Australian Opera Review

Peter Grimes, 2009-10-15, SOH

2009-10-15T12:58:00.000-07:00

A better Grimes would be hard to find
Reviewed by Peter McCallum

AT THE heart of Britten's Peter Grimes lies a metaphor for the human condition that in part explains its status as one of the enduring modernist operas.

Huddled on a ragged coast, a borough bickers about small pleasures while fed and lashed by a hostile sea. The individual who stands aloof is spiritually ostracised by the community, and defeated by the sea to which he eventually surrenders.

There seemed no reason for Opera Australia to replace its previous production of this work when so many other operas cry out for performances, but Neil Armfield's new production is a triumph for its dramatic focus and superb performances from Stuart Skelton and Susan Gritton.

Singing Grimes, Skelton achieves immaculate control and precision without losing the roughness of character. His voice flashes with power yet achieves a mystical serenity in the sustained high notes of the great aria The Great Bear and the Pleiades with which Grimes interrupts the venal pleasures of the locals in the storm-swept pub.

Skelton shambles, smiles, loses control, flashes with anger and becomes possessed by the vision that destroys him in a performance that could scarcely be bettered. Gritton as Ellen Orford matches this with singing of rich yet deeply human power that achieves transfixing strength while never losing its warmth. Peter Coleman-Wright completes the central trio as a flinty powerful Balstrode whose attempts to mediate eventually admit defeat.

Ralph Myers's set is an authentic re-creation of a community hall that evoked the claustrophobia of small-community pettiness admirably, while the side doors opened evocatively to town and sea. This made the opening chorus seem disbursed, but its sound later, at the front of the stage and in lynching mood, was terrifying.

The conductor, Mark Wigglesworth, matched the care of Armfield's dramatic timing with precision, though in moments like the first Sea Interlude the orchestral sound from the pit lacked intimacy.

Andrew Moran had venal energy as Ned Keene, and Catherine Carby as Auntie, the publican, and her nieces, Lorina Gore and Taryn Fiebig, brought radiant sounds to the trio of Act II.

David Corcoran (the hypocritical Methodist), Richard Anderson (the pompous lawyer), Elizabeth Campbell (the widow addicted to laudanum and crime), Kanen Breen (the rector) and Jud Arthur (the carter), filled out a strong cast of small-minded citizens. Nicholas Bakopoulos-Cooke was as ill-fed a waif as ever graced a Dickensian stage, while Peter Carroll as the poet George Crabbe, drinking, laughing and dancing, watched them fall.

Cosi fan tutte - SOH - 9.22.2009

2009-09-22T09:26:00.000-07:00

Fresh delights in old lovers' game

Murray Black | September 22, 2009

Article from: The Australian

FOR all its comic brilliance, Mozart's Cosi fan tutte leaves a nasty aftertaste. The game Don Alfonso plays with the four lovers is amusing yet cruel. And the message that all women are fickle and inconstant is blatantly misogynistic.

But Cosi is also about the getting of wisdom. At the opera's end, Ferrando, Guglielmo, Fiordiligi and Dorabella have learned to appreciate the ambiguities and complexities of life and love.

Sung in English, this new production directed by Jim Sharman focuses on the opera's brighter, wiser side. Sharman's stated aim was to capture its glittering surface and emotional depths. By and large, he has succeeded. Much of this success is thanks to one of the strongest, freshest casts for Opera Australia in recent memory.

There was not a weak moment, frayed line or tremulous quiver within earshot. Nor did the singers' energetic performances lapse into caricature. Sexual and comic intrigue was made vivid without becoming crass.

Pure and agile across her tessitura, soprano Rachelle Durkin was genuinely moving as she grappled with Fiordiligi's emotional confusion.

Sian Pendry's richly coloured, warm-toned singing suited Dorabella's more calculating and seductive nature.

As their beaus, tenor Henry Choo (Ferrando) and baritone Shane Lowrencev (Guglielmo) made a convincing transition from boastful complacency to bitter disillusionment. Choo's secure, attractive top-register singing and Lowrencev's dark-hued, resounding timbre were impressive.

Singing with firm, unadorned clarity, Jose Carbo depicted the world-weary Don Alfonso as essentially good-natured, retaining ironic detachment without cynicism. As Despina, Tiffany Speight displayed astute tonal variety to match her winningly perky characterisation. In the pit, conductor Simon Hewett and the orchestra's fleet tempos, buoyant rhythms, sensitive phrasing and clearly defined textures generated vivacity and warmth.

Taking the opera out of its 18th-century context, Sharman and his production team have created an abstract setting that looks contemporary yet timeless.

White dominates the sets, props and lighting, and Gabriela Tylesova's colourful costumes make a bold impact.

Although the production's freshness and lightness of touch were highly appealing, not everything worked. The video projections, seemingly de rigueur these days, were irritating and the Japanese wedding set-piece didn't make sense. Sharman has said there are several ideas about it. They flew high and wide over this reviewer's head.

Cosi fan tutte - SOH - 9.17.2009

2009-09-17T07:13:00.000-07:00

Cosi Fan Tutte

Bride dolls … Tiffany Speight (Despina) with Sian Pendry (Dorabella) and Rachelle Durkin (Fiordiligi) who embody different ideals of the desirable. (Photo: Branco Gaica)

Reviewed by Peter McCallum
September 21, 2009

Opera Australia, September 17, 2009

HAD librettist Lorenzo da Ponte written a more coherent ending, Cosi fan tutte might have become a witty satire on the double moral standards that applied to men and women, with a gender-neutral title - ''Everyone is like that'' rather than ''All women are like that''.

But as it is, it is only Despina, the pert servant given to sharp asides with a shrewd nose for hypocrisy who articulates the opinion that since men are rarely faithful, it is foolish for women to be. We are thus left with the unsatisfactory dominant message that women are temperamentally unsuited for constancy and men should get used to it. Thus, the challenge for the modern director is something like the challenge of saying something outrageous at a party and getting away with it. Jim Sharman's new production does this superbly.

Ralph Myers's set is all whites, creams and gauze as though we are watching a performance by bride and groom dolls on the contorted icing of a monstrous cake at a tourist wedding. This brings out the exuberance of Gabriela Tylesova's costumes and magnifies the effect of the colour co-ordinated confetti which the characters throw at each other symbolically.

Against this the four lovers strut and dance like mating birds. Rachelle Durkin (Fiordiligi) and Sian Pendry (Dorabella) embody different ideals of the desirable: Durkin sings with poised, well-sculpted clarity and her voice flashes with admirable precision in rapid passages. Pendry's sound is more complex with hidden colours and her approach to phrasing is rounded rather than linear. In ensembles the first impression was of mismatched voice types but the balance and discipline were sufficiently polished that it became a highly effective alliance of sounds that preserved differences.

Tiffany Speight was delightful as Despina, with a coquettishly colourful voice and a withering eyebrow. Jose Carbo brought a benign, mature vocal and stage presence to Don Alfonso.

As Guglielmo, Shane Lowrencev was particularly effective when faking it, bringing edge and vitality to persona and voice. Henry Choo (Ferrando) was responsible for the evening's most lyric moments and his ability to shape and colour slow arias so as to create a touching musical moment stood out in a production that had the pace and action of a stage play. In this respect, conductor Simon Hewett had good instinct for quick and insistent speeds. Singing the work in Jeremy Sams's deliberately klutzy English translation assisted Sharman's dramatic purpose.

Opera Australia's Mozart productions have been mixed in recent years, and this one deserves to endure.

I Capuleti - SOH - 13/8/09

2009-08-13T18:23:00.000-07:00

I Capuleti E I Montecchi

Reviewed by Peter McCallum
August 13, 2009

ACCORDING to Groves Dictionary, Franz Liszt found Bellini's I Capuleti e i Montecchi ''intolerably old-fashioned". Those who booed at the end of Act 1 of Orpha Phelan's modernised production probably wished it were more so.

Yet Phelan captures more of the original context than they may have realised. Though he was a moderniser in his way, Bellini fell foul of the shift towards realism in theatre and a more symphonic conception in music. Phelan juxtaposes the gentle expressiveness of Bellini's lines with grim, dehumanised realism of modern sectarian violence: a young boy (Alexander Keighley) is taught to shoot an enemy woman before he is held hostage, a knife at his throat.

The assertive disconnection between music and drama thus embodies the love-and-hate dichotomy at the heart of the Romeo and Juliet story.

We have grown to expect that the hate will be portrayed by little more than costumed sword-play, and Phelan's confronting approach was bound to ruffle feathers. For me, the incongruity of setting added an effective edge in places while in others, such as the nightmare sequence in which Giulietta is thrown around like rag doll, the gesture, though ingenious, missed its mark.

The great musical glories were the duets between Emma Matthews (Giulietta) and Catherine Carby (in the "breeches" role of Romeo). Carby combined wonderfully flexible vocal expressiveness with a haughty stage swagger so that her pluck, statuesque carriage and fragility amid the realism of guns and knives created a genuine frisson. Matthews sang with superbly languorous bell canto colour and shape, matching Carby's sound and the lyrical tenor of Henry Choo (who took over the part of Tebaldo at short notice) with equal comeliness. Choo's smooth sound and instinct for melodic shape is natural for this style, and his stage movement was impressive for a last-minute substitution.

Conductor Richard Bonynge had brought the woodwind and horns to the front and elevated the orchestra to bring the sound out of the pit, so that it had brightness and presence, and the players were able to concentrate on focused ensemble discipline and vigour. Stephen Bennett was strong and incisive as Capellio.

Leslie Travers's menacing design was basically a parquet floor progressively torn up by strife. Liszt, in any event, would have loved the singing.

Photos: Branco Gaica

Fidelio, SOH, 10 Aug 2009

2009-08-10T09:59:00.000-07:00

OPERA: Beethoven’s Fidelio
BY: Opera Australia
WHERE: Opera House
WHEN: Until August 29

With its openness, warm, clear lighting and Napoleonic garb, Michael Hampe’s production of Fidelio (first staged by Opera Australia in 1992) celebrates fundamental tenets of the Age of Enlightenment: righteous determination rewarded and triumph over political persecution.

Leonore’s unwavering determination to rescue her imprisoned husband, and the spirit of heroism found in Beethoven’s only opera, has been likened to his dogged will to continue composing even after his hearing had deteriorated, making this morality tale all the more inspiring.

Elizabeth Stannard must be praised for her determination, opening Opera Australia’s 2009 revival as Leonore and continuing in performances as first Lisa Gasteen and then Nicole Youl were forced to withdraw (the latter temporarily) due to injury and illness respectively.

Stannard may not have quite the depth of tone one hopes to hear in the title role, nor was her stagecraft entirely fluid, but her rich mezzo was admirable for its warmth and passion throughout.

Her intensity crystallised during the great second-act duet that sees Leonore finally reunited with her beloved Florestan.

Julian Gavin offered the evening’s finest singing and dramatic performance at the beginning of Act Two, though his full, robust tenor certainly doesn’t give the impression of an inmate chained to a dungeon wall, weakened by starvation and lack of sunlight.

Peter Coleman-Wright as Don Pizarro embodied cruelty, corruption and conspiracy, singing with a full-bodied, dark tone well suited to the cloaked villain.

In Marzelline, ill-fated enough to fall in love with Leonore disguised as a man, soprano Lorina Gore embraces her ideal role, both vocally (light and supple) and dramatically. Her playful scenes rejecting the advances of Jaquino are a delight, among the most enjoyable in this production.

Warwick Fyfe’s Don Fernando concludes the opera with great pomp and composure.

Particularly memorable in John Gunter’s beautifully-balanced design is the moving scene in which the chorus of male prisoners is permitted to step into the sunlight after months and years wasting away in cold, dark cells. Here, musically, the strings are luminous and the voices express wonderment and yearning in perfect harmony.

Though the chorus provided superb support throughout, the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra was often sloppy under conductor Jonathan Darlington, with a lack of refinement in strings and a well controlled but lacklustre brass sound.

The cast’s strength was in duet and in key solo moments of reflection, but together in trios, quartets and ensemble sections the balance was almost always poorly judged.

Poppea - SOH - Aug 8th, 2009

2009-08-08T10:32:00.000-07:00

Sydney Opera House Adventures presents
the Vienna Schauspielhaus production of
Poppea
Director Barrie Kosky
Sung in German with English surtitles
Venue: Drama Theatre, Sydney Opera House
Dates: 6 - 16 August 2009
Duration: 2 hours including one 20 minute interval
Written by Rebecca Whitton

Saturday, 08 August 2009

Auteur theatre director Barrie Kosky has taken The Coronation of Poppea, an early Baroque opera by Monteverdi about the decadence of Nero’s Rome, merged it with songs by Cole Porter from the equally decadent Jazz Age, to create a unique, contemporary music theatre piece that is rich with visceral spectacle, tragedy and humour.

Monteverdi’s plot teems with lust, jealously, ambition, sex, violence and death – perfect material for Kosky who is at his best when dealing with extravagant and grandiose themes. The ambitious harlot, Poppea wants to usurp Ottavia’s role as Nero’s queen to become it herself. Nero (Kyrre Kvam) is happy to oblige. His philosopher, Seneca, advises against it and famously meets his death as a result, and Otavia (Beatrice Frey) is exiled, consigned to sailing the seas for the rest of her life.

Kosky’s mix of explicit sex and violence affects the subconscious as much, or more than the intellect. The power of Poppea is not so much emotional, but visceral. Kosky’s debauched savagery has a cathartic effect.

The music of Cole Porter, interspersed between Monteverdi, works remarkably well. Kosky says that, to him, Monteverdi and Porter share a similar melancholy. He uses the Porter songs to fill a number of roles and cleverly places them so that they comment on the action. Sometimes they alleviate the tension with the good-humoured razzle dazzle of a grotesque cabaret routine and at others they pepper the scenes with irony.

This production shows the virtuosity of Kosky’s unique style – particularly his mastery and knowledge of music. It also shows his consummate skill as a director who has a finely honed ability to keep the audience working. Kosky crafts the tone and pace of each scene so that they are like a series of challenges and treats. There are moments of awe at his spectacular imagery (often highlighted by clever spot lighting and shadow effects, designed by Michael Zerz). There is great relief when moments of beauty arrive, very often following carnality and savagery.

Instead of opera singers, Kosky has assembled actor singers for his cast. All of them are fine voiced, strong performers, particularly the beautiful silky tenor of Martin Niedermair, playing Ottone. Melita Jurisic, prowling the stage in a diaphanous, beaded flapper gown, and singing in a low, captivating growl, is perfectly lascivious, yet strangely distant as Poppea.

Barbara Spitz infuses jaded glamour in the ever present and troublesome God of Love, Amor, playing her like a well-fed brothel madam. Beatrice Frey’s natural comic gifts sometimes overshadowed the tragedy of Ottavia’s lot, but given the style of this production shifts between tragedy and farce, it hardly mattered. Ruth Brauer-Kvam’s Drusilla (the only redeeming character of the evening) gave a dynamic performance, and the most striking of the production.

Whether it is a scene of love, death or threat, Nero remains the sociopath for which he is historically famous. His sado masochistic lovemaking with Poppea is chilling and Seneca’s (Florian Carove) enforced suicide in the bathtub is excruciating, carnal, bloody and hideously compelling.

Poppea is challenging and theatrically fascinating. It is not deeply affecting like Kosky’s 2008 STC production of Euripides’ Women of Troy (there are images, songs and speeches from that production that are indelibly etched on my memory). But it is an entirely different genre and it is perhaps unfair to compare them. This, after all, is closer to German cabaret than it is a play. Poppea is unsettling, outrageous, playful and satiric as much as it is tragic or epic.

Should you see it? Yes, if you are up for it and are prepared to give yourself over to Kosky’s genius. But if your taste runs more to a well made play or a respectable opera, stay well away.
Pictured above - Melita Jurisic

La Sonnambula, Pacific Opera, July 31, 2009

2009-07-31T17:46:00.000-07:00

Terrific Pacific

04 Aug 09

by Rod Bennett

Eva Kong

Glen St Theatre proved itself more than worthy to carry opera as an artform when the first performance for Pacific Opera was staged on Friday night, July 31.

La Sonnambula (The Sleepwalker) was warmly received by the packed house when it graced the stage for its opening night.

At last, a professional operatic company on the northern beaches presenting an entire season, and looking to make Glen St its new artistic home.

The balance between singers and orchestra was excellent and the vision was clear and intimate, putting the audience right in the action of this provincial Italian hotel in 1963.

The production itself was great with strong performances from tenor Roy Best in the lead as Elvino, soprano Eva Kong as the female lead Amina, and baritone Adrian Tamburini as Count Rodolpho.

The story in a nutshell is that on the eve of nuptuals between Elvino and Amina plans are thrown into chaos when Amina sleepwalks into the Count’s hotel bedroom, lays on his bed, and is discovered by the entire town.

Simple set designs were elegant and effective.

Being able to see the faces of the performers, their expression and personality, added to clarity of this production (subtitles helped here too).

Glen St director Rob Robertson said he always loved ``the buzz’’ which filled the Glen St foyer of particular post-performance opening nights, and that this was one of those occasions.

Fidelio - Sydney Opera House - 30 July 2009

2009-07-30T08:59:00.000-07:00

An unexpected triumph by Sarah Noble
Beethoven: Fidelio Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 30 July 2009
Most of the hype for Opera Australia's Winter Season has focused on the obvious headliners: Graeme Murphy's splashy new Aida, for instance, and a long run of The Mikado starring homegrown heartthrob Anthony Warlow. Amidst all that buzz one might be forgiven for overlooking or underestimating the company's revival of Beethoven's Fidelio, especially after the withdrawal of star soprano Lisa Gasteen, who was to sing the title role. Yet this Fidelio proves that you don't need a new staging, ubiquitous banner ads or even a superstar diva in the lead to create a hit show. Gasteen or no Gasteen, the show has more than its share of star power. Julian Gavin is a stupendous Florestan, solemn and clarion-voiced. He tackles Beethoven's fiendish vocal writing with sure-footed power, offering a persuasive portrayal of the downtrodden yet defiant political prisoner. Even better is Peter Coleman-Wright, as a sensationally evil Don Pizarro, his dark baritone laced with venom and murderous intent. His "Ha, welch ein Augenblick!" is especially terrifying: the stuff of particularly compelling nightmares. On opening night Coleman-Wright charmingly carried his villainous act right into his curtain call, answering the crowd's affectionate boos with a suitably melodramatic swirl of his cape. The greatest triumph of opening night belonged, however, to our Fidelio. Nicole Youl, Gasteen's replacement in the role, having succumbed to a malady of her own, we heard instead rising Australian-Canadian dramatic soprano Elizabeth Stannard. Not only was Stannard making a début in a massively difficult role, she was doing so at extraordinarily short notice, a prior commitment having meant she was unable to join the cast until just the previous day. If she felt herself thrown in at the deep end, it didn't show. Stannard's attentive, if slightly (and understandably) awkward stage presence was impressive given her lack of rehearsal, and she sang with confident, expressive artistry, her facility with the role's challenging runs and wide tessitura easily compensating for a slight lack of heft. It was a significant success by any standards: Stannard's performance would have done her credit even had she been cast in the show from start.
Stellar singing in this production is not limited to this powerful trio. Lorina Gore is a superlative Marzelline, her sparkling soprano slicing deftly through the densest of Beethoven's orchestration without losing its sweetness. Marzelline could easily come across as silly or saccharine, but Gore imbues her instead with real pluck and a trace of dignity, and her radiant presence stands out in the first act's sublime quartet. Stephen Smith is equally impressive as the smitten porter, Jaquino, matching light, graceful singing to an irresistible stage presence. As a 2009 Young Artist, Smith has succeeded in a number of smallish roles this season, but his excellent Jaquino is easily the best of them. Conal Coad brings his characteristic mix of wit, warmth and sonorous, stylish singing to Rocco, the flawed but goodhearted jailer, while Warwick Fyfe is striking in his brief appearance as Don Fernando, the Minister of State, singing with solid authority and looking eerily like Napoleon. There's a typically strong showing from the chorus as well, particularly its men, who sing with soft, transcendent voice in the opera's justly famous Prisoners' Chorus. Cathy Dadd directs this revival of Michael Hampe's seventeen year old production with all the vitality of a brand new vision. Hampe's staging and John Gunter's lavish, visually bold sets and costumes are all resolutely traditional, and Dadd's strong instincts ensure that this quality is never synonymous with stuffiness or boredom. Special mention is due also to Nigel Levings's lighting design: his imagination and sensitivity are vital in an opera so concerned with light and darkness. Conductor Jonathan Darlington's inspired leadership draws out some of the most refined, coherent and simply beautiful playing the AOBO has offered this season, giving appropriate weight to the complexity of Beethoven's orchestral writing without disregarding the singers. Dadd and Darlington are indeed partners in crime, or rather in triumph. As a pair of unifying forces, they draw together all the individually excellent strands of this Fidelio to form a brilliant whole which, however unexpectedly, is one of the company's finest achievements this season.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Ariadne auf Naxos - Victorian Opera, 24, July 2009

2009-07-24T18:18:00.000-07:00

Victorian Opera presents
Ariadne auf Naxos
by Richard Strauss
Venue: the Arts Centre, Playhouse
Written by Olympia Bowman-Derrick

Friday, 24 July 2009

With Strauss’ Ariadne auf Naxos the Victorian Opera Company continues to expose Victorians to the vast range and scope of the extant operatic repertoire.

Ariadne auf Naxos is an opera within an opera, the first act a very wordy prologue to the performance of the opera in the second act.

Two performance troupes, a band of commedia dell’arte and an opera company, are preparing to entertain dinner guests for Major Domo’s party when it is announced, against the composer’s wishes, that the two performances must take place simultaneously to allow time for the fireworks.

The plot has all the drama and commotion you could ever wish for in an opera, but without strong direction from James McCaughey, the wordy prologue was very confusing and hard to follow. The stage seemed cluttered, with everything happening all at once. There needed to be a greater contrast between the reality of the backstage preparations and commotion, and the on-stage dramatic performance in the second act. As the Composer, Jacqueline Dark was the highlight of the prologue, her rich resonant voice cutting through the confusion and commanding attention.

The second act was much more engaging, the overture highlighting the skill of Orchestra Victoria under Richard Gill. The beautiful liquid harmonies of the trio of nymphs (Melanie Adams, Roxane Hislop, Jessica Aszodi) set the tone for much of the second half, the performers much more comfortable and at home within the opera in the opera.

As Ariadne, Elizabeth Stannard’s performance was simple and understated, providing a much-needed respite from the over dramatic caricatures of the prologue. Stannard caressed her phrases and her character with a beautiful lyrical legato. However, as Zerbinetta, Theresa Borg lacked the sass and saucy spirit needed for the commedia coquette. In Zerbinetta’s famous show-stopping aria, Grossmächtige Prinzessin, Borg lacked the technical precision needed for the fiendishly difficult coloratura.

Victorian Opera’s Ariadne auf Naxos is a bold and exciting production which, despite its failings, is a success for its pushing of the boundaries of Victorian operatic performance.

Aida - Sydney Opera House - 23 July 2009

2009-07-23T09:01:00.000-07:00

Aida | Opera Australia
Written by Adrienne Gross

Thursday, 23 July 2009

Above - Michael Lewis (Amonasro) & Tamara Wilson (Aida) kneel before David Parkin (The King).
Photos - Branco Gaica

Opera Australia’s production of Aida is like a beautiful porcelain doll: fun to dress up in pretty dresses, but without the ability to talk. The sumptuous costumes, dynamic set design and effective lighting bring zazzle to technically perfect performers, but the acting and character believability was lacking. Overall Giuseppe Verdi’s Aida is one of those operas to see in one’s lifetime, and with this production, you’ll go home impressed with the cleverness - but you probably won’t shed a tear at the end.

Set in the time of the pharaohs, Aida has four acts over three hours and is one of the grandest Italian-language operas to fill stages worldwide since its premiere in 1871. As with any melodrama, there are love triangles, family feuds, warring nations and a tragic heroine woven into plot twists and turns. The first act opens with warrior wannabe Ramadès being granted his wish to lead the Egyptian army against Ethiopia. Meanwhile, the Egyptian princess Amneris pines for Ramadès, and suspects a rival female attention - later confirmed to be her slave, the captive Ethiopian princess, Aida. After winning the battle, the pharaoh promises Ramadès anything he wants. The story continues with betrayal, dilemmas and the tragic finale.

Overall, Aida is a bit like the most un-politically correct dinner party you can have: where sex, politics and religion are spread out on the table as an audience feast. Indeed, the direction by Graeme Murphy gave the effect that we were the gods, watching the humans create a mess of their lives.

