Intermezzo

The Tsarina's Slippers at the Royal Opera House

Cherevichki / The Tsarina's Slippers - Royal Opera House, 20 November 2009

The Royal Opera House have chosen to bestow upon their new production of Tchaikovsky's Черевички (Cherevichki or Tcherevichki) an appropriately Royal title - The Tsarina's Slippers - in place of The Little Shoes, as it's usually known in English. Me I prefer the punchier and more accurate Little Boots, but sadly that one is already taken.

Francesca Zambello's folksy production with its mostly-Russian cast is intermittently entertaining but I spent much of its three hours looking at my watch and dreaming of crisps.

The opera's lack of momentum, which must play a part in the relative rarity of performances, can't be blamed entirely on the director though. Tchaikovsky doesn't seem to care much for his central story in which Vakula, a simple village smith, enlists the Devil's aid to procure a pair of the Tsarina's fancy boots, the only way he can win the heart of a vain village girl. He seems more interested in Vakula's witchy mother and her gruesome suitors, not to mention the numerous opportunities to slip in a quick ballet.

However enchanting some of these diversionary episodes are, they all fragment the story to the point where it's hard to care less about any of the characters. You could wander out for ten minutes and not really miss anything (a point to bear in mind when the BBC broadcast this over Xmas). The inevitable cuts don't help either. Why keep in all the royal minister's endless windbagging, but cut out the Cossacks' entrance to court, which explains how Vakula gets in to see the Tsarina?

For all the Royal Opera's attempts to sell this opera as Tchaikovsky's hidden comic side, it's telling that Vakula's longest and most effective scene is not some festive fairytale nonsense, but the one where he's contemplating suicide at the water's edge.

Two things hold this production together. The first is Alexander Polianichko's marvellous conducting. He doesn't just display the music, he conducts the whole opera with a splendid ear for drama and support for the singers. Inevitably some colour and detail is sacrificed for pace, but I think it's the right choice. The other is the design. Mikhail Mokrov's charmingly naive sets and Tatiana Noginova's traditionally-inspired costumes fill the stage with busy colour, though at the expense sometimes of any clear idea of location.

Apart from that, it's a collection of set pieces, some more successful than others, with the highlights coming from the Royal Ballet's contributions. Alastair Marriott went with a traditionally-styled pastiche that fits the production like a glove. His perfectly-judged idiomatic choreography includes an underwater nymph dance, a royal ball and a couple of delightful pas de deux, Gary Avis lofting tiny Mara Galeazzi with a grace and purity of line that made an affecting contrast to the riotous clamour of the village peasantry. A huge hairy dancing bear in pointe shoes (we guessed Bennet Gartside from the size) added more colour to the grand party finale.

The biggest applause of the night went deservedly to the team of spectacular high-kicking Cossack dancers who emerged from beneath the skirts of a giant golden Tsarina effigy  - their chapkas and p0rn 'taches cunningly concealing the fact they come from Nottingham.

The singing was Russian through and through, full of heart and gusto. Not a lot of finesse though. The likeable Vsevolod Grivnov had to work hard to be heard, but his lyrical tenor made Vakula the pick of the bunch. Olga Guryakova's powerful but wayward soprano made it only too clear that the part of the shoe-loving Oxana is not an easy sing. At least the petulant charm that enraptures Vakula came more easily than the notes.

Maxim Mikhailov was desperately underpowered as the Devil, as none of his tail-twirling antics could conceal - was his prosthetic piggy snout a problem perhaps?  Larissa Diadkova's mumsy witch Solokha would put the wind up no-one. At this stage in her long career she sounds more timeworn than her remarkably smooth brow might suggest, but that's no handicap in this part. The one unequivocally successful non-dancing scene ended in a quartet with her four lovers concealed in coal sacks - some splendid deep Russian voices especially from Vladimir Matorin as Chub.

The vocal shortcomings might have been less obvious if the singers had been better directed. But it appeared everyone had been choreographed into position and left to their own devices, leaving the task of entertaining the audience to the scenery. It almost worked.

