The Bavarian State Opera are live-streaming Saturday night's performance of Jenufa from their website, starting at 19:00 CET (6pm UK).
Barbara Frey's 2009 production features Karita Mattila in the title role, together with Stefan Margita and Gabriele Schnaut.
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Karita Mattila / Martin Katz; Sarah Connolly / Eugene Asti; Angelika Kirchschlager / Ian Bostridge / Julius Drake; Artemis Quartet - Wigmore Hall, 10 - 14 September 2010
Wigmore Hall's 110th anniversary season is made of awesome, with recitals coming up from just about everyone you could possibly want to hear, including rare visitors like Jonas Kaufmann, Martha Argerich and Daniel Barenboim.
But the season's opening weekend was almost derailed by illness, with both Karita Mattila and Angelika Kirchschlager suffering from colds. Kirchschlager's was so bad she cancelled her scheduled appearance on the Saturday, eventually appearing - only partially recovered - on Monday.
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Intermezzo learns that Karita Mattila has abandoned the role of Tosca permanently for artistic reasons.
Recent performances in New York and Munich suggested the part wasn't a great match for her talents, so this sounds to me like a courageous and sensible decision, the sort that more singers should have the guts to make.
The news means that she's dropping out of the Royal Opera House's production next June, to be replaced by Martina Serafin (who was scheduled to sing two performances anyway).
Ms Mattila stated, “I very much regret cancelling performances with The Royal Opera and Maestro Pappano, and disappointing audiences at Covent Garden, but this is an artistic decision that is right for me. I look forward to performing with The Royal Opera in the future.”
She will of course be back in London next month to sing Strauss's Vier letzte Lieder with the Berlin Philharmonic at the Proms, followed by a rare Wigmore Hall recital.
Here she is singing Tosca in Munich last month:
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The introduction was almost the best bit of tonight's Met simulcast of Salome. Karita Mattila wouldn't open her dressing room door for a pre-show probing at the hostessly hands of Deborah Voight. (Did the producers seriously think they'd get a cosy chat?) When Mattila finally burst out, half Marilyn, half Arnie in her white satin gown, her only words as she strode off to battle were "let's kick ass".
This was only the second live opera screening I've been to (the first was last year's Met La Fille du Régiment). While (as prior reports suggested) the whole thing was gloriously sung, with Mattila especially at her radiant peak, the relentless loudness of the recording and the overweighting of the voices became wearing.
And the direction - so amateurish. We never got to see the full picture, to have any sense of what it felt like to watch Salome live in the house. Shot like a football game, a mash of unprepared close ups of the guy with the ball, it fractured the narrative and eliminated an essential element of live opera, the ability to watch both action and reaction at the same time.
It was merciless towards Mattila. In the flesh, her matchless acting skills make her a credible teenage temptress from even the front row, as was clear from the scant long shots. But blown up to fill a forty foot screen the illusion inevitably explodes.
In retrospect, it was a smart decision to pan away from the climax of Mattila's 'seven veils' dance. We saw her naked back; we saw Herod's ecstatic face; it was enough information.
But can't the Met trust us with a few more long shots? The fundamental sing-your-life premise of musical drama requires such a staggering suspension of disbelief from the audience that we don't need it to look exactly like the telly, thanks.
At the moment, big screen opera is pulling in the audiences. It's still a novelty, and people, me included, are satisfied simply to be able to see it up there. But as audiences become more sophisticated, higher quality will become expected. The Met's recorded product currently displays only a feeble shadow of the skill and professionalism applied to the live productions. Or indeed, applied to the average opera DVD. To spend months working on the musical and staging aspects, then simply stick cameras up the singers' noses is such a waste.
****UPDATE**** Viewers at the Gate Cinema in Notting Hill apparently got a bonus language lesson thrown in. The subtitles were in German. Oops. (Thanks to reader Joan for the info)
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There may be a disappointment in store for anyone clutching a movie ticket for Saturday's live broadcast of Salome from the Met.
Although its star, Karita Mattila, will disrobe fully for the 'seven veils' scene in the big house, some tasteful pan'n'scan from the cameras will ensure those of us in the cinema seats see nothing more titillating than her face reports the LA Times.
According to a Met spokesman, the decision to cover up came from Met general manager Peter Gelb, who, he said, "decided early on that the 'Salome' broadcast would not feature nudity." Karita Mattila herself, on the other hand, is presumably less bothered, judging by shots like this (*warning - incredibly NSFW*) one.
In contrast, the Royal Opera House not only displayed the full bewb-flash from the stage production in their recent cinema screening of Don Giovanni, they've made it freely available to all online. More details here.