And what a mess - imagine you had to choose between the love of your country and your lover. No wonder Verdi littered the songs with such extreme words as ‘let death be their just destination’ and ‘helpless children slain.’ That level of emotion means expectations are high for some tormented stage presence so powerful that the visceral pain of the character should be spilled into voice and physicality. This is the basis of empathy, a bridge between audience and actor, without which one may as well be watching the midday movie with some Tim Tams. Thus, I was a little disappointed at the disconnection been the performers and their roles. There is no doubting the technical skill of the voices - pure and controlled - but the interaction between characters was like individuals who happened to be on stage with someone else. There are many reasons why this lacking in emotional dialogue exists: mis-casting, minimalist direction, even the plot itself.

However, each performer still gave competent individuality to their roles. Amneris, as played by Milijana Nikolic was the standout, embracing the pharaoh’s daughter role with panache; exuding richness, haughtiness and class. Aida (Tamara Wilson) came across as a lost little girl, quivering with indecision at her fate. Dongwon Shin’s Ramadès held himself grandly and hit the long notes without fault. The supporting characters of High Priest (Jud Arthur) and King of Egypt (David Parkin) performed to their roles with sternness, with Michael Lewis popping with verve as the impassioned patriotic King of Ethiopia Amonasro, who wanted to win at any price. Perhaps that embodiment of emotion is what the other characters needed, in the way they walked, stood and gestured.

Between all the main characters were the dancers and the chorus of men and women. The dancers made for delightful jumpstarts, popping around the stage with grace and clever choreography. The chorus was in tune and provided a background humming of either doom or elation as plot required. Some of the stage action though seemed bit unpolished, as movements weren’t quite so in-time and symmetrical as was most likely intended.

If this production of Aida were a film, surely the Oscar would go to creative associate Janet Vernon and the set designer Roger Kirk, the latter also designing the magnificent costumes. Their combined talents transformed the small stage into a spectacular arrangement of simple and effective scene transitions and dynamic movement. The lighting design by Damien Cooper and projection design by The Brothers Gruchy were also outstanding in creating mood and shifting scenes from desert to lush valleys. I won’t spoil the surprises, but I looked forward to each new scene to see what masterful idea they brought into what is already renowned for being a grand-scale opera.

The grandness was also conducted by Sir Richard Armstrong via the tight and technical performance of the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra, particularly the brass section. The music of Aida isn’t as widespread in Looney Tunes and advertising as is say, the Barber of Seville, but many people would know the Triumphal March. No wonder it’s used at soccer games to celebrate victory - this was the musical climax, with all the performers arranged on stage pooling their voices together in a shaking tremor of glory. Contrasting to the gusto of machismo was the hum-along delicate Possente Fthà, as sung by the maidens of Amneris’ court.

All of the performers were first rate - but as a whole, the cast was a fizzle without the pop. Aida is worth seeing though for the complete theatrical experience: lavish costumes, clever set design and crafted orchestral performance.

Opera Australia presents
Aida
by Giuseppe Verdi
Venue: Opera Theatre, Sydney Opera House | Bennelong Point, Sydney
Dates: 15 Jul - 15 Sep 2009
Tickets: $93 - $250

Manon Lescaut - Sydney Opera House - 16 July 2009

2009-07-16T09:10:00.000-07:00

A grand and passionate Manon Lescaut by Sarah Noble
Puccini: Manon Lescaut Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 16 July 2009
Puccini was not the first composer, nor even the second, to turn the Abbé Prevost's L'histoire du chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut into an opera. Both Auber and Massenet had already tackled the subject. None of the three adhered too rigidly to the original, which was probably a smart move given the style of its narrative: a sentimental, intermittently moralistic flashback told entirely by the miserable Des Grieux, in which Manon is barely allowed to speak, let alone develop a personality of her own beyond her spectacular selfishness and fatal beauty. Puccini's Manon isn't any more admirable than her literary counterpart, but at least she's three-dimensional. The role is a fearsome prospect for a soprano, requiring serious vocal stamina and an actress who can play the complicated Manon with enough charisma to remind us that she does indeed have a heart. Cheryl Barker rises powerfully to the challenge, charting Manon's extraordinary journey with a slow burning intensity. The role is heavyish for her forceful but essentially lyric instrument, but Barker's sterling technique, thrilling dynamic range and bright, burnished timbre make any serious difficulty hard to detect. Barker's astute characterisation acknowledges Manon's faults alongside her charms, resisting the urge to make the character more heroic than she is. As vital as Puccini heroines have been to Barker's career, this season marks her début as his Manon. While there's still a tantalising hint of depths still to be plumbed, this is nevertheless already an intelligent and fantastically sung creation. As her lover Des Grieux, Mexican tenor Jorge Lopez-Yañez isn't so subtly shaded, but he brings an ardent presence to the stage just the same, along with a voice of idiomatic charm, if slightly raspy at the very top. He's especially engaging in the first act, as a briefly carefree student who falls all too quickly for the woman destined to ruin him. His "Donna non vidi mai" is delivered with tremulous joy, and he moves convincingly through the character's subsequent agonies. The chemistry between the lovers doesn't sizzle but they're still a reasonably well matched pair. Teddy Tahu Rhodes seems a slightly curious choice for Lescaut, Manon's manipulative brother. There's no questioning his charismatic stage presence, and his singing is strong throughout; but Puccini is hardly Rhodes's home repertoire, and the character isn't an ideal temperamental fit either. Rhodes' star power carries him through, but it's hard not to feel he could be more profitably employed elsewhere. More seriously miscast is Richard Alexander as Geronte di Ravoir, the rich and elderly protector to whom Manon succumbs. Alexander sings beautifully, with a firm, mellifluous baritone; but that very voice, and his ridiculous buffo make-up and behaviour, only serve to underline his youth, so that a character who should be genuinely repellent and threatening seems like a commedia dell'arte fool.
Among the supporting cast, tenor Stephen Smith is most impressive, as a lithe and energetic Edmondo. Dominica Matthews's rich contralto is a luxury in the Madrigal Singer's brief appearance, as is tenor Andrew Brunsdon's turn as the Lamplighter. Graeme Macfarlane, master of the effete character role, is ideal in his cameo as Manon's fussy Dancing Master. The chorus is in fine form, with the women especially revelling in the campy possibilities of their roles as French prostitutes. Conductor Alexander Polianichko leads a sensuous reading of Puccini's score, gaining in splendour as the evening progresses. The gorgeous Intermezzo between Acts Three and Four is vividly realised, but was rather spoilt on opening night by the bangs and crashes emanating from behind the curtain as the set was changed. Director Gale Edwards' production is just the right kind of traditional, an intelligent, unfussy piece of storytelling, with occasional flourishes of telling unconventionality. Peter J. Davison's sets move from sumptuous realism to slightly more abstract design, with the desert of the final act represented by what is essentially a stripped version of the first act's village scene: a telling reminder of the terrible changes time has wrought since that first meeting. Roger Kirk's extravagant costumes are as striking in their depiction of shabby decay as in the powdered resplendence of Act Two, and Nigel Levings' lighting is skilfully evocative, especially the half darkness of the desert scene. Puccini's Manon Lescaut isn't flawless, but it was his first major success, and with good reason. Just as Des Grieux, entranced by her beauty, ecstatically forgives Manon's rather serious failings, so the fleeting faults of Puccini's opera are easily overwhelmed by its vitality, its varied palette and the sublime dignity of its conclusion. Manon might not be little or lovable like some of the composer's later heroines, but she's grand, passionate, beautiful and complex, and the fascination she exercises - as Puccini well knew - is timeless.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Fidelio, Conservatorium Theatre - Brisbane, July 12, 2009

2009-07-12T20:58:00.000-07:00

Opera Queensland presents
Fidelio
by Ludwig van Beethoven
Director/Designer Marthinus Basson
Conductor Graham Abbott
Venue: Conservatorium Theatre, South Bank

Written by Jason Whittaker

Sunday, 12 July 2009

Fidelio is a dark, dour work. We are drawn into the murky shadows, squinting almost to make out the politically persecuted left to rot in their underground hell. Florestan is on death row; his executioner, prison governor Don Pizarro, holds a vengeful grudge against the man for exposing his crimes.

But Florestan’s wife Lenore refuses to give up hope. She disguises herself as a male prison guard; as Fidelio she ventures into the darkness to free her beloved and liberate the prisoners. When revolution comes, it is glorious. The darkness subsides for a joyful chorus of powerfully strong voice and heart.

Ludwig van Beethoven was inspired by the feeling of revolution in France in the late 1700s. He gives us a timeless story of heroism against persecution; undying love driving social liberation. It started life as a three-act opera in 1805, but would be refined to two acts over a difficult development. Such a trial was his first opera, indeed, the German maestro never wrote another.

It remains a challenging work for performers and audiences alike. The lyrical litheness demanded of the German libretto is only matched by Beethoven’s painstaking score. To the audience it can produce a wall of sound; competing motivations delicately interwoven. The narrative exposition and darkness in tone of the first act particularly can be tough going for the uninitiated.

But this production is a contemporarily literate work – literally, with three-dimensional letters strewn across the stage spelling out (in English) the feelings of the protagonists. LOVE becomes HOME. RAGE becomes COURAGE. OPRESSION turns to LIBERATION.

Opera Queensland has imported the design and direction of South African Marthinus Basson, who on the limited canvass of the Conservatorium Theatre paints a simple but affective retelling. It is much less grand than the local company’s previous production of La Traviata at the Lyric Theatre, and unashamedly modern (the mixed themes in the costuming, for no apparent reason, does jar), but the concert-style staging allows some world-class performers to shine.

German-born Anke Höppner obviously wraps her tongue around the Deutsch, and her commanding soprano chords convey the heartbreak and resilience of the opera’s namesake. She is on stage for almost the entire performance, restrained by the buttoned-up prison garb and cropped hair but Lenore’s desperation and determination is palpable. With Spaniard Rafael Soler struck down by winter sickness, local tenor Bradley Daley didn’t let down the opening night crowd with a faultless performance as Florestan. He opens the second act with two wonderful arias: Gott! Welch Dunkel Hier (God! What Darkness Here) and In Des Lebens Frühlingstagen (In The Spring Of Life).

Opera Australia veterans Barry Ryan and Richard Anderson make their Queensland debuts as the villainous Don Pizarro and his prison warden Rocco, respectively. As Rocco’s daughter Marzelline, who unfortunately (but comically) falls for the disguised Lenore, Sarah Crane is a treat, while long-time Opera Queensland bass Peter Axford has suitable gravitas as the King’s Minister. The men of the Opera Queensland chorus relish the rousing freedom ode Oh Welche Lust (Oh What A Joy), which along with the finale is a spine-tingling highlight.

The Queensland Orchestra (under Graham Abbott’s baton) sounds magnificent in the symphony-made space of the Conservatorium, in a production that doesn’t thrill like other operas but certainly draws you in with an inspired new design and rich musical experience.

Aida - Sydney Opera House - July 9, 2009

2009-07-09T09:07:00.000-07:00

Aida

Tamara Wilson in Graeme Murphy's production of Aida.
Photo: Tamara Dean

Reviewed by Peter McCallum
July 9, 2009

Opera Australia

Opera House, July 7

PRODUCTIONS of Aida risk falling into a colossal self-parody. Graeme Murphy's deft new creation sidesteps this with grace and humour, reinforcing Verdi's singular musical and dramatic structure rather than capriciously undermining it.

Roger Kirk's design, based on a concept of Murphy's and beautifully lit by Damien Cooper, is a simple sloping stage. In front are two moving strips on which the characters walk without moving their legs, as though cut out of an ancient frieze. Nowhere is this exploited with more charm and impact than in the triumphal march of Act 2 which, sans elephants, is a two-dimensional, subtly animated parade of characters doomed eternally, as in Egyptian art, to stand in profile with elbows crooked.

At the very front, the Nile is a slim lap pool in which monarchs parade, holy people wash and naked lovers frolic. The whole is animated by a vocabulary of Egyptian images, hieroglyphs, eagles, sphinxes and other totems, which are projected, flown in and, most importantly, danced with gloriously imaginative choreography (an apparent collaboration between Murphy and Janet Vernon).

At the end of Act 1 dancers with mythical wings enact the priestess's melismatic lines (evocatively sung by Amy Wilkinson), punctuated between verses by a dazzlingly lit, smooth-toned male chorus so that myth, drama, music and dance reinforce each other in structure, comeliness and significance.

With the subtlety that increasingly characterised his late operas, Verdi introduces the character of Aida in a trio that establishes the dramatic and musical tensions of the principal characters, rather than in a set-piece aria, but that did not prevent Tamara Wilson's voice from asserting its distinctiveness and strength from the start. Dongwon Shin as Radames took a little longer to establish a vocal presence but by Act 3 had overcome an unsettled opening to project with firm persuasive expressiveness.

Similarly, Milijana Nikolic was best in her Act 3 tour-de-force of tragic power, while earlier her vibrato had crazed the surface of the sound as though not quite warmed up.

Jud Arthur was strong and implacable as Ramfis the High Priest, and David Parkin showed there is life after Operatunity with a solid performance as Amneris's father. Michael Lewis sang Amonasro, the fierce Ethiopian king, with flashing eyes, floating hair and focused intensity.

With a strong chorus, large forces, onstage trumpets and plenty of straightforwardly appealing tunes, it is difficult for the score not to have moments of splendour, although conductor Richard Armstrong tended not to highlight or energise textural changes to bring out Verdi's carefully crafted contrast.

Aida - Sydney Opera House - 7 July 2009

2009-07-07T09:06:00.000-07:00

A successful if not triumphant Aida by Sarah Noble
Verdi: Aida Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 7 July 2009
Verdi's Aida is an opera which leads a double life. At one (lucrative) level, it's a crowd pleaser par excellence, a favourite choice for arena spectaculars and a boon to directors who relish the chance to put an elephant or two on stage. Beyond the spectacle, however, Aida is also a perceptive examination of personal relationships ruptured by politics: the kind of opera of which Verdi, especially in his late career, was a master. Opera Australia's new production of Aida highlights this dual nature. Graeme Murphy's staging (realised in sets and costumes by Roger Kirk) presents three dimensional lives against a two dimensional background, an Egypt represented by massive cut-outs and an all-pervasive black/white/gold colour scheme. This bold aesthetic is appealing, but in the first two acts especially, Murphy's deliberate artificiality sometimes bears too close a resemblance to the clumsy décor of an amateur production, thus diffusing the impact of its stylisation. A change comes in the second half, however, as constant movement and fanciful flats give way to a far more focused vision. From cluttered beginnings, a seriously striking Aida now takes shape, culminating in a final act whose visual impact at last matches the deep, dark intensity of its musical and dramatic climax. Musically, the performance follows a similar trajectory. Sir Richard Armstrong's leadership of the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra is robust throughout but troubled initially by balance and tempo issues. As Murphy's staging begins to glow, however, so too does the orchestral sound, which is eventually as awash with gold as the stage. The chorus is switched on from the beginning, a vibrant vocal and visual presence.
Among the four principal singers, only two start as they mean to continue. From her first note to her last, Tamara Wilson's Aida displays a voice of distinctive beauty and apparently effortless power, warm and evenly produced throughout her considerable range. While not a natural actress, she is a sincere and sympathetic heroine. As her father, Amonasro, Michael Lewis is likewise excellent from his first appearance, his commanding voice and presence carrying all the hallmarks of a first rate Verdi baritone. Dongwon Shin copes well with Radames' demanding "Celeste Aida," but not until his third act assignation with Aida does the thrilling power of his voice properly reveal itself. His muscular tenor blends effectively with Wilson's tender soprano in their shimmering final duet. Milijana Nikolic, as a feline Amneris, also takes time to warm up, but her earthy contralto flares up in the final act with a blistering depiction of the princess's inner torment. Bass David Parkin, who won the ABC TV show Operatunity Oz in 2006, makes his official company début as an imposing King of Egypt, overcoming initial nerves to prove himself once again a basso profundo of serious promise. Jud Arthur brings his characteristic vocal authority to Ramfis, despite occasional throat trouble on opening night. Amy Wilkinson sings well from offstage as the Priestess, although there's not much of the celestial about her voice. Also noteworthy are the virtuosic performances by the company of dancers engaged for this production. Murphy is, after all, first and foremost a choreographer, and dance not surprisingly plays a prominent part in his staging, to mostly successful and occasionally revelatory effect. Aida is a double edged sword, so it's fitting that this production offers such a collection of dualities, intentional and otherwise. Had it remained at the level of its first two acts, this would be a troubled Aida at best, musical accomplishments notwithstanding. But the marked improvement in the final acts of every aspect of the performance is enough to make it a success, albeit a qualified one. If the first half can be raised to the dynamic level of the second, it might even become a triumph.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Traviata, Lyric Theatre, QPAC - 24 May 2009

2009-05-24T14:01:00.000-07:00

Opera Queensland presents
La Traviata
by Giuseppe Verdi
Venue: Lyric Theatre, QPAC
Written by Jason Whittaker

Sunday, 24 May 2009

Opera in Italian is like spaghetti and meatballs - the perfect match. La Traviata - Giuseppe Verdi's glorious opera - showcases this with gusto.

They are both so much larger than life, opera and Italians. Gregarious, extravagant, pleasure-seeking; big gestures and bigger voices. Wonderfully life-exaggerating, life-affirming, both.

The curtain opens to reveal a sumptuous Parisian party, but the ambience is infectiously Italian. The vino is flowing and the guests are merry. They sing drinking songs - the famed duet Libiamo ne' lieti calici is instantly recognisable to even opera novices. Be happy / The wine and singing / Beautify both the night and the laughter / Let the new day find us in this paradise.

Violetta Valery - the hedonistic heroine of Verdi's story, or as she will become the ‘fallen women' as the translated title suggests - has returned to the capital after recovering from tuberculosis. She meets a long-time admirer, the sweet-natured Alfredo Germont, who is soon confessing his love. After much hilarious internal debate Violetta will give up her life on the party circuit to settle down with her lover.

But nothing is that simple in opera. Money is tight, the in-laws are overbearing and there are romantic rivals waiting in the wings. There are family obligations, social standards, issues of love and morality. They are ubiquitously timeless themes in all their musically melodramatic glory. We watch Violetta's inevitable fall, inflicted by sickness and heartbreak. We're strangely touched by the genuine pathos. We care about her plight. We examine our own lives and what is important.

Doubt me, if you like. As a less-than-regular opera-goer I may have done the same. But just go and see it. You will be moved by this eternal masterpiece from Verdi and librettist Francesco Maria Piave.

What can you say about a 161-year-old score from one of the true Romantic masters? Only that the Queensland Orchestra, under the assured baton of British conductor Peter Robinson, brings it to life as you might expect. What a treat it is to peer into a crowded orchestra pit and hear this music reverberate around the renovated Lyric Theatre once more.

Russian Elvira Fatykhova has performed the lead role countless times in opera theatres around the world, including in Australia previously, but she is still deeply affecting as Violetta. The voice is as flawless as you might expect, but impressively it is her, largely, that grounds Verdi's soaring score with an emotional integrity and draws the audience closer. This production is also lucky to have accomplished Victorian tenor Adrian Dwyer, who makes his debut as Alfredo but is a charismatic match for the gorgeous soprano.

Special mention, too, must go to veteran Australian performer Douglas McNicol as Giorgio Germont, the father intent on restoring his family's name, and successful Australian export Andrew Collis as Doctor Grenvil. The popular John Bolton Wood, too, is typecast as the pompous protector of Violetta, Baron Douphol. The Queensland Opera chorus, 40-plus-strong, crowds the stage in fine, full voice. World-class stuff.

Elijah Moshinsky designed an original Australian production, which has been updated by emerging young director Julie Edwardson. It looks incredible, from Michael Yeargan's majestic and beautifully decorated sets, Nigel Leving's captivating lighting design that creates three seasons on stage, to Peter J Hall's gorgeous costumes that instantly transport you back to the Paris of 1877. All as grand as Verdi no doubt intended.

How does it stack up as a production, an opera behind only Madama Butterfly and La Boheme as the most performed work in the world? My admission is I'm not qualified to answer. But as a piece of theatre it is exquisite, a luscious treat for the eyes and ears and soul. Bellissimo!

Traviata, Lyric Theatre, QPAC - 23 May 2009

2009-05-23T14:04:00.000-07:00

Opera Queensland opened its 2009 season on Saturday evening in true style with their sumptuous production of La Traviata. The main season for the year also includes an all new production of Beethoven's Fidelio in July and Rigoletto in October and also includes two entirely new pieces commissioned by the company - Dirty Apple and Waltzing Our Matilda also in July. Dirty Apple is a collaboration with Backbone Youth Arts and is to be directed by the very talented Michael Futcher (winner of numerous awards in recent years), while Waltzing Our Matilda is part of the 150th birthday celebrations of our wonderful state.

But back to La Traviata. The opera is based on Alexandre Dumas' play The Lady of the Camellias. Verdi's operatic version, with libretto by Francesco Maria Piave opened in Venice in March 1853, while this particular production was first staged by Opera Australia in August 1994.

The role of Violetta in this production is sung by the incomparable Elvira Fatykhova who is, quite simply, in a class all her own. Queensland audiences have already been witness to this Russian soprano's amazing talent through her singing of the role of Lucia in Lucia di Lammermoor a couple of years ago and as Rosina in last year's production of The Barber of Seville.

Cast alongside her is Australian Tenor Adrian Dwyer in the role of Alfredo. While technically quite competent in his own right Dwyer is quite simply outclassed by Fatykhova and so the production, while very good in and of itself, does not quite reach its full potential.

Douglas McNicol, as Alfredo's father Giorgio Germont, puts in a sterling performance and Rosemarie Arthars (a graduate of the Queensland Conservatorium of Music) is equally good.

However, this is a grand opera with a big cast and to go on naming a critiquing each and every performer would take more space than this column allows. Suffice it to say that the production just reeks of class and is a real treat for opera lovers.

Sets and costumes, designed originally by Michael Yeargan, who is himself Professor of Design at Yale Repertory Theatre, are simply wonderful. So much attention to detail has gone into this production that one can easily become distracted simply looking at all the little bits and pieces that have gone into it. Such an air of space has been created that it is difficult at times to realize that this is still the stage at Brisbane's own Lyric Theatre.

The Chorus, which of course for a production like La Traviata, is vast and is simply first rate. Likewise the Queensland Orchestra, under the baton of Peter Robinson, proves yet again that they are the equal of any orchestra in the country, if not the world.

Perhaps you don't like Opera. Or think you don't. Try this one anyway and you will surprise yourself. Verdi's music is sublime and will very likely win your heart. If you do like opera then make sure you don't miss this.

Four and a half Stars

-- Nigel Munro-Wallis

Cavalleria / Tosca - Sydney Lyric Opera - May 7, 2009

2009-05-07T16:16:00.000-07:00

Brothers excel in company premiere
Thomas Howard
May 7, 2009

The Sydney Lyric Opera launched its inaugural season last night and showcased some wonderful young operatic talent. The Independent Theatre in North Sydney was an intimate and yet grand setting for this operatic gala which presented concert versions of Puccini’s Tosca and Mascagni’s Cavalleria Rusticana. The stated mission of the Sydney Lyric Opera is to promote emerging opera artists and to provide the Sydney community with high quality traditional opera staged in a beautiful and intimate setting and at an affordable price. Even though some of the young voices on display demonstrated a general level of discomfort with this difficult repertoire, the Sydney Lyric Opera did in fact live up to its mission, by providing high quality performances by a couple of extraordinary young tenors who look to have huge careers ahead of them. Adding to the intrigue is the fact that they are brothers.

Singing the role of Mario Cavaradossi in Tosca was Daniel Sloman, an internationally acclaimed Cantor. For over a decade he has held various cantorial posts at some of Australia’s finest synagogues, including The Great Synagogue Sydney, but in recent years has studied opera extensively and traveled regularly to the United States to perform. It is obvious to see why this amazing singer was highly successful as a Cantor as his voice is one of staggering beauty and elegance and he perfectly expressed the romance of Puccini’s Tosca. His Cavaradossi was one of tremendous sensitivity and warm lyricism in the duets with Tosca, and he juxtaposed this superbly with heroic passion in his confrontations with Scarpia and dramatic sorrow in his despairingly heartfelt third act aria. His is certainly a career to watch out for.

But perhaps an even bigger impact was made by his younger brother, Benjamin Sloman, in the role of Turiddu in Cavalleria Rusticana. True big voiced tenors are a very rare breed, but it appears that Australia has unearthed one here last night. Benjamin Sloman lifted the roof off the elegant Independent Theatre with a performance dripping with virile Italianate fire. This is a voice of staggering power and technical excellence, endowed with astonishingly clarion ring. His artistry was sophisticated and stylish and he managed to add nuance and pathos to a role which is generally crude and shallow. Without a doubt we will be hearing from this fine tenor for decades to come.

