A Così without Fangs

September 28, 2013 - Così fan tutte at the Met

Levine’s Back! 

Lui: Excitement was in the air at what seemed like a full house at the Met as James Levine was back in the pit directing a revival of a production of Mozart's Così fan tutte that debuted in 1996. Mr. Levine's Così kept a lively tempo, the way it should be, pushing the singers briskly through their recitatives without compromising a word of Da Ponte's delicious language. 

Photo Credit: Marty Sohl/Met

Lei: It was indeed exciting to finally see James Levine back on the conductor’s podium after an absence of two years due to a spinal cord injury. I was craning my neck from our family circle seats hoping to get a glimpse of him coming in but could not see anything. Somehow he magically appeared on the podium (I later read that it happened thanks to a special lift built expressly for him) because all of a sudden I could see the top of his head and his little arms reaching out and then the overture exploded into the opera house, as fierily joyful as only Wolfie can be. 

At the end of Act I, Levine turned swiftly to greet the cheering public and it was then clear to all that he had been conducting from what looked like a high tech wheelchair that included a bar across his chest to keep him stable. The cheering roared even louder to salute and honor his bravery in getting back to conducting (and doing it so beautifully), despite not being able to stand on his feet. This time, too, I was moved to the edge of tears, though not by a singer performing some aria but rather by the extraordinarily inspiring Maestro Levine. 

Photo Credit: Marty Sohl/Met

An Overly Classic Production

Lui: This third and last of the Mozart/Da Ponte collaborations holds a special place in my heart, not least of all because it is the first opera that Zerlinetta and I first bonded over. Needless to say, I have almost every word of Da Ponte's libretto indelibly written in my mind. So I'm always eager to dig my teeth into any production I can get my hands on.  

Photo Credit: Marty Sohl/Met

Lei: Being so close to an opera to basically know its libretto by heart has its pros and cons. While, on the one hand, I have fun singing favorite arias in the shower at the top of my lungs (La mia Dorabella capace non è / fedel quanto bella il cielo la fe’ – La mia Fiordiligi tradirmi non sa / uguale in lei credo costanza e beltà – È amore un ladroncello / un serpentello è amor etc.), on the other, I tend to take it personally when I feel that this wonderful Mozart/Da Ponte material is not realized thoroughly. I saw this production a few years ago and seeing it again now reminded me of just how plain and straightforward it is. In 2013, the Met should and could produce a more dynamic Così. From the sets to certain directorial choices, this rendition misses a myriad opportunities present in this great though often under-rated opera.

Lui: This year's revival of the Lesley Koenig 1996 production, with sets and costumes designed by Michael Yeargan, does present a slavish, classic take on the material. Although it may be flat in execution, it nevertheless features, like many classically-styled Met productions, several effective stage elements like the ship that comes and goes from one scene to the next. Utilizing much of the far reaches of the stage, it seems to lie out on the bay through a scrim of coastal fog out in the distance. While it may not present the sun-drenched Naples that some productions give us, it does have its suggestive moments.  

There were many clever staging conceits and directorial decisions in some of the nuances of the action. For instance, in the aria In uomini, in soldati, when Despina lectures Dorabella and Fiordiligi on the finer points of courtship, she takes their lockets from them. After she bestows such kernels of wisdom as: "Uno val l'altro, perchè nessun val nulla," she intentionally gives them the wrong lockets back so they have to exchange them again – foreshadowing the big mix up. The world of these naive young lovers starts to veer toward the topsy turvy. Men for Despina are just as interchangeable as women are for Don Alfonso. Despite the feminine gender bias of the opera's title, the battle of the sexes is waged on two sides.

