Review of Capuletti e Montecchi

My review of Grange Park Opera's production of Capuletti e Montecchi at Nevill Holt is here, on Music and Vision.

Proms ahoy

Today's Evening Standard has an article with different critics selecting their stand-out Proms from this year's season. And whilst there are some interesting things out there, I must confess that not many of this seasons concerts make me burn with a desire to be in the Albert Hall. Particularly when I've done a full day's work and could be sitting comfortably at home. Or am I just getting old?

Anyway, we are doing the Proms, well 3 of them! But July and August are generally so crammed with holidays, weekends away etc. that we usually miss the best Proms. On Tuesday 17th we're doing the late night prom with the newly discovered Striggio Mass amongst other things. Friends who have sung in the Striggio 40-part motet have commented that it is rather boring, so I will be very interested.

The following Tuesday we are seeing the Glyndebourne Prom, Verdi's Macbeth without the controversial production. Then later in the season we'll be hearing Elgar's The Apostles. One of those works that it's necessary to hear every 10 years or so. (Which means I've got a Bruckner symphony coming up soon!)

Last night we managed to listen again on the BBC website to Saturday's Early Music Show. I had caught the programme live, but not listened properly as I was busy finishing a piece of Music. (For those who wonder, I have the rather annoying habit of having the radio on in each room and playing the piano or playing back music from my PC.).

Rather fascinatingly the piece O Crux Fructus
taken from a disc by Ensemble Lucidarium, sounded a lot like one of the track's from Luc Arbogast's disc.

Almost worth the trip

The American Symphony Orchestra under Leon Botstein are giving the American premiere of Ethel Smyth's opera The Wreckers at Avery Fisher Hall in New York on September 30th. There is no information yet about casting. If it wasn't for the complicated security arrangements required for transatlantic travel I'd almost be tempted to go!

More on Capuletti e Montecchi

The role of Romeo in Bellini's Capuletti e Montecchi was originally written for the soprano, Giulietta Grisi. In 1832, when Maria Malibran essayed the role , Rossini suggested that she use a scene from Nicola Vaccai's opera Romeo e Giulietta as the penultimate scene of the score. Malibran had a voice of remarkable range, but this change made the role of Romeo more accessible to contraltos and it became a regular option for singers like Maria Alboni.

A high counter-tenor friend, who had sung scenes from Bellini's opera, once opined that if the Vaccai ending was used he would be able to sing the whole role. I am not aware that anyone has actually tried this out yet.

Vaccai had been an older contemporary of Bellini's who had had a degree of success, in fact Romeo e Giulietta was his most popular opera, one of the few to receive performances outside Italy. Unfortunately it was eclipsed by Bellini's opera; Bellini probably chose the subject because his librettist, Felice Romani was embroiled in a financial dispute with Vaccai.

London Concord Singers Concert

This Thursday at St. Cyprian's Church, Glentworth Street, London NW1 I will be singing in the London Concord Singers summer concert. We're presenting a programme whose main works are Walton's Cantico del Sole, Rheinberger's Mass in E flat and Howells's Requiem. The programme will also form the basis for our concert tour to Basel, Switzerland, at the beginning of August when we will be performing 2 concerts in the Basler Münster and singing Mass at Mariastein Monastery.

Review of Semele

My review of Semele at Grange Park last weekend is here, on Music and Vision.

Capuletti e Montecchi

Last night we went to hear Grange Park Opera at their outpost at Nevill Holt in Leicestershire. Nevill Holt is a rambling old (v. old) mansion owned by David Ross and he has built a very permanent temporary theatre in the courtyard of the stables.

Unlike Northington Grange, Grange Park Opera's main home, Nevill Holt is occupied so all of the audience facilities are in tents. As David Ross has guests for the opera you get a stream of people going into the house before the opera, some of them arriving in helicopters (not allowed at Northington Grange). Ross has had the house and the gardens restored and before the opera there is the chance to have a wander around the fabulous walled gardens.

My review of the opera itself will appear in due course, but the performance was entrancing.