Soprano Cathryn Deuchar was perhaps too lyric a voice for the dramatically intense role of Santuzza, but she sang with superb line and her voice is one of tremendous innate beauty. In fact, she spins such an entrancing tone that one is left wondering why Turiddu ever cheated on her in the first place. The role of Tosca was unusually double cast – in the same performance – with Jessica Walls and Angie Torbay sharing the honours. The role of Tosca poses great difficulty to even the most experienced of singers, and the Sydney Lyric Opera focuses on young artists, so it is not surprising that a compromise like this had to be made. Suffice it to say that neither Walls nor Torbay was able to deliver an authentic voice for Tosca. Nonetheless, both displayed good musicianship and generous voices that look to develop into instruments of some importance. As if making up for the shared role of Tosca, Ian Fisher performed double duty singing both the roles of Scarpia and Alfio. His voice is dark and dramatic but suffered a little as the evening went on, the higher pitches spreading and diffusing. His artistry was solid, however, and particularly successful in the menacing and violent scenes where Scarpia interrogates Tosca.

As musical director, maestro John Martin held the evening together with great mastery and performed with great sensitivity.

Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk - State Theatre - Apr 27, 2009

2009-04-27T13:25:00.000-07:00

The opera that got up Stalin's nose

April 27, 2009

LADY MACBETH OF MTSENSK
By Dmitri Shostakovich,
Opera Australia. State Theatre.
Until May 5.
Reviewer John Slavin

IT IS difficult to know what made Stalin so savagely persecute this opera's composer. Perhaps it was its anti-Utopianism.

The work, brilliantly directed by Francesca Zambello, depicts a vodka and sex-sodden rural working class brutalised by the system. Katerina (Susan Bullock) is bored and neglected by her husband, Zinovy (David Corcoran), the son of merchant Boris Ismailov (Daniel Sumegi). When her husband leaves on business she is seduced by itinerant worker Sergei (Richard Berkeley-Steele). The lovers are soon exposed and Katerina murders first her father-in-law and afterwards her husband.

This tale of immoral passion is lucidly and passionately depicted. Hildegard Bechtler's sets are efficiently created out of a depressingly functional Rubik's Cube. The dreary isolation of this Russian hinterland is not the official fantasy of agit-prop farm labourers. There is a strong sense of threat and lawlessness in the first half that leads to rape, seduction, violence and murder.

But it is Shostakovich's extraordinary score that is the key player in the drama. It represents both the composer's perspective, satirical, priapic and bitter, and a Dionysian profligacy that bursts open the repressive hypocrisy of traditional society.

There is something brutal and cruel about the score. Sergei and Katerina's erotic gymnastics are depicted with big explosive discords reminiscent of Wozzeck. When the heroine mourns her murdered father-in-law, her elegy is parodied by lewd flute and bassoon.

Parody explodes in the second half. The officials who arrest the lovers are Soviet military police straight out of political cartoons. But Shostakovich's avant-garde exploration of the disjunction between sound and vision makes this work a rich musical experience as Orchestra Victoria, directed by Richard Armstrong, subverts the drama.

Berkeley-Steele's Sergei is stretched in the upper register but suitably romantic and duplicitous. Sumegi's Boris is what Sergei is destined to become, a drunken bully lashing out against his sexual impotence.

As Katerina, Bullock is wistful, vulnerable and impulsive. She does not tick like a time bomb with sensuality, the approach the role usually evokes. Her sweet tone and meticulous phrasing is not musically powerful, but it is a highly intelligent interpretation.

Explosive in its idiom, this opera is as rough, dissident and brave as the day it was conceived.

I Capuleti, State Theatre, April 14, 2009

2009-04-14T11:21:00.000-07:00

Romance in full voice

Lovers amid carnage: Romeo (Catherine Carby) and Giulietta (Hye Seoung Kwon).
Photo: Jeff Busby

I CAPULETI E I MONTECCHI: BELLINI
Opera Australia, State Theatre,
April 14. Until May 9. 150 minutes
Reviewer John Slavin

IN ORPHA Phelan's production of Bellini's version of Romeo and Juliet, the act one set makes an ideological statement. The fire curtain is transformed into a massive metal wall. Drawn on it is a bull's eye pock-marked with bullet holes.

The Capuleti and the Montecchi are warring clans, in this instance in drab grey suits, who probably represent the internecine violence of Northern Ireland. Fairy lights traverse the wall and its target, a symbol of the love between Giulietta (Hye Seoung Kwon) and Romeo (Catherine Carby) that might refute the carnage.

But scarcely before the singing begins, there is an arbitrary murder of a hostage by a small boy with a rifle. It is supervised by the Capuleti leader (Shane Lowrencev) and its violence freezes the blood. It is against such shocking production values that the expressive tact of the music's best moments is measured. But the composer has not yet learned to establish complex character through his music and so there is no inner dynamism. Rather the narrative is a frame on which to hang the vocal exercises of bel canto.

There is no balcony, no brief happiness for the lovers. True, when Romeo first appears in his enemy's camp, he is brave and noble of voice and demeanour. But this is quickly undermined by the personal drama and when he faces his nemesis and rival, Tebaldo (Aldo Di Toro) on the battlefield, news of Giulietta's apparent death reduces both heroes to blubbering suicidal boys. Such impotent passion is underwritten by two females in the principal roles that emphasises their vulnerability. Carby, who is in fine voice with lovely coloratura flourishes, attempts to make of Romeo a charismatic romantic straight out of Walter Scott, but the libretto and the score allow her no space.

Giulietta is a thankless role. Chronically anxious, she is a crushed doll even before we first meet her.

Hye, whose lyric soprano is perfectly suited to the role, gives her a sweetness that is undemonstrative yet full of sentiment. She dies without poison or dagger, a victim of her romantic sensibility.

Brad Cohen guides Orchestra Victoria with a lyrical lightness of touch and there are moments when the music achieves a classic nobility and simplicity, a hint of the greatness to come.

Traviata, Melbourne Opera, Mar 28, 2009

2009-03-28T23:12:00.000-07:00

Melbourne Opera presents
La Traviata
by Giuseppe Verdi
Directed by Hugh Halliday
Venue: Athenaeum Theatre
Written by Olympia Bowman-Derrick

Saturday, 28 March 2009 02:53

La Traviata is Giuseppe Verdi’s tragic romantic masterpiece. Violetta Valery (Kerry Gill), a Parisian courtesan, and Alfredo Germont (Roy Best), her secret admirer, are star-crossed lovers. Like Romeo and Juliet, their tragedy is their circumstance, their society and its conventions.

Melbourne Opera opens their 2009 season with a new production of the first opera produced by the company six years ago. Under South East Regional Touring Opera, Melbourne Opera continues to provide affordable professional opera performances to metropolitan and south east regions, and greater employment opportunities for local artists.

In the quaint, yet acoustically-challenged Athenaeum theatre, Hugh Halliday’s slightly antiquated production sat perfectly. Andrew Bellchambers attractive set design framed (quite literally) the action – outstretched longing hands reaching over a bed of Camellias.

The fiery passion that infuses Verdi’s musical score demands great emotional engagement and expression – however, in this production, the need to perform to the front, for reasons of projection, seemed to take priority. Much of the dramatic passion was lost. It is very difficult, perhaps impossible, to portray the joy of love when you are not looking at the person you’re supposed to be in love with. Gill and Best lacked chemistry.

Gill, who stepped in for the indisposed Amanda Wang, performed commendably. Her voice has a velvety sweetness that caressed Verdi’s legato phrases beautifully. However, the role of Violetta demands both dramatic and lyric potential to express the joyous outbursts of love and the tender breaking of a heart. Gill offered an exquisite lyrical pianissimo, but did not contrast this with the dramatic fortissimo needed to capture the vitality of spirit of Violetta, and of Verdi’s music.

Gill’s portrayal was not helped by Sue Halls’ unflattering costume design and Christina Pallikaris’ hair and makeup. In a bustled, lacy Victorian gown, with a tight feathered bun, Violetta seemed more of the Marx Brothers’ Margaret Dumont matron than the coquettish vibrant flower. Only in the final act, as Violetta is dying from consumption, did the spirit of Verdi’s Violetta seem to emerge. In a simple slip, Gill’s soft frailty of expression captured the audience.

Once described as, La *cough-cough* Traviata, this is an opera which despite its incredible subtlety and beauty, can quite easily slide into the melodrama and histrionics of a period costume drama. And yes, Hugh Halliday’s production included stiffly rehearsed unison chorus bursts of laughter, Victorian inspired costumes, and a little touch of Gilbert and Sullivan. But all of this simply added to the curious charm of the production – despite its failings, the audience was captivated by the vividness of Verdi’s music.

Photos - Robin Halls: Kerry Gill as Violetta and Roy Best as Alfredo.

Werther - SOH - 23 March 2009

2009-03-23T18:48:00.000-07:00

This well executed revival of Werther displays an admirable lightness of touch by Sarah Noble
Massenet: Werther Opera Australia Sydney Opera House March 2009
Jules Massenet's Werther is a curious European hybrid: a very French treatment of a very German story. Published in 1774, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's novel Werther made a celebrity of its author and an icon of its melancholy protagonist. Approaching the subject over a century later, Massenet and his librettists instead took every liberty necessary to adapt the novel to their own, very different idiom: plot points were manipulated, motives altered, and characters developed, expanded or simply invented. Massenet's Werther is a very different creature from Goethe's, with an artistic life all its own. Novel and opera recount the same basic story of the poet Werther's ill-fated love for the married Charlotte, a devotion which ultimately results in his suicide. Massenet's most significant departure from Goethe is in the nature of Charlotte's own feelings. Goethe's Lotte has great affection for Werther, but she does not return his love and has no intention of leaving her husband. Massenet's Charlotte is a romantic heroine in her own right, with the solo scenes and arias to match. She returns Werther's love completely, despite attempts to deny it, but remains bound by her mother's dying wish (another of the opera's inventions) to marry Albert. Goethe's Werther shoots himself and dies alone; Massenet's succumbs in the arms of a stricken Charlotte, who has finally confessed her feelings to him. Elijah Moshinsky's production of Werther for Opera Australia premiered in 1989. It's a slick modernisation, kept genuinely current by Moshinsky's stipulation that new costumes be sourced from contemporary designers (in this case Leona Edmiston and Farage) for every revival. There's no escaping the opera's Romantic-era melodrama, but Moshinsky's update offers an intriguing examination of the social politics at work in Werther without crushing its sentimental excesses. Michael Yeargan's spare, elegant sets and Robert Bryan's dramatic lighting design (realised by Simon Lefort) lend the production a cinematic quality: a hyperrealism which indulges occasional histrionics without veering into farce. Elke Neidhardt directs this revival with perceptive vision and admirable lightness of touch, finding room for the opera's sometimes laughable melodrama within a sincere depiction of its tragedy.
Australian tenor Aldo Di Toro's refined, expressive artistry is sensational in the title role. His honey-voiced Werther is a sensitively realised creation, his radiant pianissimi as moving as the ardent heights of his "Pourquoi me réveiller". Michèle Losier is a dignified Charlotte, her dark, full-bodied mezzo especially powerful in Charlotte's third act monologue and aria ("Qui m'aurait dit la place...Va! Laisse couler mes larmes"). Baritone Andrew Schroeder brings vocal authority to the role of Albert, Charlotte's husband, although he's hampered by a one-dimensionally stuffy conception of his character. Sarah Crane's sunny soprano is well suited to Sophie, Charlotte's relentlessly cheerful younger sister, a potentially irritating character made more than bearable by Crane's delightful presence. Stephen Bennett is warm and benevolent as Le Bailli, his sturdy bass and sterling French diction making much of the character's relatively brief appearances; he's trailed by a host of talented children as his Von Trappish brood. Stephen Smith and David Thelander bring welcome local colour to the piece as drinking buddies Schmidt and Johann, while Andrew Brunsdon and Jodie McGuren are suitably comical in their cameos as a pair of ersatz Beatniks, part of Albert's entourage of Beautiful People. The children's chorus sings with purity and intelligible French in their vital final appearance: a merry offstage Christmas carol cruelly juxtaposed with Werther's painful death. Conductor Emmanuel Plasson puts a winningly French stamp upon the work, carefully blending sincerity and syrup to give Massenet's rich, emotionally vivid score plenty of space to breathe and blossom. Werther will probably always have to give way to Manon as Australia's favourite Massenet opera but thanks to Moshinsky, Neidhardt and Plasson, this enjoyable and touching production is a happy reminder of why it shouldn't be entirely ignored.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Flute - OA - Feb 03, 2009

2009-02-03T01:01:00.000-08:00

The Magic Flute

Reviewed by Peter McCallum
February 3, 2009

Acrobats unleash circus of fire and water.

Fire on the night . . . Emma Pearson as the Queen.

MOZART'S The Magic Flute aspired to a new style of vernacular theatre involving pantomime, magic, natural speech and stock characters, and has fought against the constraints of operatic connoisseurship ever since.

When David Freeman's production with the circus/dance group Legs On The Wall, choreographed by Debra Batton, first appeared, it updated Mozart's populist intentions with the stylish physicality of modern circus, but the high Fs and the high wires fought one another to some extent, and at times the music seemed upstaged.

On revisiting this revival the balance seems better, and so many of the production ideas - the acrobats who spectacularly unravel themselves from the ceiling, the affectionate archetypal lions who act as fierce primitive custodians of the just, and the appealing fire and water circus spectacles - produce simple theatrical joy in line with the egalitarian intentions of Mozart and his librettist Schikaneder, an innovator if not a genius.

Dan Potra's design, with lighting by Damien Cooper, evokes Enlightenment symbolism with modern lines, charm and liberal dispersals of pantomime vulgarity when needed.
Musically this is well sung, though the young conductor Ollivier-Philippe Cuneo does not quite have the maturity to keep the tempos fresh, bring out the tension in the bass and harmony, and impart the stresses that shape the melody, which made some tempos slightly slow. (Opera Australia has not really done anyone a service in bringing him prematurely to opening-night exposure.)

The principal pair, Andrew Goodwin (Tamino) and Emma Matthews (Pamina), are noble and true in voice and deed, both displaying gracious attractiveness of sound, which brings touching sincerity to Mozart's and Schikaneder's abjectly sexist story (the women are all bad or weak until, of course, they yield to a firm male guiding hand when, surprise, surprise, the sun comes out). Emma Pearson triumphed as Queen of the Night, particularly in the Act II aria, Der Hoelle Rache Kocht In Meinem Herzen (roughly translated as "slit Sarastro in the gullet for me"), where she had dramatic fire, took risks, and conquered. Warwick Fyfe had a more subtle triumph in managing to put across an ocker Papageno without inducing grimaces - largely because he sang so well, but the comic ability should also be recognised.

Daniel Sumegi produced some wonderfully focused deep sounds, and created a human, fallible Sarastro; a little more yielding of tempo between him and conductor might help move the more solemn arias forward.

The ubiquitous Three Ladies (Sarah Crane, Catherine Carby and Dominica Matthews) were archly comely, while the Three Boys (Joseph Bourke, Daniel Assetta and Cameron Woodhouse) settled into a touching final scene after initially unsettled pitch and balance.
Kanen Breen was a lubricious Monostatos, and Amy Wilkinson's Papagena was appropriate cheeky. Stephen Bennett was priestly and ascetic as the Speaker, and Andrew Brunsdon and Richard Anderson sang the wonderful mock-choral with walking bass in Act II with rich firmness of purpose.

Cavalleria / Pagliacci - OA - Jan 22, 2009

2009-01-22T19:09:00.000-08:00

Opera Australia's Cav & Pag fails to catch fire by Sarah Noble
Mascagni: Cavalleria rusticana Leoncavallo: Pagliacci Opera Australia Sydney Opera House January 2009
The double bill of Mascagni's Cavalleria rusticana and Leoncavallo's Pagliacci is frequently touted as an ideal beginner's night at the opera, and in many ways it is: two tightly woven, musically rewarding pieces, stuffed with all the Mediterranean melodrama a novice could want from a first opera. But that thrilling potential requires a thrilling creative team to realise it. The forces assembled for Opera Australia's current revival are certainly none too shabby, and the resulting production has a good deal to offer: but it doesn't exactly blaze with Road to Damascus brilliance. Operatic evangelists looking for converts during this summer season would do better to direct their novitiates to the company's revival of Madama Butterfly: this Cav/Pag is not guaranteed to do the trick. Director Andrew Sinclair has opted for a traditional approach. In some ways, this simplicity is admirable but ultimately it's far too static for the grand passions depicted. In both operas, there is a frustrating imbalance between background and foreground: the operas' respective sets of villagers abound with individual stage business while their leads seem to wander aimlessly among them, characterization dependent more on each artist's own personal magnetism than a considered directorial conception. Welsh tenor Dennis O'Neill, a frequent guest here, appears as both Turiddu (Cavalleria rusticana) and Canio (Pagliacci). His ringing, Italian tenor is in excellent form from the first notes of Turiddu's offstage serenade to the tragic conclusion of Pagliacci - his phrasing is fluid, his timbre distinctive and his voice secure from top to bottom. It's a shame he hasn't a comparable gift for stagecraft. There's very little sense of character development in his Turiddu, despite the huge emotional upheaval the character experiences, and there's insufficient distinction made between that characterisation and his Canio. His characters' fraught encounters with the women in their lives fall disappointingly flat, his unresponsiveness proving difficult to overcome, despite admirable efforts from the women in the cast. Also appearing in both operas is Australian baritone Jonathan Summers, who quickly emerges as the backbone the evening. Alfio receives relatively little stage time in Cavalleria rusticana, but Summers' riveting presence, subtle characterisation and dark, purring baritone transform him into the opera's central figure, or close to it. Better still is his unsettling turn as Pagliacci's disfigured and ultimately vengeful Tonio. Summers' vehement delivery of the opera's famous prologue ("Si puo?") is positively Shakespearean: even O'Neill's stellar rendition of "Vesti la giubba" doesn't quite outshine it.
Nicole Youl sings with restrained purity as Cavalleria's Santuzza. She's touching in the character's early scenes as the downtrodden social outcast, and her soft, silvery tone soars in her prayer. Her rather placid portrayal is at odds with Santuzza's more vicious outbursts, however, and her encounters with both Turiddu and Alfio suffer as a result. Jacqueline Dark is persuasive as the hunched, greying Mamma Lucia. But it is Dominica Matthews' sultry Lola who takes first honours among the women of Cavalleria, her flaming red hair and smoky contralto radiating seductive danger. Amelia Farrugia slinks and struts through Nedda's amorous entanglements with impish glee. It's an enjoyable but basically shallow characterisation: her Nedda is too superficial to be sympathetic, even when her flightiness gives way to real emotions. The role obliges Farrugia to make a rare and welcome excursion into the middle of her voice: happily, she finds more colour there than she has previously displayed, although the upper register remains by far the stronger and more interesting part of her voice. José Carbo sings with sincerity and suave, secure tone as her lover, Silvio, his powerful and mellifluous baritone making the role's comparative brevity all the more lamentable. Tenor Stephen Smith puts in an impressive star turn as Beppe, his light, graceful tenor complemented by smart, perceptive acting. Maestro Andrea Licata's reading of the two scores sweeps broad strokes of colour, opting for a dense sound, soaked in Mediterranean sun, over multifaceted transparency. The approach works well in parts but occasionally goes too far: slower passages grow soporific, while the tension in some moments of high drama is dulled. Thankfully, Licata's innate understanding of the style and the undeniably evocative scores of both operas - along with a healthy dash of muscular orchestral playing - prevent it falling into total torpor. There's a strong contribution from the chorus in both operas: they're especially effective in Cavalleria's moving prayer, operatic voices scaled back sufficiently to truly evoke a church service. Cavalleria rusticana and Pagliacci are two of the most flamboyantly Italian works in the repertoire. It's a pairing full of melodramatic potential, capable, in the right hands, of setting an opera house alight. Opera Australia's revival has flashes of inspiration, a few of them very bright indeed - but it's definitely no fire hazard.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Butterfly, SOH - Dec 30, 2008

2008-12-30T13:07:00.000-08:00

A worthy tribute to Puccini by Sarah Noble
Puccini: Madama Butterfly Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 30 December 2008
Two days before the end of 2008, Opera Australia opened its 2009 season with perhaps the most popular opera of all, Puccini's Madama Butterfly. Moffatt Oxenbould's production, now twelve years old, remains as enchantingly youthful as Cio-Cio San herself. Cluttered exoticism gives way to an approach revelatory in its simplicity, where naturalism mingles seamlessly with stylised, balletic movement and elements of mysticism. The design by Russell Cohen and Peter England evokes a fragrant and sensual Japan, the spare, formalist set contrasting with the startling blues, pinks and reds of those who populate it. Robert Bryan's lighting design creates some extraordinary effects; the glow which surrounds Cio-Cio San in her midnight vigil is especially striking. It is a production which is suggestive rather than slavish in its detail, drawing inspiration from Oriental tradition without applying a theatrical concept so rigorously as to overshadow the opera's human centre - or its music. This revival sees the return of the singer for whom the production was created. Cheryl Barker is an internationally fêted Cio-Cio San who could possibly be forgiven for resting on her laurels. Instead, she brings her experience to bear in an interpretation which seems freshly created. She is an irresistible Cio-Cio San: not a relentlessly solemn and pathetic figure, but rather a spirited, passionate heroine whose laughter is as infectious as her tears are moving. Her voice may no longer have the girlish brilliance of ten years ago, but her vibrant tone is as thrilling as ever, and her darker timbre brings with it a host of new possibilities. Barker handles Butterfly's incredibly demanding music with typical panache and attention to detail. Her rendition of the famous "Un bel di" is especially impressive, transcending the aria's warhorse status to bring out its every detail and reinstate its very real emotion. Opera has few villains so universally reviled as Benjamin Franklin Pinkerton, the feckless American sailor whose abandonment of Cio-Cio San leaves her no option but suicide. That, at least, is the theory, but many tenors have found a way to give Pinkerton at least a hint of humanity. Julian Gavin's Pinkerton is more gormless than ruthless: a gauche tourist, deeply infatuated with his bride but fundamentally incapable of understanding the implications of his actions. Gavin's singing is refreshingly refined: he delivers a lyrical and dynamically varied performance, full of colour and happily free from bellowing.
Catherine Carby's presence as Suzuki seems like luxury casting, but in fact she's precisely as luxurious as the role itself demands. Suzuki is commonly cited as the archetypal Thankless Mezzo Role, but while she mightn't have a great deal to sing, her presence is nevertheless vital. Carby fills this role with delicate sincerity, and when she does sing, her shimmering mezzo is a delight, lighter than might be expected in the role, but surprisingly powerful. Barry Ryan brings gravity and expansive tone to the role of Sharpless, responding astutely in his crucial encounter with Cio-Cio San despite occasionally awkward Italian diction. Graeme Macfarlane is curiously appealing as the incorrigible marriage broker Goro, flitting about the stage and lacing his singing with just the right dash of mischief. Jud Arthur makes a striking cameo as the demonic Bonze, putting his remarkable bass voice to wonderfully scary use. Luke Gabbedy's appearance as the preening Yamadori is a little on the quiet side vocally, but he cuts a fine figure: maybe Butterfly should have accepted him. Young Artist Andrew Moran is strong as the Imperial Commissioner, while Jane Parkin, recently seen singing Cio-Cio San for OzOpera, is excellent as Kate Pinkerton. Maestro Shao-Chia Lü leads the orchestra in a performance of astonishing richness, beautifully shaped and carefully considered. There's stellar playing throughout, particularly from the strings. Some slight wrangling over tempo in the early moments of the opera was quickly resolved, and Lü's reading was as magical as the production, allowing the orchestral playing to rise as far as possible above its unhelpful pit conditions while supporting his soloists with care. The chorus is splendid, the women's voices blending gorgeously in Butterfly's entrance (surely one of the loveliest moments in all opera) and in the famous Humming Chorus. Reviving such a perennial favourite may seem a rather safe way of launching a season. But this particular Butterfly, with its strong cast, excellent conductor and eternally exquisite production, is no dull, everyday choice. Coming as it does on the heels of a season in which the company suffered a barrage of criticism and the sudden, tragic death of its music director, Richard Hickox, this revival of Madama Butterfly is a welcome reminder of all that's good and admirable about the company; and, a week after his 150th birthday, it's a worthy tribute to the genius of Puccini.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Otello, Vic Arts Centre, 21 Nov 2008

2008-11-21T21:02:00.000-08:00

Opera Australia presents
Otello
Giuseppe Verdi
Venue: the Arts Centre
Written by Olympia Bowman-Derrick

Friday, 21 November 2008 10:00

Shakespeare’s Othello – the classic tragedy of deceit, revenge, love, and jealousy... in essence, all the makings for the spectacle and drama that is opera.