*******   LOADS more production and curtain call photos, plus videos, on next page   *******

 

Venezuelan invasion begins - Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra hit London

Orquesta Sinfónica Simón Bolívar / Dudamel - Royal Festival Hall, 14 April 2009 

After their amazing, unforgettable 2007 Proms concert, Gustavo Dudamel and the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra were back in town to light up the South Bank for the first night of a short residency.

They'd won the game as soon as they stepped on stage, judging by the applause. It's an enormous band - twelve double basses, at least forty violins - but they all squeezed on somehow.

Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra was the opener, a clever choice that demonstrates clearly that the orchestra can handle more than just fiesta music, as well as providing plenty of individual chances to shine. The woodwinds were particularly impressive, their unerringly accurate intonation a rare delight south of the river, but the whole orchestra was immaculately-drilled. The size of the band provides a depth and richness of sound few conventional symphony orchestras can match, but it could also prove unwieldy. Not so in the expert hands of Gustavo Dudamel - even the quicksilver twists and turns of the last movement were crisp and fleet.

He drove Tchaikovsky's Fourth Symphony relentlessly.  It was exciting, edge-of-seat stuff, but at the same time I would have appreciated more subtlety here and there - the first movement's woodwind slivers airier, like glints of light on water, the brass fanfares more stately and monumental. The potential is there, and these musicians have grasped the most important lesson of all, which is how to listen and how to play as part of a greater whole. All they need now is the age and experience to hone their talents to the final degree.

The standing ovation erupted on the last note, maybe even before, and the lights dipped for a quick onstage costume change. Off came the DJs, on went the famed Venezuela jackets, and they launched into their party-piece Ginastera and Bernstein, complete with dancing violinists, twirling horns, and recklessly juggled drum sticks. The audience went wild, and wilder still as jackets were daintily removed and flung out into eagerly awaiting hands.

This orchestra doesn't produce the most refined playing you'll ever hear, but that's so far from the point it's irrelevant. What it does - and what no other orchestra right now seems able to do - is simply to bring people together in the joy of music. Simple, but not easy, and nobody does it better.

*****************************************

u want more photos? Turn teh page..............

Mariinsky's Queen of Spades at the Barbican

Queen of Spades - Mariinsky Theatre / Gergiev - Barbican, 30 January 2009

The Mariinsky Theatre scored an undisputed away win with the first opera of their three-night Barbican residency. 

And a two-fingered salute to those who whine that Gergiev doesn't rehearse enough.

Maybe he didn't rehearse this at all - I don't know - with his non-stop schedule it's hard to see how he could fit much in. But 'enough' rehearsal is however much the ensemble in question need to achieve the required results. With a competent orchestra who know the work, are nurtured in the same traditions as the conductor, and appreciate that half the joy of music-making is those unexpected moments of inspiration, then maybe rehearsals can be shelved altogether. It helps of course that Tchaikovsky's Queen of Spades is a Mariinsky staple. But this was no warhorse plod, it was a faultless and minutely-detailed performance, fresh and alive.

The Barbican has a notoriously lousy acoustic, but Gergiev's LSO job has taught him how to work it. You could believe it was the best concert hall in the world, so perfect was the balance between the lusciously warm Mariinsky strings, the dazzling brass and whispering winds. And with the singers lined up out of sight in front of him, there must have been some kind of ESP at play - no slips, no imbalances. No wallowing either. Gergiev's pace was brisk and his accents decisive, sugar-free romance that displayed the full palette of Tchaikovsky's remarkable orchestral colouring.

Last week most of the cast were performing the opera in the Mariinsky Theatre itself. They brought all the physical expressivity of their staged performance to this no-scores-required concert version, and the drama came alive in a way it rarely does in the concert hall. Not one performance was less than strong, and some were very good indeed.  

Larissa Diadkova simply *is* the Countess, grand but vulnerable, burdened by her terrible secret, conveying with the twist of a note the omnipresent fear of death lurking beneath the silver-spoon graciousness. With the nostalgic reverie of her Grétry aria she held the audience spellbound.

Vladimir Galusin is a sort of Russian Domingo with a dark, baritonal quality beneath his bright ringing tones, and he gave an intense and powerful performance as Herman. I didn't quite buy the transition from lovelorn innocent to manic gambler, but I think that's as much Tchaikovsky's fault as any singer's, and a problem that disappears in a good staging.

