Turandot in HD

Conductor...............Yannick Nézet-Séguin
Production..............Franco Zeffirelli

Turandot................Christine Goerke
Calàf...................Yusif Eyvazov
Liù.....................Eleonora Buratto
Timur...................James Morris

Today the season for the Metropolitan opera in HD began with a performance of Puccini's Turandot.   I think it was also Yannick Nézet-Séguin's first HD as the Musical Director of the Met.

The plot to this opera must be considered iffy.  It isn't exactly a MeToo opera (I'm thinking of making a list) because the abusive power figure is a woman.  She uses her position as heir to the Emperor of China to destroy as many men as possible for something that happened to one of her ancestors.  One isn't sure what the right response would be.  Becoming Emperor of China might be a greater temptation than the princess.  Calaf is an idiot, but he can hardly be blamed for the unfortunate results of his desire for Turandot.  The ending must be considered happy.

It was nice to spot James Morris under his very heavy makeup. This is going to sound strange, but I thought that the lead role sounded rather light in Ms Goerke's voice.  To me she seemed to be struggling with the role.  I thought the hit performance of the evening was the Calaf of Yusif Eyvazov.  He carried himself with dignity and confidence.  I have started to like him.

Yannick brought us a beautiful opera.  I hope to see more of him, but the only HD he is scheduled for is Wozzeck.  Sigh. They did curtain bows after all three acts.  I haven't seen that in a long time.

Porgy and Bess on Broadway

Bess - Audra McDonald
Porgy - Norm Lewis
Sportin Life - David Alan Grier

I am watching a “non-television” film of Gershwin's Porgy and Bess from the 2012 Broadway production.  Until I saw this, I did not realize that there are actually 2 so very different versions of this work.  Until now I have only been aware of the opera version where all the text is sung and accompanied by a standard opera orchestra, the original version from 1935.

The Broadway version is substantially shorter and includes spoken dialog written for this production.  The sound of the recording isn't good enough to understand most of this.  As an opera fan and musician, I very much miss the sound I am used to.  I'm getting more of a swing band sound here with a lot of brass, or perhaps it should be described as a pit band.  If there are violins, I'm not hearing them.  The singing is pretty good, but the backup kind of leaves them hanging.  I haven't kept in touch with the Broadway sound in the 21st century. Audra is classically trained, but I don't believe the others are.  This is just my opinion.

The aim here isn't opera but is instead to produce a realistic, life-like view of southern black culture.  It is felt that presentations by large opera companies don't achieve this.  There is a lot of realistic acting, occasionally approaching actual abuse.  I've seen Audra in a full length work before, live for Mahagonny, and she is astounding here.  She quit the run early because of illness.  I can see now that she spends a lot of time shouting, not a good idea for a singer.  I remember well going to sports events as a teenager and its effect on the voice.

Though Porgy and Bess has always been controversial, my own perspective doesn't really have anything to add to this argument.  Many count the entire story to be racist. Edwin DuBose Heyward who wrote both the libretto and the novel it is based on was southern white and of the planter class.  Read Audra McDonald's take on racism in Porgy and Bess here.

This is mind altering, not at all the Porgy and Bess of memory, but still one knows that it does not exist without Gershwin.  This particular version doesn't exist without Audra McDonald.  The general impression is one of intense raw power.  It's rather frightening.

I think it is regrettable that there is no commercial film of this.  I feel glad I saw it at all, but a commercial film would result in clearer sound, making the dialog easier to understand and the music more beautiful.  It did not woo me away from my operatic version.  I could almost count this as a new opera.

Favorite Verdi Performances 👍🏻

In honor of Verdi's birthday I have selected a list of my favorite performances throughout the life of the blog.

• We must begin with Anna Netrebko in the Willy Decker production of La Traviata in 2006 from Salzburg.  She is the only one I have truly loved in this production.  An abstract production requires active and exciting performers in the lead roles, which we certainly had here with Anna and Rolando Villazon.

• I got very excited over Macbeth in 2008 from the Met with Maria Guleghina.  This was a new production, and I think perhaps I still prefer Maria in this role.

• That same year was a great excitement when I saw Aida at the Arena di Verona.  Amonasro was Ambrogio Maestri, but everyone else I did not know.  No matter.  The thrill of the Arena di Verona lies in the space itself.  Such massive scale for Aida cannot help but be thrilling.