Giuseppe Verdi’s Otello, on a libretto by Arrigo Boito after Shakespeare, charts the downfall of its hero (Franco Farina), the Moorish general and governor of Cyprus, as he is manipulated by Iago (Jonathan Summers) and consumed by jealousy and distrust for his wife, Desdemona (Kate Ladner). Verdi’s Shakespeare adaptations are notable for the way in which vocal drama assumes importance over vocal technique and display. The composition of Otello is exquisite in the subtlety and grace of its melodies, creating a fluid form which adapts to the expressive needs of the narrative.

Opera Australia’s production of Otello was first produced in 2003 under the direction of Harry Kupfer, and revived by Cathy Dadd for this season. The most striking and prominent aspect of this production is the set, designed by Hans Schavernoch. An imposing black and red staircase dominates the stage, cleverly creating a sense of depth which allows for simultaneous action on different levels of the stage between different characters. However, the lack of practicality provided by the design was very obvious, with the performers taking care not to trip and tumble into the orchestra pit!

Unfortunately, the caution required by the performers in navigating the set seemed to be carried over into their dramatic portrayals. Farina, Summers, and Ladner brought the expressive beauty of Verdi’s music to life, but often lost the drama of the action. In particular, the murder and suicide at the climax verged on comedy rather than tragedy – the strangling scene was almost cartoonish.

Despite all this, there were a few precious moments in which Verdi’s ideal of the inseparable nature of music and drama were realised. The love duet between Farina and Ladner in the first act was charming, Summers interpretation of the ‘Credo’, in which Iago revels in his evil, an audience favourite, and Ladner’s performance and interpretation of the ‘Willow Song’ poignant in its tender lightness of touch and simplicity.

However, the highlight of the performance were the large chorus numbers by the Opera Australia Chorus under the direction of Michael Black. The energy and spirit with which the chorus burst onto the stage as the curtains opened was tangible, with members of the chorus quite literally flinging themselves onto the set as they sung of the ferocity of the storm which opens the opera.

Pity that staircase prevented a little bit more of that fearlessness.

Billy Budd, SOH, Sept 26, 2008

2008-09-26T12:59:00.000-07:00

Murray Black | September 26, 2008

Billy Budd by Benjamin Britten. Opera Australia. Conductor: Richard Hickox. Director: Neil Armfield. Sydney Opera House, September24. Tickets: $99-$240. Bookings: (02) 9318 8200. Until October 16.

TEN years after its premiere, director Neil Armfield's production of Benjamin Britten's opera Billy Budd remains fresh and compelling. Dominated by a movable rectangular platform that rises, falls and circles an otherwise sparse stage, its great virtue is that nothing is allowed to distract from the moral drama that unfolds.

At this production's core are three magnificent performances. Although Peter Coleman-Wright's singing in the original production had greater richness of tone and complexity of colour, fellow baritone Teddy Tahu Rhodes is still a fine Billy Budd. Singing with a clear, focused tone and impressive agility, his firm, youthful-sounding voice is well suited to his character's exuberant good nature. Rhodes's characterisation is a winning mix of virile magnetism, artless simplicity and, ultimately, moral strength. And, yes, his shirt does come off for a while during the first act.

Tenor Philip Langridge's Aschenbach in Opera Australia's 2005 production of Britten's Death in Venice was extraordinary. Here, as Captain Vere, he is almost as good. Despite showing occasional signs of strain in his top register, Langridge's sinuous line, superb diction and sensitive phrasing illuminate Vere's inner torment at the excruciating moral dilemma he faces. He wants to save Billy from the gallows but his sense of duty cannot allow it. The pain and grief at what he is forced to do are seared into Langridge's vocal timbre.

As the black-hearted Claggart, bass-baritone John Wegner almost steals the show. It is a commanding performance of imposing malevolence and slow-burning intensity. He sings with stamina and strength, investing his voice with a burnished dark-hued tone. Wegner also captures his character's seething heart of darkness. Homoerotism is acknowledged without being overdone and twisted self-loathing adds complexity to a convincing portrait of evil.

The three leads receive able support from the rest of the all-male cast. The male chorus also has a prominent role in this opera. Sustaining good balance and blend throughout, they're equally impressive in hushed, sotto voce passages and full-voiced, fortissimo outbursts.

Apart from the occasional blemish, the orchestra responds to Richard Hickox's inspired direction with polish and refinement.

OA has been criticised recently for its musical standards and production qualities. There can be no more eloquent rebuttal than this outstanding production.

Billy Budd, SOH, Sept 24, 2008

2008-09-24T13:00:00.000-07:00

Opera Australia at its very best by Sarah Noble
Britten: Billy Budd Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 24 September 2008
Not every great composer has been lucky enough to find a librettist of equal inspiration. Benjamin Britten, however, was blessed with several superb librettists, whose creations not only match the excellence of his music, but stand on their own as works of real literary merit. The libretto for Billy Budd is a prime example. Adapted from Herman Melville's unfinished novella by novelist E.M. Forster and longtime Britten collaborator Eric Crozier, it is at once readily intelligible and powerfully poetic. Britten's extraordinary score could ask for no better partner. The story opens upon the ageing Captain Edward Fairfax "Starry" Vere, recalling the year 1797, when he commanded the Indomitable. Haunted by remorse, he remembers the young Billy Budd, a talented and beautiful sailor with a heart of gold, pressed into the ship's service. The opera continues as Vere's flashback. Billy is innocent, kind and fiercely loyal; but that very goodness - and his remarkable beauty - earn him the obsessive hatred of the despotic master-at-arms, John Claggart, who plots to destroy him with a false charge of treason. The plot succeeds, but, bewildered by his interrogation, Billy strikes Claggart and kills him. Vere has no choice but to call a court martial, knowing that Billy will be sentenced to death but unable to budge from his own strict code of ethics. He is stricken with guilt. But Billy comes to accept his fate and with his last words, blesses his beloved Captain. The opera ends with the elderly Vere once more, still tormented by his memories, but clinging to that final blessing for his own redemption. Richard Hickox, Opera Australia's music director and an internationally acclaimed Britten specialist, leads a sweeping, richly-textured performance of this haunting score. He conveys the grandeur of its climaxes without lapsing into melodrama, and draws out its contrasting orchestral textures with warmth and clarity. Especially striking are the undulating strings, conjuring up both the physical ocean and all the psychological turmoil for which it stands. Kiwi baritone Teddy Tahu Rhodes is an ideal Billy, possessing all the vocal prowess and all the physical beauty the role requires. Despite his imposing physical presence, he captures beautifully the side of Billy which is still essentially an innocent child. He throws himself fearlessly into both the physicality and the emotional requirements of the role, and his smooth, sonorous singing is hugely expressive. Billy's final monologue, sung as he waits, in chains, to be executed, is devastating.
The opera may be titled Billy Budd, but ultimately it is Captain Vere, and not Billy, who is its centre. Vere's moral crisis is the crux of the story, and it is his tormented recollections which frame the opera, as prologue and epilogue. English tenor Philip Langridge is arguably the finest Britten tenor of his generation and he is stunning in this vital role. Age has brought to his voice an ideal patina of craggy maturity, mingled still with a freshness of tone which makes Langridge equally convincing as both and old man and as his younger self. He doesn't so much play the role as inhabit it completely, giving a performance of rare poignancy - truly a privilege to behold. John Wegner is outstanding as the terrifying Claggart, his tone alternately growling and caressing and his whole being an embodiment of diabolical malice. In a sea of ruddy sailors' faces, Claggart's face is an ghostly shade of white - he radiates unnatural evil before he has even sung a note. His credo (reminiscent of Iago's in Verdi's Otello) in which he outlines his hatred of Billy and its attendant schemes for his downfall, is a bloodcurdling tour de force. The sterling supporting cast is a showcase of some of the country's finest male singers, including particularly strong performances by Barry Ryan and Andrew Collis as Mr Redburn and Mr Flint, and Luke Gabbedy as the larrikin Donald. Andrew Goodwin is touching as the young Novice, while Kanen Breen's thin, reedy tenor is just right for the snivelling Squeak. The remainder of the cast is too numerous to list in its entirety, but all members are worthy of praise. The men's chorus is in superlative form, singing with unity and shimmering voice. Neil Armfield's excellent direction draws out not just the horror and suffering of this story, but also its humour and beauty. He explores all the ambiguous depths and destructive power of good and evil without forcing any single resolution upon their eternal struggle. Brian Thomson's set is stark, industrial and abstract - a single platform, surrounded by a few pieces of scaffolding, rises, falls and rotates to represent every part of the ship. Set against a vast blackness, it evokes not so much the detail of life at sea as the psychology of it, of a profound sense of isolation. Nigel Levings' lighting enhances the eerie mood and his representation of Billy's execution is a particular stroke of genius. Armfield's Billy Budd has been called one of Opera Australia's finest: it's a reputation richly deserved. Brought to life by such a convincing, talented creative team, it is nothing short of phenomenal.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Pearlfishers - OA - Sept 8, 2008

2008-09-08T10:52:00.000-07:00

The Pearlfishers

Peter McCallum, reviewer
September 8, 2008

Ann-Magret Pettersson's production is an opera about orientalism and Western representations of the East.

Of golden voice... Henry Choo as Nadir.
Photo: Brendan Esposito

BIZET probably saw his opera The Pearl Fishers as a story in the tradition of Bellini's Norma: a love triangle about a woman, Leila, torn between sacred vows and profane love, and two men united in loyalty but divided by jealousy.

Placing it in Ceylon (originally it was Mexico) provides the usual excuse for exotic dance and colour, as is amply exploited in this revival. It is also an opportunity for the passions to run more freely than in real life.

Ann-Magret Pettersson's 2000 production transforms the work into an opera about orientalism and Western representations of the East, bringing the tacet colonial assumptions of Bizet and his librettists, Michel Cormon and Eugene Carre, to the fore.

Bizet's head fisherman and village leader, Zurga, becomes a French colonial governor and the whole story is set as a distant memory after he has returned to Paris. This gives a piquant and subtle twist to Bizet's musical representation of Leila, the famous hymn-like tune first heard in the great duet Au Fond Du Temple Saint.

With its celestial harp and flute introduction, it might have originally evoked the sanctity of an Ave Maria for Bizet's listeners; in this production it places her firmly on the Parisian side of the orientalist divide.

It also allows the design team (John Conklin, Clare Mitchell and Nigel Levings) to get away with a cardboard cutout view of Ceylon. In the post-9/11 world, orientalist analysis is under challenge, as this production might also be, although it is a thought-provoking way of setting a piece whose music still shines.

The cast of this revival oscillates between the stellar and the stalwart. Looking regally statuesque, Leanne Kenneally, as Leila, began with a veiled sound, her voice finding attractive definition in act two and powerful expressive intensity in the last act, where she was fiercely coloured with being stentorian.

Henry Choo sang Nadir with golden smoothness of voice. His dramatic persona is amiable, such that one would be inclined to put his importunate breaching of the temple in act two down to stupidity rather than passion.

Michael Lewis sang Zurga, bringing the judgment of experience to create fine balance in the great scene with Nadir of act one, as did Shane Lowrencev, the pious priest, Nourabad, who calls for blood in act two.

Bizet's opening was stilted but the Opera Australia chorus is magnificent in moments such as the closing of act one. The conductor, Emmanuel Joel-Hornak, exhorted passion from the pit, sometimes at the expense of precise co-ordination.

Butterfly, Oz Opera, Aug 15, 2008

2008-08-15T12:32:00.000-07:00

Butterfly takes to the road by Sarah Noble
Puccini: Madama Butterfly Oz Opera Riverside Theatre Parramatta 15 August 2008
Oz Opera is the touring arm of Opera Australia. Every year it visits metropolitan, regional and remote communities throughout Australia, armed with a portable production, a chamber orchestra and a cast of hardy young singers. Principal roles are double cast and sung in rotation - those not taking principal role on a given evening take smaller parts or make up the minimal chorus. In communities where opera is rarely seen, Oz Opera productions are an invaluable opportunity for novitiates and buffs alike to share in the talents of our national company. They can also function as a training ground for rising young artists. This year Oz Opera is presenting Puccini's Madama Butterfly, in a production by John Bell, of Bell Shakespeare fame. Bell's simple and elegant production has updated the action very slightly, moving it from the nineteenth century to the early twentieth, to Nagasaki in the 1940s. Pinkerton wears khaki instead of the usual blue, and, like the tourist that he is, takes incessant photos of Butterfly's attendants. The new setting aids in bringing Butterfly's situation a little closer to our own lives. Abandoned, but still adoring, she does her very best to embody the American Wife she believes herself to be: she dresses like an American girl, and plasters her paper walls with clippings of Superman, the Andrews Sisters and other pop culture icons. Sets and costumes were designed by the late Jennie Tate (to whom this production is dedicated) and realised Julie Lynch. Tate's imaginative colour sense and eye for beauty are everywhere apparent, as is her ingenuity: the single, uncluttered set has been built for easy portability, but there is nothing makeshift about it. Bell's sensitive staging makes excellent use of the limited space; the final scene, Butterfly's suicide, is a particularly striking coup de théâtre. On the evening I attended, Butterfly and Pinkerton were sung by Jane Parkin and David Corcoran, with their alternates (Elisa Wilson and Jason Wasley) forming part of the six person chorus. Parkin was a vivid Cio Cio San, tackling the role's fearsome vocal demands with grace and distinctive tone. Only in its upper register did her voice show signs of misbehaviour, although even this was not a consistent problem; she rose to the climaxes of "Un bel di" and "Tu, tu, piccolo iddio!" with devastating power. Butterfly is too often dismissed as a victimised shrinking violet, but her dialogue (especially in the middle part of the opera) reveals a far more spirited and complex individual. Parkin's bright characterisation did a fine job of exploring these aspects alongside the character's obvious pathos, and even earned a laugh or two in her confrontation with the strutting Yamadori. As her feckless husband, David Corcoran was surprisingly sympathetic - no mean feat in one of opera's easiest-to-hate roles. Though thoughtless without a doubt, he was no brute; both his passing infatuation with Butterfly and his subsequent horror at her fate were brought off with convincing emotion. Singing with extraordinary beauty of tone and impressive musicality, Corcoran proved he is definitely One To Watch: it's no surprise he's been nabbed for Opera Australia's Young Artist programme next year. The remainder of the cast provide mostly strong support. Ian Cousins brings experience and steady voice to Sharpless. Brendon Wickham enjoys the comic mugging of Goro, although his performance is marred by choppy phrasing and wayward pitch. Victoria Lambourn's expressive mezzo makes much of Suzuki, and she's especially touching in the final scene, while Karen van Spall is appealingly dignified as Kate Pinkerton. Eddie Muliamaseali'i makes a spectacular appearance as the Bonze; Rohan Thatcher is suitably peacockish as the rich Yamadori. A touring production of this nature requires a few significant adjustments. With most of the theatres it visits unequipped to provide English surtitles, Oz Opera productions are performed in translation to ensure their intelligibility. While it's a pity to lose the particular piquancy of the Italian text, Peter Hutchinson's translation is faithful, witty and highly singable, and coupled with the sterling diction of the singers, does an excellent job of recreating the spirit of its original. In addition, since touring with a full orchestra would be impossible, Oz Opera's Madama Butterfly is performed by a 12 piece orchestra, in a re-orchestration by Lara Taylor. Such a reduction necessarily robs the score of much of its texture and prismatic sonority, but once the ear has adjusted, it does bring to it a degree of intimacy which is not without its charms. Christopher van Tuinen does an admirable job of leading this small-scale Butterfly, particularly in at its dynamic extremes, where he draws an intensity from the orchestra which belies its size. Oz Opera might sometimes be viewed, by citydwellers especially, as Opera Australia's "country cousin", but the strong creative team and high musical standards of this production are abundant proof that it is nothing of the sort. It's only a pity that, in New South Wales at least, this production couldn't be seen closer to the capital. Those unwilling to trek to Parramatta for Puccini have missed out on a treat.
Text © Sarah Noble

Lucia, Aug 3, 2008

2008-08-03T21:26:00.000-07:00

Opera Australia presents
Lucia di Lammermoor
Donizetti

Venue: Opera Theatre, Sydney Opera House
Dates/Times: Evenings @ 7.30pm – July 30; August 5, 12, 16, 19, 22 & 27
Matinees: 1.00pm, August 2, 9 & 30
Written by Alexandra Coghlan

Sunday, 03 August 2008 23:41

Once you accept that Doninzetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor is essentially Brigadoon with an Italian accent (and perhaps just a hint more death...) and stop wanting or wishing it to be grand opera in the Verdi mode, then everything suddenly falls into place.

With more tartan than Edinburgh on Burns Night, britches and bustles galore and a hefty dollop of swashbuckling, John Copley’s 1980 production (revived by Luise Napier), today feels as dramatically anachronistic as it is historically faithful. Yet in many ways this aged pantomime dame of a production is the perfect foil to Donizetti’s highland romp, playing its fairly extraordinary convolutions of plot and emotion with the straight-faced affection that they deserve, and making more sense of this celebration of operatic extravagance than any pared-down contemporary rendering.

Henry Bardon’s set was a miracle of heavy-duty construction, with the wooded glades, cavernous vaulted interiors and secret grottos of Scott’s gothicke novel brought lovingly (if somewhat creakingly) to life, and was exploited to its full potential in the intelligent movement direction. At the close of each act the curtain would fall and rise again to reveal a dramatic tableau. Softly lit and beautifully constructed, each image was a three dimensional Dutch painting of surprising charm and life.

Musically Donizetti’s Lucia poses some serious challenges, and not all of them technical. Even with the glorious richness of tone and dramatic commitment supplied by Jose Carbo (as Lucia’s brother Enrico) and Eric Cutler (as Lucia’s lover, Edgardo), it is very hard to take a vengeance duet seriously when the music itself lilts along in a brisk 4/4 like a Neapolitan folk song. After the ominous horn calls with which the opera opens there is really very little music in the minor key, which – in an opera that treats subjects of murder and madness – requires disbelief being not so much suspended as ushered out on indefinite leave. While the frenetic major key meanderings of the mad scene add a certain painful poignancy to the action, elsewhere the drama struggles to compensate for the atmospheric deficiency of the music.

Emma Matthews, making her debut in the opera’s title role, was in characteristically silver-voiced form, and her performance only grew in sparkle and assurance as the evening progressed, culminating in a top Eb so exact that it was in danger of devaluing the sheer stamina involved. Cosmetic though it may be, it was such a delight, vocally as much as physically, to have a young and vivacious Lucia – a character whose dramas and histrionics are so much those of youth. With Richard Bonynge as conductor, the shadow of Dame Joan herself was always going to loom over proceedings. The lightness and energy of Matthews herself however ensured that comparisons never obtruded into the immediate life of this latest operatic incarnation.

While the central trio of Matthews, Carbo and Cutler formed as strong a vocal line-up as has yet been fielded by Opera Australia this season, there were disappointments in the supporting cast, including a rather woolly Alisa from Rosemary Gunn, and Richard Anderson's somewhat stiff Raimondo. It was uncertain what exactly went wrong with the first chorus entry, but the precarious listing of ensemble that resulted has been something of recurring issue recently – perhaps owing to the inevitably tight rehearsal periods – and detracting from their strong vocal performances.

Opera Australia’s Lucia di Lammermoor is a product of its (considerable) age, and as with all things elderly should be treated with affectionate respect and indulgence. Give over to the slower rhythms and quaintly atmospheric charms of this production however and the rewards are considerable, with Matthews and the rest of the young cast bringing a stylish flair to music that, for all its dramatic flaws, still represents some of the best tunes in the opera canon.

Lucia, Aug 1, 2008

2008-08-01T12:35:00.000-07:00

Lucia Di Lammermoor

Peter McCallum, reviewer
August 1, 2008

It was all her own and that's refreshing.

BLOODIED (literally, at least in the tomato sauce sense) but unbowed, Emma Matthews rose to the top E flat at the end of the infamous mad scene of Lucia - a note Donizetti never wrote but which no soprano since Sutherland could contemplate omitting - and gave it a colour all of her own.

All the ghost Lucias who haunt the Opera House - Sutherland, obviously, but also Gillian Sullivan and Sumi Jo - were listening, at least vicariously through the ears of listeners who heard them and chalked up their performances for future comparison.

If judged on this note alone, Matthews would take an honourable place among the ghosts. Unlike Jo, Matthews sang substantially the same cadenza in the mad scene as Sutherland (Sutherland's husband, Richard Bonynge, was conducting). However, what was refreshing about Matthews's debut in this role was that she gave musico-dramatic meaning to the scene, so the experience became more than simply listening to the virtuosity and wondering when she would fall off (she didn't). Her combination of colour, lightness and agility was there in abundance right from her Act 1 aria, Regnava nel Silenzio, and it gave her portrayal of this role distinctiveness and freshness.

The return to focus on the dramatic purpose by Matthews and the rest of this strong cast is welcome and would be well served by replacing John Copley's ageing costume pantomime production from 1980 with something new. Too much of it looks and feels like the kind of parody of operatic convention described by Tolstoy in Natasha's debut in War And Peace.

But although the production is creaking, Matthews was far from being a lone point in a dark sky. Eric Cutler, as Edgardo, Lucia's star-crossed lover, was magnificent throughout for the smoothness and polish of his voice. He had power in reserve for the last act, which he delivered without a hint of strain and with impressive dramatic as well as musical stature. Jose Carbo, as Lucia's wicked brother, was equally splendid, with a forceful and focused tone and fiery stage presence boding well for the future.

Richard Anderson sang Raimondo, the compromised priest, with sober warmth, and Kanen Breen was dashingly superficial as Arturo.

Rosemary Gunn was redoubtable as Alisa, and Graeme Macfarlane made a worthy Normanno. The orchestra under Bonynge was under-energised.

It is time to move this work on from the Sutherland glory days or else impose a moratorium while singers and conductors check again what Donizetti actually wrote.

Lucia, July 30 2008

2008-07-30T16:19:00.000-07:00

A Lucia to please both eye and ear by Sarah Noble
Donizetti: Lucia di Lammermoor Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 30 July 2008
Swords, tartan and leg-of-mutton sleeves abound in John Copley's production of Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor for Opera Australia. At twenty-eight years of age, it's one of the oldest productions still in repertory, but it's also something of a classic. Michael Stennett's opulent period costumes and Henry Bardon's imposing architectural features set the scene for a night of good, old-fashioned bel canto - short on drama, but with plenty of heart and enough beautiful singing to gladden the most jaded heart. Maestro Richard Bonynge conducts with the steady, expert hand to be expected from a man who might just know this opera better than anyone else on the planet. He leads a light, lyrical performance, sensitive always to the needs of his singers. Bonynge's tendency to play it safe might disappoint some - this is a reading as comfortable as the production, relatively free of drastic dynamic extremes or risky innovation - but his bel canto credentials are beyond reproach. Exciting or otherwise, there's no doubting the authenticity of his approach; and if, after several hundred Lucias, he occasionally seems a little blasé in his approach, that's surely understandable. Soprano Emma Matthews, an established darling of Australian audiences, makes a keenly anticipated début in the title role. She could hardly ask for better conditions: a supportive conductor, a theatre packed with adoring fans and music to which her rare agility and pearly tone are ideally suited. Matthews' is a small Lucia, perfectly formed - what she lacks in sheer volume is amply compensated by exquisite, note-perfect singing. Dramatically, she's yet to make the role her own. She clearly revels in the loony antics of the mad scene, but seems unsure of how to portray Lucia's journey to that climactic scene - thus, by the time her Lucia appears, bloodstained and bedraggled, she's done little more than pout dejectedly. But this is not a production dependent upon theatrical credibility; the considerable vocal success which Matthews scores in the role is enough to carry the show.
Eric Cutler is a remarkably tender and sweet-toned Edgardo, more lover than fighter, despite his sword-brandishing heroics. His bright and beautiful sound blends wonderfully with Matthews' crystalline Lucia in their Act I duet; his "Tombe degli avi miei" is even more impressive, displaying intelligent phrasing, melting legato and a stunningly controlled upper register. José Carbo is similarly excellent as the other man in Lucia's life, her scheming brother Enrico. Carbo's vivid stage presence brings a dash of individuality to this melodramatic role, making him a cruel but charismatic villain. His rich, muscular baritone is consistently thrilling; the duet with Edgardo in the Wolf's Crag scene is particularly electrifying. The principal trio is backed up by a supporting cast of company stalwarts. Rosemary Gunn's Alisa is a stern duenna, sincerely sung if rather threadbare. Richard Anderson sings with solemnity and careful control as Lucia's tutor, Raimondo, while Graeme Macfarlane is a strong Normanno. Most distinctive is Kanen Breen, clear-voiced and blindingly effete as Arturo, Lucia's bridegroom/victim. The Opera Australia chorus is in strong, unified voice. Copley's staging doesn't require them to do much more than stand around looking concerned, but this they do with aplomb; the unintentionally hilarious Highland dancing at Lucia's wedding is wisely left to the professionals. Resplendent frocks, a handsome set, fabulous singing and just enough blood to keep things interesting - it all adds up to a solid, traditional and enjoyable Lucia, unlikely to devastate, but guaranteed to please both eye and ear.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Otello - SOH - July 2008

2008-07-25T00:27:00.000-07:00

Otello	Dennis O'Neill
Desdemona	Cheryl Barker
Iago	Jonathan Summers
Cassio	Kanen Breen
Roderigo	Andrew Brunsdon
Lodovico	Shane Lowrencev
Montano	Stephen Bennett
Emilia	Jacqueline Dark

Coronation of Poppea - Victorian Opera - 23 July 2008

2008-07-23T06:23:00.000-07:00

Victorian Opera presents
The Coronation of Poppea
sung in Italian with English surtitles
Venue: South Melbourne Town Hall
Written by Olympia Bowman-Derrick

Wednesday, 23 July 2008

Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea is a tale of ambition and manipulation intertwined with love and passion – the perfect recipe for drama. Poppea is a fiery, determined woman who uses her sexuality to secure the throne. Director Kate Cherry draws parallels between Poppea and Paris Hilton - Monteverdi seems to have captured the timeless essence of excess mixed with passion and desire for power.