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Sadly, Karita Mattila has withdrawn from the first night of the Proms (tomorrow, Friday 18th) due to ill health.
But the good news is that Christine Brewer will be replacing her for Strauss’s Four Last Songs.
To be broadcast on Radio 3 and BBC2 at 8pm.
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LA Philharmonic/Salonen/Karita Mattila - Barbican, 9 November 2007
LA Philharmonic/Salonen/Ben Heppner - Barbican, 10 November 2007
The third of the LA Phil's four-night Barbican Sibelius cycle saw them tackle his first and third Symphonies. In his Symphony no.3, Sibelius is perhaps most distant from the vodka-soaked nordic miserablism that characterises so much of his work. So, after their cheery and energetic run last week in the first of their four nights, I'd expected it to suit the LA Phil (let's draw a veil here over their second night, so grimly drab that I couldn't depress myself by writing about it).
They surprised me by bringing not just vitality, but a much higher degree of finesse to their trimmed-down ensemble. Salonen's keenly rhythmic sense delineated the galloping pulse of the first movement and controlled the multiple motifs of the third, bringing it to its hymn-like conclusion.
The closer, Symphony no.1, is uncharacteristic for another reason -- it's simply less 'Sibelian', more obviously indebted to his influences, principally Tchaikovsky. With stately pacing and daring dynamics, Salonen patiently unfolded its tragedy and grandeur, rather more willing than he had been last week to probe beneath the surface. It was an utterly gripping performance.
Despite the excellence of the Sibelius, the night really belonged to Karita Mattila, with a group of songs in French, Quatre Instants, written for her by Kaija Saariaho. 
I'd heard these in the original piano version before, but not the extravagantly sensual orchestral arrangement. Mattila more than measured up to it. In a one-shouldered black dress banded with crystals, frozen white bouffant and scarlet fingernails she towered majestically over Salonen, next to her a cowering shrimp in his habitual curry-house waiter uniform.
Her pure clean tone has a worldliness that reminds me more of Sarah Vaughan than of any operatic contemporary. And in these nordic torch songs it cast a potent spell, from the lilting Attente, to the ardent despair of Douleur, the indecent intensity of Parfum de l'Instant (where Mattila locked eyes with Salonen for a breathstopping minute) and the valedictory Résonances.
Her French would convince no one south of Dover, but Mattila was never for one moment less than utterly immersed in the emotional landscape of the music. Her platinum glamour might evoke a long-lost Gabor sister, but in reality she is the most giving and least plastic of performers. 
There were yawning seconds of total silence when she'd finished, as we reeled stunned in her wake. Somewhere during the massive applause, Kaija Saariaho suddenly popped up on stage for a huge hug from Mattila. And rightly so - this performance convinced not only that Mattila, here at the height of her powers, is in so many ways the greatest soprano around right now, but also that this is possibly the finest song cycle written in my life time, and one that deserves to be performed many more times.
The LA Phil's final performance, the fifth and sixth Symphonies, couldn't hope to measure up to the previous night, but it was by no means a disappointment.
The translucent lyricism of the opening No.6 shone through, even if its spiritual reflectiveness eluded Salonen. 
It was followed by a group of seven Sibelius songs, for which Ben Heppner was drafted in. Heppner, it's fair to say, has a big voice, but John Estacio's orchestral arrangements were even bigger. I suspect the people directly in front of Heppner would have heard more, but sitting towards the side (the same position from which I'd heard Mattila loud and clear), I found his voice largely drowned. In the odd moments where the orchestration thinned out, it was clear Heppner was delivering a thoughtfully nuanced performance, but as for the rest I have little idea.
The night was rescued with a titanic performance of Symphony No.5. Salonen pulled all the stops out here. Unafraid to linger in the tiniest of pianissimos in the first movement, spreading the majestic pooling brass in the last, it was a bold and enthralling account. The six final chords, conducted it appeared with eyes closed, provided emphatic closure.
The encore, Sibelius's much earlier Death of Mélisande, seemed a curiously downbeat way to end the evening, but the juxtaposition with the fifth displayed the resonances between the two.
Here's a video of Salonen conducting the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra a few years ago in the fifth - he took the LA Phil a bit faster than this:
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Fellow Sibelius lovers, quit your whinging. They've given in. We got it. Our very own Sibelius Festival, that is.
From September through to December, London will be hosting the Sibelius & Beyond festival, a celebration of all things musical and Finnish. An impressive 22 concerts are planned, plus a series of Wigmore Hall study sessions, and a mini-season of Sibelius films at the Barbican. Highlights include Karita Mattila and Ben Heppner with the LA Phil at the Barbican.
Full details here.
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I think I got the horn player!