Photo Credit: Marty Sohl/Met

Other directorial decisions also struck me in this production. Moving in unison as though connected at hip throughout most of the ensemble-heavy first act, Dorabella and Fiordiligi embodied in their acting style the baroque-psychedelic core of this drama of kaleidoscopic symmetries. Sung like siamese-twins, their duets were fabulous. They sang off each other, intertwining their voices into each other, beautifully depicting the fact that these two young woman still derive most of their individual strength from their sisterly collective. In fact, most people have a hard time distinguishing the two female characters and keeping them straight. This production seems to have deliberately added to the confusion. In the first act they not only have the same hair color but they are even wearing virtually the same dress, rendering them almost entirely interchangeable. After slowly emerging over the course of the first act, their individual identities do finally blossom in Act II, at which time, of course, their sturdy facade of certainty also begins to crumble. As cliff sides battered by the waves gradually succumb to the sea, so our chaste maidens give into temptation.  

Photo Credit: Marty Sohl/Met

The Singing Swingers Party

Lui: Susanna Phillips' Fiordiligi carried the show for me. I really got into her character arc in the second act. She has some of the great female arias in this piece, and she led me to see Fiordiligi's wavering through fresh eyes. Matthew Polenzani was also very strong and carried the drama alongside with Phillips. Though his Aura amorosa was too throaty, and neither warm nor round enough for my tastes, he, nevertheless, struck a forceful presence.

Lei: Though not warm or sweet enough, Matthew Polenzani was a fine Ferrando, with a clear powerful voice and good articulation. I liked him better than in last year’s Elisir but remain not fully convinced by his ability to melt me from the inside – the test of a true tenor for me. Baritone Rodion Pogossov as Guglielmo was generally a good actor but not a bold enough singer, plus his recitatives were often off Italian-wise. In the role of Don Alfonso, Maurizio Muraro’s singing and acting were not powerful or incisive enough and generally felt too slow. I will say, however, that all singers sounded almost muffled through Act I but seemed to have warmed up with renewed energy in Act II. The ladies dominated the singing: soprano Susanna Phillips was wonderful as Fiordiligi, mezzo Isabel Leonard was a fiery Dorabella, and the always excellent coloratura soprano Danielle de Niese offered the most charismatic acting as a vezzosetta Despinetta.  

Photo Credit: Marty Sohl/Met

Where Are the Fangs?

Lei: Don Alfonso is the key character of the opera, being the mastermind behind the affront to feminine fidelity that initiates the flurry of tricks, treachery and the trading of partners between the two couples. In this rendition he comes off as a jovial old fellow merely amusing himself by setting up the young lovers for deceit. Otherwise, he does not seem particularly endowed with much in terms of his background and motivation. There are many ways he could be played, with nuances ranging from bitter to cynical to ironic to love-master, and this production simply misses the opportunity to give Don Alfonso (and Così) some depth.

Lui: The problem with playing Don Alfonso so straight leads to a number of issues. Taming him into a benign old man may seem to make for a more harmless finale: a simple "lesson in love." Yet if no one ends up hurt at the end and you take Don Alfonso's fangs away with the original couples being restored no questions asked with little or no sweat off anyone's back, then you end up with a story that resolves on a note that love does not exist. Don Alfonso's lesson in love suddenly becomes a lesson the art of the swinger party. This week you hooked up with each other's girl, next time we can see if they have any cousins, get another couple of couples involved in this thing, and we'll all trade partners again!

Photo Credit: Carol Rosegg/NYC Opera

Back in Spring 2012, Christopher Alden's Così for the New York City Opera proposed a creepy, park-dwelling Mephistopheles-style mentor for the naive young men at the center of the story. He was a shadowy figure who wore a Count Dracula cape and borrowed moves from a silent-film era Nosferatu. This shadowy street urchin version of Don Alfonso may have seemed a startling interpretation of Da Ponte's character but it provided food for thought. If you take away all of Don Alfonso's cynicism and strip the old man of his apparent malice, the force that his elaborate burla can potentially have on the young men and women alike is lost. In the finale of Alden's more malicious take on the story, all four of our young lovers are left shipwrecked against the rocks of betrayal in a sea of heartache and pain. Counter-intuitively, this not the cynical take at all. On the contrary, the palpable residue of hurt that remains at the end of Alden's production is the very proof that love exists. As it turns out, Alden's production is perhaps the most optimistic way to stage Così of all.