The Victorian Opera Company is dedicated to providing greater access to, and educating more Victorians about opera, not only as entertainment but also as an art form. Music director, Richard Gill, possesses a tangible enthusiasm and passion for the operatic repertoire – beginning the performance by emphasising how the performance, in terms of the musical elements, tries to emulate the way in which the work would have first been performed. Musically, the performance was delightful, with the harpsichord immediately evoking the atmosphere of 17th century Europe. Gill’s enthusiasm was evident in the energy and refined skill of the small ensemble.

The sinister atmosphere created musically was reflected in Richard Roberts’ clever all black set design. The stark blackness of the design suggested the celebrity mansions of today, while creating a striking contrast with Poppea’s crimson gown. A wall of light-sensitive glass used to conceal and reveal was used very effectively to emphasise deception and manipulation. The striking contrast between the music and set design created a beautiful balance which broke the mould of opera as a museum piece, so often disconnected from our contemporary reality.

An interesting aspect of the scoring for this opera is that Nerone, the king of Rome, was originally written for a castrato, as was the character of Ottone, both Poppea and Drusilla’s lover. Surprisingly, David Hansen as Nerone and Daniel Goodwin as Ottone replicate the sound of the castrati (how I do not know!). During the 17th century the practice of writing music for castrati was very popular, as they possessed incredible vocal ability which was unparalleled by a female soprano. To a contemporary audience however, the castrati sound used by the two male leads in this production suggests the characters’ spoilt youth in comparison to Poppea’s (Tiffany Speight) rich warmth of tone which emphasises her experience and maturity. The similarity of tone with contrasting physicality was, at first, slightly disconcerting but ultimately created an interesting pair of lovers with brilliantly delicate harmonies between the two voices.

However, the lack of subtly in the relationship between Nerone and Poppea meant that the relationship and the tension building up to the end of the opera, when Poppea is crowned, was also lacking. The image of the lovers in the third act, circling each other but separated by the wall of glass, lost all power after numerous scenes of awkward groping.

The performance highlights were found in some of the supporting and minor roles, in particular Jacqueline Porter as Drusilla who created a beautifully complex character with a lovely voice which was both rich and shimmering. Edmund Choo in the minor roles of Liberto and Seneca’s friend was another highlight with a resonant voice and strong stage presence.

The Victorian Opera’s production of Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea was a unique performance experience, which from the sound of the applause (some of the loudest and most enthusiastic I have heard in a long time!) was thoroughly enjoyed by the audience. Despite some of its problems, the production created a lovely balance between allowing Monteverdi’s music to be realised in its original form while creating a world strangely recognisable to a contemporary audience.

Otello - July 21, 2008

2008-07-21T10:45:00.000-07:00

Otello

Peter McCallum, reviewer
July 21, 2008

A worthy and forceful interpretation of an enduring masterpiece.

Otello

THE opening of Verdi's Otello is as good a lesson as any in how to turn a play into an opera. While Shakespeare eases suggestively into his drama, Verdi plunges straight into the storm, which this fine 2003 production (by Harry Kupfer, revived here by Cathy Dadd) dramatises with the coup de theatre of a chorus descending a staircase.

The staircase, the centrepiece of Hans Schavernoch's design, provides a telling objective correlative (in T.S.Eliot's term) for the tension of the work: people display themselves on it but are always in danger of falling or being pushed.

After deftly demonstrating each of these potential uses, the chorus delivers the great opening numbers with magnificent force. The chorus part in Otello is among Verdi's finest achievements, drawing on a lifetime of experience in using collective choral energy to propel dramatic excitement, and the Opera Australia Chorus here reveals the full depth of its vocal talent and power right from the start.

Cheryl Barker's performance as Desdemona is on the opposite trajectory, growing with commanding dignity from her unassuming but beautiful opening phrase, "my fair warrior" in Act I to powerfully tragic outbursts in Act III. She has the maturity and evenness of range to give the Willow Song in Act IV a subtle mixture of sadness, resignation and courage, right down to the premonitory firm tone on the low C sharps.

As Otello, Dennis O'Neill was in excellent voice, and in those moments of stentorian intensity which Sydney audiences have learnt to admire, the pitch was every bit as firm as the unflinching power as, for example, in the mighty duet with Iago which closes Act II.

As Iago, Jonathan Summers had that bad-liver look of every villain and had the capacity to sour his voice with malice without sacrificing strength. Kanen Breen as Cassio is showing encouraging capacity to move from comedy into stronger roles: he acts well and maintains the energy and lightness of his voice to serious purpose.

Jacqueline Dark is a vocally warm and sensitive Emilia, and the remaining support roles (Stephen Bennett, Andrew Brunsdon, Andrew Moran and Shane Lowrencev) were all strong. The conductor, Simon Hewett, has alert and intelligent command of the work's musico-dramatic demands. This production remains a worthy and forceful interpretation of an enduring masterpiece.

Otello - July 18, 2008

2008-07-18T01:42:00.000-07:00

A memorable, moving experience by Sarah Noble
Verdi: Otello Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 18 July 2008
Verdi's Otello is a rare bird. Arguably the composer's finest dramatic opera, it is also one of very few Shakespearean operas to do justice to the Bard. That's thanks partly to a composer as prodigiously gifted in his own field as Shakespeare was in his, and partly to Arrigo Boito's superbly concise adaptation, which removes much of the play's action and several of its characters while losing none of its impact. Stripped to bare essentials, Boito's libretto is a concentrated examination of the precarious personal relationships which are at the play's core. The score is one of Verdi's most extraordinary, his orchestral writing mingling clashing violence with swirling lyricism. Vocal lines are mostly fluid and naturalistic, eschewing the traditional recitative/aria structure, but incorporating several stunning set pieces. Harry Kupfer's bold production further tightens the opera's focus. Kupfer abandons the comfortably distant trappings of Elizabethan theatre, setting the scene in wartime Europe, in a mansion belonging to a senior member of an all too familiar (though never explicitly identified) Fascist party. Hans Schavernoch's single set is a massive black staircase shot through by a cross of red and gold carpet, a bronze Atlas rises at the centre. This is grandeur on the verge of disintegration, however: an architectural reflection of the characters' internal state. The carpet is worn and there's a charred and gaping bomb crater at one side, determinedly ignored by all on stage. Against this implacable backdrop, the emotional turmoil which plays out is brought into sharp relief - despite the obvious historical connotations, it is the personal, not the political, which drives this Otello. A strong and experienced cast rises to the challenge. Welsh tenor Dennis O'Neill is impressive as Otello, singing with nobility and thrilling Italianate thrust. His powerful voice encompasses both the pathos and the fury of this hugely difficult role, and he meets its technical demands with idiomatic ease. O'Neill's acting extends little further than grimaces and gesticulation, but there's no doubting his commitment, and the authority of his vocal performance compensates his dramatic shortcomings. Cheryl Barker is a finely-wrought Desdemona. No mere adoring sweetheart, Barker's Desdemona has consciously founded her own identity upon the might of her powerful husband; abandoned by him, she finds herself completely bereft of any other means of emotional support. Barker sings with grace, precision and prismatic beauty, effortlessly conveying Desdemona's shifting state of mind. She's sweet and vivacious in early scenes, touchingly bewildered in the face of her husband's wild accusations and finally, in her Willow Song and Ave Maria, she's a picture of desolate loveliness, her soaring tone, gossamer pianissimi and vivid dramatic sense combining to heartrending effect.
Best of all is Jonathan Summers' diabolical Iago, a figure of inhuman - yet shockingly believable - evil and cruelty. Iago's presence is made all the more unsettling by his army uniform and jackboots; his "Credo in un dio crudel" is delivered with horrifying sincerity and shades of Nuremberg. Summers' slightly threadbare baritone is ideally suited to his purpose, and he manipulates it brilliantly - snarling one moment, smoothly persuasive the next. Kanen Breen is brings attractive tone to Cassio, the unwitting centre of so much strife. After a worryingly muffled Elemer in Arabella, it's pleasing to hear Breen in such robust voice, although his preening stage presence make it hard to credit Cassio's promotion. Jacqueline Dark's Emilia resembles nothing so much as president of the local Women's Institute, but betrays real emotional depth in the opera's final moments and her rosy mezzo is a sumptuous, if fleeting, delight. Andrew Brunsdon is effective in his brief appearance as Roderigo, Shane Lowrencev dignified as the Venetian ambassador, and Andrew Moran's Herald another reminder of his very real promise. Verdi assigns a significant role to the chorus in Otello, and the Opera Australia chorus does an excellent job. It is they who open the opera, streaming down the stairs to Verdi's thunderous storm music, and they maintain that intensity throughout. It's a pity, though, that the uniformly strong singing on stage is not always matched in the pit. Simon Hewett - a protegé of Simone Young, who conducted the première of this production in 2003 - is effective in exploring the lush, radiant side of the score but a tendency to wallow means his reading can become hazy, robbing the opera of many of its striking orchestral colours. Even so, however, it's impossible deny the potency of Verdi's score. Brought to life by such a compelling cast of singers and fired by the genius of Harry Kupfer, it's a memorable, moving experience.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Don Giovanni, SOH - July 7, 2008

2008-07-07T20:16:00.000-07:00

Latter-day Don doesn't quite seduce

Murray Black | July 07, 2008

Don Giovanni by Mozart
Director; Elke Neidhardt. Conductor: Mikhail Agrest.
Sydney Opera House, July 5. Tickets: $102-$246.
Bookings: (02) 9318 8200. Until September 10.

DIRECTOR Elke Neidhardt never shies away from taking risks. Whatever you think of the outcome, there's no denying the intellectual rigour and narrative coherence of her creations.

In her new production of Don Giovanni, the action is transferred from the 18th century to a stylised contemporary setting that conveys the universality of the story. The abstract but adaptable set is dominated by black and white hues, with periodic splashes of colour coming from flashing neon signs, washes of orange lighting and the sometimes garish costumes.

Ultimately, though, Neidhardt's dark, sombre vision of Don Giovanni only partially convinces. Addicted to the instant gratifications of sexual promiscuity and sensual pleasure, there's nothing glamorous about Giovanni's lifestyle. He just seems to be going through the motions.

That's fair enough on one level, but we need to believe there's something enjoyable and appealing about it if he is to have the vitality and allure that make him both irresistibly attractive to women and the opera's dominating force.

Unlike some directors, Neidhardt has certainly thought through the logical consequences of her modern adaptation. Superstitious elements are reinvented as cocaine-fuelled hallucinations. Concepts of heaven and hell have become meaningless so the final moralising sextet is removed. Instead, Giovanni's departure leaves the other characters dazed and confused.

There are drawbacks here, too. The central character's refusal to repent draws its power and courage from knowing that eternal damnation follows. Here it is diminished because we don't really sense what its consequences are.

Although Hungarian bass-baritone Gabor Bretz's interpretation of Don Giovanni suited Neidhardt's vision, he lacked the necessary charisma and charm. Vocally, however, he was persuasive, cleverly varying his tone to match the moment: rich and full-voiced when wooing his romantic prey, lighter and more unadorned elsewhere. Even finer was Joshua Bloom's Leporello. Sustaining a burnished, resonant timbre, his singing impressed with its excellent dynamic control, fluid phrasing and superb dexterity while his performance captured his character's cunning and servile resentment.

As Donna Anna, Rachelle Durkin's strong sense of line and bright, piercing tone suited the determined intensity of her character. Catherine Carby's richly coloured singing and passionate acting made for a fiery, feisty Donna Elvira, tormented by her conflicting emotions towards Giovanni. Henry Choo (Don Ottavio), Amy Wilkinson (Zerbina) and Richard Alexander (Masetto) all provided sterling support and the orchestral playing under the direction of Mikhail Agrest was largely stylish and alert.

In spite of its flaws, Neidhardt's production largely overcomes the inherent dangers that lurk in updating an opera. Even if it doesn't stir the emotions, her Don Giovanni stimulates the mind like few other productions have done.

Don Giovanni - Sydney Opera House 5 July 2008

2008-07-05T11:38:00.000-07:00

The singing wins the day in this updated Giovanni by Sarah Noble
Mozart: Don Giovanni Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 5 July 2008
Don Giovanni is Mozart's darkest, most ambiguous work. Comic episodes punctuate a sinister tale of dark deeds and darker consequences; stock opera buffa characters mingle with - and themselves become - villains and victims. Such fascinating complexity invites subversive interpretation, and numerous directors have proved powerless to resist. Most recent to heed that call is Australia's Elke Neidhardt, whose bleak, black 21st century Don Giovanni opened this week in Sydney. Neidhardt's Giovanni is a callous, drug-taking playboy whose downfall is wrought not by the Commendatore's vengeance but by his own reckless lifestyle - the statue becomes a figment of a cocaine-induced hallucination; Giovanni's demise is the result of an excruciating overdose. Along the way, he assaults and is assaulted (sometimes explicitly) by various characters to whose lives he has blithely laid waste - a harmlessly trashy Zerlina, a garrulous and overwrought Elvira and his reluctant wing-man Leporello, all rendered in charmless modern style. The very concept will be anathema to some. Still, this is an opera rife with truly nasty behaviour and there is something to be said for an unflinching exposition of that underbelly - it's a valid, if not ideal or intrinsically appealing approach to the work. But it's an approach which requires both a cohesive vision and genuine innovation to succeed, and unfortunately Neidhardt's production delivers neither. Wavering between gritty realism and twisted stylisation without settling satisfactorily on either, this is a frustrating Don Giovanni in which momentary flashes of inspiration and black humour are promptly dulled by confused direction and unremittingly ugly sets. It's not all bad news, however. This may be a theatrically disappointing Don Giovanni, but its musical values are exceedingly high. Russian maestro Mikhail Agrest leads a tense and fast-paced performance, highlighting the fervour and turmoil of the score without denying its lyricism. Following a Mozartian precedent, Neidhardt and Agrest have cut the moralising sextet finale which usually ends the opera, choosing instead to finish with Giovanni's demise. It's an abrupt but curiously effective conclusion, although it probably requires even more decisive playing and singing to really make its mark.
Hungarian bass Gabor Bretz brings rugged self-assurance and a warmly expansive voice to the title role. In manner and in voice, his is a brutish Giovanni, in keeping with Neidhardt's vision; Bretz slides convincingly into character as a present-day bad boy. Narcissism is key - he is most compelling in the manic "Finch'han del vino" and later, in his wretched final scene; moments of suave seduction are less persuasive. Bretz's limelight is very nearly stolen, however, by Joshua Bloom's terrific Leporello. Bloom is the ideal comic foil, providing humour without resorting to pantomime comedy; he's also in magnificent voice, his "Madamina, il catalogo è questo" as mellifluous as it is funny. As an expensively attired and pathologically repressed Donna Anna, Rachelle Durkin sings with icy brilliance and fearsome virtuosity. Her stage presence is sometimes unfocused but vocally it's a powerful characterisation; her "Non mi dir", sung on the verge of a breakdown to an emotionally (then physically) absent Don Ottavio, is sensational. She's the polar opposite of Catherine Carby's hysterical Donna Elvira, a chaotic, gaudily dressed mess who can't even walk comfortably in her own preposterous pink high heels. Carby's voice may be a shade small for the role but she tackles it fearlessly and with astounding commitment; her staggering "Mi tradi" is possibly the production's finest moment. Current Young Artist Amy Wilkinson shows promise as a tarty Zerlina, singing with sweet, if sometimes strident, tone. Richard Anderson is a solid, conventional Masetto, singing well but apparently oblivious to the updated setting. Henry Choo's Don Ottavio is sung with his usual lilting beauty and pristine diction, but his ineffectual stage presence does little to enliven this basically gormless character. As the Commendatore, Jud Arthur is in characteristically towering voice, dominating the stage even while invisible. The chorus (in reduced form) sings with strength and spirit, particularly as the invisible spirits who drag Giovanni away. Visually, there's little to love in this barren modern-day Don Giovanni; aurally, it's another story entirely. See it for the singing, then; and if necessary, just close your eyes.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Don Giovanni, SOH - July 3, 2008

2008-07-03T10:40:00.000-07:00

Don Giovanni

Peter McCallum, reviewer
July 3, 2008

Gabor Bretz is the latest singer to play the love-rat Don in Elke Neidhardt's edgy new production.

Playing opera's bad boy ... Gabor Bretz.
Photo: Marco Del Grande

THERE is a 19th-century tradition of interpreting Don Giovanni in the manner of Faust, where his desire for transcendence gets a little out of control. Elke Neidhardt's production gets away from the "male problem" - the Don begins as thoughtless and becomes progressively odious, until, rather than being dragged down to hell, he creates his own drug-induced one. She refocuses on the three female victims, making each an active rather than passive agent in their involvement with him, bringing interest and credibility to their motivations.

Instead of being a remote psycho-drama of the subconscious, the production becomes increasingly disturbing, because we all know people who display the pathological behaviour revealed here. It is a theatrically vivid and thought-provoking new reading and, as the mixture of cheers and boos at the end displayed, places the work once again at the uncomfortable edge between reassurance and disturbance. This is set up at the opening where Donna Anna appears as a far from reluctant participant in her own seduction, while the death of her father, the Commendatore, is an accidental result of criminally careless insolent treatment from Giovanni.

The subsequent behaviour of Donna Anna, a proudly statuesque Rachelle Durkin, is motivated by desire, guilt and revenge. Durkin's vocal projection and reliable agility is impressive: though there was room for variety of tone in Act I, her Act II aria, Crudele?, was wonderfully poised and polished.

Catherine Carby's Donna Elvira was the work's most interesting character in her comic, self-humiliating obsession with Giovanni, and she rose to the challenge with humour and poignancy. Her beautifully phrased and coloured Act II aria, Mi trada, was a musico-dramatic turning. Notwithstanding the psychological focus on the women, the two male leads, Joshua Bloom's Leporello, and Gabor Bretz's Giovanni, were superb and carried the show.

Bloom, as strong a Leporello as I have heard in an Opera Australia production, sang magnificently, while Bretz captured haughty power in his voice and demeanour, and mapped the evolution from thoughtlessness to psychosis with true mastery. Amy Wilkinson was a charmingly fallible Zerlina, against Richard Anderson's persuasive Masetto, while Henry Choo's smoothly lyrical tenor sound as Don Ottavio fitted the renewed interest that Neidhardt brought to what is traditionally one of the most boring relationships in all of opera.

The conductor, Mikhail Agrest, had a fine feel for telling tempos at crucial moments and brought sophisticated shape to phrases although the stage-pit co-ordination was not always perfect. Jud Arthur sang the Commendatore with impressive implacability, though with most of his involvement occurring offstage it almost wasn't worth his while putting on a suit for the evening.

The design, by Michael Scott-Mitchell, Jennie Tate, Julie Lynch and Nick Schlieper, was dark and angular, unified by diagonals and strong contrast as though to hint at fate's sinister and inhuman side.

Arabella, Mar 10, 2008

2008-03-10T06:32:00.000-07:00

Arabella

Peter McCallum, reviewer
March 10, 2008

A triumph of Viennese seduction.

Strength and warmth ... Peter Coleman-Wright and Cheryl Barker.
Photo: Marco Del Grande

Richard Strauss's Viennese comedy Arabella was first performed in 1933, the same year the new Nazi Government appointed him president of the Reichsmusikkammer (Reich Chamber of Music) without consulting him. It seems the perfect subject for the quip by the Viennese satirist Karl Kraus: "In Berlin the situation is serious but not yet desperate; in Vienna it is desperate but not yet serious."

Strauss had already perfected (in Der Rosenkavalier and elsewhere) the brilliantly volatile, energised style in which the music never stands still, like someone working the room at a rather hysterical party.

Richard Hickox and the Opera and Ballet Orchestra propelled this in Act I with a mix of flexibility and forward movement, and it was quickly clear that the whole package of this new production - cast, design (Robert Perdziola) and direction, both musical (Hickox) and theatrical (John Cox) - is a triumph of seduction, coaxing you to enjoy gorgeous sounds and images, even against your better judgment.

Wherefore this restless impulse to keep changing the musical subject? Theodor Adorno suggested Strauss embraced psychological flux because the system of musical keys (what we call tonality) had lost its power to shape musical form, but it is hard not to also see in the distinctive mix of satire and idealism of the librettist Hugo von Hofmannsthal a more psychological explanation, as theatrical archetype, stock-type and fairytale collide.

There is degeneracy and post-Freudian hysteria, represented in the emblematically dysfunctional aristocratic family in which the second daughter, Zdenka, is dressed as a boy to save money, and regeneration in the form of Goethe's redeeming pure woman, das Ewigweibliche, always on hand to mop up the mess men make.

Strauss, the master artificer, does not try to convince us he believes all this. It is an opera about the emotions people think they are supposed to feel when in love: for each facsimile of a noble feeling, Strauss provides a brilliant facsimile of noble music.

Cheryl Barker is superb in the title role, particularly in the third act when her voice had found its pitch focus and strength all wrapped in the warmth of colour. Emma Matthews (Zdenka) is a different vocal type, appealing for its clarity rather than reverberance. Although not a sound traditionally associated with the luxuriance of Strauss, the combination had its own charm in the Act I duet, like matching silk with velvet.

As redeeming women, both have their work cut out. Arabella gets a boorish jealous Croatian, Mandryka, whose redeeming feature is the capacity to look sheepish, and Peter Coleman-Wright had forceful focus, though the role does not emphasise the best parts of his range.

Zdenka gets a self-absorbed army officer who does not even notice when he is inadvertently making love to his beloved's sister: Richard Roberts was passionate in the first act. though after the suggestive Act III overture his voice showed signs of post-coital fatigue.

Conal Coad does a fine character role as Count Waldner, and Milijana Nikolic is strong as Countess Adelaide.

The unsuccessful suitors, Kanen Breen, David Thelander and Barry Ryan, made strong foils for Barker in Act II. Lorina Gore's Fiakermilli was agile but shrill, while Jacqueline Dark's fortune teller conjured apt colours at the opening.

Arabella, Mar 10, 2008 - AS

2008-03-10T04:24:00.000-07:00

Written by Eliza Eggler

Monday, 10 March 2008

Arabella, the eponymous heroine of Richard Strauss’s comic opera is looking for love. She is a poor little rich girl seeking a ‘master’ to whom she will be ‘as obedient as a child’ and a firm believer in the notion of ‘Mr. Right’. Her parents alas have other plans for her, namely that she be sold to the highest bidder in order to rescue the families floundering fortunes by means of a profitable marriage. Count Waldner, Arabella’s gambling father who is responsible for their financial demise, sends a picture of Arabella to a decrepit old army friend in the hope of snaring a wealthy husband for his maiden daughter. Fortunately for our heroine the old goat has long gone and the picture ends up in the hands of his wealthy young nephew Mandryka. This ‘prince charming’ character, having been attacked by an over enthusiastic bear and unable to get out of bed for three months, spends the entire time dreaming about the girl in the picture before heading off to Vienna to claim her as his bride.

