Les Troyens, Metropolitan Opera live cinema relay, January 5, 2013

Where are the Trojans when we need them? They provided the Greeks with stories portraying a welcome incompetence, letting a wooden horse full of Greeks into their city, and having their great warrior Hector defeat someone he thought was Achilles, only to be killed by the real one.

MetOpera image/ Cory Weaver

But in this Met production the Trojans are strongly represented, and Deborah Voigt as Cassandra was spectacular, not only singing the part with great power but exhibiting a stage presence worthy of the world’s greatest actresses. The glorious costume helped show her to be the most beautiful woman in the world, desired by Apollo who gave her the gift of prophecy but took it away with the curse that no one would ever believe her.

Coroebus and Cassandra/ KenHoward

As the Trojan prince Aeneas, Bryan Hymel took over from Marcello Giordani, who was a puzzling choice for this role. Hymel sang it at Covent Garden last summer, and was once again magnificent. His Act V solo Inutiles regrets was terrific, and his chemistry with Susan Graham as Dido was excellent.

She really came into her own in Act V, so beautiful in her mauve dress earlier in that act, so convincing in her grief. In Acts III and IV she also sang gloriously but came over more as a suburban widow than a queen, though I blame director Francesca Zambello here. I’ve seen her render other vivacious heroines in an unattractive way, and what did all that choreography by Doug Varone achieve in Acts III and IV? It was naff. It was tiresome. Some people left the cinema after Act IV, and indeed the sugary atmosphere was so cloying that Aeneas must have wanted out too. But that’s not the way Virgil intended it, nor indeed Berlioz.

Aeneas and son/ KenHoward

The direction and setting in Acts III and IV was extraordinarily suburban and unregal. Dido, Aeneas and others sat around watching entertainment and looking like actors in a television sit-com, while the camera zoomed in as Dido rearranged her dress. Queens do not do this — indeed imagine Angela Merkel rearranging her dress at a semi-public entertainment, and she is a mere prime minister. Dido was the great queen who led her people from Tyre to found a new colony in North Africa, but Acts III and IV failed to exhibit this. And even in Act V when Dido committed suicide she thrust the short sword to the side of her waist and then turned away from the audience. She should turn first, particularly with camera close-ups, so we can’t see the pretence.

Directorial faults aside, Fabio Luisi in the orchestra pit gave a lyrical account of Berlioz’s score, and the singers and huge chorus were magnificent. Karen Cargill sang very strongly as Dido’s sister Anna, as did Kwangchul Youn as Dido’s Minister Narbal, showing the gravitas that befits a man who sang a wonderful Gurnemanz at Bayreuth last summer. The Met have assembled an excellent cast and among other soloists, Dwayne Croft sang with nobility as Cassandra’s fiancé Coroebus, and Paul Appleby gave a stirring performance of Hylas’s song at the start of Act V.

Dido in agony/ CoryWeaver

With David McVicar’s production at Covent Garden, La Scala, San Francisco and Vienna, and now this production at the Met, Les Troyens seems to be much in vogue, but it is long and with the tiresome choreography on display here some cuts to the dance sequences might be very welcome.

Un Ballo in Maschera, Metropolitan Opera live cinema relay, December 2012

David Alden’s vivid production of Verdi’s Ballo, portrays the main characters Riccardo and Renato in their historical roles as the Swedish king Gustav III and his murderer Anckarström. The assassination took place at a masked ball, and in an account written by a Polish officer who was present, the king received an anonymous warning “N’allez pas au bal ce soir. Il y va de votre vie” (Do not go to the ball this evening. Your life will be lost).

Fortune telling with King in disguise, all images MetOpera/ Ken Howard

Captain Anckarström, chosen by the two main conspirators, shot the king in the back at close range with a pistol loaded with rusty nails to encourage gangrene, and the king took thirteen days to die. He forgave the conspirators, but Anckarström was captured, had his gun hand lopped off and was flogged for three days, before being beheaded and quartered.

Scribe wrote a play on the incident, plus an opera libretto for Auber, titled Gustave III, ou Le bal masqué. Verdi wanted to use it for his own opera, but censors and other irritations transferred the action to Boston with a new libretto. Verdi used the invention of a love intrigue between Gustav and Anckarström’s, but in fact Gustav was homosexual, and the assassin nursed a different grievance. But many points of the story, such as the fortune-teller Ulrica Arfvidsson are quite accurate, and the king paid this society medium an incognito visit where she predicted his death by a man in a mask.

