There's still no live opera to speak of, anywhere or anyplace. Of course, the primary cause for this deficiency can be traced to the coronavirus outbreak. Regardless, you can obtain your daily dosage of the operatic art via Met Opera on Demand, the company's streaming app, if you are so inclined.
Well, this fan happens to be so inclined. Available for download (including from the Roku streamer), Met Opera on Demand can provide the starving opera lover with whatever jolt to the system one needs. The only limitation, if you would like to hear about it, is that all performances come from previously available material: Live in HD, Live from Lincoln Center, and/or Great Performances at the Met. Most are courtesy of the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) archives and go as far back as the mid-1970s, the dawn of live televised opera.
Having watched many (but not all) of these productions when they were first broadcast, I noticed a number of changes that have taken place in the four or more decades since they made their initial appearance. The main differences between Met Opera productions from the seventies and eighties and those that materialized in the 1990s through 2010 and so forth were not only in the physical aspect of the sets and costumes, but in the looks and actions of the principal players.
The ones from earlier years featured large structures with little in the way of flow and movement. Modern lighting techniques and elaborate choreography, as viewers have come to understand and appreciate them, were limited and crudely handled. Simply stated, productions revolved around major stars (i.e., Millo, Scotto, Price, Sutherland, Horne, Verrett, Bumbry, Pavarotti, Domingo, Milnes, MacNeil, and many others) who planted their feet firmly on the Met's stage and basically confined themselves to a given space. Stand and deliver, that was the maxim. You entered, you sang, you exited. You bowed to the audience and called it a night.
By my count, the notion of European Regietheater did not take hold until the 2006 arrival of General Manager Peter Gelb. Prior to Gelb, Joseph Volpe controlled when and what got produced, and with whom. Before Volpe, the Schuyler Chapin era flourished, despite money being especially tight. There was also a traditionalist fervor prevalent in those long-ago Volpe years, in that an opera's looks and time period were set in the traditional manner, with little to no variance from the norm.
On occasion, a more provocative experiment would spring up from the doldrums that had inevitably set in (for example, the sparseness of John Dexter's work). This was due mostly to the scarcity of financial resources. With Gelb's rise came productions with a modernistic bent (with sets and costumes to match) that challenged how audiences experienced opera in ways not formerly seen.
Hand in hand with these came a strong impact from the nearby Broadway stage. Although many joint productions from Europe and major North American theaters began to take hold, overall these proved less expensive and, therefore, more practical to put on in comparison to something developed from scratch. This smacked of the old "out of town tryouts" long favored by Broadway producers. Well, if it worked for the Great White Way, why not give opera a shot.
Since those earlier times, today's audiences have been privy to a younger crop of singers who have demonstrated an increasing mastery of the art form. Additionally, this newer generation can boast of superior vocal talent and acting abilities where the stand-and-sing methodology of yore has grown stale with the years. But for every gain there is some loss. A star one moment can become a has-been the next - and in far less time. In truth, a forty-or-more-year career span is becoming increasingly rare these days.
What drove this obsession with appearance and relevance is a simple fact of theatrical life: audiences want to be moved. As a result, the public must believe in the protagonists' struggles on stage, or at least suspend their disbelief for the duration. Those trials and tribulations called for in the music and text must be convincing (that is, to a reasonable extent). Along with this, singers must strive to "look" their parts. That's a tall order if you happen to be six-foot-two and weigh 300 pounds, or five-feet-nothing. "No problem," you say. "They can play character roles." Well, maybe. That's if they want to play them.
As you can see, there is a lot to think about when dealing with modern-day opera productions. Still, those Golden Age throats were golden for a reason: the Pavarottis, the Prices, the Domingos, the Hornes, the Sutherlands, and the MacNeils of the opera world could SING and sing WELL, with personalities that spilled over the footlights and into the audiences' laps.
With these caveats in mind, let me take you through a partial romp of Met Opera on Demand performances from the past:
Don Giovanni (1978) - Eugene Berman's original 1957 ink and watercolor sets for Mozart's most controversial work is a certified design classic. In this broadcast, a young James Morris appeared in his first starring role as the titular libertine. Channeling Howard Keel in MGM's Kiss Me, Kate, the Cole Porter musical about temperamental theater people, Morris steals the thunder (and the spotlight) from veterans many years his senior. Only 31 at the time, the novice bass upstaged everyone with his mellifluous tones, slim build and carefree stage deportment. It was obvious to anyone watching that here was a star in the making. His only problem, as far as I could discern, was getting through the high tessitura of Giovanni's Act II serenade. This impediment, however, became mute when the budding bass-baritone took on Wotan in Wagner's Ring cycle (see below).
