Speaking of “malaise,” the overworked pace of 2018 kept me on a restricted opera regimen–and, actually, a restricted regimen of any life outside of work!–and I regretted having missed most of the Met’s HDs and radio broadcasts and many of the other broadcasts I would love to have seen and heard. (I’ve generally been MIA from my favorite opera groups online. I miss my dear opera pals so much!) However, things are looking up, and on this restful Sunday morning I’ve been spending time reviewing the recent announcements on the Met’s 2019-2020 season, both on stage (radio, for me!) and cinema.
Overall, nothing stands out in the way that La Fanciulla del West did this past season, with the return not only of this too-little-performed Puccini opera, but of Jonas Kaufmann. Nor have any of my long-term hopes been realized: another big HD role for John Relyea and Štefan Kocán–both of whom are notably absent from any Met performances in the coming season; nor my perhaps quixotic hope that the Met will one day put on a gloriously heartbreaking production of Don Quichotte with Ferruccio Furlanetto, capturing this iconic role in HD for the ages; nor yet the promised all-star Don Carlos in the 5-act French version. Nor do I see anything with King René Pape.
On a few underwhelming notes, what we do have are some of the standby, albeit beautiful Zeffirelli productions–La Bohème, Turandot. (Frankly, I was hoping that they wouldn’t HD the latter again until Jonas Kaufmann finally sings Calaf.) We have an Anna Netrebko feast, with her special concert, as well as the reprisal of her Lady Macbeth and Tosca roles. But we also have Marco Berti back, and Aleksandrs Antonenko.
But I’d rather stick to a few more exciting, positive highlights:
To hear the great Luca Pisaroni‘s Guglielmo and Gerald Finley‘s Don Alfonso in Così fan tutte, although not an HD of the season, alas.
The return of Sir Bryn Terfel, in Der Fliegende Holländer, conducted by Valery Gergiev in a new production.
Stars such as Elīna Garanča, Bryan Hymel, and Ildar Abdrazakov in Berlioz’s Faust.
Morris Robinson’s Sarastro, although the shorter, English Magic Flute.
Diana Damrau and Jamie Barton in Maria Stuarda.
Angel Blue and Eric Owens in Porgy and Bess.
Luca Pisaroni again, as Figaro in the Nov/Dec Nozze.
Luca Salsi as Germont in Feb/March La Traviata–though I’m not overall a huge fan of the opera–and Quinn Kelsey in the Jan/early-Feb performances.
Kate Lindsey and Joyce DiDonato in Agrippina.
Other intriguing cast members: Peter Mattei and Tamara Mumford (Wozzeck); Roberto in Bohème; roles with Matthew Polenzani, Javier Camarena, and the great Željko Lučić.
I decided to write this after being informed about the announcement by my dear opera pal Gaby, but before getting back on my beloved opera groups, and I’m intrigued to hear others’ reactions. Similarly underwhelmed? Or perhaps intrigued and inspired? I’d like it to be contagious, if the latter.
In any case, here’s to a new season–not to mention, grateful for a lineup of fantastic performers–and, hopefully, pleasant surprises.
The opera obsession is getting a little out of hand.
As life circumstances have been a hindrance to regular writing/blogging, I fear it may have appeared as though I’d fallen off Planet Opera. In reality, I’ve been listening to and watching a fair deal of recorded opera over the past months, but in a cobbled-together fashion, somewhat like a patchwork quilt—or perhaps like Frankenstein’s monster—rather than my usual method of falling down the rabbit hole with one particular opera or composer for a time. A little Baroque here, a little Puccini there; half an opera here, interrupted by half of a different opera the next night—oh, and there’s that Saturday radio broadcast I nearly forgot about—to finally return to finish the first on the next available night. YouTube operas here, a library CD there. A week off of opera here; only a day off of opera there.
Partly, this chaotic approach (“approach” making it sound more intentional a method than it is) has been due to an unpredictable work routine. This is soon to change, thankfully, for a steadier situation. This seamstress has–ahem–altered her 13.5 year old sewing business, and all the irregularly-scheduled side-jobs to fund it, in order to hereafter do volunteer sewing work only, taking on a more regular “day job” to make ends meet.