Even better yet, in my mind, is the rare production that stages, just before the curtain goes down, a last-minute switch from the original pairs back to the new coupling that transpired over the course of the opera. In this case, Don Alfonso's lesson will have doubled over as a formative journey of self-discovery by means of which all four of the young lovers will have learned not only a thing or two about themselves and each other, but they also will have experienced the pleasure of seduction. They come out of the wringer of Don Alfonso's dirty trick having found their voices as budding sexual beings and enjoyed the challenge of having had to work to attain the object of their desire. When they switch back, their former partner lacks that original luster of first love and they find that in the meantime they actually have fallen – in a more profound and now slightly more grown up way – for the person whose affections they were forced to win thanks to Don Alfonso's dirty dealing. This simple unscripted move at the end of the opera casts a whole new light on the story as it is typically told.

Photo Credit: Marty Sohl/Met

This year's Met production is solid and pleasurable as Mozart always is, particularly with Levine conducting, but lacks some of the fireworks that could ignite this otherwise deceptively light material.

Lei: Now that Levine's back (and NYC Opera is going bankrupt) it seems like the right time for the Met to rise to the occasion and start producing operas that dare to get deeper and fresher than this Così. 

Playbill of the first Così performance, Vienna (1790)

The Met 2013 Opening Gala – A Not Too Shabby Russian Drama

Over the last few years, I’ve come to look forward to the Met gala opening as the exciting moment when a new season is kicked off and opera is available again on a daily basis after the summer break (if one wanted and could indulge so). I expect the gala to deliver a grandiose operatic experience, either showcasing non-mainstream works or casting a new light on all time favorites. I found last year’s Elisir disappointingly bland, while I liked the epic dusting off of Anna Bolena in 2012 and the controversial Tosca opening production in 2011. This year, I had relatively low expectations of being blown away by Eugene Onegin since I tend to get less emotionally involved when operas are sung in a language I don’t understand. Also, I had my own (admittedly misinformed) prejudices on Russian not being musical enough for my operatic taste.

The gala production of Eugene Onegin proved me wrong. I discovered it to be a wonderful powerful drama and was surprised by how beautifully musical the singing sounded. I was expecting it to be harsh but it was actually sweet and very romantic. It was distracting to have to constantly peek at the subtitles to really appreciate the libretto and the story (“niet” being pretty much the only word I got) however the reading did not detract too much from the experience.

A cast of sensational strong and inspired singers helped mitigate my Russian prejudices and it was definitely one of the main reasons I got swept away by this Onegin. When Anna Neterebko sings in her native Russian she is even more impressive (and expressive) than when she does in Italian.  Her acting as Tatyana was convincing and superb, with an evolution from shy dreamy girl, to fiery woman in love, to mature icy spouse (though she clearly enjoyed more the moments when she could unleash her diva-self).

I found Mariusz Kwiecien initially too stiff as Onegin, while it may be part of the character I somehow felt that he was not harsh enough. It may be because I discovered him as a playful Don Giovanni and a hilarious Belcore, and I just could not really see him as an arrogant Russian aristocrat moping around in disdain. However, when Onegin breaks down and comes together as a character in Act III, Kwiecien delivered big time with devastating and desperate passionate dramatic flair. His last defeated scream that concluded the opera was quintessential drama.

Piotr Beczala was the real revelation of the night for me, particularly given the scarcity of tenors able to make me melt these days. When I heard him last year as the Duke in Rigoletto I was underwhelmed and found him not powerful or warm enough. Maybe the gala opening was his night or maybe he performs better in Russian, no matter the reason he was sensational - open, warm, sweet and powerful at the same time, just the way I like a tenor. His Lensky’s declaration of love to Olga in Act I was joyful, powerful and uplifting, made me sigh dreamily to young innocent pure love. In the Act II duel he was heartbreaking, I actually gripped my armrests when he was shot and grieved his early operatic death that deprived me of the pleasure of hearing him in Act III. Will definitely look forward to more Bezcala this season.