• Other Aidas have been excellent.  In 2017 Netrebko's version from Salzburg was in an unusual production which moved us to a modern middle eastern country.  That same year featured Netrebko and Anita Rachvelishvili in the standard Met production.  They were gorgeous together, but the performance was marred by some very bad singing from Aleksandrs Antonenko.  Casting Verdi is difficult.

• The Met brought us a regie production of Un Ballo in Maschera in 2012 which starred Dmitri Hvorostovsky, Sondra Radvanovsky, Marcelo Álvarez, Stephanie Blythe and Kathleen Kim. This would be a very hard cast to top.  The singing was spectacular.

• The Verdi bicentennial in 2013 brought many wonderful performances, but my favorites starred the fabulous duo of Jonas Kaufmann and Anja Harteros.  From Salzburg we saw Don Carlo performed with "intensity and excitement."

• The other Verdi with Jonas Kaufmann and Anja Harteros came from Munich.  This was the best production I have seen of La Forza del Destino with all the confusing action very carefully laid out.  Our stars have great stage rapport.

• The final great performance of 2013 was the magnificent Falstaff from the Metropolitan starring Ambrigio Maestri.  Sir John is staying in a hotel with beautiful rooms.  Ambrogio is the person you want for the role of Falstaff, and the supporting cast were all excellent.

• I seem to have failed to include an Il Trovatore.  My favorite seems to be Anna Netrebko and Dmitri Hvorostovsky at the Met in 2015.  This is some of Anna's best singing and also one of Dmitri's last performances.

• My last great Verdi performance for this particular list must be Otello from the Bayerische Staatsoper in 2018 with our duo of Jonas Kaufmann and Anja Harteros.  Gerald Finley, a great singing actor, rounded out the trio.  This is the most serious Otello I have seen.

Most of these selections are either available from Met on Demand or can be purchased as DVDs (not Arena di Verona or BSO Otello).  Enjoy.
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I masnadieri

Conductor Michele Mariotti
Staging David McVicar

Massimiliano, Count Moor..Michele Pertusi, bass
Carlo, his elder son......Fabio Sartori, tenor
Francesco, his younger son..Massimo Cavalletti, baritone
Amalia, his niece........Lisette Oropesa, soprano
Moser, priest...... Alessandro Spina, bass
Arminio, servant..Francesco Pittari, tenor
Rolla...Matteo Desole, baritone

This year Verdi's I masnadieri (The Bandits) was presented at La Scala.  We have taken notice because the female role is sung by Lisette Oropesa.

This traditional production completely violates my rules of portraying a plot.  The director's primary job is to explain the plot.  So who the hell is this guy in the military uniform that wanders around the stage in all these scenes?  Carlo before he became a bandit?  Francesco before he became a shit? Who?  Carlo is the fat guy.  So perhaps the director didn't like him and gave all his stuff to someone else.  Sigh.  I hate that.  He carries around a notebook where he occasionally writes, so the speculation is that he might be Schiller, the original writer of the story.

Lisette is spectacularly good in this, moving gently away from her soubrette Fach into full lyric repertoire.  I like her sound, her technique, her phrasing, anything else I can't think of.  She is developing into a truly wonderful singer.  This role was written for Jenny Lind who appears to have been a lyric soprano.  There is a lot of bombastic early Verdi singing throughout this opera, but the soprano is sweet and lyrical throughout.  It is an excellent role for Lisette.

The bandits seem to be having a lot of fun except for Carlo.  They leap and dance around. Francesco repents but the priest refuses to forgive him.  The silent writer comes to life and kills Francesco.  Then Amalia comes out and says that whether Carlo is an angel or a devil, she will always be his wife.  So then he kills her.  This plot is basically BS.

The male singers are all on the same page with the big Verdi sound.  The most applause was for Pertusi, Sartori and Oropesa, all well deserved.  I never have to see this opera again.  Just listening and ignoring the action is always an option.

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Jessye Norman has died.

Ms Norman was a very great artist with a gorgeous voice and great style. It is very heartwarming that Ms Norman is receiving so much attention throughout the music world at this time.  This is from the New York Times:

Jessye Norman, Regal American Soprano, Is Dead at 74


A multiple Grammy Award winner, she was a towering figure on the operatic, concert and recital stages.