During this whole work/life transition, and in the midst of opera joys, my heart–and that of so many others–bleeds for Dmitri Hvorostovsky’s needful cancellations, due to his chemotherapy and imbalance issues resulting from his brain tumor. But he still continues to surprise us with his dedicated love of his art, as he did at the Met Gala in May.
Jonas Kaufmann as Otello, ROH 2017
One of the more beautiful aspects of the past month is the fulfillment–almost–of Jonas’ much-anticipated Otello debut at Covent Garden, which was live-streamed to some lucky cinemas on June 28th, but which won’t make it to any here out West (only two cinemas in Oregon are showing it) for another couple of weeks. The reviews have been, generally, jaw-dropping.
So, in the following couple of blog posts over the coming days, I’ll write—with as much brevity as possible, and not in any particular order at all—about a few of my opera viewings and listenings over the past months, with more in-depth commentary about only a couple of them.
Lovely Luca Pisaroni
In finding more operas with Luca Pisaroni–La Cenerentola, Don Giovanni, etc–I want to highlight the 2016 Salzburg Le Nozze di Figaro. If you can see it somehow, please do. You can see my little write-up at this link.
First of all, I finished the Met cinema season a little early, but with a bang. As I didn’t make it to Der Rosenkavalier, I ended on Eugene Onegin, with Peter Mattei, Anna Netrebko, and the glorious bass Štefan Kocán. I loved Mattei’s intelligent, jaded Eugene—one who clearly overthinks everything, to his own disadvantage—and his shimmery gold voice. Anna was marvelously dusky in the role of Tatiana. But it was, interestingly enough, Prince Gremin—who is often played as much older than Tatiana, but here in younger and virile form with Štefan Kocán’s portrayal—who stole the show, and won every heart with his Act III aria. (It was that aria which made the tears flow, I assure you. That love, folks, is the real deal. Oh, how he looks at Tatiana! I say: forget Eugene. Hands down.)
Robin Ticciati, conductor. Photo by Marco Borggreve.
Side note to Eugene Onegin: I will also add as a side note that I not only fell in love with Prince Gremin in the Met 2017 cinema broadcast, but also with the conductor Robin Ticciati. I could have watched a complete second HD, just to see his every expression while conducting.
It was a blog post on Mozart’s Così fan tutte that finally inspired me to try seeing a production of it. (Yay for opera enablers!! Thank you Blake!!) But I didn’t stop at one. In about a week’s time, or just a little over, I’ve seen three different recordings of this extraordinarily beautiful opera–usually in time snatched far too late at night for me–and the glorious music has been in my head all week like a haunting, friendly spirit.
If you would like a Cliffs’ Notes version of what will probably shape up to be a wordy blog ***or if you aren’t familiar with the story ofCosì fan tutte yet (in which case, spoilers!)*** here are my highlights:
2. I highly recommend S. Blake Duncan’s blogs for deeper appreciation after you’ve seen it, particularly: In Defense of Così, and my personal favorite, More on Così fan Tutte. My discovery of all three of the productions that I’ll mention here is the direct result of his recommendations and these wonderful posts. (Again, many thanks…!) I was grateful not only for the sensitive insight of a musician—I so especially appreciated the discussion of the “sound” of winds, like the winds of change, in the orchestration, as well as the discussion of “il core vi dono” and the other pieces throughout—but one of historical perspective in the face of modern sensibilities which are, on the surface, somewhat at odds with the exquisite Mozart/Da Ponte work.
First productions…
The first recording that I watched of this opera, just over a week ago now, was the 2014 production from Met on Demand, with Isabel Leonard, Susanna Phillips, and Matthew Polenzani—and Danielle de Niece as a bright and spunky Despina. A charming, winning production, beautifully done by all.
Luca Pisaroni (Guglielmo) and Miah Persson (Fiordiligi)
The second, and my favorite as a whole, was the one I chose for my birthday movie: the magical, bright 2006 Glyndebourne production with Luca Pisaroni (I was sold, right there!), Miah Persson, a very handsome Nicolas Rivenq, Topi Lehtipuu, and Anke Vondung. (As of this post, it’s available free if you have Amazon Prime, at least in the US!) It really captures the lighthearted as well as bittersweet/painful elements in the brilliant story, and the singers portray the characters with a winning tenderness, exquisitely sung. Luca’s portrayal of hurtful resentment I found especially compelling.