The noble baritone of Alexey Markov produced the most purely beautiful singing of the night in the short part of Yeletsky. And Kristina Kapustinskaya, doubling up as Polina and Milovzor, should be on everyone's watch list - an outstanding smoky-timbred mezzo with a haunting quality that stops you in your tracks.

The quality of the chorus was underlined when Viktor Antipenko stepped up out of the ranks to perform the small roles of Master of Ceremonies and Chaplitsky. Many opera houses would be happy to have a clear big voiced tenor like that singing their leads.

But all this would have been as nothing without Gergiev, who feels this music in his bones and transmitted it through his fluttering fingertips. 

 

 

Vlad hair day

Iolanta - LPO / Jurowski - Royal Festival Hall, 25 October 2008

How many conductors can tether their hair in a Queen Victoria bun and still look cool? How many would even try? How many have enough hair, come to that? In Vladimir Jurowski's case, it simply adds to his swami-like aura of inscrutability. Sigh. A few dirty looks were directed at the women who yelled "I love you!" as he left the stage, but I understand.

Since Opera Holland Park tackled it this summer, Iolanta has been growing on me. It has its draggy bits and its derivative bits, and any story about a blind princess who gains sight through the power of love and self-awareness is undeniably on the silly side. But there are moments of real invention, starting with the rugged chromaticism of the overture, and it builds into a compelling whole. (There's a 1955 Russian recording available on last.fm - not exactly brilliant, but at least it's free).

Part of Jurowski's Revealing Tchaikovsky series, this concert performance of Iolanta was staffed mostly by well-drilled Russian imports. Not only did all but one do their stuff without a score, but they even managed a little stage business in the postage-stamp space between the violins and the podium.

Jurowski's balletically airy reading took time to warm up. But it eventually touched the heart with King Rene's arioso. Sergei Aleksashkin's noble, timeworn bass was so committed it deserved nothing less than complete attention.

The tenor Yevgeny Shapovalov as Iolanta's suitor Count Vaudemont had a mixed night, hitting his first top Bflat in falsetto, but he went for bust after that, with a heroic ring and bags of passion.

Tatiana Monogarova was appealing but a little chilly in the title role - I was more impressed by the sprightly and silvery Ekaterina Lekhina in the much smaller part of Brigitta.

Rodion Pogossov's delivery of Robert's aria almost inevitably suffered in comparison to Hvorostovsky's magnificent encore, still fresh in the mind from last week, but like Alexandra Durseneva (Martha), Maxim Mikhailov (Bertrand) and Vyacheslav Pochapsky (Ibn-Hakia), his performance was committed and hard to criticise.

The only (minor) disappointment was the small Moscow Conservatory Chamber Choir, whose sound simply didn't carry to where I was sitting - whether this is down to them or to the horrendous acoustics of the Royal Festival Hall is hard to tell.

Jurowski's lean, mean Tchaikovsky clearly has some appeal. Despite the relative unfamiliarity of the work and the soloists, there was a pretty good turnout for this. I wonder if the 2 for 1 ticket offer helped?

 

 

 

Here Anna Netrebko and Rolando Villazon tackle Iolanta and Robert's duet:

Dmitri Hvorostovsky and Evgeny Kissin do it Russian style

Dmitri Hvorostovsky / Evgeny Kissin  - Barbican, 16 October 2008

Wassiliy Kandinsky: Russian Scene (Sunday)

Dmitri Hvorostovsky's Barbican programme tonight was the same one I heard him perform in Edinburgh a couple of months ago, all from the more distant corners of the Russian repertoire. A not insignificant change of pianist though, with Evgeny Kissin joining him in London. As they stood, bathing in the warm welcome with their blousy black shirts, cheesy grins and curious hairdos, only the presence of the piano indicated that this was a recital not a hairdressing competition. 

The all-Tchaikovsky first half was frankly a bit of a disappointment. Hvorostovsky, though good, was not at his best. He looked and sounded anxious and challenged. Straining at the top, parched at the bottom, he approximated the most distant notes.  He improved as he went on, but there was no question that this was not the standard we had seen in Edinburgh - though here too there was vigorous applause between all the songs.