Sills and Crespin

There have been obituaries in the recent days for Beverley Sills and for Regine Crespin. Sills was a singer who I never heard live. Though she was in my thoughts recently because last night we went to see Bellini's Capuletti e Montecchi at Nevill Holt and Sills recorded it with Janet Baker as Romeo. The recording never did really get fabulous reviews but it remains in my memory as one of Baker's rare excursions into Italian early 19th century opera. I'm not sure whether its still available, but it is certainly a recording I'd like to acquire.

Crespin I saw twice. The first time was in recital in Scotland at the Usher Hall (I think) with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra. She did a lighter recital, the most serious piece being an extract from Massenet's Manon. The encores included an item from the Chocolate Soldier, I seem to remember, and the drinking song from Offenbach's La Perichole. The most remarkable thing about the recital was her pink jersey dress trimmed at the bottom with ostrich feathers!

Later on, in the 1980's I think, I saw her performance as the Old Prioress in the Covent Garden revival of Poulenc's Carmelites (with amongst others Pauline Tinsely, Marie McLaughlin, Eiddwen Harrhy and Valerie Masterson). Crespin's was a fabulous performance that stood out amongst many other fine performances.

But I really came to love Crespin's voice from disc. Her recording of extracts from Les Troyens; her early recital of French romantic opera including the excerpt from Reyer's Sigurd (now that's an opera I'd like to hear)and her live Gluck from South America (not brilliant recordings, but what a performance).

Gleanings from this Month's opera magazine (I)

Some jottings from the July edition of Opera Magazine

The opening editorial is about age-ism and the editor quotes Yvonne Kenny who said in an interview with the magazine in 1992 that Fiordiligi is so gruelling a sing that it takes a 40-ish soprano to illuminate it. The editor then speculates about a director bringing us a mid-life crisis version of Cosi !

The interview this month is with the young Scottish director, Paul Curran. Young being a relative term, he's 42. It is curious how some people seem to have lives that are intertwined even though they don't meet, and the intertwinings are ultimately rather meaningless.. As a young man Curran had a number of key experiences of theatre at the Citizens in the late 70's when I was in Scotland and went there as well. He saw the 1980 Wozzeck at Scottish Opera, as did I. Later in London he saw Christa Ludwig as Klytemnestra, as did I. He studied at the London Studio Centre, where a friend of mine works. And he went on to dance with Scottish Ballet, I troupe that I enjoyed immensely.

More importantly, the interview sheds light on Curran's formative experiences. At the age of 16 he fell in love with a (male) dancer and was thrown out by his parents. This is the sort of important detail which is glossed over in such interviews and it is all to Curran, and Opera Magazine's credit that they include such important details.

Curran was in London in the 1980's when ENO was run by Lord Harewood. He makes the important point that Harewood had a mix of styles. David Alden and David Pountney, as well as John Cox, Joh Dexter, John Copley and some 1960's productions. It was this balance that was lost when the PowerHouse took over. 'I don't want every show I do to have the same look, because not every story can be told the same way. Harewood's ENO nurtured that philosophy'. Later on he quotes David Pountney's interesting dictum about 'the danger, when you take something out of its era, of creating more of a monster than a meaningful interpretation'. Hmm, how many recent productions could I apply that to!!

There is a feature article on Montemezzi's opera, L'amore dei tre re, described in a 1947 history of opera as 'the greatest tragic opera since Verdi's Otello'. Oh yes? The leading lady was a favourite role of Mary Garden's, in fact it was one of the few roles she did in Italian (she even did Tosca in French).

Another interview, this time with Francis Egerton who has been on my operatic radar since I started seeing operas at Covent Garden. He has been singing there since 1972. We saw one of his last appearances, in La Fanciulla del West.

Hugh Canning's review of Winton Dean's 2nd volume on Handel's Opera is really hardly a review at all. After all, the book is so masterly that much is beyond criticism. Still, Dean does manage to include quite a lot of comment about contemporary opera production and Canning manages to have an interesting dialogue with that.