The third, although I regrettably had to break it up into a number of viewings, and not with the full concentration I would like to have given it, is another beauty from 1992, which as of this posting can still be found at this link, with English subtitles. I’d like to see it again, all in one sitting. But I thought the set, costumes, and ensemble were all a treat. I particularly enjoyed the voice and performance of Rodney Gilfry as Guglielmo here. (The scene where Ferrando woos Fiordiligi, with Guglielmo looking on…ouch…) And the ending…fitting and lovely.
A Così summary…
The setting is late-18th century Naples. The storyline, with libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte and the most glorious music by Mozart, is not unlike a story told in Cervantes’ Don Quixote, wherein a certain man persuades his best friend to woo his wife, in order to test her fidelity. In the case of Così, it is two men, Ferrando and Guglielmo, who are challenged by their older, worldly friend Don Alfonso to put their own fiancées to the test by wooing them in disguise—Ferrando and Guglielmo ostensibly being called off to the battlefield—and the upshot will be, in Don Alfonso’s mind, to disabuse his friends of the notion that these two women are any more faithful or high-minded than any other human being. Così fan tutte! (They [women] all do it!) The men have help in this endeavor from the clever maid Despina, who encourages her mistresses’ infidelities by her woman-of-the-world “wisdom”; she also disguises herself at various times as a notary, or a doctor –the latter a hilarious spoof on Mesmer’s “magnetism” that was a current fad, who “saves” the would-be wooers from death by poison. Guglielmo woos his friend’s betrothed Dorabella, and Ferrando woos Fiordiligi—and it’s hard to resist the charms of either.
A few thoughts…
The very title, Così fan tutte, seems to present a challenge for us, as though suggesting that troubles with constancy is a “woman’s problem”; I won’t go into the reasons for thinking of this differently, as was so well done by the articles mentioned above. Nor do I think in this case, like Jane Austen’s Anne in Persuasion, that “men have had every advantage of us in telling their own story”–agreed, yes; but Mozart and Da Ponte were both ahead of their time here in the implications of this opera. I personally think that had the plot gone in the other direction, with the women testing the fidelity of the men, the results would likely enough have been the same in Mozart and Da Ponte’s story…in fact, as Despina’s many comments suggest, that idea is a given. No need to test it, in her mind.
In this character-sextet—the two couples, Don Alfonso, and Despina—Despina is clearly the mirror of Don Alfonso, even though his opposite in gender and station. They’re not romantics. Despina’s words to her mistresses are as cutting as any, as the ladies pine for the men who must leave them:
To hope for faithfulness in men, in soldiers? Don’t let people hear you, for heaven’s sake! All men are made of the same stuff; the swaying boughs, the fickle breezes have greater stability than men have.
The “problem” here is not about womens’ constancy, nor their submission (a problem that haunts Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew, for example). When I consider Così, the more intriguing “problem” for me is the human story itself. The trick Don Alfonso and the men play is warranted in the context of a farce–and to view it with excessive sobriety is surely not the intent. We can’t forget that it IS a farce. I mean, we very willingly suspend disbelief as the ladies are “tricked” by their own—or their sisters’–betrothed husbands. And simply because they’re disguised in exotic costumes and wearing outrageous mustacchi? They’re fooled by the idea of magnets extracting poison from the bodies of the ridiculously convulsing men who were driven to suicide out of love at first sight? It’s delightfully outrageous…and we’re having fun along the way.
But…there is a “but,” in my mind. Just as with Shakespeare, who always managed to make things more humanly complicated and interesting than any genre would ever require, so too Mozart and Da Ponte are just too darn interesting, brilliant, and poignant in their creation to make it only a send-up, or only a comedy. We may just as often want to weep as to laugh. How will the characters recover from this? Will they? And not only the romances, but–I always seem to worry about this especially–the friendships of the men, both of whom have succeeded in making the other’s betrothed unfaithful.
Yes, the music is so glorious and the libretto so captivating as to make us pause.
It does have the element of the Shakespearean problem play, in that there is an ostensibly “happy” ending, not without room for interpretation. “Interpretation” not as in conceptualizing, nor trying to appease a 21st century audience, but character interpretation. A pause, a doubt, a hesitation, an unexpected nuance. As I left each production, floating in the clouds at some of the most beautiful music ever written, and happy…I still had that lurking feeling afterwards: but will they really be okay?
