Nimble Tread

Masters of Melisma

With Christmas in the air and the smell of mince pies wafting about and tickling the nostrils, it's nice to get away from the yuletide hullabaloo and seek refuge in the Great Indoors.   And where better to do so than a decommissioned church?  St. John's, Smith Square played host last night to the Tallis Scholars, and to the audience that came to hear the famous ensemble.  The programme was a mixed bag of 16th century composers, beginning with Thomas Tallis and including Christopher Tye, Philippe de Monte, Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, and John Taverner, all of whom composed liturgical music but did so in markedly different ways.  The major feature of the concert's first half was Tye's Missa Western Wynde, which he composed some time between 1535 and 1545, and, like the Western Wind Masses by Sheppard and Taverner, is believed to be based on a secular sea shanty -- which I think is readily apparent in the second verse of the Gloria, 'Domine Fili unigenite' -- popular at the time.  The Scholars took to the piece reasonably well, and after a modest start with the Gloria were up and running with the Credo.  They sang the last three verses ('Qui propter nos homines...' 'Et resurrexit tertia die secundum...' and 'Et exspecto resurrectionem') in as fine a manner as you're likely to hear, managing to be highly emotive while maintaining distinct vocal lines throughout.  There were a couple of instances at movements' end where the polyphony fused into a single voice and the entire room seemed to resonate in sympathy with the performers.  It was terrific to experience, all the more so for the fact that the Scholars couldn't muster the effect at the end of every piece.  They came close most of the time, but really only nailed it twice, which, by the way, is no small accomplishment.  It's one thing for everyone to come in at the same moment, but quite another to do so with voices perfectly stacked. 
  The group kicked off the second half with two pieces by de Monte, O Suavitas et dulcedo and O bone Jesu, the latter of which represented the more formidable work and consequently required much more from the singers.   The piece's rhythm is very difficult, and offers many opportunities for disaster, particularly in the first and third stanzas ('O bone Jesu...' and 'O amantissime Jesu' respectively), which, if done well, gives the disorienting impression of being sung backwards.  The Scholars managed it alright, but sacrificed some articulation in 'O amantissime Jesu' and made the verse sound as though it were being sung backwards in a tankfull of water.  Fortunately the muddle was left behind for the remainder of the piece and for the next one, Palestrina's take on 'O bone Jesu,' which I'll simply describe as being short and sweet, the perfect lead-in to my favourite tune of the night, Taverner's four-line-long Quemadmodum.  The song is heavy with polyphony, and is possessed of a jarring syllabic schock, first on every other beat and then in more irregular, unexpected intervals.  The music is ripe with quick crescendos followed by dippy diminuendos, and melodic vocal lines sprouting from one another, all of which the Scholars sang with finesse,  the general effect being not unlike a low-voltage tickle buzzing around the body.  Hockets were used to great advantage, and the inherent gaps were filled with small surprises that charmed the audience into demanding an encore, which they got in the form of Praetorius' Joseph, lieber Joseph mein.   The Tallis Scholars recorded the piece a few years ago and have incorporated it into their performance repertoire, perhaps for obvious reasons.  It's a particularly tuneful song, and does a good job of pepping up the audience a bit at the end of the concert by giving them something to sing on the way home.   I had it on my mind for nearly five minutes when, three-hundred feet or so from St. John's, it was displaced by Mel Tormé's The Christmas Song, which was issuing from a passing car.  It's really a hell of a tune for a cold winter's night, and I'm afraid good ol' Praetorius never had a chance. 

Sightings

Hot on the heels of his recent success outside of Teatro alla Scala, Roberto Alagna turned up in the Covent Garden Piazza last night and treated his adoring public to a selection of arias from Puccini's seldom-heard opera, Il Pazzo.  The tenor was in high spirits and, as he sang, what looked to be the gold trimming of a Radames costume could be seen dangling below the hem of his overcoat.   'We all have moments of weakness,' he said, hands on hips, 'but some of us can make up for them with moments of bravissimo.  I'm in the bravissimo business.  It's what I do.'  With that he blew a kiss to the crowd and dashed off 'to catch a plane to New York.'  My NYC readers may expect to see him sallying forth at Lincoln Center in the next day or so. 