Kissin, on the other hand, was a revelation. Often justly criticised for thumping, here he was a sensitive and accomodating partner. And needless to say, he breezed through the many technical challenges. I've long admired his Shostakovich, so perhaps it's the old cliche, Russians play Russian best.

The second half, as in Edinburgh, was shared between Medtner and Rachmaninov.  Both demand much virtuoso pianism, a sort of river of shimmering semiquavers that the song line floats serenely above. Again Kissin impressed with his ease and sensitivity.

Hvorostovsky, meanwhile, was transformed, his full, rich, burnished tone back in place, as if the first half was just some bizarre aberration. I don't know, perhaps he was simply holding himself back, storing up ammo for the full second half attack. He moved more freely, he sang more openly, he hit every single note cleanly. And when he sang, we heard Goethe and Pushkin's wonderful poetry and could overlook Medtner's rather derivative settings. Pulling off a few miraculously-sustained final notes turned the audience into putty. And I know that's kind of a cheap trick, but that doesn't mean it's an easy one - it's gobsmackingly impressive in the flesh. 

Whatever the sins of the first half, the capacity audience didn't mind, or more likely didn't notice, and two encores were gratefully received.

The first, something I didn't know and didn't quite catch, meant 'Sounds of the Night', and was more of the same. The second, Robert's aria from Tchaikovsky's Iolanta, was the standout of the night, Hvorostovsky sounding totally at home in its simple, direct idiom.

I hadn't appreciated that poor Hvorostovsky was working on his birthday (46 today!) until he was presented with a bouquet and - a Barbican first I think - a birthday balloon.  

 

 

Swanning around for Halloween

Yay for seasonally inappropriate programming!

Despite being gifted a name like Vlad, Maestro Jurowski  and his OAE accomplices will be coaxing the bats from the rafters of the Royal Festival Hall this Halloween with the late-nite sounds of, er ......Swan Lake. Coupled with the equally scary Romeo & Juliet.

Do they not have Halloween in Russia, or wut? Mr Pumpkinhead is not amused, though Mr Tchaikovsky is grateful for the exposure.

For anyone who finds Halloween always a trick and never a treat, the concert is a bargain alternative, with tickets at just £8 for an hour of live music (starting 10pm) plus DJ sets. More and booking details here. 

 

Night of the Juggalo Zombies - Rolando Villazon in new Berlin Eugene Onegin

Eugene Onegin - Staatsoper Unter den Linden, Berlin, 27 September 2008

 
production photos: Monika Rittershaus; curtain call photos: intermezzo.typepad.com

Who is Eugene Onegin all about? Onegin or Tatyana? That's the question usually asked. Director Achim Freyer seems to think it's all about himself. Ignoring the demands of the story and the music, he's simply slotted his new Berlin Staatsoper production into his familiar style of puppety characters, painterly sets and disengaged movement. This abnormal level of stylisation and artificiality may enhance a Zauberflote, but it's a treatment that reveals little about the down-to-earth and richly characterised Eugene Onegin. Indeed if you watched the whole thing with your fingers in your ears, you'd be hard pressed to guess what opera was in front of you.

There's a bargain-basement look (what funding crisis?)to the bare stage, sheeted in white for the first two acts, whipped away to reveal glossy black for the last. The costumes were my favourite part of the design concept - anonymous black garments rolled in whitewash that suggest uniformity but also snow and dusty decay.

Freyer has the whole cast on the steeply-raked stage most of the time, made-up like an Insane Clown Posse vid, shuffling up and down and across in a series of extended painful-looking zombie movements, a sort of barking mad dance. Chairs are wielded, waved, sometimes even sat on, a substitute for any human contact. 

The whole extended sequence is repeated four and a half times over the three hours - yes, there's a reason why all the production photos seem to look the same. (Once I twigged this, three reps in, I felt enormously clever - until I realised it had taken me two hours to grasp it). The occasional brief respites, like the hundreds of red ping pong balls that cascade down the stage as Onegin rejects Tatyana, are too crudely executed to provoke anything except embarrassed giggles.

Of course this all means that the action doesn't fit the situation, but that's Freyer's point. Life is a series of endlessly repeating loops, without meaning; everything is governed by fate.