I wouldn’t compare the two, as Così is a little more Twelfth Night than Measure for Measure, but in the latter (again, spoiler alert!) we are following a character who seems to possess a sort of omnicient, Godlike perspective on the play’s situation, Duke Vincentio. He is ever observing, testing…even manipulating events into submission. (It’s a good thing that he’s a decent character, or else everyone would be in trouble.) But after bringing justice to a messed-up situation, the play ends with him confidently declaring his love to a nun, Isabella—nevermind that, not long before, we were so disturbed by Angelo’s proposal to her. Sure, we might think: obviously, Angelo’s was a rotten deal—but the Duke, well, he’s a decent guy…he’s not blackmailing her, although she does, one might say, owe him…But he must really love her and want what’s best for her. And really, she’s only a novice at the convent, and maybe she doesn’t really want to be a nun in the first place. But still…still. It’s more than a little disconcerting. One can interpret it so that the ending is left open—and indeed, the best version I’ve seen of it literally has the lights fade on the sight of the handsome, commanding Duke standing with an outstretched hand towards an ambivalent Isabella. What will happen? Much of what we are left to imagine will depend on the trajectory of what has gone before, and the characterization of each.
So, back to Così. It is a lighthearted romp, and something in the category of magical realism. When I first heard the overture, there is a stong, confident buoyancy…suggestive of the later refrain of “Cosìfan tutte” and the sharpness of, say, “come scoglio immoto resta”, which then melts into moments of something…unexpected, bittersweet.
Such is the melting required of the men’s hearts at the end, if all is to be well. One hopes that all will be well…but something is off. But even if the couples are “really” okay–which is not absolutely certain–such wisdom, tenderness, and forgiveness as the ending requires is not likely to happen in a moment. I think the reverse kind of forgiveness needs to happen too: we have to remember that it is a send-up, because, really, the men have played a pretty unkind trick.
So, no, we don’t quite know how things would turn out, and it would have taken a Mozart and Da Ponte to write the kind of sequel poignant enough to do justice to a perfectly imperfect situation.
Some of the most beautiful moments in the opera are based on an imperfect situation, such as “il core vi dono,” surely one of the most beautiful and poignant love duets ever written. If it weren’t for that one major caveat—the trickery involved—it would surely be the consummate love duet. Here’s the same link shared in Blake’s blog posts above mentioned, which made me seek out this marvelous Glyndebourne production:
Other moments have been running incessantly through my head all week, such as Ferrando’s “un’aura amorosa” (beautifully done at this link by Lawrence Brownlee), or the, for me, literally show-stoppingly beautiful farewell trio between Fiordiligi, Dorabella, and Don Alfonso, as the two men (so the ladies think) leave for the battlefield. When I first heard this trio, “soave sia il vento” (a link here to a version sung by Renee Fleming, Thomas Hampson, and Susan Graham), I could hardly go on…I had to listen again. It is transcendent…and the “wind” sound in the strings so perfect…one feels at sea:
Nicolas Rivenq as Don Alfonso. (Seriously, were I a man, I’d wear a coat and scarf just like that…)
And Don Alfonso: are we supposed to necessarily “like”–or think that we should think like—Don Alfonso or Despina, simply because they’re proven right? I personally don’t think so. Hopefully most of us still believe that fidelity is not only possible, but necessary…but also that forgiveness in the midst of frailty is possible, and necessary. So, as long as we stay in the realm of farce, where the old jokes about infidelity and inconstancy are given free rein, sure, Don Alfonso and Despina are fun to watch and listen to, and most certainly not villains. But the fact that they are “experienced” doesn’t make them wiser or more compassionate. They give the two fellows the lesson needed, but not how to deal with it after. I thought of the line from the 1999 film The Winslow Boy, based on the Terence Rattigan play: it is “easy to do justice; very hard to do right.” What Don Alfonso did and the point he was trying to make might have been a just one…but was it right? Those who love each other build the other up ~ they don’t tear the other down. We’re all damaged goods. What if we strove to nurture and treasure the beloved into greater health and wholeness, rather than to question, doubt, or challenge it to an external ideal?