 

Jessye Norman performing in 1991 at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. CreditCreditFrans Schellekens/Redferns, via Getty Images

By The New York Times
• Sept. 30, 2019Updated 6:17 p.m. ET
• • 
    
• 
  
Jessye Norman, the majestic American soprano who brought a sumptuous, shimmering voice to a broad range of roles at the Metropolitan Opera and houses around the world and had a notable career as a recitalist and soloist with orchestras, died on Monday in New York. She was 74.
The cause was septic shock and multiorgan failure following complications of a spinal cord injury she suffered in 2015, according to a statement released The Associated Press.
A full obituary will follow shortly.

These are great examples, but my favorite has been withdrawn.

Greta's Mama

Remember the teenage girl Greta Thunberg that spoke at the United Nations this week? This is her mama.

Opera on DVD Revised

These DVDs fill in some enormous gaps in Metropolitan Opera on demand video listings.  There are, of course, many more than what I'm showing.  I generally prefer to recommend currently or recently active performers.  For my recommendations from the Met on demand see here.

It is impossible to complete this list.  I include my favorites Jonas Kaufmann, Philippe Jaroussky, Cecilia Bartoli, Anna Netrebko, etc.

Baroque

The Met is woefully lacking in this area. I like:
 

L’Incoronazione di Poppea	Monteverdi	2008 with Danielle de Niese
Dido and Aeneas	Purcell	Dido and Aeneas with Sarah Connolly
Giulio Cesare	Handel	Cecilia at Salzburg-Grammy nomination
Orlando Furioso	Vivaldi	Marie-Nicole Lemieux
Artaserse	Vinci	Artaserse with 5 Countertenors
Partenope	Handel	YouTube from San Francisco
Semele	Handel	Zurich Cecilia
Theodora	Handel	Theodora from Glyndebourne

I will need to do additional research to find the best version of Monteverdi's L'Orfeo, a very significant opera.  But the Danielle de Niese L’Incoronazione di Poppea is a fine Monteverdi example.

Two star Cecilia Bartoli, one from Zurich, Semele, and one from Salzburg, Giulio Cesare.  Operas chosen for the modern productions are Partenope and Theodora.  A modern production can improve a Baroque opera.
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Classic

Orphée et Eurydice	Gluck	Vesseliina Kasarova
Don Giovanni	Mozart	Bartoli Zurich
Le Nozze di Figaro	Mozart	Netrebko Salzburg

The Met on demand has covered this genre, but I will keep searching for examples to add here.    The Gluck shown above is a wonderful performance of the Berlioz arrangement made for Pauline Viardot.

Roméo et Juliette

Conductor: Yves Abel
Director: Jean-Louis Grinda *

Romeo: Pene Pati
Juliet: Nadine Sierra
Mercutio: Lucas Meachem
Friar Lawrence: James Creswell
Count Capulet Timothy Mix
Tybalt Daniel Montenegro
Duke of Verona Philip Skinner
Stephano Stephanie Lauricella *
Gertrude Eve Gigliotti *
Gregorio SeokJong Baek
Benvolio Christopher Oglesby
Paris Hadleigh Adams


Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette was presented last night at the San Francisco Opera.  This was very pleasing due to our stars Nadine Sierra and Pene Pati. Theirs was a very sweet and gentle romance.

The sets were abstract but functional.  There was no balcony.  I always remember visiting Juliet's balcony in Verona.  It's very plain and in an ordinary street.

Nadine sings around the operatic world and is by now well known.  Pene Pati is a newcomer with a beautiful, sweet voice that suits this role perfectly.

Another name worth mentioning is Lucas Meachem as Mercutio.

After Britten we were pleased to hear melodies and beautiful choruses.  There's a lot more chorus in French opera than there is in Italian opera.  We were treated to some actual sword fights, though the stabbing was with a dagger. 

News

I've tried to stay out of the scandal surrounding Placido Domingo, but I have been glad recently to hear that AGMA, the American Guild of Musical Artists, the union that covers singers in opera and symphony in America, has taken this on.  They will conduct their own investigation.  I believe there is a strong role for unions in this type of situation.  They can make it a rule with management that they cannot punish an employee for reporting harassment.  For me this is the central issue.  No one should be afraid to tell the truth.