On the direction, I did not find that the last minute change from Deborah Warner to Fiona Shaw was such a disaster, I thought that the dramatic core of the opera was conveyed powerfully: the stream of consciousness in Tatyana’s letter scene, her confrontation with Onegin, his hug of Lensky before the duel and the last Tatyana-Onegin Act III encounter where she kisses him passionately before walking away in the snow and never looking back.  

The sets, however, did not always work for me. The rustic realism of the country scenes and costumes

in Act I was a bit underwhelming, though it did contrast effectively with the glitter of Act III, consistently with one of the narrative strengths of the opera. I got more excited with the staging starting from the duel scene with its looming fog and barren trees, when the mirrored floors and walls really started to shine, functioning at times as iced surfaces in the Russian winter or as ritzy ballrooms of St. Petersburg’s high society. All in all maybe not the most impressive sets, however with such amazing levels of singing and acting the décor was really secondary.

I was impressed by this production as a wonderful theatrical and musical experience, with some high peaks of punching drama. Since it was my first Onegin, I cannot really say how safe or adventurous the direction’s choices were but I will be on the lookout for other Onegins in the future.

A gala worthy performance? Definitely, at least for me: singing and acting were top class, drama kept me glued to my seat and moved me deeply, made me discover and appreciate Russian opera and my eyes teared up a few times. Unfortunately I could not hum and sing my favorite arias on my walk back home and go check the libretto to appreciate the nuances of the language but I will certainly do so after Levine’s Cosi’ Fan Tutte tonight. (Lei)

All photo credits: Met

(Quick note on the anti-Putin riots at the gala: the only shouting I want to hear inside an opera house is that coming from the stage, however I will say that the whole affair remained fairly short and civilized between the national anthem and the overture, with no disruption of the opera itself - were it not the case I would have unleashed some raging fury on the protesters, I can barely tolerate coughers during a performance, let alone rioting.  Also, the protesting gentlemen wore tuxedos, which always helps.) 

Loose Morals and Girly Boys

L’Incoronazione di Poppea

Claudio Monteverdi
Dell’Arte Opera Ensemble 
August 24, 2013 – East 13th Street Theater

Photo Credit: Dell'Arte Opera Ensemble

Why is Italian baroque opera so rarely performed in NYC? We need more Monteverdi (and Vivaldi too while we’re at it). It’s just inexplicable that such perfect, highly entertaining gems remain so neglected. Thank goodness we have enterprising independent opera companies like the Dell'Arte Opera Ensemble, whose performance of Monteverdi's L'incoronazione di Poppea delivered a welcome dose of baroque. Orchestration was provided by the Sebastians, an excellent seven-piece chamber ensemble replete with period instruments that worked great in the cozy theater space, however such a wonderfully fiery score would only benefit from a bigger group of instruments. We just can never get enough baroque!

Girls who sing boys who sing girly boys

Photo Credit: Dell'Arte Opera Ensemble

Lei: The singers were all extremely young, which made their mastery of vocal technique, Italian articulation and expressiveness all the more impressive. Their enthusiasm and dedication in bringing to life such a rarely performed piece was touching in itself, but I was particularly impressed by Greer Davis (soprano), a graceful and fiery Poppea; Alison Cheeseman (mezzo) a very convincing Nero; Hans Tashjian (bass), a deep and expressive Seneca; and Jeffrey Mandelbaum (counter-tenor) as an Ottone of many nuances. The latter is no novice to the baroque scene since he played Ferdinand in the Met's Enchanted Island production.