That, hopefully, is what they’re left with at the end to consider and to live out, but it’s not what they lived in the story. And it doesn’t necessarily justify Don Alfonso’s attitude, his cynicism and mocking of genuine emotion and ideals. (We really need ideals, at least for ourselves…the old adage about shooting for the moon and landing on the barn roof might be applicable here. One of our many tendencies as human beings is to fall short of our ideals anyway; if we only shoot for the barn roof we aren’t even going to get off the ground.) Did they really have to break the “other” first in order to realize that their beloved women were indeed women and not angelic beings? Perhaps. It doesn’t make it right.
But where would the story be otherwise?
Whatever the case, the very “problems” add to the captivating beauty of this opera for me. Part delightful farce, part something decidedly more. So much more. Like Shakespeare, Mozart and Da Ponte cannot help making it more. (Though Verdi’s Don Carlo has the edge for all-time favorite operas, with Don Giovanni being more or less tied with it, Mozart is certainly now my favorite composer.) The complications involved with this opera make it an even greater source of interest, beauty, humor, and pathos…like life itself. It is a delightful, bittersweet, gloriously beautiful work that has haunted me all week, and I am already looking forward to delving ever deeper, finding new productions, and revisiting these, particularly the Glyndebourne. The lines that consummate the heart-rending love duet sum up my feelings of this first Così week perfectly:
“Che nuovi diletti! Che dolce penar!”(“What new delights! What sweet pain!”)
*Note #1: if we’re friends on Facebook, you’ve probably seen these notes already…
**Note #2: These are very informal–and too lengthy–impressions from an opera newbie!
***Note #3: “Cliff’s Notes” Version of this post: Please see the 2011 Don Giovanni and the 2007 Eugene Onegin, if I absolutely must narrow it down. Also, fell head-over-heels with three bass singers: René Pape, Štefan Kocán, and John Relyea! (Already loved bass Ildar, of course!)
~~~
Oscar Wilde said that “the only way to get rid of temptation is to yield to it”. Well, apparently I’ve been following this advice with the opera addiction. The subtitle to this post might be: “Or, How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Give into My Met-On-Demand Addiction”. (It might also be subtitled: “The Month of the Bass and Baritone”.)
What enabled me to watch an unusual amount of recorded opera this month is that I happened to be, at several points, involved in an aspect of my sewing work which is too rare: that which allows for multitasking! (Mostly the hand-sewing part, which alone took a good 18 hours lately. YES!) So…here goes! Not necessarily in the order in which I watched them.
Thanks to my friend and enabler, Viv, and partly inspired by seeing the recent HD cinema showing of the current Don Giovanni with Simon Keenlyside–which I had mixed feelings about overall, but enjoyed, particularly Simon himself–I finally watched the 2011 Don Giovanni (same set/production) with Mariusz Kwiecien, Luca Pisaroni, Štefan Kocán, Marina Rebeka, Barbara Frittoli, and Ramón Vargas.
Oh my. I have fallen in love with this opera all over again, and simply cannot get it out of my head. Mariusz is a most charming, seductive Don, and what shall we say of Luca? I see why he is a legend in this role of Leporello ~ vocally, it just doesn’t get better, but added to that is an impeccable comic timing and complete naturalness in the role. I particularly loved the way Mariusz and Luca play off one another ~ I have never seen a production which captures so well the relationship between Giovanni and Leporello, love-hate though it is, as Luca has expressed his interpretation in a recent interview…however much they may betray one another, is not unlike a dysfunctional married couple, each knowing the other so well. There are even moments of tenderness. When the Don makes his final act of defiance to agree to come to dinner with the Commendatore, there is a moment of farewell between them, which I have not quite seen anything like. (And indeed, Luca’s Leporello looks somewhat lost without his villainous master in the final minutes…)
This production captured the comedy of this incredible opera, and both the direction and the conducting–Fabio Luisi–kept a sprightly pace. In fact, the whole production felt sprightly and energetic! The Anna–dang, she’s great!–Elvira, Masetto, and Zerlina were also wonderful. I went from moments of irrepressible laughter–such as when Leporello imitates the Don in seducing Donna Elvira–to tears, as in Mariusz’s “deh vieni alla finestra”…yes, that charming Don manages to seduce his audience every bit as much as he did the 1800+ ladies.