Other, less fabricated, events were on offer last night as well, particularly the Royal Opera's new production of Carmen, with Anna Caterina Antonacci in the title role.  This new version, directed by Francesca Zambello, is a lot racier than the old one, and even begins with a couple of women bathing topless in the town square.  There were a few people in the Upper Slips who almost fell to their deaths straining to get a better look at the action on stage, which, though pulse-quickening, wasn't actually gratuitous.  If anything, all of the skin on display reinforced the feeling one got from the set itself, which was painted a sun-burnt orange and radiated the ferocious midday Seville heat.  The scene was brought to life by Arthur Pita's choreography, which merged warring kids marching in platoons, real soldiers recovering from military exertion, and coquettish cigarette girls peddling their wares to the tune of 'La cloche a sonné.'  Everything was lively and very well-sung.  The orchestra was in good form with Antonio Pappano at the helm, and despite moments of shameful insensitivity to the singers -- particularly where the incredible Jonas Kaufmann was concerned -- the band gave one of its better performances of the period.  The absolute star of the evening was Kaufmann, who as Don José sang a beautifully coloured legato rendition of 'La fleur que tu m'avais jetée' that had half the audience in a dead swoon.  Almost as successful was Ildebrando D'Arcangelo's stab at the Toreador Song, which he sang with complete bombast and majesty, thereby justifying the presence of a live horse on the stage. 

Both male leads were finely cast, but the blue ribbon went to Anna Caterina Antonacci, who clearly has some gypsy blood coursing through her veins.  She not only looked like Carmen, but also smiled like Carmen, sang like Carmen, pouted like Carmen, and flew into a blind rage like Carmen.  It was really something to see.  And hear.  Her first act 'Tra la la' aria was completely disarming, and showed us how easy it would be in a few minutes' time for her to have Don José do her bidding and let her escape.  Antonacci also thrived in less playful moments, including the least playful of all, her final scene with Don José.  The two are completely alone, isolated from the frenzied bullfight crowd by the stadium wall, and left to work out their problems in dramatic fashion.  She's convincingly resigned to her fate and unafraid of him; he's a shell of a man and desperate to restore his life to normalcy.  It's an unequal balance, impossible to sustain.  You feel for them both, but for Don José a bit more, so when Carmen flings the ring he gave her into the dirt ('Cette bague, autrefois') -- a gesture Antonacci pulls off with vim -- the sting is acutely felt, and what comes next seems inevitable. 

It looks like the rest of the run is sold out, but tickets can always be had if one is inclined to queue for day seats.  There are certain things that merit waking up early, and I believe you'll find this is one of them.      

Update

The news continues to pour in from Milan, but I'll leave its coverage to Opera Chic, who is, after all, local.  Suffice to say more parties have become involved -- including former Royal Ballet guest dancer Roberto Bolle -- and things have gotten pretty ugly.  There's also a rumor circulating that Antonello Palombi did everything short of dropping Alagna's be-costumed replacement down a trap door in order to usurp the number 2 spot, which is why he ended up on stage looking like a hobo.  If reports are to be believed, he may not be the best tenor around, but he's certainly the fastest.  If you'd like to draw your own conclusions, take a gander at this video of the theatrics that started this whole mess.   

Off-Stage Drama

The plot thickens in Opera Land.  After storming off the La Scala stage following a wave of boos from the loggione on Sunday night, Roberto Alagna has announced that he's planning to sue the management for preventing him from resuming the role of Radames in the Teatro's current production of Aida.  La Scala, on the other hand, has apparently sent Alagna a letter declaring that the theatre will no longer be picking up the tab for the expenses the tenor incurred over the last month, and barred him from entering the building.  Alagna's now concerned that his run of La Traviata in Rome is in jeopardy, and has the additional problem of being embroiled in a feud with Franco Zeffirelli, which certainly won't help matters any.  It's really one hell of a story, and is unfortunately becoming juicier by the minute.  If you're looking for a recap, Opera Chic has got you covered, complete with a video interview with Alagna and the latest news.