Photo Credit: Brian Long

Lui: As is characteristic of so much baroque opera, all of the principal roles occupy the higher registers. Hans Tashjian's Seneca is the one main exception. The lower register of his role helped to ground the piece for me. I felt a sigh of relief every time he was on stage. I actually found myself singing along with the chorus in the beginning of the second act when Seneca is coerced to commit suicide, thus depriving us of his soothing low-register melodies for the remainder of the opera. I found myself chanting along with the chorus: Non morire, Seneca, no! Once he is gone we're left with the shrill feminine voices of the core of the cast. While I enjoy the higher registers of the baroque aesthetic, the lower male registers end up becoming a soothing refuge that allows me to breathe.

Irrational tearjerker

Photo Credit: Brian Long

Lei: Although I generally appreciate baroque operas for their exhilarating, energizing and fiery effects, I have to confess that the final duet “Pur ti miro” between Nero and Poppea moved me to a few tears. It was completely irrational: if we look at it from the narrative side, we are talking about the arrogant Roman emperor Nero who is beaming after having just sent into exile his “infrigidita ed infeconda” (frigid and barren) wife Ottavia, so that he can marry his hot young lover Poppea – not the most moving of situations. In perfectly baroque fashion, Nero is a castrato role, in this production thankfully performed by a female mezzo-soprano (if you really need to have adult male characters with frilly voices, I’d rather have women play them, sounds less odd), so the “Pur ti miro” aria was a lovey-dovey back and forth between a soprano and a mezzo, again, on paper not the most romantic setting by my standards – men gotta act, look and sound like men. Still, this aria was so overwhelmingly pure and movingly loving that I could not hold back the tears.

Lui: For such a hauntingly beautiful finale, the underlying moral is, in fact, rather unsettling. I felt you tear up at my side, which led me to realize just how emotionally involved I was in that last scene too. As an aria that I have come to appreciate after having studied it in a masterpieces of Western music course in college, my enjoyment of “Pur ti miro” this time was heightened by the fact that it registered with me, that I recognized it intellectually. However, experiencing it in the moral depravation of its full narrative context I was strangely divided. The sheer beauty of the music virtually sugar coats the rather shocking immorality of the story. 

On the entertainment of loose morals

Photo Credit: Dell'Arte Opera Ensemble

Lei: I was impressed by how unconventional the plot was, particularly for the period (and also for the next couple of operatic centuries). There is no edifying moral, quite the opposite: the overarching concept is that love (or, better, lust) is an overwhelming force, more powerful than virtue and fortune. The opera celebrates one of the worst tyrants in Roman history lusting over his slutty lover (Poppea spends most of the time getting undressed and asking Nero to nickname her breasts) and taking all sorts of unfair actions (such as sending to death his trusted counselor Seneca) to be able to crown her as Roman empress by his side. Throughout the opera, with a climax in the finale, this couple is celebrated as the maximum expression of romantic love. So we can look at this opera as either extremely cynical or revolutionarily romantic – in any event, it’s highly entertaining and musically exciting. 

Lui: It is striking that virtually all of Poppea's scenes take place in the bedroom. We can't forget, however, that the whole opera is framed as a story told by Amore intended to demonstrate his superiority over the forces of Virtù and Fortuna. So, in some way I think that Love is meant to be seen as pulling the strings. Great entertainment, indeed, that keep me hooked all along. 

Circa 1570, by unknown of Fointanbleu School

2012-2013 SEASON RECAP

- HIGHLIGHTS -

Photo Credit: Lucie Jansch

Einstein came to Brooklyn.  A year ago Satyagraha cast a meditative spell on me at the Met, this year I remained entranced by the utterly unique experience of watching that bar of light in Robert Wilson’s Einstein on the Beach almost imperceptibly rise to the beat of Glass' signature droning score. If you’ve seen it, you know which bar of light I’m talking about. Brilliant the places it takes you. It was unlike anything I've ever experienced, in completely unexpected ways. Thank you BAM. (Lui)