Arabella is very much a story of fantasy versus reality and Opera Australia’s production of this lesser known Strauss masterpiece has done a good job at presenting these themes. Act one opens with Arabella’s mother (Milijana Nikolic) bemoaning the family’s imminent bankruptcy and Arabella’s sister Zdenka (Emma Mathews) who has been dressed as a boy since childhood to avoid the cost of two marriages, urging Arabella (Cheryl Barker) to accept Matteo (Richard Roberts), a young officer, in marriage. All of the singing in these opening scenes is extremely good, as is the acting which brings out the humour of the plot. Miss Barker is a confident and poised Arabella and sings with a beautiful warm voice and wonderful legato line. She is easily heard above the orchestra thanks to sensitive leadership from conductor Richard Hickox and her intonation and diction are outstanding. Emma Matthews, who is a very good actress, sings with her usual creamy tone and is thoroughly convincing in this pants role; if it weren’t for the beautiful soprano voice you could be forgiven for thinking Zdenka is in fact male. Count Waldner (Conal Coad) portrays a humorous character who is more interested in gambling than most things in life and his solid bass voice and acting add to the overall success and humour of the first act. With the arrival of the handsome Mandryka (Peter Coleman-Wright), who comes to ask for Arabella’s hand in marriage, the audience has the pleasure of hearing a mighty and beautiful voice and it’s no wonder Arabella falls head over heels when they finally meet in the second act! Waldner consents immediately to the marriage and by accepting money from Mandryka makes the connection between matrimony and cash all too obvious.

Act two sees the first meeting between Arabella and Mandryka at the Cabbies’ Ball and they fall instantly in love. Whilst the speed at which this happens is troubling, the wonderful music and singing more than make up for problems inherent in the plot. The stage design is simple and attractive and the small chorus comes and goes without detracting from the focus of the action. The duet between Mandryka and Arabella with its soaring lyrical themes and luscious harmonies is a highlight of the opera; Arabella has found her life partner and Mandryka the great beauty he has fantasized about for months. From this point on however the fairy tale begins to unravel. Arabella takes leave of her other suitors who are now disappointed that she has chosen another man. Matteo is particularly stung and Zdenka, who is secretly in love with him, seizes the opportunity to have him for herself. She gives the heartbroken fool a letter, supposedly from Arabella but which she has in fact written, inviting him to her room and even providing him with the key (her key). Mandryka, who has witnessed all this and thinks Arabella is untrue, flies into a jealous rage and immediately starts flirting with Fiakermilli (Lorina Gore), the cabaret artiste from the ball. He then insults Arabella’s mother and the act draws to a troubling close. Miss Gore as Fiakermilli sings with commitment and precision and is a highlight of the second act. She has a clear light coloratura voice which cuts across the orchestra like a knife and her flirtatious acting is completely charming.

Act three deals with Zdenka’s coming out as a woman and Mandryka and Arabella’s reconciliation. Matteo, who has made love to Zdenka thinking it was Arabella (that room must have been dark!) is shocked by Arabella’s sudden coldness towards him. He is also shocked when he discovers that he has in fact just slept with Zdenka whom he thought was Zdenko, his best friend, but gets over this in about two minutes and decides that he now wants to marry Zdenka and not Arabella! The confusion is great as is Mandryka’s refusal to believe that Arabella is innocent of betraying him. Once he realizes what a fool he has been he curses himself and his failure to trust Arabella. His great remorse is relieved however when Arabella forgives him and in agreeing to marry him fulfils the fairy tale hope of living ‘happily ever after’. The singing in this act is once again splendid as is the acting and the opera draws to a satisfying conclusion. Arabella sings some of the loveliest music in the final moments of the piece and Miss Barker’s wonderfully even voice and warmth of tone are really worth hearing. She sings ‘Take me as I am’, meaning take me as I am and not as you imagine me to be and not as you think I ought to be, and there is a relevant message for all of us in these words today.

Although the plot of Arabella is convoluted and clichéd, Opera Australia has managed to create an attractive looking and successful production. The singing is consistently good throughout and the orchestra plays beautifully and without drowning out the singers. The acting is always believable and the singers, who are ideally suited to their roles both vocally and physically, portray believable characters. Whilst this production will not challenge you much, the quality of the music making definitely makes it worth a look.

Arabella , SOH, 7 March 2008

2008-03-07T10:30:00.000-08:00

A rare and transcendent experience by Sarah Noble
R. Strauss: Arabella Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 7 March 2008
Arabella is the beloved daughter of the Waldners, an aristocratic family of rapidly diminishing means. Their survival depends on a good marriage for their daughter; Arabella has no shortage of suitors but steadfastly awaits "the right man". She finds him in Mandryka. But the Waldners have another daughter, Zdenka, who has been raised as a boy - bringing two daughters out in 19th century Viennese society would be far too expensive. Zdenka unrequitedly loves Arabella's most ardent admirer, Matteo, and forges letters to him from her sister which she passes on in her guise as "Zdenko", Arabella's sister and Matteo's confidant. Everything comes to a head at the Cabbies' Ball. Zdenka, taking her forgeries a step further, arranges a nocturnal liaison with Matteo, supposedly on her sister's behalf, but planning to be there herself instead. Mandryka overhears their conversation. Shattered, he misbehaves appallingly and nearly ruins everything - until a lengthy, confused confrontation in the hotel lobby eventually reveals all. Matteo conveniently transfers his affections to the newly female Zdenka and Arabella and her Mr. Right are at last betrothed. Strauss' opera intersperses hilarity with passages of real depth and emotional power, exploring both the comic possibilities of love and its complex, psychological side. Arabella is a fascinating, witty heroine, who laughingly flirts with her suitors without wavering in her determination to marry only for true love. The action hints at farce but never descends to it; Strauss' luscious, shimmering score paints true love in all its glory, and adds a touch of greatness to even the silliest moments. Opera Australia has done itself proud with this, its very first Arabella. John Cox's resplendently traditional production is a joy, presented with genuine insight and an eye for beauty. Behind the interior sets hovers a birds-eye diorama of Vienna, a quietly effective reminder of the larger world into which these individuals fit. His ball scene is a triumph of subtlety, merely hinting at the outskirts of a crowd rather than piling everybody in, as some directors might. Richard Hickox leads the orchestra in a beautifully shaped performance, sensitive but never subservient to the singers. Strauss' score offers many an opportunity for almost outrageous orchestral gorgeousness; Hickox grabs most of them, while steering admirably clear of total self-indulgence. Cheryl Barker is incandescent in the title role, a sweet, vivacious Arabella who sounds as heart-stoppingly exquisite as she looks. An actress of rare talent, she creates a three dimensional and immensely sympathetic character. Vocally the role fits her dark, lustrous tone and electrifying expressivity like an expensive silk glove. Having begun beautifully, her performance proceeds to gain in intensity as the performance proceeds, culminating in a climax and denouement of incredible impact. A true Sternstunde for a consistently excellent artist.
Singing Mandryka is Barker's real-life partner, baritone Peter Coleman-Wright. Unsurprisingly, the chemistry between the two is potent. When, in the duet "Und du wirst mein Gebieter sein", they pledge themselves to one another, the electricity is palpable. Indeed, it's hard to know whether to watch, amazed, or turn aside and give them their privacy. Coleman-Wright's Mandryka is a genial and appealing creation; what his voice lacks in outright splendour he makes up for in elegant phrasing and smooth, Straussian legato. Emma Matthews' success as Zdenka is less complete. In Strauss' fast-paced recitatives she is in her element, bright-toned and bubbly. As her phrases grow longer and more lyrical, however, she flutters rather than soars; her quick vibrato and light tone, while basically appealing, don't quite do justice to all of Zdenka's music. Usually a pretty admirable actress, she falters in this quasi-pants role, squirming and posturing like Cherubino on a sugar rush; contrasted with the radiant stillness of Cheryl Barker's Arabella, her manner is all the more offputting. It is not until matters turn serious in the final act that her own usual poise and musical grace return. Richard Roberts is suitably lyrical and earnest as her Matteo, his clear and youthful tenor floating easily above the orchestra. Mezzo soprano Milijana Nikolic is wickedly wonderful as the extravagant Countess Waldner, her sonorous tone put to particularly good use. As her husband, Conal Coad is likewise in fine form, an endearingly mischievous compulsive gambler. Particularly impressive is Lorina Gore's star turn (and Opera Australia début) as Fiakermilli, tackling the role's fearsome coloratura with agility and impressive vocal clarity. Jacqueline Dark is an all-too-brief treat as a mercenary Fortune Teller. Only Kanen Breen is miscast, his unchanging brand of comedy, though suitable elsewhere, are trivial and irrelevant in Arabella and his voice is all but inaudible. Yet even a far greater misstep would have little impact on the overarching excellence of this Arabella. "How vain to separate the two. Words and music become as one, join together to form a new creation....Each art redeemed by the other!" So says the Countess Madeleine in the closing scene of another Strauss opera, his Capriccio. Asked to determine which is the most important aspect of opera, she cannot choose, she realises that there is no choice to be made - in its ideal form, opera combines the two to create something new and indivisible. With its new production of his elegant Viennese comedy Arabella, Opera Australia has achieved just this kind of alchemy. Very much more than the sum of its individually excellent parts, this Arabella is a rare and transcendent experience, not to be missed by those who have not seen it and unlikely to be forgotten by those who have.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Un Ballo in Maschera, SOH, Feb 24, 2008

2008-02-24T06:13:00.000-08:00

Opera Australia
Un Ballo in Maschera (A Masked Ball)
Giuseppe Verdi
Performed in Italian with English surtitles
Venue: Opera Theatre | Sydney Opera House
Evenings: February 20, 23, 26, 29; March 10, 13, 19, 29 @ 7.30pm
Matinee: March 8 at 1.00pm

Review written by Eliza Eggler

Sunday, 24 February 2008

Giuseppe Verdi’s Un Ballo in Maschera (A Masked Ball) is considered by some to be a masterpiece whilst others have described it as his ‘worst opera’; and whilst Opera Australia’s current production is not the ‘worst opera’ I have seen, it is disappointing. Wednesday’s opening night performance is a good example of all the worst stereotypes that people think of when the word ‘opera’ is mentioned; these include overacting, ridiculous costumes, and portly singers bellowing in unattractive tones about an impossible and unrequited love.

The opera tells the story of King Gustav III of Sweden who is murdered by his best friend Anckarstroem at a masked ball. Anckarstroem kills Gustav after learning that the king and his wife are in love with one another and have had a secret rendezvous.

‘Un Ballo in Maschera’ is full of wonderful music and has the potential to be a really exciting piece of theatre. This production however, which is now over twenty years old, is anything but exciting and looks quite worn out and drab. The first scene of the first act is set in the king’s audience chamber and we are introduced to most of the opera’s main characters. King Gustav (Dennis O’Neill) does much of his singing from a ridiculous looking winged throne and unfortunately looks anything but a king. His singing seems insecure and he has difficulties moving between the middle and upper registers of his voice. Oscar, the king’s page (Natalie Jones) sings competently and portrays a lively and cheeky character. She has however an excessive vibrato which detracts from what is otherwise a very good voice.

Scene two of the first act is set in Ulrica the fortune tellers hut and the stage is so dimly lit that it’s difficult to see who is singing what. Ulrica, (Bernadette Cullen) wearing a costume of rags and with feathers in her hair, looks somewhat like a cross between Hiawatha and Oliver Twist. She sings an aria to invoke spirits and as with the other female singers in this cast has excessive vibrato. After she tells some fortunes, Ulrica sends everyone away and the heroine Amelia (Nicole Youl) arrives seeking a cure for her forbidden love. Ulrica suggests a herb which can only be found growing beneath the cities gallows and Amelia resolves to get some that very night.

Act two scene two is where Gustav and Amelia, alone together at last, confess their love for one another in one of opera’s most beautiful duets. The singing is not bad and the tenor seems to have settled in to his voice more by this stage. Miss Youl has a powerful and at times beautiful voice, although once again I found the vibrato to be excessive and this detracts from her lovely tone. My main objection to this scene is that it is simply impossible to believe that these two characters are in love. The soprano is considerably taller than the portly tenor and looks beautiful, but Gustav, the object of her affection looks comical in his costume and wig (I couldn’t help imagining Danny de Vito cast opposite Catherine Zeta Jones). After singing a luscious and passionate duet together they grab one another as if hanging on to a block of wood and as the audience applauds, look most uncomfortable indeed.

Act three scene one, Anckerstroem (Michael Lewis) has discovered his wife’s betrayal and decides that she deserves to die. He sings the aria ‘Eri tu, che macchiavi quell’ anima’ with a beautiful, steady baritone voice and this was the only instance in the whole evening that I felt slightly moved.

The second scene of this act is devoted to the masked ball where the murder of Gustav is to take place. The stage finally comes alive and it is a relief to see some movement. Up until now, the action has been thoroughly static and with the dim lighting effect, keeping the eyes open has been difficult. The chorus sings well and it’s a joy to hear the massed voices, although why the choristers are all dressed in identical costumes of what looks like grey silk is anyone’s guess. Anckerstroem finally does the deed, stabbing Gustav and fatally wounding him. Gustav takes some time to die however and manages to sing a last aria before finally passing away. Just prior to his death he makes a choking sound and rather than tears on my behalf I almost laughed, so unrealistic was the acting.

This production of ‘Ballo’ is disappointing indeed. The stage is often static and boring to watch, the singing is mediocre and the acting not believable. On top of this it’s impossible to imagine that Gustav and Amelia are remotely attracted to each other, let alone madly in love! The audience reaction fluctuated between cool and luke warm and I couldn’t help noticing that the seats in front of me had been vacated after the second interval. It is definitely time for a new production of this Verdi ‘masterpiece’ and if Opera Australia wants to continue attracting an audience it’s time to say goodbye to this tired looking production. Having said that, if you just love Verdi and want to hear some beautiful music, then by all means take a look. If however you want to see an exciting and challenging piece of theatre, then don’t worry about this one.

Un Ballo in Maschera, SOH - Picture Essay

2008-02-22T23:25:00.000-08:00

Un Ballo in Maschera, SOH, Feb 20, 2008

2008-02-20T09:01:00.000-08:00

Opera Australia's Ballo falls short by Sarah Noble
Verdi: Un ballo in maschera Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 20 February 2008
UN ballo in maschera is the ultimate grand opera, embodying both the genuine conventions of the genre and the popular, slightly ridiculous stereotype. Within its brisk plot, it incorporates all the elements some might imagine are to be found in every opera - royalty, political intrigue, lovers' trysts, disguises, vengeance, murder. The subject is romanticised history. Gustav III of Sweden loves Amelia, and is loved in return. But Amelia is married to Anckerstroem, Gustav's best friend and Secretary of State. When Anckerstroem discovers the pair's mutual affection, he joins a conspiracy to kill Gustav, ultimately stabbing the king at the titular masked ball. Gustav survives just long enough to pardon his assassins and assure Anckerstroem of Amelia's purity. In lesser hands, such a work might become mere self-caricature. Verdi's treatment, however, ensures that while UN ballo in maschera embodies those conventions, it also enlivens them. It follows a formula, but does so with concentrated energy and incredible skill, and therein lies its appeal. Ballo is excellent but not extraordinary, and thus requires something extraordinary in its execution to truly succeed. A superlative cast, or a fascinating production; or even better, both. Opera Australia's UN ballo in maschera unfortunately provides neither. Maestro Licata's passion can't be doubted, but the performance he leads lacks shape and rhythmic drive. The orchestral palette seems uncharacteristically limited - even the seriously spooky music which introduces the satanic fortune teller Ulrica lacks impact, hard to believe given Verdi's hugely atmospheric writing for the scene. The first act in particular was marred by a lack of cohesion between orchestra and soloists. John Cox's production, directed for revival by Luise Napier, is similarly uninspiring, offering little insight or character development. The opening scenes hint at a deeper interpretation - Gustav's throne room is overshadowed by glimpses of Ulrica's lair which loom behind, a hint of his increasingly threatened position. However, later scenes fail to follow this notion through effectively, and the singers are left relatively directionless. Michael Stennett's impressive costume designs are perhaps the most vivid aspect of the production - otherwise the result is disappointing.
Verdi specialist Dennis O'Neill sings Gustav. This style is evidently in O'Neill's blood and he responds passionately to the role's declamatory climaxes. As an authoritative leader, his singing is compelling. But Gustav is also supposed to be madly in love, and here O'Neill is far less convincing. Coupled with a repertoire of almost cartoonish stock gestures, his shouted expressions of tender feeling are difficult to credit - his facial and vocal expression in these moments bearing little resemblance to the words being sung. Michael Lewis' Anckerstroem is a more persuasive characterisation, his patrician baritone conveying subtler authority. Nicole Youl sings Amelia with some beauty but little electricity. Even in her highly dramatic graveyard scene, surrounded by swirling mist and the corpses of executed criminals, she seems strangely detached. Her performance intensifies for the final act, however, and "Morro, ma prima in grazia" is quite moving. Mezzo soprano Bernadette Cullen, by contrast, makes much of the role of Ulrica, glorying in the fortune teller's doom-laden and eerie music. Her dark, austere sound is suitably scary, and she makes liberal and gratifying use of her chest register. Natalie Jones brings sweetness of tone and a sense of fun to the exuberant page Oscar, but her coloratura is laboured and lacks sparkle. Among the supporting cast, Andrew Moran is a standout as a bright-toned sailor, and Jud Arthur brings his usual suave, expressive baritone and appealing stage presence to the role of the conspirator Count Ribbing. The chorus sings well as always, but seems less at ease in this idiom than elsewhere. UN ballo in maschera isn't the most celebrated of Verdi's operas, and neither should it be. However, it is top shelf Verdi just the same, and marks an important point on the path to the greatest of his masterpieces. It is a work of conventional excellence laced with hints of utter genius, and needs a performance to match. Despite intermittently valiant attempts, Opera Australia's production ultimately falls short.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Carmen - SOH - Jan 25, 2008

2008-01-25T10:07:00.000-08:00

Carmen

Peter McCallum, reviewer
January 25, 2008

Nothing beastly about the animals, just the staging.

Feeling giddy ... Michael Todd Simpson and Kirstin Chavez in Carmen.
Photo: Domino Postiglione

The toreador's entrance into Act 2's Goyaesque tavern was splendid in every way, but just before the famous toreador refrain, the noble beast on which he was mounted shook its ears with that worrisome intensity that animals conjure when something is not right.

Up to that point, I had been inclined to agree.

The staging of Act 1 was flat, both visually and dramatically, with Tanya McCallin's set of ochre-stained concrete stressing the horizontal, while the direction, by Francesca Zambello and Denni Sayers, seemed intent on creating a crowded stage with formulaic flirtation. This chiefly involved cigarette girls being pawed, lifting skirts and straddling everything that moved and a few things that didn't, while in place of ideas a few gratuitous animals wandered listlessly around, provoking amusement.

However, Kirstin Chavez is an arresting Carmen, and although her seductive aspect in this act was about as subtle as watching tomcats having their tails pulled, the voice (even with a slight tendency to go sharp in this act) captures the same rich fleshiness and freedom as the persona.

As a performance, it grew in stature: in Act 3, when she keeps dealing the cards and finding death, Chavez was able to toll the low notes of her register with remarkable penetration and resonance. She remained statuesque and defiant in voice and spirit to the final moment, even when sprawled across the stage, pretending that the final rape attempt was more potent than it was.

Rosario La Spina's Don Jose was best in Act 2. Tenors need to save the best for the last act in this role. While there was no hint of vocal fatigue at the end (the less controlled moments were, in fact, in Act 1), the performance had passed its peak in terms of dramatic and vocal intensity.

Sarah Crane sang Micaela, the good girl's role, with an ideal mixture of vocal sweetness, fluid musical shape and suppressed inner fervour, and was one of the few characters whose on-stage dignity rivalled the horse.

As Escamillo the toreador, Michael Todd Simpson was tall and amiable, and a fine singer and table-top dancer: the persona and voice tended more towards the affable than the hypnotically erotic.

The support characters were strong, with Sian Pendry and Amy Wilkinson making an engaging gypsy pair in Act 3. Smugglers Luke Gabbedy and Graeme Macfarlane mercurially oiled the wheels of the action while troopers Andrew Moran and Shane Lowrencev failed to block its spokes.

The conductor, Richard Hickox, led a well-balanced orchestra with an unusually strong string section.

Carmen - SOH - Jan 24, 2008

2008-01-24T10:11:00.000-08:00

Visually remarkable but ultimately lacking in depth by Sarah Noble
Bizet: Carmen Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 24 January 2008
Francesca Zambello's production of Bizet's Carmen, which premiered at the Royal Opera House in 2006 and opened in Sydney on Thursday evening, opens with a striking, Goya-esque tableau of a handcuffed and bloodied Don José - the imprisoned murderer of Carmen. He's led roughly offstage and the opera follows as José's flashback. It's an unconventional start to an otherwise hypertraditional production. Zambello's Carmen bursts with local colour, brilliant detail and the odd surprise: a half-naked village girl, a real live donkey, flamenco dancers and a show-stealing black horse for Escamillo. She has succeeded in breathing vibrant new life into an opera which can easily become cliché. However that vibrancy, which depends largely on production values, only goes so far. With an occasional exception, the opera contains a set of performances which, while engaging enough, could nevertheless come from any less visually imaginative production.. The new life which Zambello has brought doesn't stretch beyond the gorgeous surface, and the result is an attractive but ultimately slightly shallow Carmen. That said, Kirstin Chávez makes a mightily alluring Carmen, an intelligent portrayal which neither descends to outright sluttishness nor exaggerates the character's unconventional virtues. Hers is a voice full of the requisite Bohemian fire and earthy sex appeal, a velvety mezzo in the same black and scarlet tones as her costumes, and she is disarmingly at ease in the role. As Don José, Rosario La Spina displays improving musical sensitivity, his tendency to shout pleasingly curbed in favour of a subtler approach. Some high passages are still pushed too hard but overall his singing here indicates reassuring artistic progress. Unfortunately, his Don José sounds romantic but doesn't particularly look it, his stilted behaviour towards both Carmen and Micaela showing little evidence of devotion or passion for either. Sarah Crane brings sweet, ringing tone to the innocent Micaela, though she's slightly too soubrettish for the role; Micaela is young, but she has a grave, mature soul which is better reflected by a fuller lyric voice. She's best in her early ensemble scenes; later, her "Je dis que rien ne m'épouvante" is touching and pretty, but rather mercilessly exposed. Baritone Michael Todd Simpson is the suave toréador Escamillo, bringing a slender but elegant voice to the part, though he's done no favours by the theatre's poor acoustics. His is an understated Escamillo; at times this appeals but ultimately it makes him slightly difficult to accept as the local celebrity and dashing thief of Carmen's heart.
Carmen's cohorts Frasquita and Mercédès are sung by soprano Amy Wilkinson and mezzo Sian Pendry respectively, both current members of Young Artists programme. They sing with spirit and style; Pendry in particular shows real promise, displaying the sturdy, colourful voice of a Carmen in the making. Andrew Moran shows impressive vocal command as Moralès, while Shane Lowrencev makes an amusingly lecherous Zuniga. Luke Gabbedy and Graeme Macfarlane are the smugglers Dancaïro and Remendado, at their rascally best in the ensemble "Nous avons en tête une affaire". The Opera Australia chorus is characterful and enthusiastic in the opera's many crowd scenes, taking well-deserved pleasure in the famous Toréador Song. The boys of the remarkably small chorus of urchins (only nine or ten) are likewise a credit to the company. The score of Carmen is one of the best known in the repertory. To maintain interest it needs a conductor who can maintain a lively pace without riding roughshod over the detail. Opera Australia has lavished one of the finest conductors in its stable - Music Director Richard Hickox - upon the piece, and he more or less manages this feat. He starts the overture almost the very second he reaches the podium, and continues to conduct a Carmen at once exciting and familiarly jolly - no shocking turns of orchestral phrase, but no slipping into autopilot either. However, on opening night there was quite a tug of war between Hickox and Chávez regarding tempi, particularly in her Habanera - the only blot on an otherwise smoulderingly beautiful rendition. The issue eventually seemed to resolve itself, though it was difficult to tell who was bent to whose will. Carmen has been an audience favourite for a very long time. Productions such as Zambello's ensure it will remain so for years to come, revitalising the opera's beloved aspects without challenging the assumptions which underlie that adored status. Nevertheless this is a visually remarkable Carmen ultimately let down by dramatic superficiality and thus, while impressive, is never genuinely exceptional. Zambello's Carmen preaches to the choir, offering an array of delights guaranteed to please those who adore the opera already, but likely to leave hungry those in search of psychological depth or a dash of revolution.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Cenerentola - SOH - Jan 18, 2008