King and Amelia

Verdi’s opera brings into Act I the main characters, Gustavo, Anckarström, Amelia, Ulrica, and the additional role of the page Oscar, and Alden used some of the bouncy music for a song and dance routine, as if this were to be Ballo, the Musical. The bare stage allowed plenty of movement and was very effective for the scene in a wild place outside the city in Act II. This was after the interval, which featured a love-in between the interviewer Deborah Voigt, who looked terrific, and Marcello Alvarez, along with a welcomely assertive Dmitri Hvorostovsky, who commented on the set amplifying the voices, perhaps explaining why the others in Act I seemed a bit strained at times.

Anckarström and Amelia

After the first interval the problem was rectified, and as Act II started, Sondra Radvanovsky came through beautifully in her long soliloquy as Amelia. Marcello Alvarez sang Gustavo with a warm passion, and Dmitri Hvorostovsky played Anckarström with just the right feeling, from concern for the king’s safety to horror in finding the veiled woman he accompanies back to the city to be his own wife. With Stephenie Blythe as Ulrica in Act I, and Kathleen Kim as a lively page with a pretty voice, the singing of the cast complemented the orchestra to perfection under sensitive musical direction by Fabio Luisi.

Oscar tends the dying king

Verdi’s music for this opera is inspired, and Sondra Radvanovsky’s Morrè, ma prima in grazia (I shall die, but first, in mercy … ) was upliftingly emotional. Her husband’s response was sung with great feeling by Hvorostovsky, as was the monologue by Alvarez, Forse la soglio attinse (Perhaps she reached her home … ) in the next scene, before the stage exploded into action for a dramatic ball scene. Ballo may not one of Verdi’s most famous operas, but don’t miss this in a repeat cinema screening if it’s available.

Götterdämmerung, Metropolitan Opera live cinema relay, February 2012

Rossini is said to have commented that Wagner had some beautiful moments, but terrible quarters of an hour. Whether this is genuine, I don’t know, but Rossini never heard Götterdämmerung, which is riveting, from the Norns with their rope of fate at the start to Brünnhilde’s immolation at the end. In the right hands with the right singers Götterdämmerung is magnificent, and the Met gave us a whole string of superlatives.

The final scene, all images MetOpera/ Ken Howard

Robert Lepage’s production with its set of long planks on pivots, along with Etienne Boucher’s lighting, allows transformations that in the final scene show Brünnhilde riding her horse onto the funeral pyre and disappearing into a mass of flames washed away by the Rhein. The set allows the Rheinmaidens to swim up and slide down those planks as they tease Siegfried about the ring, and after Gunther has got blood on his hands by cradling the dying Siegfried in his arms, he washes it away and we see the river run red. Glorious effects, but I only wish the translated sub-titles were more accurate. Hagen’s final words are Zurück vom Ring! (Get back from the ring), not ‘Give me the ring!’ And if that was a choice made in the context of the production the same excuse does not apply in some other cases. My point is that we heard such fine diction and it jars when the words are mangled in translation.

Brünnhilde and Siegfried

This is a minor quibble of course because the singing and character portrayals were unbeatable. Jay Hunter Morris is the most convincing Siegfried we are ever likely to encounter. He imbues the role with a joy and vivacity I have never seen equalled. Such a sweet smile he gives the Rheinmaidens when they ask for the ring, and his retelling of past deeds during the hunt was enchanting. Lepage’s production even brought the shadows of those ravens onto the stage before Hagen struck the fatal blow. And what a Hagen we had here in Hans-Peter König. His soliloquy Hier sitz’ ich zur Wacht at the end of Act I scene 2 was hugely powerful, with the production providing added value by seating him between two pillars, in a great chair that finally disappeared through the floor. His call to the vassals in Act II was terrific, and this extraordinary singer portrayed his character as a cunningly smug operator who, despite the dark make-up, reminded me of that Scottish politician attempting to pull Scotland out of the United Kingdom.

Hagen and Siegfried

The Alberich of Eric Owens looked so shrivelled as he appears to Hagen at night, a clever transformation because Owens is a large man. And that other dialogue between Brünnhilde and her sister Waltraute was full of angst. Waltraud Meier showed fearful determination as she visited her sister, yet gradually exhibited a sense that she was out of her depth with Brünnhilde’s newly found passion. Such a tragedy that Brünnhilde is then accosted by an unknown stranger who has walked through the fire, and this was cleverly done with Siegfried’s head covered by the net of the Tarnhelm, which he helpfully removed at one point so the audience could be sure of who he was.