Talent and Technique

We Londoners are luckier than those stiffs in New York, especially when it comes to Juan Diego Flórez, who felt ill enough to cancel his Carnegie Hall appearance last week, but managed to pull himself together in time for his Barbican recital last night.  The tenor announced after the evening's first song, 'Dies Bildnis ist bezaubernd schön' from Die Zauberflöte, that he wasn't feeling 100% and that he'd accordingly have to make a couple of changes to the programme.  This claim might have been reinforced by the cup of tea sitting on a small table next to the piano, but certainly not by his singing, which was somewhat less resonant than usual, but still possessed of the incredible colour and responsiveness we've come to know. 

Flórez was accompanied on piano by Vincenzo Scalera, who, like the tenor, was dressed in white tie for the performance and had about him a charming heel-clicking air that, combined with the light infirm scratch in Flórez's voice, made me think of a handful of Hollywood films from the 1930s.  Scalera is a pianist and coach at La Scala, and is therefore intimately acquainted with the repertoire.  His accompaniment was really very good in that he managed to switch from mere harmonic support to conversational agent with perfect ease and discriminating timing.  This was especially clear with Rossini's aria 'Intesi, ah, tutto intesi,' from Il turco in Italia: tenor and pianist operated hand-in-glove, and the result was the finest performance of the night.  When Flórez sang 'vendetta!' over and over again, each time with greater intesity and determination, I'll be damned if I didn't believe him.  It was a gutsy rendition, especially considering his condition, which, though fit enough to allow him to take the stage, still required him to cough and sniffle as vigorously as decorum would allow during the applauds that followed each song. 

Just as gutsy was his decision to more or less stick with the original bel canto programme.  The mix of Bellini, Rossini, Donizetti, and Mozart offered him only the smallest respite in the form of two songs each from the Peruvian composers Clotilde Arias and Rosa Mercedes Ayarza de Morales.  These were followed by a trio of seldom-performed solo tunes by Bellini, of which the sorrowful 'Vanne, o rosa fortunata' captured my particular fancy.  From there it was onto the last tune of the night, Donizetti's 'Linda!...Si ritiro' from his opera Linda di Chamounix, which Flórez sang with complete confidence, and capped off with a smile of satisfaction.  At this point, the audience, having been charmed to the point of hysteria, proceeded to dish out the year's most thunderous round of applauds and leapt to its feet in order to more convincingly demand an encore.  Flórez and Scalera trotted out a few moments later and announced that they hadn't rehearsed anything, but would nonetheless do a couple of numbers off the cuff.  The first was 'Una furtiva lagrima' Donizetti's famous aria from L'Elisir d'Amore, which received the same response as The Beatles appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964, and in fact might have shared some of the same responders.  Three curtain calls later, it was Verdi's 'La donna è mobile,' which scarcely needed an introduction, and only received a resigned shrug from Flórez as the famous introduction drowned out a couple of stray hoots and hollers.  After several more trips on and off the stage, Flórez and Scalera stood side by side at the piano, genially flipping through their music in hopes of finding a suitable closer.  Someone from the audience jokingly called out 'Ah mes amis!' and Flórez, not one to be intimidated by nine high Cs and a mild chest cold decided to oblige, saying that he'd "do the end."  In a Borge-esque moment, he looked at the music, pounded out four chords on the piano, cocked an eyebrow at the audience and said "that's the end!"  But it wasn't, and he graciously took centre stage to perform one of the more virtuosic pieces in the repertoire, all high spirits and in seemingly perfect health.  It's wonderful what a pair of standing ovations will do for one's recovery, just as it's amazing what an incredible performance will do for one's spirits.  Flórez doubtless left the Barbican one step closer to being rid of his cold, and the audience members made their way home dreaming of La fille du regiment and thinking they'd live forever.

And speaking of Donizetti's opera, Flórez will join Natalie Dessay and company to sing it at the Royal Opera House this January.  If your appetite needs whetting, here's a video of him singing 'Ah mes amis' in Paris sometime in 2004.          

Abbey Oratorio

Christmas is just around the corner, and accordingly the annual string of oratorio performances is being cheerfully drawn across the city.   The Barbican's offering a slew of concerts, including the Messiah on December 10th and 12th, and Bach's Christmas Oratorio on the 15th; St. John's Smith Square has plenty on the docket, including the ubiquitous Messiah, several Christmas concerts, and the Tallis Scholars on the 21st, which I'm particularly looking forward to;  there's a sacred voices concert at the Queen Elizabeth Hall on the 16th, which will include Bach’s Cantata No.118, the ethereal Mass by Stravinsky, and a pastoral cantata on the birth of Christ by Respighi; the list goes on and on. 