Sad to say, Morris did not have a Kathryn Grayson to play off, nor were the tap-dancing skills of Ann Miller around for added comfort. Instead, we had Joan Sutherland as Donna Anna and Julia Varady as Donna Elvira - both artists equally adept at Mozart's fast runs and intricate passage work but lacking in genuine vivacity. An atrociously made-up Huguette Tourangeau as Zerlina did little to convince me of her feminine charms. I am aware this was an early TV transmission, but the closeups did this fine artist no favors. She failed to make viewers believe that the dapper Don would want to make a play for this 40-something peasant. In this and in other respects, the camera does not hide but reveals.
Giovanni's comic foil, Leporello, was taken by the stylish French baritone Gabriel Bacquier. From a previous generation of classically trained singers, Monsieur Bacquier played the servant with a mixture of deference and defiance. His crisply enunciated patter and elegantly executed exchanges were the work of a refined artist. At all times, one had no trouble mistaking who was the master and who was the servant. Bacquier was that rarest of birds, one I had the immense pleasure of seeing live at the Met as Donizetti's Don Pasquale.
John Brecknock's Don Ottavio was pleasurable as well, if without much dash. Unlike most tenors, he observed the composer's markings which included the usually omitted appoggiaturas, those added grace notes that come before the written score. Bass John Macurdy's Commendatore was a refreshing bit of booming bass bluster, albeit short-lived. And baritone Alan Monk's overly ripe Masetto, while firmly sung, seemed out of sorts. He reminded me of comedian Red Skelton in his Little Lord Fauntleroy outfit. But Morris was the main draw, a winning television debut which I can recommend without reservation.
Don Giovanni (2013) - Completely apart from the old Berman set, this Michael Grandage production is another in a long line of what some critics like to call the Laugh-In look. That is to say, it will rekindle older viewers' memories of the 1960s NBC-TV comedy show (hosted by Dan Rowan and Dick Martin) where cast members and invited guests popped in and out of windows to make dumb remarks about the latest goings-on.
In the title role, Polish baritone Mariusz Kwiecien dominated with his virile if smallish stature and cutting tone. But compared to that old pro Morris, Kwiecien's Don was a bush leaguer. He did make for an unctuously sensual Don, and his interactions with Luca Pisaroni's bumptious Leporello were amusingly varied. Pisaroni was a tad short at the top and bottom of his range, but he shone in the comedic portions that were allotted to him.
The women's roles were well acted and sung, starting with Marina Rebeka's Donna Anna, Barbara Frittoli's Donna Elvira, and Mojca Erdmann's Zerlina, all convincingly youthful and vividly voiced. They were smartly dressed, too, their costumes and headwear being of the period in question. Ramón Vargas' Don Ottavio felt more comfortable in the ensemble passages (he was wonderful in the Trio of the Masks) than in his two solos. And Slovakian basso Štefan Kocán was an appropriately other-worldly Commendatore, his voice soaring mysteriously over the loudspeakers.
- Eleven years after his ground-breaking Don Giovanni, James Morris went on to appear in the Otto Schenk/Günther Schneider-Siemssen production of Wagner's Ring. In the second opera of the cycle, Die Walküre, Morris is the god personified, his formidable six-foot-four-inch frame easily filling the bill. Even more significant, his impressive bass-baritone had matured to the point where Morris' interpretation set standards (he had studied the role with the great Hans Hotter, the previous generation's leading exponent). He went on to become the Wotan of his generation. And why not? Few singers could master the Act II dialogue in such a biting manner as he could. Yet, he managed to portray an awesome fury as the angry god struck Hunding dead with a look and a wave of his hand.
For me, Morris' poignant and dramatically forthright musings in the long Act II scene with daughter Brünnhilde, sung and acted to perfection by soprano Hildegard Behrens, were this performance's high points. Even better was Wotan's Farewell, with both artists' emotional commitment to the drama (and their moving glances to one another) captured for all time by the superb camera work. Unfortunately, the image has become blurred and faded with time (remember, this broadcast took place in the days before high definition), but the impact these sequences held for viewers are worth putting up with such minor inconveniences.
As added bonuses, Jessye Norman's womanly Sieglinde was seconded by Gary Lakes' fervent Siegmund. Kurt Moll, growly voiced and threatening, made for a low-bottomed Hunding. Christa Ludwig, a stylish singer in Strauss and Mozart, proved a good choice for Wotan's put-upon spouse Fricka. But at this stage in her long career, Ludwig's high notes were wanting. Still, she gave her all to the part. James Levine's conducting, as good as it would get in this early going, managed to whip up a thick head of steam for the Act I duet with Lakes and Norman. The Magic Fire music toward the end put the finishing touches to a classic performance (in the old stand-up-and-sing style!), one not to be forgotten.