Laurent Pelly's production of La Fille du Regiment has landed in Vienna. Still with Florez and Dessay but with Monsterrat Caballe as the Duchess; now that I would like to have seen. Over in Buenos Aires, the Colon mounted a production of Wozzeck entirely with a Latin cast, no small feat; it is amazing how many performances of German operas you read about in Latin or Latin American countries only to find the cast has been body shopped from Germany. More power to the Colon's elbow, so to speak.

A new opera in Brussels, Benoit Mernier's opera based on Spring Awakening. It sounds a remarkable show but I don't suppose we'll get to see it any time soon. Also in Brussels, but soon to come to Covent Garden (and Madrid and San Francisco and Lyons) is Robert LePage's 1950's Hollywood setting for Rakes Progress. It sounds fascinating and beautifully done, but you wonder why. And of course, Pountney's dictum starts to spring to mind.

I had not realised that the 1881 revised version of Simon Boccanegra started Tamagno (the first Otello) as Gabriele Adorno. Given Tamagno's huge voice, this puts a remarkably slant on the balance of the revised piece. The comment about it in opera was made in the context of a lyric tenor singing the role.

In Berlin Iphigenie en Tauride cropped up. The producer Barrie Kosky evidently said in interview that the opera's real love interest was between Oreste and Pylade, which seems to me to be a very interesting point. The reviewer, Carlos Maria Solare, simply comments 'Mercifully the ... point wasn't unduly harped on'. Well? And why not please?

Another travelling show is the Villazon/Netrebko Manon, it sounds interesting enough but I gather that much material not involving the leading couple has been cut. Surely not a good basis for a musical edition for a production.


In Trieste they did a production of La Sonnambula borrowed from Verona. How on earth do you fit a production designed for the arena into an ordinary theatre?

John Allison reviews the première of Jonathan Harvey's new opera, Wagner Dream, premièred in Luxembourg. The libretto, in English, is by Jean-Claude Carriere and though the philosophy sounds distinguished, his English writing does not. Great shame. Seems like there are just too many 'Pass the Mustard' type moments. Always a difficult one in librettos. Also, some of the big parts are spoken. So I'll have to reserve judgement until I hear it, if I ever do.

Over in New York, the Met. has revived Giulio Cesare with David Daniels and Ruth Ann Swenson in John Copley's production which was new, for ENO, in 1979; it first appeared in New York in 1988. Now that is longevity. Their latest production, Puccini's Il Trittico is billed as 'the largest production in the company's history' - now is that a good thing or a bad thing?

Review of Benvenuto Cellini

On Friday we went to see the 2nd of the LSO's performances of Benvenuto Cellini at the Barbican. It was billed as being part of their Choral Blockbusters series. Really, I can't see Benvenuto Cellini as a choral blockbuster, but it does have some fabulous choral set pieces and the entire London Symphony Chorus was present in force. As was the LSO, to such an extent that there was barely any room on the platform for the soloists. Colin Davis was in charge and the tenor soloist was supposed to be Giuseppi Sabbatiini, who had sung the role with the LSO in 1999. This was the period when the LSO were just setting up LSO live and Benvenuto Cellini was one of the items they missed, so this pair of performances could be seen as filling a gap allowing them to have the complete Berlioz dramatic works on their label with Colin Davis.

Unfortunately both Sabbattini and Michele Pertusi pulled out, so that we had Gregory Kunde instead. Kunde has a rather open sounding voice, quite surprising in this repertoire, but he does specialise in French 19th century operas. He sang Aeneas in the staging of Les Troyens at the Chatelet which was conducted by John Eliot Gardiner. The nearest voice that I can come to is the sound of John Vickers, singing something like Samson (I never heard Vickers in any Berlioz). Kunde usually takes his chest voice quite high and there are moments where you think the voice will strain but it does not. He also mixes in some lovely head voice, which balances well with the rest of his vocal production. He is also technically adept, so that the verbal and vocal intricacies of the part were well covered.