My season got underway last night at Westminster Abbey, where The English Concert and The Choir of Westminster Abbey performed Bach's Orchestral Suite No. 4 in D, BWV 1069, and all three parts of his Christmas Oratorio, BWV 248.  The evening was threateningly overcast, and most everyone was possessed of that strange mood wherein one feels almost lightheaded owing to the storm's delay: people walked around wholly nonplussed, clutching at their umbrellas and looking upwards into the haloed lights surrounding Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament.   At 6:30 or so, the pedestrians around St. James' were either tourists or concert-goers, and typically neither group is in much of a hurry.  Scores of couples strolled across the Westminster Bridge, or posed in front of the Tube, their backs to Big Ben, which loomed imposingly in the background and is almost certain to come out blurred when the underlit photograph is developed.   The Abbey, meanwhile, sat patiently across the street, looking a bit sombre in its mass, but eager nonetheless to host anyone who should enter its front courtyard.  A fence of thick pointed iron bars separated those within from those without, and as you walked past the slabs of inelegant buttressing, through the smaller interior gate, and finally into the Abbey via the Great West Door, it was simple work to imagine yourself in a completely different realm. 

There aren't very many concerts at the Abbey -- organ recitals notwithstanding -- so people tend to make the most of the opportunity and show up early with the intention of having a look around, free from the oppression of tour guides and their flocks.  The best, or at any rate the most impressive, vantage point is found in front of the Henry VII chapel, where a receptive spectator can stand in awe of the view looking through the crossing, down the cavernous nave, and toward the West Entrance in the distance.  Vaultings and columns shoot this way and that, and feel almost like a petrified fireworks display set off years ago in a fit of inspiration and then frozen forever in mid-arc, as if in perpetual tribute to the famous names -- Kipling, Handel, Dickens, Chaucer, Browning -- buried below.  My seat on the north side of the nave was very nearly on top of Darwin, and from it I not only had a terrific view of the orchestra, but of Isaac Newton as well, who looked contemplative and relaxed, reclined as he was beneath a cosmic globe, with one arm propped on a stack of books, enjoying the company of a pair of angels.   

In contrast to this scene of splendour, I found myself in the company of a pair of dowagers from Sussex, who passed the time before the concert discussing the intricacies of Christmas cake design and the relative merits of pecans.  A bit inane, for sure, but charming in its way as well.  They kept it up until the band took their seats and then gave the floor over to James O'Donnell, the organist and master of choristers at Westminster Abbey, also the evening's conductor.  He quickly got underway with the orchestral suite, which the English Concert handled with their typical spirit.  It became immediately apparent, however, that the group would be plagued by the Abbey's acoustic balance, which is unforgiving at best towards stringed instruments and light woodwinds: there were times when the trumpets and timpani so overpowered the quieter voices that one had to infer what was being played from whatever notes managed to slip through.  It was like trying to figure out what someone's saying in a nightclub by reading their lips and piecing together odd snippets of words.   Still, the audible parts were a pleasure, and if nothing else, the piece was carried by the sheer atmosphere in the Abbey. 

More successful was the Christmas Oratorio, which saw the English Concert joined by The Choir of Westminster Abbey.  The Choir is naturally all-male, but mixed in the sense that it consists of boys as well as men, all of whom wear red robes with white trim at the necks -- austere collars for the long-in-the-tooth and sprouts of lace for the lads, which made them look a bit like cabbages.   Completing the roster  were the soloists Robin Blaze, Andrew Staples, and Matthew Hargreaves, listed as countertenor, tenor, and bass-baritone respectively.  They took turns singing the Evangelist's recitatives from the rostrum, and then swept into their arias, a few of which were remarkably good.  Staples' rendition of the aria 'Frohe Hirten, eilt, ach eilet' was terrific, and only matched by Blaze's ethereal lullaby 'Schlafe, mein Leibster, geniesse der Ruh,' from Part II, and the Choir's work in 'Wie soll ich dich empfangen,' which they sang with near explosive enthusiasm.  Also noteworthy was Matthew Truscott's solo violin efforts in the introduction and accompaniment to Mary's aria, 'Schliess, mein Herze, dies selige Wunder,' which was sung by Blaze. 