- There is little to recommend in director Robert Lepage's "Barnum & Bailey meet Cirque du Soleil" version of Wagner's Ring cycle. Contrasted with the Met's stodgy old Otto Schenk standby, this so-called "novel take" on the composer's second installment, Die Walküre, points out the major flaws in placing too much faith in modern technology. Those 24-noisy planks and the noticeably restricted playing area that resulted left most viewers and critics with a bad taste in their mouths. Only in Siegfried did the stage machinery appear to work in the way the production team had planned. Otherwise, give me the tried and the true, please.
If only the singing were up to the task! And in this, for Act I anyway, we had Eva-Maria Westbroek in her company debut as a womanly/girlish Sieglinde, Jonas Kaufmann as a heroic and iron-lunged Siegmund (for once, they actually looked like twins), and Hans-Peter König's menacing Hunding (as gentle as an ox otherwise). The pair's rousing duet closed out to raucous shouts of approbation. James Levine was back in the pit (he did not take up the baton for Das Rheingold due to a back injury) and was greeted with a thunderous roar.
For Act II, the heart of the drama, Bryn Terfel's blustery, bright-voiced Wotan left this viewer wanting: more bite, and less fuming and fussing. His frequent eye-popping at the slightest provocation was distracting to the point of our nominating him to the Ralph Kramden Appreciation Society. Soprano Deborah Voigt's trim figure and spunky attitude were ideal for Act II, but they came at a loss of full-bodied warbling. Her voice grew thin on top, and those high C's called for in her war whoops were indistinguishable from one another.
Despite the two decades that separated them, neither artist were a match for the bond and chemistry that generated between James Morris and Hildegard Behrens. A real singing lesson was delivered by the great Stephanie Blythe as a thunderously imposing Fricka. Her acting with the eyes alone was enough to make any god whither before this harridan.
Lohengrin (1986) - An August Everding barebones production, with the sets held together by Lincoln Logs. In Act II, it's all ceremonial pomp and circumstance for 40 minutes where the action comes to a halt. Peter Hofmann, the titular knight in shining white armor, looked every inch the part. His voice, however, lacked power in the ensembles. The ring of a Jonas Kaufmann or a Piotr Beczala was not Hofmann's to command, despite his golden-haired looks and gentlemanly manner. He did deliver a congenial tone, and his soft utterances to his bride-to-be were not to be missed. Still, he lacked that spark of inspiration, the near-Christlike aura that must surround the otherworldly Lohengrin, a Knight of the Holy Grail. It's what artists such as Jess Thomas, who had that ethereal quality in spades, exuded and conveyed, as did Sandor Konya, a notable knight in his own right. Hofmann got by on looks alone, the rest we must take for granted.
Two major female stars gave polar opposite performances: soprano Eva Marton as Elsa of Brabant, the damsel in distress, and legendary diva Leonie Rysanek as the witch Ortrud. Marton's Madonna-esque Elsa mesmerized Met audiences with her teary-eyed, emotionally laden assumption, one of the best we've ever witnessed. At nearly every juncture, Marton poured out sumptuous tones of warmth and humility. She meant every word of her tale of woe. Who, one need ask, would doubt such a winning persona?
Marton moved mountains, and proved immensely effective against the vicious tirades and calculating villainy of Ortrud, played by veteran scene-stealer Leonie Rysanek. This was old-fashioned acting at its finest, compared to Marton's measured approach. Wild-eyed and untamable, Ryansek's voice tended to spread on top. But the scale of her instrument was larger than life. Indeed, this was a stage performance aimed at the farthest reaches of the Met balcony. Exaggerated? Yes, and way over the top. Yet, Rysanek earned the lion's share of the applause - not unmerited, mind you, but not one to be repeated. Again, think theatrics: How captivating she must have been live, but not in HD!
As the witch's husband Telramund, baritone Leif Roar was a cipher, a dull and routine "villain," weak-minded and too easily manipulated. Telramund must be the most ungrateful part Wagner ever wrote. No wonder few star singers take it on. It's punishing to the voice, the tessitura merciless and unyielding. He's plainly a Mama's boy, one who deserves his pitiless end. John Macurdy's sturdy-voiced King Henry brought welcome power and thrust. Upon learning of his death at age 90, one felt the sad passing of an era, and a major American artist in one of his signature roles. Macurdy was one of those old Met Opera stalwarts who seemed ageless. He was a dependable mainstay, and will be sorely missed by those who knew his work.
éo et Juliette (2017) - This operatic version of Shakespeare's tragedy all but confirmed tenor Vittorio Grigolo's standing as one of the Met's most valuable go-to-players for French repertoire. Not only was his finesse with the French language close to that of a native, his natural acting ability and complete immersion in whatever role he'd been assigned to brought a whiff of spring air to what could have been a stuffy drawing-room drama. To date, Grigolo has taken on Gounod's Faust, Massenet's Werther, and Offenbach's Hoffmann. Visibly dashing and handsome as all hell, the Tuscan tenor would win any woman's heart with this portrayal - especially with his bold ascending of the balcony and his athletic displays of swordsmanship.