Now to be fair, that's a perspective that could be validly drawn from Onegin. But it's far from the only one. And it certainly doesn't bear non-stop exploration to the exclusion of everything else in the opera. Tchaikowsky allows his characters thoughts and actions, with consequences, but Freyer's too busy taking three hours to make one simple point to investigate anything else. As the second act heckler (incidentally young and normal-looking) shouted, "Freyer is boring".

This production isn't half as clever or beautiful as it thinks it is, just rather silly. But in an honest, childlike way, not a manipulative or irritating one. And its chilly detachment does at least avoid the gasping and clutching and cloying sentimentality of many conventional interpretations. In short, it gives the music room to breathe.

Daniel Barenboim's reading was predictably muscular and confident, fortuitously matched to the production. He raced brusquely through the crowd scenes as if he'd rather leave them out altogether, and he certainly left the chorus behind at a few points. For the soloists he was attentive and sympathetic, moulding the orchestra around them, creating the characterisations that the production concept denied. Only the dramatically lingering finale had the least hint of sentimentality.

Rolando Villazón was someone else who positively benefited from the production. The constrained movement encouraged rather anonymous vocalising from many in the cast. Rolando's Lensky moved like a zombie but he sounded like a living, breathing person, full of fire and passion, and his physical stillness focussed and intensified his energy.

He sang in a less (technically) 'open' way than he had in Don Carlo at Covent Garden. But the upside was a voice that sounded totally under his control, with never a hint of strain or cracking. The highest notes pushed him to his limits, but again it was controlled, with just the occasional dip off pitch. On stage for the whole time, often in weird contorted poses, he must have been in some physical discomfort (if not real pain) by the end, but this never found its way into his singing.

If he wasn't already a star, a performance like this would make him one - was that why Freyer placed him centre stage, at the heart of the action? - if there's one character Onegin is not 'about', it's Lensky, after all. Villazón fans could hardly complain about either the quality or the quantity of Rolando on show.

Rene Pape's Gremin was as dignified as his clown makeup allowed him to be, though the chill of the production seemed to have worked its way into his bones. Fine singing, but missing that final degree of commitment.

Beside these two, the other singers largely faded into the background. Roman Trekel sang Onegin competently enough, but if you didn't know the opera was titled Eugene Onegin, you'd never guess from his retiring performance.

Anna Samuil was altogether too detached to be engaging, and brought little sense of Tatyana's emotional development to the final act.

Margarita Nekrasova, a sturdy and imposing Nurse, was the most impressive amongst the smaller roles and Stephan Rügamer's Triquet was nicely sung.

At the end, the boos for Freyer at the end predictably drowned out the applause. The earlier heckler wasn't bored enough to leave - he hung around to add his voice to the masses. It was touching to see both Rolando Villazón and Daniel Barenboim grasp the elderly director's arm in a gesture of solidarity. But I predict with confidence that this production won't be joining Berlin's repertory staples.

The full official photo gallery is here, there are some more press pictures here, and some more curtain call shots below - captioned because you'll need it..... 

 

 

Rolando Villazón and Anna Samuil: 

 

Rolando Villazón, Maria Gortsevkaya (Olga) and Margarita Nekrasova:

 

Rolando Villazón:

 

 

 

Rene Pape and Roman Trekel:

 

 

Rene Pape:

 

Rolando Villazón and Daniel Barenboim - comparing injuries?:

 

 

 

 

 

Rene Pape's bid for Blobbydom

Mr Blobby in 1993:

Rene Pape in last night's Berlin Staatsoper premiere of Eugene Onegin:

 

and here's teh Papester in action (photo: Monika Rittershaus):

Rolando Villazon Pandacam !!

 

Live from Berlin !! well, live-ish.

Yup, in Achim Freyer's new, minimalist production of Eugen Onegin for the Staatsoper which premiered tonight in front of teh Merkin, the only thing there was plenty of was panstik. And trowels, I venture.

Rolando was on stage for the whole three hours, more or less. Centre stage! Even after he died! It was that sort of show. Anyone who'd gone just to see Rolando could hardly feel short-changed.

Though it looked like the director had taken all the money for the sets and spent it on mind-bending drugs instead, it actually wasn't too bad, in a Nightmare Before Christmas sort of a way. Not distracting, not irritating, just a little silly (though inevitably it got as many boos as cheers, and even a mid-show heckler).