His blood brother Gunther was superbly sung and portrayed by Iain Paterson, who looked very much the part, far slimmer than his recent Don Giovanni at the English National Opera. With Wendy Bryn Harmer as his sister Gutrune, the pair of them were attractively eligible, exhibiting determination and weakness at the same time.

Gunther, Brünnhilde, Hagen

Finally there was Deborah Voigt as Brünnhilde, who opens things up immediately after the Norn scene, and brings it all to a close at the end. She was magnificent and one can see her as the wife of the man who will now rule the world after Wotan’s will has been broken. But like Siegfried she is cleverly deceived by Hagen, giving him the secret of how to kill her hero,and only when the scales have fallen from her eyes can she find the right course of action. Her immolation scene brings all to a close, and the lighting does the rest, as the flames recede into the distance carrying the gods away, and the Rhein purifies the world of Alberich’s transgressions and Wotan’s plans and deceits.

Wonderfully sensitive conducting by Fabio Luisi throughout, ranging from pellucid chamber opera to a full-throated roar of polyphony. I eagerly await broadcasts of the full Ring cycle in 2013.

This broadcast in 2012 is rather well-timed in terms of the Euro crisis — see my Eurodämmerung essay comparing the Ring with the Euro.

Siegfried, Metropolitan Opera, Met live cinema relay, November 2011

In the final part of the intermission feature from the second interval, as Renee Fleming went to meet Bryn Terfel in his dressing room, he said he was wondering when she would get round to him. Was he feeling left out? Perhaps so, but never mind because in the third act he was superb as the Wanderer. When Siegfried asks, who are you then, who wants to restrain me? Terfel’s lengthy response came over superbly, with a strong focus on Wotan’s psychological angst, ‘wer sie erweckt, wer sie gewänne, machtlos macht’ er mich ewig!‘ (whoever wakes her, whoever wins her, would render me powerless forever!).

Mime and Siegfried, all images Ken Howard

This production by Robert Lepage, brilliantly conducted by Fabio Luisi, brings nuances in the score and the libretto that had previously passed me by, and in Act I, Gerhard Siegel gives one of the finest portrayals of Mime that I have ever seen. After his encounter with the Wanderer, and his failure to ask the one question he really needs answering, he muses on what he has just learned: that only one who knows no fear can kill the dragon. He has already forfeit his head to the Wanderer and knows that Siegfried will lop it off unless he learns fear from the Dragon Fafner. But how can he kill the dragon if he learns fear? “Verfluchte Klemme!” (Damned dilemma!) he sings, and you feel for the poor fellow who has devoted eighteen years to bringing up the boy who will kill the dragon, but will also finish his own ill-fated existence. Gerhard Siegel acts everyone else off the stage, making me think of him as an Asperger’s victim embroiled in teenage fantasies that he can never fulfil.

Siegfried and the Sword

As for the real teenager, Siegfried, Jay Hunter Morris sang the role with huge conviction. There are not many people in the world who can do this well, but their number has just increased by one with this great new Heldentenor, and the intermission features showed he was utterly dedicated and loved what he was doing. He looked the part too, as a Christ-like figure full of spirit, rather than the rambunctious oaf he sometimes appears.

Alberich and the Wanderer

Eric Owens reprised his wonderful Alberich from Rheingold, and Patricia Bardon looked and sang a beautiful Erda, with Deborah Voigt bringing back her Brünnhilde from Walküre. After a mythical eighteen year sleep, and a real absence of over four hours while the other singers have warmed up, or even died, she has to come in with Heil dir, Sonne! Heil dir, Licht! and it’s a tough call. As she began expressing her love for Siegfried, the voice took on more confidence and she was terrific.

Brünnhilde and Siegfried

One of the odd moments in the last scene is when Siegfried loosens the breastplate of the sleeping hero, and cries, Das is kein Mann! This sometimes sounds foolishly naive but the way Jay Hunter Morris tackled it, facing the audience with this revelation, it all made sense. Making sense is a vital feature of this production, and Terfel helped bring out the subtleties of Wotan’s dilemmas. Technically I regret that the shards of the sword looked fake, unlike the eventual sword itself — an important point when you have close-ups on the cinema screen — but the Woodbird flitted around like a well-rehearsed pet animal, and we shall doubtless see more of these clever 3D-projections in other productions.

Don Giovanni, Metropolitan Opera live relay from New York, October 2011

For Don Giovanni lovers it doesn’t get much better than this.

