their recital was generously programmed, some 24 songs, and by exploring the byways of the French melodie, they enabled us to get to knwo some lesser known gems in stunning performances.

Concert press release

The press release for our Feb 23rd Concert is on-line here, at PressBox.

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Approaching the Sublime

On Saturday February 23rd 2008 at 7.30pm at St. Peter’s Church, 119 Eaton Square, London SW1W 9AL, FifteenB, conductor Paul Ayres and organist Malcolm Cottle will be performing a programme which explores different approaches to the sublime. Haydn’s Little Organ Mass, with its sublime soprano in the Benedictus, will be contrasted with Rabindranath Tagore’s evocative religious imagery in Robert Hugill’s cantata Crossing setting 2 of Tagore’s poems. A different approach is taken in the poetry of Black American poet Carl Cook, whose contemporary religious imagery suffuses Robert Hugill’s Choruses from “Passion”. The concert also includes the premiere of Robert Hugill’s Annunciation for solo soprano, solo tenor and organ.

Tickets for the concert, price £10 (concessions £6) are available on the door or in advance from Islington Music, tel. 020 7354 3195. Online booking available at:-
http://www.sphericaleditions.co.uk/celebration.html

Singing actors?

Should actors in musicals be able to sing? Is it necessary for them to be able to sing well, or are untrained voices acceptable? These thoughts occurred to me whilst reading reviews of the new film of Sondheim’s Sweeny Todd. I have yet to see the film but find myself disturbed by the comments on how unused to singing the leading actors were.

For me, I must admit, the answer to the question is a resounding yes, an actor should be able to sing, and sing well if they are to appear in a musical. I realise that not everyone will agree with this and find it acceptable it the performers can get by in a reasonably expressive manner.

But it is this little word expressive which is a big sticking point. An interesting example of my problem is the National Theatre production of Sondheim’s A Little Night Music with Judi Dench. Now Dench is a superb actress and an adequate singer, she was after all the first London Sally Bowles. But I felt it noticeable in the musical that she was less flexible, less expressive in her musical numbers. Her lack of (regular) musical experience meant that she was a little constrained; she could not be as expressive musically as she could with words.

And musicals are meant to be sung. I can still remember a revival of one of the great American musicals in the West End where virtually none of the cast could properly hold a tune. Very few actors are the equal of Rex Harrison who could be very expressive in musical numbers even though he just talked his way through the songs in My Fair Lady. Of course, with the advent of microphones and improved recording technology, it is possible to make a poor or inadequate singer seem fascinating on film. Of course, this requires the performer to be in some way charismatic so that, in the Rex Harrison mould, other qualities come to the fore and replace the musical ones.

Music is a language and if a performer is unused to it, then they simply will not be able to express themselves as well as they can in words. And when ballet dancers turn actors or singers, they have a double hurdle to leap as they are unused to expressing themselves with their voice at all. I saw Irek Mukhamedov in The King and I and though his acting and singing were creditable, it was noticeable that he was at his most relaxed and most expressive when dancing.

Live performance suffers in a similar manner because of the use of microphones, meaning that a singer who would be expected to be able to project their speaking voice in an auditorium does not have to do this when singing. I have seen a few musicals over the years where amplification was not used. Carousel at the National Theatre was done without, I believe, and it revealed an entirely different set of strengths and weaknesses in the cast. The big advantage was that you were hearing the performers for real and this forced them to consider how to be expressive musically. My abiding musical memory of that performance was Patricia Routledge singing You’ll never walk alone. But then I heard Routledge upstage June Anderson and a clutch of other opera singers in a concert performance (unamplified) of Bernstein’s Candide.

Grange Park Opera have a tradition of doing the occasional musical and, given the smallness of the theatre, doing them unamplified. They mix young opera singers and actors. Listening to these performances, it makes you realise that the performers in the early musical must have been fine, musical actors with decent, if not strong voices.

But you can take things to the opposite extreme, and a musical cast entirely from opera singers is not necessarily a lovely thing either!

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From this month's Opera

Gleanings from this months Opera magazine.

A couple of snippets from the profile of Gianandrea Noseda. He was the first foreigner since Albert Coates to be a regular conductor at the Kirov, and Coates worked there before the Revolution. He makes an interesting comment about the sort of conductors he is interested in encouraging in TurinI don't want singers to have an easy life with conductors who will simply follow them not matter what they do. It was Noseda's Beethoven cycle for the BBC in Manchester which had the remarkable download success, attracting 1.4 million downloads in 3 weeks. (Something the BBC have never repeated).