Rolando's Lensky pretty much pwned it, adding a vital human touch amidst the slo-mo zombie posturing of the Konzept. Rene Pape made a late bid for the top spot with his splendid Gremin, but it's hard to be noble in Mr Blobby makeup.

The path was clear for Daniel Barenboim to grab that unoccupied audience attention and make the orchestra the centre of the opera. Perhaps that was the idea all along.......?

More, much more, tomorrow..........

Dmitri Hvorostovsky paints it black at the Edinburgh Festival

Edinburgh Festival: Dmitri Hvorostovsky / Ivari Ilja  - Usher Hall, 9 August 2008

Tchaikovsky Ochevo?( Why?,Op 6 No 5), Lubov mertvetza (The Love of a Dead Man, Op 34 No 5), yesli b ty mogla (Ah, If only you could for one moment, Op 38 No 4), Na nivy zhjoltye… (On the Golden cornfields, Op 57 No 2)
Pimpinella, Op 38 No 6, Skazi o chem. v teni vetvei (Tell me, what’s in the shade of the branches, Op 57 No 1), Zabyt tak skoro? (to forget so soon?), Sred’ shumnogo bala (In the Midst of the Ball, Op 38 No 3), Serenade O ditja, Op 63 No 6, Don Juan’s Serenade, Op 38 No 1
Nikolai Medtner - Ja perezhil svoi zhelania (Gone are My Heart’s Desires, Op 3 No 2), Mechtatelju (To a Dreamer, Op 32 No 6), Schastlivoe plavanie (Prosperous Voyage, Op 15 No 8), Nochnaja pesn strannika (The Wanderer’s Night Song, Op 6 No 1), Zimnij vecher (Winter’s Evening, Op 13 No 1) 
Rachmaninov - Pora (It is Time, Op 14 No 12),  Ne ver’ moi drug (Believe me not, Friend, Op 14 No 7) , Ja byl u nei (I was with her, Op 14 No 4), My otdokhnjom (Let us rest, Op 26 No 3), Vesennie vody (Spring Waters, Op 14 No 11)

Back to Pat Benatar's wardrobe go the notorious black leather pants Dmitri Hvorostovsky has sported on recent tours. But Mr Showbiz (Siberian branch) is not a man to jade the eyeballs with a penguin suit. Tonight the interval remarks were provoked by a black puffy granny blouse (no! is traditional shirt of Russian people!) tucked it into functional matching trousers.

The sombre wardrobe echoed the programme's Russian gloom. Why has the glorious rose wilted in the spring? asked the first song, Ochevo. Covered by the cold ground I lie began the second. O if you could just for a single moment forget your sadness tried the third - but couldn't.

There's an vein of despair throughout Tchaikovsky's work and these songs which filled the first half get right to its heart. Hvorostovsky was able to tap straight into it, painting his words in many shades of black, but resisting any temptation to wallow or indulge himself in theatrics. 

Enthusiastic applause after every song stemmed the relentless misery (hay Usher Hall, how about replacing the No Photography sign with a No Clapping F***ers? And sling in a Turn Your F***ing Phone Off while you're at it). But rather than resenting this vulgar intrusion, Hvorostovsky seemed happy to bask in the warmth of the audience response with a ready smile.

In the middle of the gloom came a bit of an oddity - Pimpinella - Tchaikovsky's transcription of a cheery folk tune and sung in Italian. Hvorostovsky sang throughout from memory, but here he needed to grab the music from his pianist first for a quick refresher. There wasn't room for any Verdi on the programme tonight, but this bouncy tune provided a reminder of Hvorostovsky's skills in that corner as he relished the long open vowels so scarce amidst the Russian language's gobfuls of consonants.

Tchaikovsky's florid pianistic underpinnings provide more garnish than backbone to his luxuriant melodies. I think that's why his songs lack the intensity of the German lieder repertoire. The pain and heartache of the texts is always battling the gorgeous tunes and the dazzling virtuosity rippling away beneath. Hvorostovsky got the balance right and Ivari Ilja proved the perfect accompanist, coupling technical ease with restraint and taste. I can't think of another pair who have quite such a harmonious professional marriage.