2008-01-18T10:06:00.000-08:00

Capturing the magic of La Cenerentola by Sarah Noble
Rossini: La Cenerentola Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 18 January 2008
It's Cinderella, but not as we know it. Rossini's La Cenerentola retains the basic story - the downtrodden and virtuous cinder-girl who enchants a prince and transcends her nasty stepfamily - but excises its supernatural aspects. No transfigured rodents, no pumpkin, no glass slipper and no fairy godmother. Instead, the story is recast to better fit comic opera conventions. Cenerentola/Angelina resembles a less frivolous Rosina, a strong-willed young woman, oppressed by circumstances, but convinced that she can triumph - her opening aria, the simple canzone "Una volta c'era un rè", tells of a king in search of a wife who chose innocence and goodness over pomp and beauty. The accidentally abandoned glass slipper is replaced by a bracelet (one of a pair) which Angelina herself gives to the man she loves, thus taking control of her own destiny. Fairytales from Perrault to Disney abound in truly terrifying evil stepmothers, but Cenerentola has instead a bumbling buffo basso stepfather (ironically named Don Magnifico); her stepsisters are silly, conceited girls but never menacing. Replacing the fairy godmother as deus ex machina is the prince's wise old tutor Alidoro - whose name, literally "wings of gold", acknowledges his magical origins - who oversees a typically opera buffa series of disguises and swapped identities. The Prince (Don Ramiro) switches places with his valet (Dandini). The pure-heared Cenerentola falls for the penniless valet; while the disguised Dandini easily exposes the heartless vanity of the sisters. The fairies, spells and enchanted flora and fauna might be gone, but thanks to Rossini's ever inventive (even if in places self-plagiarised) and sprightly score, and a truly lovely rendering by Opera Australia, the magic is not. Directed by Michael Hampe, with sets and costumes by Reinhard Heinrich, the production finds other ways to bewitch - the stepsisters' preposterously lavish frocks, storybook sets and best of all, a frenzied dash through the storm by a horse and carriage in Gothic silhouette, a coup de théâtre which drew much laughter and applause from the audience. Plenty of magic, too, in the evening's performances. Dominica Matthews, a 2007 Young Artist now taking on her first lead role with the company, is a winning Cenerentola, determined but sweet. Blessed with both a full, fascinating lower register and a bright (if occasionally edgy) top - not to particular brand of agility which Rossini's operas demand - she tackles the role's vocal challenges with verve and clear-voiced beauty, and mostly emerges triumphant. At this early stage of her career, she mightn't yet be prima donna enough to carry the whole show herself; but she certainly shows signs of blossoming into just such a talent.
Don Ramiro is sung by Kanen Breen, one of Opera Australia's more unusual artists - a lyric tenor whose greatest asset is not his voice (appealing but rarely distinctive and occasionally worryingly constricted) but his prodigious gift for physical comedy. With his matinée idol features, he could be the illegitimate operatic offspring of Buster Keaton and Ivor Novello. He certainly makes a wonderfully funny Prince; but the fact remains that it's Prince Charming whom Cinderella falls for, not Prince Great Sense of Humour, and his characterisation, both physical and vocal, could have done with a touch more suavity. If there's a show-stealer in this Cenerentola, it's Joshua Bloom's Dandini. Bloom has already won a Green Room Award for his portrayal of the role, and it's hardly surprising - he's irresistibly, outrageously hilarious, especially when camping it up in Act II to disconcert Don Magnifico. He matches comic brilliance with vocal splendour, an opulent and flexible baritone. David Thelander is disappointingly underpowered as Alidoro; he has some attractive passages but lacks the commanding vocal and physical presence which his role as puppeteer requires. Richard Alexander fares somewhat better as Don Magnifico, but is ultimately too generic, missing the role's abundant opportunities for hilarity. The two stepsisters - one hesitates to call them "ugly" as both look and sound rather pretty - make no such mistake. Taryn Fiebig is a deliciously bright-toned Clorinda, showcasing her none-too-shabby ballet skills in the opening scene, and is well matched by Jacqueline Dark's ebullient mezzo as Tisbe. The men of the Opera Australia chorus are superb as the royal entourage, their singing crisp and precise and their synchronised fawning highly amusing. Maestro Brad Cohen draws a mostly cohesive, idiomatic performance from the AOBO, skilfully balancing overbubbling wit with a strong sense of line and elegance and deftly supporting the singers. Rossini's La Cenerentola mightn't be a fairytale in the strictest sense, but there's little doubt of its power to enchant, and with this smart production and a generally impressive cast, Opera Australia goes a long way toward capturing that magic.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Cenerentola - SOH - Jan 14, 2008

2008-01-14T10:05:00.000-08:00

La Cenerentola

Peter McCallum, reviewer
January 14, 2008

A testament to opera's fidelity to its bel canto roots and its determination never to be taken entirely seriously as an art form.

In some respects it is surprising that Rossini's La Cenerentola continues to be performed at all by major opera companies: the survival of this pantomime work is a testament to opera's fidelity to its bel canto roots and its determination never to be taken entirely seriously as an art form.

When Rossini wrote it in 1817, it was a manifestation of popular escapism from the grimness of post-Napoleonic regimes, and he weaves together unreconstructed enlightenment ideals about clemency and virtuous rulers which were an anachronism in their time and whose contemporary relevance is doubly questionable. It remains an expensive version of the children's fairy story (without pumpkin and slippers) primarily watched by adults who feel it would be a perfect introduction for children if only they could be captured at that crucial point between fidgetiness and rebellion. Few can, but hope springs eternal.

This production gives a young team valuable opportunities in major roles. As Angelina (Cinderella), Dominica Matthews is a promising coloratura mezzo soprano who, in the simple arias of Act I, had warmth without wobble and, in the virtuosic closing show-stopper, Nacqui All'Affanno, had agility and focus throughout the demanding two-octave-plus range over which Rossini asks his singer to skate. Sometimes, there is an element of caution which slightly inhibits the nuance and shaping behind each phrase and occasionally gives an impression of inflexibility but this is a creditable role debut.

Kanen Breen, as the handsome prince, has a penetrating edge to his voice, well suited to comedy, as though he sang everything with a light chuckle, giving his Act II aria Si, Ritrovarla Io Guiro effective precision. In some respects his voice and Matthews's didn't blend at all in the love duet of Act I, though this imparted its own comic charm, like a bean-pole wooing a homely maid.

Taryn Fiebig, as the stepsister Clorinda, had true Rossinian lightness and colour, while Jacqueline Dark (Tisbe) brought warmth to ensembles. Under conductor Brad Cohen, those ensembles were not always together, although the choice of tempos was generally apt.

One recent press advertisement for a children's pantomime proclaimed the educational value of repetitive learning and Rossini's sequences certainly provide plenty of opportunities for that, and perhaps a little more scope for variety and sharply pointed phrasing in the orchestral playing than was exploited here.

Richard Alexander created a fine character role, vocally and dramatically, out of the pompous baron, Don Magnifico.

With fly-in sets and silhouetted shadow plays, this production by Michael Hampe (direction), Reinhard Heinrich (design) and Nigel Levings builds on the artificialities of pantomime and, as a way to give your children expensive tastes, it is certainly recommended.

La Boheme - SOH - Jan 7, 2008

2008-01-07T10:00:00.000-08:00

Kwon creates a precious beauty

Reviewed by Peter McCallum
January 7, 2008

La Boheme, Opera Australia, Opera House, January 4

The Paris of Simon Phillips's production of Puccini's La Boheme is not the sort of Paris you imagine; though, with its cheap accommodation, bad wiring and grimy car parks, it is possibly the one you will get, at least on a modern budget.

His bohemians are generation Y males, who use laptops, do drugs and leave the toilet seat up and, although some of the transposition of 19th-century deprivations to contemporary ones are contrived (burning a print-out of your latest play for warmth doesn't have quite the devil-may-care abandon of burning a handwritten text), the attempt is generally amusing.

However, this is not really the point. As the writer Carl Dahlhaus pointed out, Paris is as much the heroine of Boheme as Mimi. You have to love them both. You have to feel that in the intoxication of the Cafe Momus, that, for a brief moment, the problems of the world and the problems of your love life are inextricably fused and equally solvable. Loving is easy to do in the case of Hye Seoung Kwon's Mimi, who is becoming Opera Australia's patron saint of dying waifs.

But Phillips and the designer, Stephen Curtis, have replaced Paris with an anonymous modern city space overtaken by what Milan Kundera has called the Age of Total Ugliness.

Kwon's voice is still on the small side for this role, but the purity of sound and vowel creates a precious beauty, which sat very well with her fragile characterisation, and she was able to rise to great strength in Act III. In fact it was Acts III and IV that redeemed this performance after a first half that lacked both dramatic and musical passion (despite the efforts of a splendid breakdancer just before the curtain).

As Rodolfo, Aldo Di Toro didn't quite sustain the long lines of the great duet at the end of Act I, with a slight tendency to let the tension out of the voice between phrases, despite an undeniably attractive lightness in all parts of his range.

But in the last two acts, things became both musically and dramatically galvanised and Phillips should be congratulated for finding a way of setting Puccini's difficult final close plausibly without losing impact.

The gen Y males, though uncouth, are splendid, Jose Carbo powerful and suave as Marcello, Jud Arthur, as the dreadlocked drug-dealing philosopher Colline, soberly renunciatory in the Act IV coat song, and Warwick Fyfe intense as the burning-eyed musician Schaunard. Amelia Farrugia's Musetta was vocally bright and involving in the second and final acts, although cluttered direction deprived her vocally fine Quando M'en Vo Soletta in Act II of seductiveness, pushing it towards meretricious parody, to which John Bolton Wood (Benoit and Alcindoro) was a willing fall guy.

The conductor, Giovanni Reggioli, allowed musical lines to float with an instinctive ear for dramatic pace and the result from the orchestra was well-shaped and rewarding despite occasional weaknesses, particularly in the woodwind.

La Bohème - SOH - 4 January 2008

2008-01-04T09:57:00.000-08:00

Contemporary, but comfortable and suitably tragic by Sarah Noble
Puccini: La bohème Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 4 January 2008
Updating operas isn't necessarily a risky business; there are ways of playing it safe. Simon Phillips' production of Puccini's La bohème, which opened Opera Australia's 2008 season, does just this. The sets and costumes are recognisably, and at times even surprisingly, modern-day - Rodolfo writes his poem on a laptop, the crowd around Café Momus includes a breakdancer in gold lurex, and the reunion of Mimi and Rodolfo takes place amid dumpsters and wheelie bins. Within his contemporary frame, though, Phillips does little to court controversy. Having recontextualised the action, he more or less lets it be, and the core theme of the opera - the blossoming of love and friendship in conditions of extreme poverty - is left unmeddled with. Other than their clothes and lodgings, there's little about Rodolfo's and Mimi's behaviour and interaction that reflects the modern setting, though Marcello's and Musetta's tempestuous relationship is slightly more twenty-first century. The poet Rodolfo is sung with silky legato and bright, compact tone by tenor Aldo Di Toro. His is an appealingly understated performance, responding well to the lyrical expansiveness of the score but resisting melodramatic vocal gestures. This occasionally means he's swallowed up in the orchestra, but when his own musical climaxes arrive, such as at Mimi's death, the contrast is all the more powerful. Hye Seoung Kwon brings a pretty, girlish (if at times too vibrato-laden) sound and sweet stage presence to Mimi, but both voice and characterisation lack depth; this will no doubt come as Kwon, whose career is still in relative infancy, has time to settle into the role and put her own stamp upon it. There was stagey affection but little palpable chemistry between the couple, though this may simply have been down to opening night jitters.
Chemistry aplenty, however, came from the opera's other couple, the fiery, on-again off-again pairing of Marcello and Musetta. José Carbo is in towering form as the former, his rich, expressive baritone dominating his every scene and easily filling the house. Amelia Farrugia brings wit, humanity and sparkling tone to Musetta. Jud Arthur is a sonorous yet playful Colline, touching in his brief aria, a farewell to his treasured overcoat. Warwick Fyfe's Schaunard suffered initially from rather muddy diction and breathy delivery but shortly blossomed into a winning and humorous performance. John Bolton Wood brings every ounce of his buffo basso expertise to bear in his two brilliant cameos, as the grouchy landlord Benoit and then as Musetta's baffled sugar-daddy, Alcindoro. The Opera Australia chorus is in typically excellent form, adding real energy and fun to the Act II crowd scene. Maestro Giovanni Reggioli leads the AOBO through a sprightly and atmospheric rendering of Puccini's score. Rodolfo and Mimi might be an iconic couple, but La bohème is in its essence an ensemble piece. Opera Australia has put together an cast who work well together, a combination of old hands and relative debutantes. Set against the backdrop of Simon Phillips' affectionate modernisation, this La bohème while not madly passionate, is nevertheless heartwarming and quietly tragic. This is a contemporary but comfortable La bohème; and whether that's a blessing or a bit of a disappointment depends entirely on your point of view.
Text © Sarah Noble Photos © Branco Gaica

Juditha Triumphans - Pinchgut - Dec 8, 2007

2007-12-08T14:26:00.000-08:00

Pinchgut Opera presents
Vivaldi’s Juditha Triumphans
Sung in Latin with English surtitles
Venue: City Recital Hall Angel Place, Sydney
Written by Eliza Eggler

Saturday, 08 December 2007

‘Judith was left alone in the tent, with Holofernes stretched out on the bed, for he was overcome with wine … she went up to the post at the end of the bed, above Holofernes’ head, and took down his sword that hung there. She came close to the bed and took hold of the hair of his head, and said: ‘Give me strength this day, O Lord God of Israel!’ And she struck his neck twice with all her might, and severed his head from his body.’ The Book of Judith 13:9

Italy 1617, a red haired Italian priest by the name of Antonio Vivaldi is commissioned by his employer at the Ospedale della Pieta to write an oratorio in celebration of Venice’s victory over the Turks. He takes as his subject matter the biblical story of Judith, a story that draws parallels to a Venice under threat from Turkish invasion; as a result, ‘Juditha Triumphans’ is born.

Australia 2007, Pinchgut Opera presents this little-known work at the City Recital Hall in Sydney for four performances only and draws it’s own parallels between the biblical story and contemporary political struggles. Religious persecution, military domination and the clash of cultures are themes that resonate strongly today. By creating a hybrid world of modernity and antiquity, director Mark Gaal has created an extremely relevant piece of theatre. Who would have thought this possible with a 400 year old oratorio sung in Latin!

‘Juditha Triumphans’ is full of the most glorious vocal and orchestral music and conductor Attilio Cremonesi (also a Venetian) lovingly coaxes the very best from his musicians and singers. The Orchestra of the Antipodes is situated in front of the stage allowing the audience to feel closer to the music making process and to marvel at the curious array of early music instruments; the chalumeau (predecessor of the clarinet) and the theorbo (a variation of the lute) are particularly interesting.

The singers perform on a very small stage consisting of some stairs, scaffolding and various props, and despite the lack of space, the stage convincingly transforms itself into the enemy camp of the Assyrians, the town of Bethulia, and Holofernes’ tent where Judith beheads the Assyrian general.

Sally-Anne Russell sings the title role of Judith and I can’t praise her enough. Not only does she have a glorious voice, she is also a convincing actress. Her voice is capable of beautiful legato and pianissimo singing as well as more dramatic tones, and on several occasions you could have heard a pin drop, so mesmerizing was she. Her performance of ‘Veni, Veni me sequere fida’, which also features Craig Hill on the soprano chalumeau, is a highlight of the evening. The culmination of Judith’s emotional journey in the oratorio occurs when she beheads Holofernes and Miss Russell's portrayal of this struggle is thrilling. Red light floods the stage as Judith decapitates her admirer and the oppressor of her people, blood splashing across her dress; the effect is chilling and realistic and is the most effective murder scene I have witnessed in an opera.

Counter tenor David Walker (Holofernes) has a beautiful warm voice and his performance on opening night, although somewhat tentative at first, became more confident as the evening progressed. Although he is the evildoer of the piece, he presents a not completely inhuman character and this works well as it makes Judith’s struggle with her grim task easier to believe.

Fiona Campbell who plays Vagaus (Holofernes’ aide) is also a singer of outstanding ability and her performance of ‘Umbrae carae’ is incredibly beautiful. This is soon followed by the aria ‘Armatae face’ which she sings after discovering the beheading of Holofernes. Although the aria is full of difficult coloratura, Miss Campbell performs with ease and apparent lack of concern for the obvious technical difficulties; the audience was rightly impressed and showed their appreciation with a generous round of applause.

Sara Macliver sings Abra, Judith’s companion, and Renae Martin, Ozias. Both of these singers perform with confidence and vocal beauty.

Juditha Triumphans is not an oratorio that provides extensive opportunities for the chorus. However, the six choruses that do appear in ‘Juditha Triumphans’ are sung by Cantillation with their usual ease and glorious lightness of tone.

Pinchgut Opera’s performance of ‘Juditha Triumphans’ is a splendid opportunity to see and hear a rare work performed by wonderful musicians and singers. If you appreciate beautiful singing then this is definitely for you. Don’t miss out though because unfortunately there are only three performances left and I dare say that ‘Juditha Triumphans’ won’t be performed again in Sydney for some time to come.

Pictured - Sally-Anne Russell. Photo - Bridget Elliot

Alcina - State Theatre, Melbourne - December 3, 2007

2007-12-03T09:45:00.000-08:00

Alcina

John Slavin, Reviewer
December 3, 2007

This is a cast that brings freshness and youth with crisp techniques.

Handel's opera is a fairy tale about a sorceress, Alcina (Rachelle Durkin), who casts a spell on all who come within her ambit and when she tires of these lovers she transforms them into animals or statues. The opera was designed to combine long displays of da capo singing to show off vocal techniques, spectacular stage effects suited to the sorceress's magical interventions, and tangled plots so complicated that they would make daytime soap operas look straightforward.

Director Justin Way and designers Andrew Hays and Kimm Kovac have devised a fixed set: an ornamental baroque frame encrusted with Alcina's victims. It is as exciting as a visit to the British Museum and places a heavy hand on the live action, which seems too in danger of being petrified.

In order to alleviate this effect, Way creates a back projection that plays games with perspective. At one stage we seem to be staring down at Gericault's Raft of the Medusa from above, all squirming naked bodies. At other times a black-clad chorus of demons crawls across music scores and newspapers like ants at a picnic. This device makes the set visually busy but nothing dramatic is happening, and apparently sensing this the director throws one idea after another at the screen to avoid dullness only to see it immediately discarded.

There is no magic in the concept, and sensuality - which is the opera's central concern - has as much chance on this set as a cup of tea at the Windsor acting as an aphrodisiac.

That leaves the music. There are beautiful arias in the score, many of them elegiac laments for unrequited or betrayed love. Orchestra Victoria produces some exquisite support, particularly among the solo accompaniments, but I thought that conductor Antony Walker's tempo often took the music at a walking pace that disadvantaged the singers' slower phrasing.

As Bradamante, a girl who disguises herself as a man to rescue her brother Ruggiero, Alexandra Sherman doesn't seem comfortable in the pants role. It is a difficult part to sing, requiring distinct changes of style to imply the transfer of gender, but her timbre was challenged by her lower chest notes. Catherine Carby showed vocal dash and she caught the right nobility of tone as Ruggiero overcomes bewitchment in the name of a higher love.

The performance of the evening was Durkin's Alcina. She sang the difficult coloratura with vocal panache and good articulation, although the characterisation lacked shade and her attempts to be seductive were as ephemeral as a butterfly.

Of the other principals the singing is good but not great - and Handel's operas, in many cases creaking antiques, require memorable singing. This is a cast that brings freshness and youth with crisp techniques but a lack of depth in interpretation that creates few thrills in spite of the multiple trills.

Les pêcheurs de perles - Opera Australia

2007-11-26T09:41:00.000-08:00

Bringing back a sense of spectacle

(Myer Music Bowl - Melbourne)
John Slavin, Reviewer
November 26, 2007

Tenor Kanen Breen was busy last week. On Wednesday he played three distinctly different comic roles in Opera Australia's Tales of Hoffmann. And on Friday night he sang the role of Nadir, the hero of The Pearlfishers, an exhausting lyric tenor role that includes the duet In the depths of the temple, with his friend and mentor Zurga (Lucas de Jong).

This was a free performance, enthusiastically received by more than 12,000 people. Breen has a steely but sure sound and sang with intense poetic feeling.

The opera was voted last year by ABC listeners as their most operatic work. It is performed more often in Australia than in any other country and it is easy to see why.

While Nadir and Zurga harbour a secret passion for the Brahmin priestess Leila (Hye Seoung Kwon), they are also blood brothers and Zurga's feelings for Nadir - even in betrayal - are clearly more than platonic. This is an opera about betrayed mateship.

I initially thought that Hye Seoung Kwon's Leila was sweet but reedy. But I was wrong. She was mastering being miked. Her performance revealed an exquisite and fragile artistry, underlining beautiful articulation and intelligent phrasing.

There are anomalies in staging a full production in the Music Bowl. Ann-Margret Pettersson's original production reworks the traditional libretto. In her interpretation, Zurga becomes a French administrator in India and notions of colonial power are introduced into the fairytale. But outdoors, such complexities are largely lost because of the distance from the stage. Matters are further complicated by subtitled screens on either end of the Bowl.

The effect is screen versus stage, image versus music, drama versus spectacle. You can't do subtle stage effects or explore complex interpretations.

Nevertheless, it was the perfect Melbourne celebration of the cosmopolitan and the popular. Orchestra Victoria played with lyrical passion under Emmanuel Joel-Hornak and the full moon drifted above, right on cue.

Don Giovanni - State Theatre, November 16, 2007

2007-11-16T09:55:00.000-08:00

Tahu Rhodes irresistible as the Don

John Slavin, Reviewer
November 16, 2007

Teddy Tahu Rhodes in the title role of Mozart's Don Giovanni, and Taryn Fiebig as Zerlina in the Opera Australia production.
Photo: Branco Gaica

DON GIOVANNI
Mozart, Opera Australia, State Theatre,
November 14 - December 14.
Running time: 180 minutes with one interval.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's opera describes itself as a comic drama.

There are delightful opera buffo moments such as the scene when the Don (Teddy Tahu Rhodes) persuades his put-upon servant, Leporello (John Pringle), to swap identities so that he can seduce the maid of Donna Elvira (Fiona Janes). But even here the action slips into cruel deception as the Don takes the opportunity to half-beat his rival for the sexual favours of Zerlina (Tiffany Speight) to death. Mozart and his librettist, Lorenzo da Ponte, were creating something more subtle than a night's entertainment.

The drama splits neatly into two halves. Act One presents the Don as a philanderer who leaves in his wake a trail of dumped lovers. Nothing and no one can stop his erotic trajectory. Like a jungle predator Tahu Rhodes' seducer sniffs the flesh of the women to whom he is attracted. His persistent sexual urge suggests he is a vampire of the senses. In Act Two this production appropriately transforms him into a flower-crowned incarnation of Dionysius, god of intoxication and illusion. Erotic frenzy blurs reality so identities are destabilised. His vengeful victims owe him a vote of thanks because the Don brings passion and meaning in the form of revenge to their dull conformity.

The original set of director Goran Jarvefelt and designer Carl Friedrich Oberle is austere to the point of minimalism, a neo-classical hall, which also serves as a street. The empty space places the emphasis squarely on dramatic interpretation and its limits are pushed beyond redemption in the finale.

The supporting cast is perfectly adequate. Kate Ladner's Donna Anna has a fresh lyric soprano and is good at dramatising the circumstances of her rape but the role requires a much bigger dramatic voice. Janes sings Donna Elvira tastefully but brings no sense of anger or unrequited passion. In the thankless role of Don Ottavio, Jaewoo Kim is sweet and flaccid when compared with the Don's vitality. At the end of a distinguished career John Pringle has reached that level where artistry papers over fault lines in the upper register.

These characters are dragged in the slipstream of Tahu Rhodes' Don Giovanni. Resplendent in Errol Flynn costume and black wig, Tahu Rhodes affects a swarthy swagger that is matched by a thrilling dark baritone, which can bury its power sotto voce in scenes of seduction. He brilliantly underlines the various facets of the character and at the climax when confronted by his nemesis, the Commendatore (Jud Arthur), he attains titanic defiance.

It is a superb performance that stands out from the cast and overcomes the rather benign beat of conductor Imre Pallo.

No woman I know can resist the sex appeal of Tahu Rhodes and this is the perfect role for his dynamic talent.

Don Giovanni - State Theatre, Melbourne - November 14, 2007

2007-11-14T09:47:00.000-08:00

Don Giovanni
State Theatre, Melbourne; Opera Australia
Wednesday, November 14, 2007.
Opening Night Performance.
Review by JOSEPHINE GILES.

If Don Giovanni were written today it might look a lot like Californication, but the Don would make David Duchovny’s character look like a wimp. In Spain alone Don Giovanni has racked up 1003 conquests and is still counting...