Over in Scotland there is an interview with Alex Reedijk, Scottish Opera's new head. Another fascinating fact, Scottish Opera's educational arm was the first to be established by a UK company. It is heartening to hear that in the 2008/09 season all of the company's 4 productions will be new ones, rather than rentals. But still a little depressing that they are only doing 4 productions, no matter how necessary this is economically. Still, their forthcoming evening of 5 1-act operas, all brand new and commissioned by Scottish Opera, is exciting. They plan to develop these further, let us hope that they have some success. But the workshop method, much beloved of opera companies, does not often seem to pay major dividends when it comes to operas; somehow the process often squeezes the life out of pieces.

An article on Balfe prompts much interest, but you'll have to go down to Haslemere if you want to hear his work, Opera South are staging The Bohemian Girl. Balfe's musical connections were remarkable. He sang at La Scala with Maria Malibran (in Rossini's Otello) and at La Fenice with her in La Sonnambul. He was in Milan when both Norma and La Sonnambula had their premieres.

An interesting conflation of obituaries - Karlheinz Stockhausen and Gudrun Wagner.

In Rio de Janeiro, Lithuanian mezzo Liora Grodnikaite gets fine reviews; I'm looking forward to seeing her in Massenet's Cendrillon when Chelsea Opera Group do it later this year.

Chicago has staged a new Die Frau ohne Schatten. I'd love to have heard it, with Christine Brewer as the Dyers Wife and Deborah Voight as the Empress. In NY the Met did its first Iphigenie en Tauride since 1917!

Back in Europe, Anger Nantes Opera gave the premiere of Susumu Yoshida's Sumidagawa, based on the same Noh play that Britten used for Curlew River. Remarkably the singers (one Canadian, Argentinian) sang the piece in Japanese, quite a feat. And in Frankfurt Richard Jones's new production of Billy Bud is set in a 1940's Naval College. Still in a Britten kind of mood, Turn of the Screw cropped up in Cremona sung in English by a mostly Italian cast. It is always heartening when this happens as too often you read about unusual repertoire cropping up in places with largely imported casts.

Over in Milan, Tristan und Isolde in a new production by Patrice Chereau, with Ian Storey as Tristan; he's a British singer who I've not really heard, he seems neglected over here. His Isolde was Waltraut Meier, and Michelle de Young was Brangaene, so no Italian speakers here. The role sounds as if it might be stretch of Meier (after all she is technically a mezzo) and I'd be interested to hear her doing it with a period band at a slightly lower 19th century pitch (assuming I'm right about the pitch being slightly lower).

It seems scarcely believable that Dennis O'Neill is 60 but there was a gala to celebrate this at the Wales Millennium Centre. And, having been cataloguing my old programmes, I must admit that his name crops up rather a lot in the operas I saw in Scotland in the late 1970's.

Stephen Petitt, in his thoughtful review of The Magic Flute performed by the South African Isango/Portobello Company makes an comment that there was not a single black face in the audience the night he was there. It would be interesting to know whether this changed over the course of the run or whether opera is just as problematic in London when performed by a black South African company.

We hear that... notes that Jeanne Michele Charbonnet will be Kundry in ENO's 2010 revival of Parsifal. I'm not sure about this one, I was less than thrilled with the concrete bunker production when new and Charbonnet failed to delight when heard in John Foulds World Requiem. Fascinatingly, John Copley has replaced Jude Kelly as the director of the new Merry Widow; definitely a sea change in the sort of production we might expect. We can anticipate that Copley will turn in a well made, very revivable production (unlike some recent ENO outings). Sarah Connolly is going to be doing Dido (Purcell) at Covent Garden. The big question being, what else are they putting on the bill? And Joyce DiDonato and Juan Diego Florez will be appearing in a new Donna del Lago, another of these travelling productions (Paris, London, NY, Milan). Still, I can hardly wait, definitely a mouthwatering cast. Amanda Roocroft is doing the Countess (Capriccio)for the first time with Opera North in 2010, now we'll have to find time to go and see that.

The Great Herbert

An article by Norman Lebrecht (published in the London Evening Standard, but available on the web at La Scena Musicale raises the spectre of Herbert von Karajan's centenary.

It was when I was a student in Manchester (from 1976 to 1981) that I first really came across Karajan's work. When we could afford it we were buying LP's and inevitably Karajan's name came to our attention. This was before I came to know his stunning records of the 1950's. This was the era when he was increasingly prizing glossy perfection in his orchestra, sometimes at the expense of his singers. Further into the 1980's I came to notice the way he was pushing some singers into roles which would seem to heavy for them (Katia Ricciarelli as Aida for instance).

I heard comments about the eerie perfection of his stage productions and the stories that he would not countenance long runs as the staging started to fail to meet his exacting standards.

All this conspired against my liking for his style of music making. To this day, I have few of Karajan's recordings and only admire his early ones. For this reason we coined a name for him, The Great Herbert. To understand this you have to understand our local (Northern English) idiom, in which the phrase you daft herbert, refers to someone who has done something stupid.

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