Then, there was the new-to-me discovery of the glorious bass Štefan Kocán, the Commendatore! Wow! (Thank you, Gabriela, you were so right!!) It was some time before I could move on to the rest of the opera after the Commendatore’s death in the opening, so beautiful was his final minute of singing with Giovanni and Leporello that I had to rewatch it again and again. (By this point I must have watched that moment probably two dozen times altogether.) And of course, at the end, he returns in a most gloriously haunting finale…
All this, in a production that was done only 2 weeks after Mariusz had back surgery! Amazing. Needless to say, I highly recommend it. If you haven’t already fallen in love with this opera, this production will probably do the trick. 🙂
Be prepared for tears on this one. Not so much due to the operatic tragedy of the story, as the reception by the Met audience and orchestra of beloved Dmitri Hvorostovsky, who returned to his role of the Count di Luna after the announcement of his brain tumor and the months of chemotherapy that followed. (Just wait until the final bows and curtain calls…have tissues handy!)
This was only the second time I’ve seen a recorded production of this opera. I marvel at the vocal gymnastics that are required of our leads, and Anna Netrebko had me breathless as Leonora, particularly in her Act IV arias…dang! Dmitri, of course, shone as the Count di Luna, with such a powerful stage presence alongside the extraordinary bass Štefan Kocán as Ferrando…amazing! Dolora Zajick was a wonderful Azucena, and I very much liked Younghoon Lee as Manrico ~ very dynamic.
Loved the Goyaesque set and the period costume. Overall, a beautiful production.
Now looking forward to seeing the earlier Trovatore, from 2011…!
So…now for The Magic René–oops, I mean, The Magic Flute.
Okay, I actually watched this one before most of the others, and it’s not Met, but I thought it worth a mention, as I’ve become so hopelessly enamoured of René Pape. I’ve been remotely following him for months, but was utterly smitten after his performances in both Parsifal (Met, 2013) and his King Marke in the Met Live in HD Tristan und Isolde in early October.
I have never seen a production of Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte…nor Der ZauberRené for that matter ~ so, please take this with a grain of salt, but I thoroughly enjoyed Branagh’s quirky, random humor transposed into a fantastical World War I setting with an anti-war focus. Not to mention the Gilbert-and-Sullivanesque English libretto by Stephen Fry. Joseph Kaiser (Tamino), Amy Carson (Pamina), and glorious, mesmerizing magician-bass René Pape (Sarastro) led the cast. (Yes, as much as I adore Branagh, I daresay you know who was the magician that drew me to THIS movie…) The CGI effects are pretty cheesy in spots, but it’s somehow in keeping with the magical, goofy oddity of the whole.
Another lighthearted moment was the Met’s Le Nozze di Figaro from the 2014-15 season (available on Met on Demand), with Ildar Abdrazakov, one of my favorite bass voices! Again, as familiar as much of the music is to me, I’d never seen a production and didn’t know how delightful and hilarious it is! I loved it. Ildar, as the witty servant Figaro, couldn’t be more adorable if he tried, and Peter Mattei (wow, another beautiful voice, and a new favorite!) as the womanizing Count Almaviva was just fantastic. The whole cast was delightful, and had me laughing up in the workshop…
After the wonderful 2015 Il Trovatore that I watched the previous week, I watched the same wonderful David McVicar production–with some of the same cast, notably Dmitri Hvorostovsky, Štefan Kocán, and Dolora Zajick–in their earlier 2011 production, and was intrigued and delighted with the similarities and differences. It’s really hard to choose overall.