Photo Credit: Met

Giulio Cesare went to Bollywood (and other places too).  The most delightful and entertaining show of the season.  Not only we got baroque opera, which is in itself too rare a pleasure at the Met, but David McVicar spiced up this Giulio Cesare with Bollywood dances that went beautifully with Handel’s score and he played with times and styles mixing up roman armor, British colonial helmets, flapper fringes and baroque wigs. This pastiche fully worked, making the opera timeless and revamping its core. Also, it was a real pleasure to see Natalie Dessay at the top of her form as a multi-faceted whirlwind of a Cleopatra. Encore, s’il vous plait! (Lei)

Photo Credit: Met

Rigoletto went to Vegas.  If Lucic is singing it, Rigoletto could be staged in a safari in Tanzania and still work. Nobody made me cry more copiously than him this season. His duets with Damrau were the quintessential heartbreaking expression of father-daughter love and in Cortigiani vil razza dannata he was deep, raging and moving at the same time. On top of the extraordinary singing, the bold Vegas setting was refreshing and actually worked in unexpected ways. The Met should take these risks (and get Lucic) more often. (Lei)

Photo Credit: Carol Rosegg

Mosè in the digital desert.  With their production of Rossini’s Mosè in Egitto, NYC Opera is responsible for the most visionary staging of the year that made so very much out of what deceptively seemed like so little. The animated computer generated projections and use of rotating platforms on the stage floor were responsible for many surprising effects that I found dynamic and extremely captivating. Director Michael Counts and his production team are pointing the way to something new. His is a vision rife with possibility for future productions in this mold. (Lui) 

Photo Credit: Richard Termine

Eliogabalo brought sexy back.  It didn’t get much hotter than Gotham Chamber Opera’s titillating production of Cavalli’s Eliogabalo at the Box. The whole thing exuded sex. Gyrating virtually nude female torsos greeted the audience as they arrived. The emperor worked the catwalk that was set up through the center of the nightclub like a glam rocker. But the steamy sensuality of the whole thing was just icing on the delicious cake of Cavalli’s baroque score. Particularly memorable amongst the singers were Christopher Ainslie’s Ziggy Stardust of an Eliogabalo and Emily Grace Righter’s Alessandro. (Lui)

Image Credit: Opera Mission

Rodrigo (finally) made it to a NYC Hotel.  Rodrigo was Handel's first opera written for performance in Italy in 1707 but premiered in the U.S. only in May 2013. Opera Mission brought this baroque jewel to American life in the intimate lobby of the Gershwin hotel, with a committed cast of singers and a wonderful period orchestra. Second’s act thumping bass “Siete assai superbe, o stelle” by the tormented king Rodrigo was a great surprise of pure baroque fiery power. I hope there are many other hidden eighteen-century operas out there and more companies like Opera Mission to dig them out for us. (Lei)

- LOWLIGHTS - 

Photo Credit: Met

Elisir lost its magic powers.  Gala openings should make a statement, either showcasing rarely performed pieces or revisiting old favorites in a new light. Elisir is my favorite Donizetti and I am still quite upset with the Met for having missed an opportunity to make it extraordinary at the underwhelming September 2012 season opening, that did not bring anything remotely new to the table and was certainly not gala material. Netrebko and Kwiecien were as usual quite good but not enough to save the production. Here’s to the Met redeeming itself with Eugene Onegin this next September 23rd. (Lei)

Image Credit: New York City Opera

Too much Powder [on] Her Face.  The NYC Opera had its hits and its misses this season. Their production of Adès’ Powder Her Face at BAM missed the mark. Jay Schreib and his team simply had too many ideas, too much going on, too many distractions packed into their staging rather than just let the varied and idiosyncratic music breathe. (Lui)

Photo Credit: Carol Rosegg 

La Perichole & Jim Carrey.  Turning an opera buffa into a stupid screwball comedy will always be a turn off for me. No matter how good everything else may be, I just cannot forgive NYC Opera having its singers act like they’re in the dumbest of Jim Carrey’s movies. (Lei)