A rather frank interview with the lovely Karita Mattila on Radio 3, available online till Thursday, where she reveals some of the conductors she's worked with are 'total @$$holes' and 'totally unsupportive terrible monsters'. Though rather than sharing these sentiments with them, she prefers simply to feign other engagements if they're fool enough to call her back. Names are not named, but on the other hand there's always a place in her diary for Abbado, Pappano and Colin Davis.
She says how much she learned from an early tour with the wonderful Christa Ludwig, who at first seemed distant and scary, but she came to know as a gracious and wonderful lady, focussed and professional.
Fellow Finn and composer Kaija Saariho is another woman who impressed with her professionalism. She came to many of Mattila's performances before writing for her, and even finished the work in time. Although Mattila finds Saariho's work 'very difficult' technically, she is delighted that Saariho is going to write more for her.
She relishes the Leonore she's currently playing in the ROH Fidelio and wishes she could be more like the character herself. She has 'a certain ruthlessness' which Mattila sees as the 'absolute truth'. Playing her as 'a wimp' would be conventional and boring, and she wouldn't want to waste her time doing that.
Enthusing about Tony Pappano's conducting, she says 'I couldn't believe he's doing it for the first time'. A belief not shared by many of the audience for the first performance I would imagine, though things of course can only get better.
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Fidelio - Royal Opera House, 26 May 2007
yes it's really Karita Mattila
As I wasn't lucky enough to be in the centre stalls for this matinee premiere, I missed a lot of the action. Most of the the first act is played almost in the wings or right at the back of the set. I was unlucky enough to be sitting (expensively, mind) on the right side, so I had no idea the set on that side incorporated a suite of prison cells key to the action until I was told so at the interval by a friend who happened to have been sitting on the left. He in his turn was unhappy he'd missed most of the Fidelio/Rocco/Marzelline scenes which took place on the left. And there was enough taking place deep or high on stage to make the upper levels a poor choice too. Isn't somebody supposed to check out sightlines before they put shows out? Even simply narrowing the set would have helped.
Perhaps spreading the action around the stage was intended to compensate for the visual side of the production being static, unimaginative and tediously literal. The opportunity offered by the dramatic difficulties of the second act prison cell scene, supposedly too dark for Florestan to recognise Leonore, is partially met by the clever choice of a raised trapdoor to separate Leonore and Florestan. Underlighting the scene to a point where the audience can't see what's happening is a pointless additional touch.
and again
This production comes from the Met where its lack of corsets and pantaloons apparently riled the traditionalists. Unfortunately the indeterminate '40's-ish dress code is the only modern thing about it. (Click here for more information if you'd like to know about the Royal Opera House's own dress code). Sidestepping the gifted opportunity to pursue any of the broader political themes in the work, producer Flimm gowns his perky prisoners in sparkling white, as if they'd popped out from a health farm, and a robust Florestan is tethered in his immaculate cell with nothing more substantial than a clothesline. This apolitical approach to Fidelio eventually fails artistically too - not a small part of Beethoven's genius was to ensure that this is the only approach which can glue its disparate elements together. Flimm leaves us with a series of tableaux and demi-formed inexplicably-motivated characters.
At least there are some high points on the musical side. The best was Karita Mattila's Leonore, splendidly bold and impassioned, not to mention bravely deglamourised. It's a production worth seeing for her alone. Ailish Tynan's beautiful voice gave Marzelline just the right amount of sweetness and light, while avoiding a simpering or cloying portrayal. Endrik Wottrich as Florestan struggled to convey any notion of the physical rigours of imprisonment, but delivered sensitively in his clear metallic tone. Eric Halfvarson had bundles of energy but struggled dramatically with Rocco's political/humanitarian awakening. Terje Stensvold's Don Pizarro simply wasn't nasty enough to negotiate the gaping dramaturgical hole in Act I, where his planned murder of Florestan (who, crucially, we haven't met) comes across as the righteous revenge of a wronged man rather than a vicious abuse of power.
Unfortunately, it was clear from the opening bars that the orchestra was on less than top form, with some particularly approximate brass playing, and an uncharacteristically thin tinny sound. A general impression of tiredness, lack of power, and under-rehearsal persisted throughout. To be fair, most of the the second act was a lot more polished than the first, with a fuller sound which suggested that the anaemic timbres of the first may have been intentional - if so, Pappano's aim was completely unclear to me. Things fell apart again in the final chorus though, and if I hadn't been able to see Pappano from my seat, I would have guessed he'd fainted or something.
Maybe I've been spoilt by Glyndebourne's recent terrific Fidelio, and the even better concert version by the LSO last year, but this production simply didn't come up to scratch.
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