In both, Dima shines as the Count di Luna, Štefan Kocán is an irresistably ruthless bass Ferrando, and Dolora Zajick strikes me as a master of the gypsy Azucena. But here we have a different Leonora and Manrico, sung in 2011 by Sondra Radvanovsky and Marcelo Alvarez. While I thoroughly appreciated the Netrebko/Lee combination of 2015, and vocally it is really hard to choose–and I am naturally a little more drawn to Netrebko’s vocal quality–yet I must say Sondra really won me over in this role, and particularly the chemistry between her and Marcelo, who was also a very endearing and strong Manrico. The character interpretation of Leonora was less melancholy than Netrebko’s, and one really gets behind Sondra, whose expressive face and adoring love for Manrico are so evident. I thoroughly enjoyed both, but I must give the edge to the Radvanovsky/Alvarez combination for our two leads. (That being said, if one has time for only one of the two productions, I might choose the 2015 if for nothing else than the beautiful reception for Dima, and the endearing and heart-wrenching applause and roses for him at the end…)
A real highlight of this past opera week for me was the new-to-me discovery of Tchaikovsky’s opera Eugene Onegin, another which I did a double header on, seeing both the 2007 production with Dmitri Hvorostovsky, Renée Fleming, and Ramón Vargas, as well as the more recent production with Mariusz Kwiecien, Anna Netrebko, and Piotr Beczala. I had not known this story previously ~ about inaccessible love, haughty rejection, and the pride that destroys friendships and romantic love ~ based on the verse-novel by Alexander Pushkin. Okay, so I do have a tendency to love anything 19th century anyway, but I was captivated by these characters, and utterly loved it. It is *quintessentially* 19th century in its themes, with an ending I wouldn’t have expected in an opera. I won’t say more, but I’d like to write a more fleshed-out post on this opera alone at some point, rather than just pointing out a few highlights of these productions.
Both Anna and Renée are absolutely luminous in the role of the shy but stronger-than-she-appears Tatiana, and I really cannot choose between the two whose interpretation I prefer. (But I was more invested in Renée’s struggles, perhaps because it was my first Eugene, and I loved the whole production so much altogether.) Piotr and Ramón were both wonderful as the honorable, lovable, but almost irrationally-jealous Lenski…it was my first time seeing Piotr in anything and I was so impressed! For Eugene, I would be hard pressed to give a preference as to their vocal beauty in the role; but in terms of interpretation and sheer force of presence, undoubtedly, Dmitri has the commanding, striking haughtiness that instantly catches one off guard, as this character does Tatiana. He is positively statuesque. I mean, this Eugene really out-Darcys Mr. Darcy, and is more aimless and cynical than a Eugene Wrayburn. Unquestionably, I would choose Dima for the role, if I were forced to choose. (But I would very highly recommend both.)
Visually, both productions are luscious, and the costumes stunning. The 2013 is quite glorious to look at. My own preference, though, is decidedly in favor of the earlier 2007 production with Dima and Renée: it is utterly magical in its stark simplicity. A very minimalist set with a slightly “boxed-in” look (thematically in keeping with the bounded-in-a-nutshell situation of the characters…), but with the most stunning colors–I’d like to create a photo collage of the different scenes–and falling leaves, as though reflective of the beauty of romantic love even in it’s autumn…when it is rejected and inaccessible.
Both are so beautifully and feelingly conducted by Valery Gergiev, and there is a wonderful behind-the-scenes mini-documentary on this after the 2007 stream.
I will be rewatching both versions again and again no doubt, but particularly the 2007 version, which will probably go down as one of my favorite opera productions.💙💔
Now that I’ve practically written a novel of notes, I thought I’d also mention that these are only a few of the opera beauties I’ve heard and seen this month, which includes a live-stream with Mariusz of Donizetti’s La Favorite, and the Met Live in HD Tristan und Isolde with Nina Stemme and René.
A few radio highlights include a really marvelous radio transmission of a Don Carlo with René (Philip II), Mariusz (Rodrigo), and Michael Fabiano (Carlo) from the San Francisco Opera of June 2016; also, another Don Carlo audio with René and Dima from the Met-on-Demand (audio only)…both stunningly beautiful. Also, it’s been great fun to experience, via radio, this year’s Met production of Guillaume Tell, with Gerald Finley (Tell), Marina Rebeka (Mathilde) and another magician-bass, John Relyea (the evil Gessler! A new bass love!!). Then, this past week, another live radio broadcast of the Met’s Don Giovanni, this time with Ildar Abdrakazov in the lead! A most marvelous Don…perfect! And this has not remotely covered it all.
It’s a huge joy to be part of the Sirius Opera Fans group and Met Opera Live in HD Fans group (both on Facebook), which have been such inspiring places to discuss opera love, to learn, and to share insight. (And to find more opera-enablers!! 😉 )
Don Giovanni (Met, 2011)
Il Trovatore (Met, 2015)
**Movie Break!** (Not from the Met:) 
Le Nozze di Figaro, Met, 2014
Eugene Onegin, Met, 
Don Carlo and the Seamstress 