Leporello and the Don, all photos MetOpera/ Marty Sohl

The Met’s new music director Fabio Luisi gave a sparkling account of the overture, and the performance never looked back. Mariusz Kwiecien combined noble aplomb with demi-world charm as the Don, and Luca Pisaroni was the perfect foil as his sidekick Leporello. Their early dialogue was superbly done, and Barbara Frittoli as the Don’s erstwhile lover Donna Elvira showed huge vulnerability in her portrayal. Later in Act I when Donna Anna suddenly realises Giovanni was the man who seduced her and killed her father she recalls going outside to stop him and her disingenuous, arditamente il seguo … remains curiously unquestioned by her would-be husband Don Ottavio. Marina Rebeka as Anna makes it sound as if she really is lying about her feelings, but Ramón Vargas continues to sing in loving adoration and concern, and his voice and breath control are remarkable.

Ottavio, Anna and her father

The peasant dancing at the party that Giovanni puts on for the wedding couple Zerlina and Masetto, was delightfully done, so far as one could see from the cinema screen, and Mojca Erdmann’s lyrical Zerlina was prettily flirtatious with the Don, and cleverly seductive with her husband-to-be. With Joshua Bloom as a red-blooded and anxious Masetto they made a superb couple, and her vedrai, carino … in Act II, after he has been beaten up, was beautifully delivered.

Wedding dancing at the Don's

As the Commendatore, Štefan Kocán gave a fine performance before his death in Act I, and then made a dramatic entrance at the end, with his bluish make-up helped by Paule Constable’s lighting. The flames are real and Kwiecien’s insouciant Don goes down like the captain of his ship, bowing to no-one, not even the powers of the afterworld. It’s always difficult to tell on the cinema screen, but this production by Michael Grandage looks very good indeed, and with Fabio Luisi keeping everything on track musically it was a wonderful Giovanni.

Aida, Royal Opera, Covent Garden, March 2011

Exiles and refugees in the modern world can take their gods with them, but it was not always so. This production places the action in a very distant past, and when Roberto Alagna as Radames sings in Act III that Aida is demanding he abandon his homeland, and therefore his gods too (Abbandonar la patria, l’are de’ nostri dei!), it was a riveting moment.

Radames being smeared with blood, all images Bill Cooper

In my review last year when David McVicar’s new production was first performed, I was very positive about the fact that it was set in an ancient civilization having nothing particularly Egyptian about it. I appreciated its raw energy, with the stylized masculine combat, human sacrifice, and female sexuality, and this was all very welcome. On a second viewing I found things to criticise that may or may not have been present a year ago. When Aida enters along with other slave women beholden to the princess Amneris, all except Aida hang their heads and droop their bodies in a way that would be more likely to irritate than please a princess, and if Amneris likes to see around her women who are cowed into abject submission, then why does she tolerate Aida being so vastly different? The poses of the ballet dancers as warriors seemed a bit overdone, and the lesbian choreography for the women was dull. When the Ethiopian prisoners are brought on stage, the guards’ over-aggressive poses seemed to indicate a lack of confidence on their part. But these complaints are mostly to do with the movement on stage, and are not necessarily intrinsic to the production.

Michael Volle as Amonasro

The singing and conducting are the main things, of course, and Olga Borodina as Amneris showed enormous gravitas, singing with huge lyrical power. For me she was the star of the show, though I also found Michael Volle terrific both vocally and in terms of his stage presence as Amonasro, king of the Ethiopians and father of Aida. At the dress rehearsal, Roberto Alagna gained ground as the opera progressed, eventually carrying off the role of Radames with utter conviction. Brindley Sherratt gave a powerful presence to the King of Egypt, and I rather like the fact that this production portrays him as blind, or at any rate partially sighted, led round by a slave boy. Vitalij Kowaljov sang strongly as Ramfis the high priest, and in the dress rehearsal that I attended, Micaela Carosi reprised her role of Aida from one year ago, but despite some lovely quiet passages I felt she was too exposed on the high notes, with pitch problems in the loud passages. I gather she was replaced on the first night by Ukrainian soprano, Liudmyla Monastyrska, who is due to sing Lady Macbeth in May, opposite Simon Keenlyside.

Conducting by Fabio Luisi was effective, and I loved the off-stage trumpets in the balcony. They played with such power and clarity it was a thrill to hear them.

Kowaljow as High Priest, and Borodina as Amneris

Performances, albeit with various cast changes, continue until April 15. For example, Alagna is replaced by Carlo Ventre after the first three performances, and there are extensive changes in the last three performances, with Brindley Sherratt switching from King of Egypt to Ramfis the high priest — for more details click here.