The skies had cleared by the time the concert ended, but people lingered and slowly wandered around the Abbey until the ushers gingerly corralled them out into the courtyard.  Before leaving, people would reach out their hands and let their fingertips glide along the surface of a pillar, or wall, and enjoy the smoothness of the stone that centuries had buffed to a high polish.  I suppose that in some cases religious motives were involved, but most everyone was driven by the idea of being able to connect to the history of the place, and hoped to leave something of themselves in the building as a way of contributing to the future.   There's a reason the downbeat of a Bach dance sounds weightier in an abbey than in a concert hall; it's a comforting notion that in our astoundingly modern age there are still times when the history of shared experience trumps the technology of entertainment.

Late Praise

I'm not exactly on the Vengerov bandwagon, but I'd be remiss if I didn't note the incredible performance he gave at the Barbican with, and I stress with, pianist Lilya Zilberstein and cellist Alisa Weilerstein.  The group played two lengthy trios, Shostakovich's Piano Trio No. 2 in E minor and Tchiakovsky's Piano Trio in A minor, rigorous pieces both, and extraordinarily difficult to pull off.  Vengerov played well and, while he was still unnecessarily aggressive at times, he toned down the theatrics a bit and settled into conversation with the ladies of the stage.  Zilberstein won First Prize at the Busoni International piano Competition and has essentially played everywhere in the world.  She's a remarkable pianist, and played so well with Weilerstein -- herself an alarmingly talented cellist -- that I caught myself hoping to hear them play duets in the very near future.  One very seldom encounters sustained sizzle on stage, but it was certainly there for this performance: every note seemed to crackle or swell, and it felt like the music was ricocheting off every surface, audience members included.  The trio is now dormant, but be on the lookout for future activity.  In the meantime, Weilerstein's schedule and playing can be found here.

Fleming

You know you've reached the pinnacle of celebrity when you find it necessary to include thanks in the programme to John Galliano for creating your recital dress.  Such are the perks enjoyed by Renée Fleming, opera superstar and self-styled diva for the two-thousand-noughts, who sashayed onto the Barbican stage the other night wearing said dress and looking glamorously windswept as she presented a charming programme in conjunction with Andreas Delfs and the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra. 

The evening began with Mozart's overture to Die Zauberflöte and gradually wound its way through Ochs, Mendelssoh, Cilea, Puccini, Verdi, Korngold, Dvořák, Smetana, and Delius before arriving at Strauss' 'Ich komme- ich komme - grünende Brüder' from his opera Daphne, which, it should be said right off the bat, Fleming sang beautifully, and with uncharacterstic restraint.  When she visited last year, she performed with piano accompaniment and I noted that her performance was wonderfully tempered and in good taste: not a note drawn out to eternity or an inappropriate emotional voice break.   While I didn't mention this, I secretly wondered whether or not the absence of an orchestra, and in particular the strings section, might have contributed to her pared down vocal stylings.  The suspicion lingered with me for nearly a year, but was put to rest with this most recent performance, where despite the strings' moderate drippiness in playing Cilea's 'Poveri fiori' from Adriana Lecouvreur, Fleming stayed on the wagon and sang it more or less straight, which is sometimes all you need to do with a beautiful tune.   She even managed to keep herself in check while singing 'Vissi d'arte,' which is more than I can say for the audience, who, from the very first notes of Puccini's famous aria, began frothing at the mouth with delight and applauding as though they were in a 1920s dance hall.  Now in these parts you just don't see that every day.  Fleming's doubtless performed this tune a thousand times, and somehow managed to use that experience to convey to us a sense of the opera and Tosca's plight, which is really a remarkable feat. 

Equally remarkable, though in an admittedly different way, was her cadenza at the end of the second verse of Verdi's 'Tacea la notte placida...Di tale amor' from Il Trovatore. 'To my heart, to my enraptured eyes, Earth seemed a heaven,' she sang, and reinforced the notion with a dazzling array of rosy notes that soared effortlessly as though propelled along by Champagne bubbles.   