Whilst Kunde is not, perhaps, my ideal in the role he delivered fabulously. He seemed tireless, but also responded well to the mercurial nature of the part. By Act 3 he still had plenty of reserves to deliver a well shaded account of Cellini's impassioned invocation.

As his love, Teresa, Laura Claycomb encompassed everything that the role required. Here coloratura was dazzling and she sang charmingly and winningly. She also displayed a sense of humour, which is important in this part. My only real complaint was that her tone seemed at times a little too firm, not quite hard but not really flexible enough for this role. She never ever seemed 17 and her delivery was very mature (think Bellini heroine) rather than girlish. But when sung as well as this, I am probably being picky.

Darren Jeffery seemed a little young to be singing Balducci and, in fact, the part might be a little low for him. But he worked hard at the gravitas and succeeded by and large. Peter Coleman-Wright was superb as Fieramosca, imbuing the part with the necessary mix of comedy and bumptiousness. A very dramatic performer, you never ever felt that he was merely giving concert performance.

In fact, none of the artists gave the impression of just singing their roles. No producer was credited, but some thought had been given to entrances and exits and the way the singers interacted. All of them sang to each other and responded. The result was to create a good dramatic performance even though the staging area was tiny. This had the advantage that the whole drama was extremely involving.

Of course, it helps that everything was superbly controlled by Colin Davis. He is a conductor who has a secure grasp of the structure of Berlioz's work, whilst never losing control of the details. Every detail was beautifully in place, whilst the work flowed just as it should.

The smaller parts were very well cast with Andrew Foster Williams and Andrew Kennedy making quite a mark as Cellini's workmen, Francesco and Bernadino. Isabelle Cals, as Ascanio, seemed the only native French speaker in the cast and I would have liked to hear more of her.

The chorus part was not designed for a large amateur chorus and it says much for the LSC's discipline and professionalism that they fitted into the performance superbly and gave a well crafted performance.

The Paris version was used, but with some of the recitative replaced by spoken dialogue. A change which works remarkably well and facilitates the flow of the piece. I look forward to hearing the CD.

Recent CD Review

My review of the re-issue of the Sutherland/Pavarotti/Bonynge Il Trovatore is here, on MusicWeb International.
Many incidental beauties, but your attitude will depend on how much you like Sutherland’s technique and Bonynge’s rather limp conducting. ...

Recent CD Reviews

My review of new disc of Bach cantatas is here .
Much choral and instrumental interest, beautifully taken. Bach's name-day cantata displays the master in delightfully unbuttoned mood ...

And my review of Puccini duets (taken from classic 1950's recordings) is here . Both reviews are on MusicWeb International.

An attractive and well-filled disc which makes for good listening ... would be ideal for someone just beginning to explore Puccini's music ...

Hugues Cuenod's birthday

Tenor Hugues Cuenod is celebrating his 105th birthday. His remarkably longevity included his voice, he kept on singing well into old age. I remember seeing him as M. Taupe in Strauss's Capriccio at Glyndebourne in the old house. He has just got married, regularising his 20-year old relationship with Alfred Augustin, something possible now that Swiss law has changed.

I've stopped being a great one for competitions, partly because I dislike working on something simply because its for a competition. But if I have something around, an idea or a finished work, which seems to fit then I can often think why not.

The other issue is about the way my music looks on the page compared to how it sounds. Last year a conductor commented that my music sounded different to how you'd expect it to on the page, was more complex. I don't know if this is a general perception but it makes me mistrust sending scores off into the blue.

But that's what I'm planning at the moment. There are 2 or 3 projects which fit in with competition entries, so I think, why not?

Also I've been busy exchanging emails with the librettist of the new opera. I send her PDF's and midi-files and we discuss how things are developing. Its early days yet, but it is proving to be enormously useful having someone to bounce ideas off and to keep their eye on me. Consistency is important when mapping out different characters in a dramatic context and consistency is not always my strong point!

This morning at church it was the Feast of the Nativity of St. John the Baptist, so we sang Brahms's Missa Canonica. Quite a challenge for a church choir, even though there were 16 of us - maximum numbers. It is not my favourite piece, but I would love to hear it done properly, at least once.