The second half's songs by Rachmaninov and his contemporary Medtner were less familiar, but in the same Russian-romantic idiom. Though even more of a test for teh piano skillz of Mr Ilja, the raw material ultimately lacked the invention and durability of the first half's offerings.

Perhaps that was why Hvorostovsky chose to perk up Medtner's settings of Goethe's Glückliche Fahrt and Wandrers Nachtlied with the infinitely-sustained final notes he's famous for. What top C's are to Juan Diego Flórez, big breaths are to Dmitri Hvorostovsky. It's the length that counts, and we love him for it. Ever attentive to the mood of the audience - he's not one of those singers who retreats into himself - he obliged with a couple more big'uns towards the end. How cheap, how vulgar, how wonderful. Only a singer as technically assured and expressively controlled as Hvorostovsky can get away with this sort of showmanship without diminishing the emotional impact of what's preceded it.

He escaped after just two encores, Rachmaninov's In the Silence of the Night and a passionately camp Neapolitan number.

Dmitri Hvorostovsky repeats this programme with Evgeny Kissin at the Barbican on 16 October - not to be missed.

 

Opera Holland Park goes Russian

Iolanta / Pulcinella - Opera Holland Park, 25 July 2008

Tchaikovsky's one-act opera Iolanta may not be his finest moment, but even so, it seems to get less than its fair share of airings. However in classic London bus fashion, this Opera Holland Park staging is closely followed by the London Philharmonic's concert version on 25 October. Jurowski's crew will have their work cut out to better this version though.

Tchaikovsky gives the story of the unwittingly blind princess Iolanta, who recovers her sight by sheer willpower after falling in love, a couple of good arias and a few stunning orchestral moments. But long stretches fail to rise to the fantastical opportunities offered by the tale. It's dramatically unbalanced and yields only grudgingly to staging; it's not hard to see why concert versions are frequently favoured. 

Still, the excellent cast made the most of it.

Orla Boylan was the touching heroine and Peter Auty, a clear, ringing tenor her bespectacled love interest, Vaudémont. Mark Stone gave a solid, powerful performance as his friend Robert, and Mikhail Svetlov was characterful and credible as Iolanta's father, King René. It was announced at the start that Toby Stafford-Allen, playing Ibn-Hakia, had a throat infection, but it was hard to tell that anything was wrong. 

The low-budget set, an abstract forest in swirly greens with moody lighting, was uninspiring, but it did the business, allowing the focus to fall on the relationship between Iolanta and Vaudémont.

Preceding the short opera with Stravinsky's Pulcinella, complete with a dance staging, was presumably OHP's idea of giving the audience value for money. Black costumes against a black background were the least of its problems. The insubstantial choreography rapidly became tiresome, the singers took forever to warm up, and only the cleanly articulated performance of the City of London Sinfonia under Stuart Stratford saved me from falling asleep.

 

Gergiev does Mahler; Dudamel does a dance

LSO / Gergiev - Barbican, 5 June 2008
Philharmonia / Dudamel / Shaham - Royal Festival Hall, 8 June 2008

When I started this blog I promised myself I'd write about every performance I attended. Time has a way of defeating the best of intentions, but in the spirit of completeness I'll just catch up briefly on this pair of baffling performances from two of the most idiosyncratic conductors around.

You can't accuse Valery Gergiev of inconsistency. For this last concert in his Gergiev's Mahler™ cycle with the LSO, the Ninth Symphony coupled with the Adagio from the unfinished Tenth, he blistered forward with the same seat-of-the-pants drive he's displayed throughout the series.

I'm not sure adagios are meant to be that reckless, ländlers that turbulent, but it's undeniably riveting stuff. Lest anyone raise the old no-rehearsal issue, a scattering of precision-schooled climaxes proved that the requisite homework had been completed.

It's music making that lives in the moment, it speaks to the heart rather than the head, and standing back and thinking too hard might have highlighted some curiously back-to-front orchestral balance in places, the lack of measure in tempos. Bizarre but thrilling, and rapturously received by an exceptionally attentive and well-behaved audience. And congratulations to the LSO for (literally) sweating it out in the sub-tropical temperatures of the apparently non-airconditioned Barbican Hall.