It's a shame, then, that in late 2019 he was summarily dismissed from both the Met and London's Covent Garden for "inappropriate and aggressive behavior" with a chorus member and (allegedly) others. Since then, Grigolo has been sidelined in this country, but was received with a standing ovation at La Scala. Go figure.
His partner on this occasion, soprano Diana Damrau as Juliette, outdid herself in presenting a strong-willed and forceful heroine, one eager to match her Shakespearean wit against any and all comers. Their many love duets (and their marvelous death scene) left no dry eyes in the house. At the curtain, Vittorio literally swept Damrau, and the audience, off their feet! Thanks to this production, this old warhorse from the pen of Charles Gounod surpassed the boundaries of this dainty Victorian-flavored score to become a box office favorite.
Les Contes d'Hoffmann (2015) - In an interesting twist, Maltese tenor Joseph Calleja had earlier premiered as Hoffmann when this 2009 Bartlett Sher production was new. While he has a pleasant enough timbre and displayed fine musicianship, Calleja's carefully calculated portrait of the poet was no match for the sheer gut-wrenching thrills that Vittorio Grigolo was capable of bringing to this long and terribly difficult assignment. What set Grigolo apart from his colleague was that fiery temperament, that sense that he's willing at all times to throw caution to the winds and go for broke: those endless, prolonged high notes, those pauses between breaks, that impending sense of disaster. These take an artist of the first rank to bring off. Not that Calleja is an unqualified performer, but his basically refined sound - cautious, cool, deliberate - doesn't quite tingle the nerve endings the way that Grigolo seems adept at pulling out of a hat (or from his vocal bag of tricks).
As Hoffmann, Grigolo was the best of the modern breed of spinto tenor. Perhaps his only rival in this category is the Polish Piotr Beczala, who has lately moved on to heavier repertoire, i.e., in Wagner's Lohengrin. Suffice it say that this production is a mash-up of many shock elements (lots of semi-nude vistas and provocative poses), mostly from the decadent 1920s. Stylistically, it was all over the European map: part Kafkaesque delusion, part vaudeville spectacular. Some settings were downright ugly, others littered with Hoffmann's writings spilled out and about the Met stage. Most impressive of all was Kate Lindsay's dual role as the poet's Muse and his constant companion Nicklausse. Lindsay was seen and heard in practically every scene, which begs the question of whether to retitle the opera The Tales of Nicklausse and Hoffmann. This was a major undertaking that merited the rousing ovation given to her at the end.
My earlier criticism of Thomas Hampson's assumption of the four villains (Councilor Lindorf, Coppelius, Dr. Miracle, and Dappertutto, in that order), was reinforced by this HD transmission: His voice got lost in the proceedings, and his solo pieces went by with no force or thunder to speak of (Dappertutto's bogus "Diamond Aria" was taken a half tone lower). If this character isn't allowed to roar and bellow as the evil Dr. Miracle (or is it the miraculous Dr. Evil?), then the Antonia act falls apart. He looked smart in his top hat and tails, though, his height and bearing that of an aristocrat. As for his singing, much was wanting at this stage.
All the ladies were committed to their parts, especially Erin Morley's stratospheric, scale-ascending windup doll Olympia (just try to pick her out from the lineup of mechanical automatons onstage). Both sopranos Hibla Gerzmava as the consumptive Antonia and Christine Rice as the courtesan Giulietta did well enough. The men were a hair better at discerning individual characterizations. We must make note of Tony Stevenson's multiple portrayals (my favorite was his Gene Wilder-inspired Young Frankenstein takeoff as Spalanzani's goofy lab assistant, Cochénille), Dennis Peterson as the oleaginous Spalanzani, and baritone David Pittsinger's full-throated Luther and Crespel.
This new production of Hoffmann incorporated not only the bogus and ersatz "standard" version, with those Ernest Guiraud recitatives and that spurious Septet in the Venice act, but numerous material that was unearthed over 40 years ago and only recently has become part of the company's practice. These "newly discovered"(!) pieces include two arias for the Muse/Nicklausse, and a completely new number for Coppelius, along with a different ending for the chorus in the Epilogue. Hoffmann's chair and writing desk predominate throughout - giving notice to everyone, as if they were in doubt, that the poet's lot is to create no matter what. To hell with his love life!
We may never know what composer Jacques Offenbach ultimately had in mind for his masterpiece, since he died without having finished work on this major opus. What we do have is a theatrical assemblage, a hodgepodge if you prefer, that contains a fair amount of memorable, oftentimes jumbled yet supremely hummable music.
End of Part One
(To be continued...)
Copyright © 2020 by Josmar F. Lopes