Review of Into the Woods

The cast for the Royal opera's new production (in the Linbury Studio) of Stephen Sondheim's "Into the Woods" was a cunning mix of young opera singers and singing actors;a cast whose musical experience spanned the gamut of the musical stage. Directed by choreographer Will Tuckett, the results were surprisingly coherent and uniform. There was little of the feeling of disparated elements coupled unsatisfactorily.

Tuckett's direction was fluent and fluid. He shed no new light on the work, but simply and imaginatively told the story. Vastly helped by Lez Brotherston's flexible and beautiful set. The wood, as created by Tuckett and Brotherston was a thing of both terror and beauty. But of course, being a Sondheim show, the terror was laced with humour.

Clive Rowe and Anna Francolini were superb as the Baker and his wife, chasing after their dream of conceiving a child. At times Francolini reminded me of Imelda Staunton in the same role in Richard Jones's West End production of the musical. And Francolini's performance was nearly as impressive. Rowe brought a charming wide-eyed naivety to the role of the Baker. Plus, of course, his fine singing voice.

Suzanne Toase's Little Red Riding Hood was deliciously awful. Strong minded and knowing, her dialogue with Nicholas Garrett's Wolf redolent of sexual exploration and discovery. As Jack (of Beanstalk fame), Peter Caulfield did not have the strongest singing voice, but he put his songs over well and engaged our sympathy for Jack's hapless character - after all he spends most of Act 1 regarding his cow, Milky White, as his best friend. Jack's mother was played by Anne Reid, an actress not usually known for her singing roles, but she too put her songs over well.

As Cinderella, Gillian Kirkpatrick showed remarkable resource underneath the pretty exterior, as the character must. Kirkpatrick has an attractive voice which helped reveal Cinderella's depths. Christina Raphaelle Haldane's Rapunzel (in this version she is the Baker's long lost sister), gets to sing one thing only, but she did so beautifully. the 2 princes, Nicholas Garrett and Nic Greenshields looked and sounded the part. Their duet, "Agony" was one of the highlights, as it should be.

In every production of "Into the Woods" that I have seen, the witch has to struggle in my mind with the memory of Julia Mackenzie, who the part fitted like a glove. Beverly Klein very nearly succeeded. In her opening 'song' (actually a pitcheless number, spoken rhythmically) she established herself brilliantly. Though in her other Act 1 numbers she seemed not entirely at ease. But once transformed into a her glamorous self in Act 2, her musical performance strengthened and she gave a strong account of "The Last Midnight".

One interesting fact. Cinderella's step mother, Elizabeth Brice, played one of Cinderella's step-sisters in the original West End run.

The whole was well controlled by conductor James Holmes, who seemed to be able to operate well even though hidden behind the scenes.

Being directed by a choreographer, the stage pictures were fluid and fluent. Characters broke out into little moments of choreography, but there was not sense that this was a dance piece manqué. It was a fine piece of musico-dramatic theatre. Tuckett seems to be developing into a fine director with a nice eye/ear for character.

By the end of act 2, when the Giantess has killed many of the cast and the rest have fled, we are reduced to the Baker, his infant son, Cinderella, Jack and Red Riding Hood. They discover that they must work together to succeed against the Giantess and ultimately, make their own non-traditional family group. This is movingly conveyed in the haunting ballad "No-one is alone", which was beautifully sung and staged. Though Sondheim and Lapine do not preach, this 2nd Act is very strongly redolent of the gay community's early struggles against AIDS, which was happening around the time the work was being written.

But Sondheim and Lapine do not allow the work to end on a dying fall, but bring the mmostly dead cast back for a glorious finale.

This was a hugely enjoyable production. the cast was well balanced and all put words over very well, a strong requirement in Sondheim. I hope this is not the last time Tuckett investigates musical theatre.