Delfs and the RPCO played admirably in the role of backup group, but really came into their own between arias, when they performed a handful of overtures, one Nocturne (Mendelssohn's A Midsummer Night's Dream), and one Slavonic Dance, Dvořák's E minor, Op. 72 No. 2.  Everything was skillfully played, particularly the overture from La forza del destino and Mendelssohn's Nocturne, but I got the biggest kick out of the Overture from Captain Blood, which Korngold composed for Warner Brothers to accompany the swashbuckling film's opening credits and footage of Errol Flynn performing great and varied feats of derring-do.  The music was composed in 1935, long before the days when Korngold began churning out scores that, as some put it, were 'more corn than gold,' and Captain Blood basically established the composer's firm position in the Hollywood catbird seat. 

Fleming has a soft spot for Korngold, and performs his music frequently, particularly in encores, where she'll trot out the heart-rending Mariettalied from Die Tote Stadt.  On this evening though she went with 'Ich ging zu ihm', from Das Wunder der Haliane, which I'd never heard but immediately liked, impressed by the way it allowed the soprano's voice to sweep over the orchestra wholly supported but seemingly free of earthly ties.  It's a morbid song of amorous lament, and in that sense is very much in keeping with what Fleming did sing as an encore, Puccini's 'O mio babbino caro', a song so famous, and so beloved that I was genuinely concerned for the welfare of a handful of audience members when the orchestra struck up the tune's first notes.  We live in an ironic world, and I can only imagine the possibilities for last will and testament-related mischief at the hands of the family members of someone who's died listening to an aria from Gianni Schicchi.  In fact I did imagine it, for quite some time, on my way home after the concert.  But fortunately it was, on this particular evening, a moot point, as everyone not only survived the performance but left in high spirits, feeling happy to have been there, and looking forward to June when Fleming will be at Covent Garden singing Massenet's Thaïs.

   

The Snoozy Floozie

I don't know why I keep subjecting myself to the Royal Ballet's annual run of Petipa's The Sleeping Beauty.  The same thing happens every year: I get all excited about seeing Kobborg and Cojocaru and forget that the ballet has all the passion of a soggy Halloween pumpkin.  So I sit there like a dolt, anxiously expecting something fine to happen, and instead get a pageant in pointe shoes.  Don't get me wrong, the performance is well staged and, for the most part at any rate, well danced; it's the choreography that bugs me.  Far be it for me to criticize Petipa, who certainly turned out some doozies in his time, but this just isn't one of his best efforts.  While I'll happily admit there are some wonderful moments -- or rather one wonderful act, namely Act III, the one in the woods where Prince Florimund and Princess Aurora meet in some sort of parallel dimension and hit it off in high fashion -- much of the ballet feels like a showpiece, and often feels out of sync with the music, which is one of Tchaikovsky's best scores for ballet. 
What we do get, however, is a handful of carefully planned dances that are deceptively difficult to pull off.  Johan Kobborg is still out with an injury, so Federico Bonelli assumed the role of Prince Florimund and did a terrific job with the Act III solos, which are demanding to say the least and seldom see him less than three feet above the ground.  He was less convincing in his work with Cojocaru, who is much smaller than he is, and so dynamic that she make all but the finest partner look as though he's made of wood.  They've been doing a lot of dancing together, and it should be said that Bonelli is definitely improving, but he still has some way to go. 
Isabel McMeekan was downright magnetic as the Act II Countess, and demonstrated a come hither confidence that she'd do well to exploit in future outings.  Also noteworthy were Sarah Lamb and Yohei Sasaki, who danced terrifically, both together and apart, in the Act III talent show, and almost trumped Laura Morero for technical precision.   
There were a lot of children in the audience, which told me that Christmas is on the way, and in the ballet world that means one thing -- The Nutcracker cometh.  Now there's one production I'm definitely going to skip this year.  I've learned my lesson.  Besides, my favourite part has always been the music and I can enjoy that at home.  Yes, I believe I'll leave the spectating to the kiddies and the playing to Simon Trpčeski, whose Piano Works disc contains much from the Nutcracker Suite and is positively dripping with atmosphere.  Who needs a sixty-foot high Christmas tree anyways?