Don Giovanni is not an opera for the faint hearted, coming in at just over 3 hours, but it contains lots of fabulous music, and has a surprisingly contemporary story. Though this production is flawed in places, it is well worth seeing for the stellar performances of the two major principal males.

As Don Giovanni baritone Teddy Tahu Rhodes is outstanding as he makes the role his own. He is opera’s version of the triple threat: he can sing, act and has a great bod – which is just as well, as this particular production has his character appearing in various stages of undress. Tahu Rhodes’s voice is at turns richly menacing or sweetly seductive, and he brings a commanding physicality to his portrayal of the testosterone ruled, morally bankrupt Don.

“As everyone knows, the opera is really about Leporello”, said OA Chief Executive Adrian Collette as he introduced John Pringle at the after party. In this case, he wasn’t joking. John Pringle’s performance of the most put upon servant of the Don is one of the last appearances he will make in opera, as he is soon to retire from the stage. He makes the most of every moment on stage, exploiting the comic potential of the role to the full, and his enjoyment and rapport with Tahu Rhodes lifts the whole show. It is definitely the best Leporello I have ever seen.

The casting of the female principals is less successful, with the exception of Tiffany Speight as Zerlina, who can be relied upon to please in the Mozart subrette roles. As Donna Anna, Kate Ladner was dramatically convincing but, on the night, lacked the vocal stamina that this fiendishly difficult role demands.

The role of Donna Elvira happens to be one of my favourites, and while she is often played as a comical love sick fool, she is in my opinion a good portrait of the sort of madness that can possess a woman when she is obsessed by a charismatic, abusive man. Alternately angry then forgiving, her conflicted feelings are expressed in outbursts with a spiky vocal line that requires a soprano with an exciting top. In this production Fiona Janes’s fine mezzo quality was pleasing, but ultimately incongruous in the opera.

The one tenor role, Don Ottavio, was filled more than ably by Jaewoo Kim. It is a thankless role, as the character fruitlessly tries to capture the attention of the hysterical Anna, but Kim has a beautiful lyric tenor and was almost heroic in the aria Il mio tesoro. And bass Jud Arthurs cuts a fine figure as the Commendatore.

This production of Don Giovanni has been in the OA repertoire for some time, and its age is beginning to show. It contains a number of, to my taste, gratuitous gestures to “sexiness”, but in general maintains a good pace throughout, culminating in a powerful denouement. Opening night was hampered by too many tempo disagreements between the stage and pit, which may well account for some of the uneasiness from the girls, but I trust these problems will be resolved during the run of the season.

Tannhäuser - Sydney Opera House - 16 October 2007

2007-10-16T09:20:00.000-07:00

A peculiarly comic affair by Sandra Bowdler
Wagner: Tannhäuser Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 16 October 2007
Director Elke Neidhardt is fond of finding the jokes in Wagner, yes, including Parsifal, with synchronised swimming flower maidens in Adelaide in 2001. In this Opera Australia production which dates originally to 1998, the penchant for hilarity might be thought to be carried to excess, although there are many who think Wagner deserves to be ridiculed. If that is the case however why bother with his operas at all? It is one of the problems of performing Wagnerian opera in the post-WW II environment, that to take it too seriously courts cries of Nazi sympathies, yet as operas they are works which must be performed with some concept of their worth to make any sense of them at all. In the present instance, the chorus in Act III, is sung by the returning pilgrims holding jolly plastic bags with I 'love' Roma on them, indicating the frivolous state of religion in the Holy City, and Neidhardt refers to Wagner's "tongue-in-cheek ... treatment of the self-righteous pilgrims" in Act I; but if the pilgrims' repentance is not treated seriously in Act III, why should we care for Tannhäuser's distress at being rejected? On other occasions, the jollity is less jarring. At the conclusion of Act I, the Landgrave and his party appear kitted up in Prussian hunting outfits - Tyrolean hats, plus fours and so on, and indulge in a picnic, with teams of dachshunds escorted onto the stage just before the Act II curtain. But perhaps only a German-born director could really get away with this. In many other respects it is a stunning production, most notably during the overture. Wagner specifies an emerald-green waterfall, and here we have a brilliant effect, created by laser lighting, of an emerald-green surface, both watery and misty, through which figures emerge and sink. These gradually emerge as a variety of characters who would not be out of place in a Berlin cabaret, including a mock nun, a representation of a plastic blow-up sex doll, and an ichthyphallic little old cherub, who emerges (detumescent) in Act II, representing Tannhäuser's continued carnal desires. Venus is a strapping figure in black, trimmed with fur (refer Sacher-Masoch, of course), but poor Tannhäuser suffers under a hideously unflattering orange wig. Elisabeth's outfit is also somewhat peculiar, a red frock one might have imagined more appropriate to Venus, were it not for the inset polka-dotted train; and why does she first appear with a trench coat over this? The minstrels' court is however very effectively rendered, with rows of galleries for the court denizens. There are a number of winged figures which I first took to be Prussian eagles, but they could equally be bats or science-fiction insect creatures, and which perch around the set at different times. It is probably the merest literal-mindedness to expect the Pope's staff to actually burst into green leaves, but gold does not seem to be quite right. Musically, there was much to enjoy, although great vocalism was rather at a premium. Opera Australia's artistic director Richard Hickox is not especially known as a Wagnerian, but he did a sterling job, with orchestral playing following the surging rhythms of the work's architecture with disciplined lushness. The Opera Australia chorus was equally excellent, with a rousing Pilgrim's Chorus sung with a seriousness at odds with the directorial conceit. The most gorgeous sounds of the night came from Janice Watson's Elisabeth, her large but warm soprano matching her dramatic involvement. Milijana Nikolic was called in at short notice to replace an ailing Bernadette Cullen for this season; her height and imperious manner are perfect for Venus, as is her equally large and accurate mezzo. The title role was sung by Richard Berkeley-Steele, a seasoned English Wagnerian who nonetheless seemed vocally ill at ease in the first two acts (that wig can't have helped). His intonation and tone seemed to firm up in the last (wigless) act however, and his last soliloquy was lyrical and moving. Jonathan Summers as Wolfram was somewhat lacking in charisma, but he also rose to the vocal occasion in Act III, singing smoothly and with feeling. The Landgrave was sung with resonant authority by bass Daniel Sumegi, always an impressive performer. Wagner operas will no doubt always be a difficult proposition for a modern audience, particularly in Australia which has not had a strong tradition of performing this repertoire. Neidhardt's sublime and triumphant Adelaide Ring cycle did much to raise the Wagnerian stakes in this country, and it is interesting to see one of her earlier conceptions; if it does not match the glories of her Ring, it certainly points the way towards it.
Text © Sandra Bowdler

Les Contes d'Hoffmann - SOH - 15 October 2007

2007-10-15T09:31:00.000-07:00

Entertaining if not totally compelling by Sandra Bowdler
Offenbach: Les Contes d'Hoffmann Opera Australia Sydney Opera House 15 October 2007
Opera Australia's new production of The Tales of Hoffmann is an enjoyable exploration of the macabre and grotesque aspects of Offenbach's last operatic work, if somewhat at the expense of its romantic side. It provides an excellent vehicle for current star Emma Matthews in (as relentlessly advertised) all four soprano roles, not to mention other cast members in equally diverse parts, particularly John Wegner as Lindorf, Coppélius, Dapertutto and Dr Miracle, veteran Australian baritone John Pringle as Luther, Spalenzani and Crespel, and Kanen Breen as Nathanael, Cochenille, Pittichanaccio and Frantz. Director Stuart Maunder has generated a highly effective if somewhat (by contemporary standards) literal production, although one does wonder about the current OA obsession with mirrors. It opens with a twinkling starry background in which La Muse appears as an exaggeratedly tall figure in tiered skirt with white bodice top, from which she transmogrifies into a trousered Nicklausse. The scene is converted efficiently into an inn with the deployment of tables and the descent of a bank of lights which serves as the back setting of a bar. The Olympia scene is introduced by a revolve, revealing what one can imagine a 19th century mad scientist's laboratory might have looked like, with body parts hanging from hooks (failed experiments? spare parts for continuing creations?). To spark up the faltering doll however a distinctly 20th century defibrillator is pressed into service. A further revolve is used to take us to Giulietta's scene; comment has been made about Maunder's decision to place this before the Antonia episode, which may not have been Offenbach's intention, but both arrangements have dramatic advantages. This is a sumptuous if rather predictable Venetian ball affair, with Giulietta in red languishing in a gondola. After the interval, Antonia's domicile is dominated by a grand piano covered with a shawl. In a stunning coup de théâtre, her mother arises from the centre of the piano, to throw off the shawl and emerge as a dominating baleful figure. A last revolve returns us to the inn, with the final chorus looming from the upper balcony. Richard Hickox conducts Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra, with the Opera Australia Chorus, in this repertoire in which all seem to feel comfortably at home. All the well-known set pieces are delivered with flowing and melodic ease, with appropriately dramatic highlights. The soloists are all equal to the task, and some more so. Emma Matthews is predictably brilliant as the doll, Olympia. Both musically and dramatically, Les oiseaux dans la charmille is a perfect fit for her equally sparkling (and note perfect) coloratura and stage presence. It might be suggested that she is indeed just too warm and sparky for a mechanical creation, but of course we are seeing her through Hoffmann's magic spectacles. Her Giulietta was appropriately seductive, but Antonia was a real tour de force (and in this sense justifying the positioning of this scene), evoking empathy for the artist's plight while singing with precision and control. She was ably matched by a charismatic Milijana Nikolic as Antonia's mother, singing demonically but fluently in a rich accurate mezzo. Another mezzo, Pamela Helen Stephen, also scored a success as Hoffmann's Muse and companion Nicklausse. Her more restrained tones and subtle yet commanding presence provided a dignified observer of and commentator on, and finally solution to, Hoffmann's tribulations. Rosario La Spina has the right kind of lyric tenor for Hoffmann, capable of ringing tones as in the legend of Kleinsach. If Hoffmann's struggles are interpreted as the romantic soul finally finding its proper outlet in his artistic creativity, La Spina's interpretation fell somewhat short of this goal, suggesting someone who is a more of a blundering loser, falling victim to one manifestation of wickedness after another. These manifestations were well depicted by John Wegner, a delightfully Mephistophelian figure with commanding resonant tones, even if his intonation wandered a bit, as in Scintille diamant. John Pringle was equally adept at his multiple characterisations, even if his elegant baritone is not quite what it once was. Tenor Kanen Breen is one of the most entertaining and versatile singers in the OA stable, and he made the most of the comic possibilities of his roles. Mention should also be made of the reliable Richard Alexander's Schlemil. The Tales of Hoffmann is, as far as its narrative and sensibilities go, an odd fish for contemporary Australian audiences. After the rapturous applause for Matthew's Olympia aria, the audience seemed rather less engaged; there is, perhaps inevitably, a sense of anticlimax at Hoffmann's final indifference to his erstwhile beloved. This production manages to maintain sufficient momentum to sustain interest to the end, and the company is definitely playing to its artistic strengths, in providing an entertaining if not totally compelling night at the opera.
Text © Sandra Bowdler

Les Contes d'Hoffmann - Sydney Opera House le 15 octobre 2007

2007-10-15T09:24:00.000-07:00


Jacques Offenbach (1819-1880) Les Contes d'Hoffmann Opéra fantastique en un prologue, trois actes et un épilogue (1881) Livret de Jules Barbier d’après le drame de Jules Barbier et Michel Carré Mise en scène, Stuart Maunder Décors, Roger Kirk Lumières, Nigel Levings Chorégraphies, Elisabeth Hill Olympia, Giulietta, Antonia et Stella : Emma Matthews Hoffmann : Rosario La Spina Lindorf, Coppélius, Dappertutto et Docteur Miracle : John Wegner Luther, Spalanzani, Crespel : John Pringle Nathanael, Colchenille, Pittichinaccio, Frantz : Kanen Breen La Muse, Nicklausse : Pamela Helen Stephen La Mère d’Antonia: Milijana Nikolic Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra Direction musicale, Richard Hickox Opera Australia Chorus Chef de Choeur, Michael Black Opera Theatre, Sydney Opera House le 15 octobre 2007
Hoffmann aux antipodes Monter un opéra français à l’autre bout du monde, avec une distribution en grande partie locale et non francophone, une gageure… Pourtant ce spectacle démontre que ce genre de pari n’est pas perdu d’avance ! Les impressions premières n’étaient pourtant pas très encourageantes... Pas de distribution disponible au guichet de vente, aucun problème pour obtenir des places pour le spectacle le soir même, et ce quelle que soit la catégorie demandée… Confirmation lorsque l’on pénètre dans la belle salle toute revêtue de bois sombre… elle est un bon quart vide ! Cette faible affluence s’explique-t-elle par le fait qu’il s’agissait de la dernière représentation de la série ou qu’il s’agissait d’un opéra chanté en français ? Chanté en français, c’est d’ailleurs vite dit ! Non pas que la prononciation des chanteurs soit particulièrement défectueuse… non, non, le français chanté ce soir, bien que parfois un peu exotique, est dans l’ensemble bien intelligible, démontrant une très bonne préparation de l’ensemble de l’équipe (1). Non, la principale surprise arrive dès les premiers mots de la muse, « I am the muse »… Si le chant est bien en VO, tous les dialogues sont eux en anglais ! Compréhensible pour un public anglophone (2), ce procédé ne manque pas d’être perturbant pour un auditeur francophone. La version des Contes présentée est une version « traditionnelle », avec coupures habituelles, mais qui replace l’acte de Venise entre Olympia et Antonia. Les décors sont simples et traditionnels (3), mais esthétiques grâce notamment à une lumière soignée, chaque tableau ayant sa couleur dominante. La mise en scène de Stuart Maunder oscille elle entre le réussi et le moins abouti. Dans le camp des bonnes idées, on citera le fait d’avoir traité tous les personnages dans l’acte d’Olympia comme des êtres créés par Spalanzani, sortes de créatures de Frankenstein composant un ballet grotesque autour de la poupée. On ne pourra cependant s’empêcher de remarquer que le traitement de la chanson de Kleinzach ressemble de façon troublante à la mise en scène de Carsen à l’Opéra de Paris… Richard Hickox est certainement un des artisans principaux de la réussite de cette soirée. Sa direction musicale élégante et son attention constante aux chanteurs enchantent. Et le chant me direz-vous ? Que vaut cette distribution composée en majorité de chanteurs « maison » ? Le Hoffmann de Rosario La Spina étonne par une émission assez peu homogène : la voix semble un peu forcée sur toute la tessiture, à l’exception des aigus puissants et libérés. Le chanteur est cependant capable de nuances, et campe au final un Hoffmann très solide mais qui sait émouvoir. Peu de chanteuses osent incarner toutes les femmes d’Hoffmann. Le pari d’Emma Matthews est donc courageux. Cette soprano inconnue en Europe a pour le moment consacré sa carrière à sa seule Australie natale. La voix est d’essence légère (c’est une Lakmé, une Sophie…), ce qui rend son incarnation de Giulietta peu convaincante : la tessiture plus grave la gêne visiblement et elle est souvent couverte par l’orchestre. Dans ces conditions, la barcarolle passe ainsi presque inaperçue. La chanteuse est heureusement plus à son aise dans les autres actes. On a déjà vu des Olympia plus débridées vocalement (4), mais la poupée n’en est pas moins pleinement convaincante, lorgnant là encore vers une vision nymphomane « alla Carsen ». C’est cependant en Antonia qu’elle a semblé la plus libérée, délivrant un trio final avec sa mère et le Docteur Miracle très émouvant. Seul chanteur non australien, l’allemand John Wegner est également l’élément le moins convaincant du spectacle. Rien d’indigne ici encore, mais des aigus tirés, des graves légèrement charbonneux. Mais on regrette surtout une incarnation du méchant un peu sommaire, le chanteur se contentant du recours à l’aboiement comme seule caractérisation. La muse/Nicklausse de Pamela Helen Stephen est charmant mais on sent la chanteuse un peu bridée par une tessiture un rien trop grave pour elle. Enfin terminons par un grand coup de cœur ! Un français absolument impeccable, une grande aisance scénique, une capacité impressionnante à contrefaire sa voix… Bref Kanen Breen est la découverte du spectacle. Il arrive même à faire exister le pâle Pittichinaccio dans l’acte de Giulietta. Il va sans dire que la chanson de Frantz est hilarante dans ces conditions et accueillie par une ovation. Hoffmann n’aura donc pas trop souffert du décalage horaire et l’on est heureux de constater que la France ne brille pas seulement à l’étranger par ses marques de luxe ou sa cuisine : l’opéra français lui aussi s’exporte très bien ! Antoine BRUNETTO Notes (1) Une certaine « Marie-Claire » est créditée dans le programme… (2) Les dialogues s’éloignent d’ailleurs de la version française, étant davantage explicatifs. (3) Un voile rouge, une gondole et un grand miroir central suffisent pour camper le décor de l’Acte de Giulietta. (4) Pas de suraigus stratosphériques notamment que certaines titulaires du rôle aiment à rajout

Tannhauser - October 10, 2007

2007-10-10T09:21:00.000-07:00

Tannhauser

Peter McCallum, reviewer
October 10, 2007

Opera Australia's subverted Wagner is a triumph of theatre.

Richard Berkeley-Steele as Tannhauser.
Photo: Anthony Johnson

First a note about the birthday boys and girls. Were the Australian Opera and Ballet Orchestra really to play music that reflected their current situation in the Opera House pit, they would play nothing but Scene III of Wagner's Das Rheingold, where enslaved heavy metalsmiths, excluded from air, light and human comfort, ceaselessly hammer out priceless objects from gold ore.

On this occasion, the 40th anniversary of their founding as the Elizabethan Trust Orchestra in 1967, the ore they were given was an earlier though no less demanding Wagner score, Tannhauser, but the hammering, under Richard Hickox, was more than usually effective, particularly in the smooth, well-tuned woodwind and brass chords of the overture and the energised string playing at the beginning of Act II. No less resplendent was the chorus, who were exhilarating in the pilgrims' chorus at the close. Hickox's tempos were firm but occasionally they could have tolerated more space and flexibility to allow light, shade and detail to emerge more distinctly.

Wagner would have hated Elke Neidhardt's productions for the way they subvert his grandiosity and self-mythologising. I love them and would go further to say that after the unfortunate nazification of Wagner's obnoxious (but in his case not genocidal) anti-semitism, subversion is one of the few honourable routes.

The tour de force of subversion is in the second act where the hall for the song competition is grandly assembled but plagued by marvellous human bats and a sordid cupid representing lust, whose revoltingly comic phallus is strangely resistant to the refractory detumescence that normally afflicts human males unassisted by chemicals.

The opening scene, performed by wonderful, freakily dressed dancers on and through a virtual, laser-generated platform of smoke and air, is a brilliant coup de theatre. But Neidhardt's setting of this scene stressed debauchery over seductive sensuality, which for me was a failing.

Richard Berkeley-Steele's Tannhauser, with flaming red hair and school sports jacket, was, as my companion remarked, reminiscent of one of the more wilful manifestations of Dr Who, and the brilliantly precise edge and clarity that he brought to his singing fleshed this out nicely in musical terms. However, the first moment of truly glorious vocal outpouring came in Act II from Janice Watson as the angelic, forsaken Elizabeth, with a voice of powerful, glowing warmth.

Milijana Nikolic, stepping in at short notice, sang Venus with colour, force and imperiousness. Jonathan Summers was popular as Wolfram von Eschenbach, though I found the sound not quite smooth and suave enough for the famous Song of the Evening Star in Act III. As Hermann, Daniel Sumegi blended vocal power with Neidhardt's delicate lacings of hypocrisy in the characterisation. Wagner would not have been proud. Opera Australia can be.

Tales of Hoffmann - SOH - September 3, 2007

2007-09-03T09:32:00.000-07:00

Tales of Hoffmann,

Opera Australia,

Sydney Opera House

Peter McCallum
September 3, 2007

OFFENBACH's Tales of Hoffmann is early German Romanticism reflected through late French decadence: a picture of someone taking themselves too seriously by someone who never took anything seriously enough. As Offenbach scholar (and Opera Australia chorus member) Robert Mitchell points out in a program essay, the ill-fated 19th century writer, Hoffmann, represents the spirit of art-for-art's-sake.

Offenbach, on the other hand, represents artifice for artifice's sake and hints that the difference isn't all that great. This energised production nods to both fantasy and opulence but is dominated by arresting cool modernism.

At times this lends an edge to both while elsewhere, the monumentality of Roger Kirk's set - the revolving stage, the imposing diagonal slabs and the cantilevered mirrors (perhaps it is time Opera Australia productions swore off mirrors for a while) - seemed pointless, though in Offenbach, the point is to make everything pointless.

Jules Barbier's libretto adapts three of Hoffmann's stories into a futile Faustian search by Hoffmann as he seeks love from an automaton, a courtesan, and an ailing singer before reconciling himself to poetry and drink. Emma Matthews (pictured) is triumphant in the three heroine - or antiheroine - roles.

She created a parody of her own technical accomplishments as the mechanical Olympia in the Doll Song, soared magnificently as the courtesan Giulietta in the septet of Act II, but was most impressive as Antonia where she sang with the sweeping expressive depth that grows more and more in her singing. She introduces colour and warmth to a phrase and sustains and varies it to give the melody buoyancy and life.

As Hoffmann, Rosario La Spina tamed his stentorian tenor voice to grapple with the sophisticated needs of melodic shape, achieving new-found lyricism in the duets with Antonia in Act III and in the final trio.

John Wegner with widow's peak and vocal incisiveness was demonically forceful in the three Mephist-ophelian roles. It is not that the Devil gets the best tunes but Wegner gives him the most interesting persona.

Pamela Helen Stephen, as the trusted companion, Nicklausse, has the refinement and melodic instincts for the style, retaining stamina to open out wonderfully in the third act.

True to the Paris comic tradition, the work is interspliced with spoken dialogue in which John Pringle, as the inventor, Spalanzani, and the father Crespel, was the most convincing.

The chorus work was vividly impressive, particularly in the surround sound at the end, though not always co-ordinated with the pit.

Il Trittico -August 21, 2007

2007-08-21T09:15:00.000-07:00

Il Trittico

Peter McCallum, reviewer
August 21, 2007

Purity and power ensure this revival is an object of desire - despite the decor.

Cheryl Barker as Suor Angelica
Photo: Simon Alekna

Each of Puccini's three one-act operas, known collectively as Il Trittico ( The Triptych), deals with desire and pleasure and none of them has much good news for sybarites.

In Il Tabarro ( The Cloak), desire is furtive, snatched quickly between toil and tears. In Suor Angelica, it is punished by peevish relatives and nuns, while in Gianni Schicchi it proves prohibitively expensive.

But this revival of Moffatt Oxenbould's venerable production is at least a tribute to Opera Australia's parsimony: it was first seen in 1973.

Much of Desmond Digby's design - the asymmetrical curve of the silhouetted Parisian riverbank scene of Il Tabarro and the colourful Florentine apartment of Gianni Schicchi - still looks good. Other moments pointed to an enduring operatic dilemma: for all its expense, the artistic effect of its decor is often no more than that of a children's dress-up party (less so, in fact, for seeing children dressed in one's former indiscretions is usually amusing).

When the Madonna enters at the climax of Suor Angelica, looking as though she has had a serious tussle with the plastic tray of a particularly nasty box of chocolates, one is inclined to think that it is time this particular costume was donated to the Mardi Gras or booked in for the next warehouse fire.

However, with this work, listeners don't expect to take much of it too seriously except the singing and this revival has been extremely well cast.

Voice addicts would endure much to hear Cheryl Barker's coyly manipulative "o mio babbino caro" in Gianni Schicchi, though it was actually in Suor Angelica that she delivered the best of three impressive performances, with enough vocal purity and power to atone for a host of sartorial atrocities. In Il Tabarro there was, between her and tenor Dennis O'Neill, a thrilling sense of vocal vividness.

Of Jonathan Summers' two roles, the comic audacity of Schicchi was particularly well pointed. As Michele, in Il Tabarro he was strong but the sound was a little too open.

The conductor Andrea Licata was also most effective in the comic final work. Il Tabarro was a little too drawn out, weakening the "verismo" impact, while in Suor Angelica the intonation curdled around the vibrato in the woodwind and women's voices each going their own separate way.

Elizabeth Campbell was witty and versatile as a bag lady, abbess and grasping relative. Henry Choo captured his usual attractive light tenor sound as Runiccio (in Gianni Schicchi) and Milijana Nikolic had an authentically stern dowager's wobble as the princess. It is an evening of furtive pleasures for voice addicts. Pinpoint customers who are looking for what you sell.