Review of La Clemenza di Tito

On Saturday we went to see the revival of La Clemenza di Tito at ENO. Emma Bell (Vitellia) and Paul Nilon (Tito) reappeared from the original cast and were joined by Alice Coote as Sesto.

If anything Bell's Vitellia seemed to be more neurotic and on edge than last time, it was difficult at times to see how Sesto could have loved her. Initially Bell tended to rather gabble her recitative but she settled down and her final great aria was wonderful as ever. Paul Nilon seemed to be in his element as Tito, I have rarely heard him sing as well and he brought a strong streak of sympathetic humanity to the role.

But of course, we had really gone to hear Alice Coote as Sesto. Coote is a very vivid actor but by the side of Bell's Vitellia, Coote's Sesto seemed understated and dignified. Her arias were beautifully sung, but she and conductor Edward Gardner did seem rather inclined to pull them about too much so that the 2nd halves of her arias had a little too much rubato for my inclination. She was well supported by the notable Annio of Anne Marie Gibbons. With Sarah Jane Davies as an attractive Servilia and Andrew Foster Williams as a strong Publio.

On revisting the production I still feel that it is a weakness to take the chorus off stage and put them in the pit. At the end of Act one they were back-stage which meant that the balance was not ideal in the closing ensemble. But more than this, it just feels wrong not having courtiers around Tito. Instead of taking place at a Western Roman court, McVicar seems to have in mind a more oriental court, where the Emperor is just surrounded by intimates and his guards. It works, more or less, but does not feel like the opera that Mozart wrote.

The guards, with their endless routines with long poles, were not as slick in their choreography as last time, which did not help. The recent McVicar productions that I have seen (2 Handel operas) have had a corps of dancers to take your mind of things at the boring moments. I realised that in this production the tai-chi style guards form this role.

BMS News

The British Music Society's quarterly newsletter popped through my letter box the other week and has a number of rather interesting events in it. Top of the list is the performance on Rememberance Sunday, at the Albert Hall, of John Foulds's mammoth A World Requiem, a work which was performed at the Rememberance day commemorations in the 1920's, but has not been heard since 1926.

Also on a large scale, Granville Bantock's Omar Khayam has finally been recorded by Chandos. The ever growing Bantock edition on Chandos has been circling round this mammoth work for some years and finally it has been recorded, with Catherine Wyn-Rogers, Toby Spence and Roderick Williams, BBC Symphony Chorus and Orchestra under Vernon Handley. I can't wait.

Colin Scott Sutherland's review of the new Francis George Scott disc caught my eye. Partly through his use of the word kenspeckle and partly because he gives the song recital, by Lisa Milne and Roderick Williams on Signum, such a thumbs up. Another disc for the wish list I think.

Finally, an interesting foot-note to the 1st World War. In 1914 a group of English musicians set out for the Bayreuth Festival. When war was declared they were interned as enemy aliens. Among them were Benjamin Dale and Edgar Bainton, director of the conservatoire in Newcastle. Bainton organised the camp into a hive a musical activity. And back in England, his wife was just as active in keeping the conservatoire going so that on his return Bainton could resume his activities as if nothing had happened.

Recent CD Review

My review of Rossini's early opera Ciro in Babilonia is here, on MusicWeb International.
Neither vintage Rossini nor a vintage performance. But strong, bravura performances make this well worth investigating ...

Gurney Poetry again

I've finally gotten around to digging out the text of the Ivor Gurney poem that I'm setting. It is one of four in fact, but this one seems to have the most profound homo-erotic context.

TO HIS LOVE

He's gone, and all our plans
Are useless indeed.
We'll walk no more on Cotswolds
Where the sheep feed
Quietly and take no heed.
His body that was so quick
Is not as you
Knew it, on Severn River
Under the blue
Driving our small boat through.
You would not know him now…
But still he died
Nobly, so cover him over
With violets of pride
Purple from Severn side.
Cover him, cover him soon!
And with thick-set
Masses of memoried flowers-
Hide that red wet
Thing I must somehow forget.


The poem was evidently written in 1917 but it deals with the death of a comrade in a remarkably lover like way