 

And if anyone was going to top that, it would have to be Gustavo Dudamel. He whizzed the Philharmonia through Smetana's Overture to The Bartered Bride, found the perfect partner for Dvorak's Violin Concerto in the exuberant but lyrical Gil Shaham, and finished up in blockbuster style with Tchaikovsky's Fifth. 

When a performance is delivered with such rampant joy in music making, it's impossible to criticise. Dudamel jiggles like a battery-operated muppet, his full-body conducting channelling every rhythm, his woefully tuneless bathtub singalong uninhibited in its madness.

Yet it's no sideshow act -  the Philharmonia played with flair and precision, their characteristic lush, warm string sound the base of perfectly balanced textures. And there was no lack of thoughtfulness in the repose of the Dvorak Adagio or the grace of the Tchaikovsky Valse.

A truly special performance that left every single member of the audience with a smile on their face - and how many times does that happen?

 

Steven Isserlis and Joshua Bell revive some Russians

Steven Isserlis/Joshua Bell/Beatrice Muthelet/Jerusalem Quartet/Kirill Gerstein - Wigmore Hall, 10 April 2008

Arensky String Quartet No. 2 in A minor Op. 35 for violin, viola & 2 cellos
Balakirev Romance for cello
Rubinstein Cello Sonata No. 1 in D
Tchaikovsky Souvenir de Florence Op. 70

Steven Isserlis must tie with Mitsuko Uchida for London's most indefatigable concert goer. In fact, I'm so used to seeing him in the audience that it comes as slight shock to remember he has a job. And a mission too, judging by this crusading minifest he's organised to bring underexposed Russian chamber music into the spotlight.

This was the second of the four concerts, featuring Isserlis and friends performing music more usually sidelined or flat-out ignored. It's the sort of thing that might normally half-fill the house on an aficionados-only basis, but the names of Isserlis and Joshua Bell pulled a whole new audience in. The elderly Bell fans seated next to me had to contain their surprisingly puppyish enthusiasm for an hour though, as he only appeared in the second half of the programme.

First to appear were Isserlis, his cello, and three of the Jerusalem Quartet - all sporting identical black patent dancing shoes (a bet....or an eye for a bulk buy discount?) Otherwise nothing of note visually, unless you count the Isserlis mop, now that Rattle's thinning surely the undisputed world's most musicianly hairdo (photo: Clive Barda).

Isserlis's selections emphasised the exuberant party-loving side of the Russian nature more than its vodka-soaked melancholia.

Arensky's String Quartet brought this to the fore with its brief and lugubrious opening movement giving way to lively folk song variations at the work's centre. The vigorous workout it received didn't compromise beautifully articulated playing all round.

With Kirill Gerstein at the piano, Isserlis gave Balakirev's Romance and Rubinstein's Cello Sonata a strapping muscularity that counterbalanced their inherent winsome sweetness. And it was riveting simply to watch Isserlis perform, his technique so perfect and fingers so strong that both hands seemed near-motionless as he played. Gerstein I couldn't see from where I was sitting. His playing certainly sounded effortless, an achievement particularly in the tricksy Rubinstein with its endless ripples and powerhouse chords.

The second half brought to the stage what a large chunk of the audience had been waiting for - the Tom Cruise of the violin, Joshua Bell - for Tchaikovsky's sextet Souvenir de Florence. Bell took the driving seat here, pushing the work forward at a furious pace. It was a wonderful performance, the musicians' responsiveness and communication and sheer joy in playing a delight to watch as well as listen to. Even the slower parts had a pace and energy that defied any flagging. It was no surprise that Bell, bobbing and weaving in his seat like Ali, was dripping in sweat by the end. It made me wish I'd been able to get tickets for more than one concert in this series, but they've been srs golddust since the minute they went on sale. Next time....

Daniel Harding's matching Brahms and trousers

Midori/LSO/Harding  - Barbican, 3 and 6 April 2008

The LSO have gone Midori-mad this spring. These two concerts, with a violin concerto apiece, formed part of a whole series of events built around Midori (concert programme here).

There's no doubt that Midori is a fantastic ambassador for the violin, for classical music, for the arts generally. As a performer, I'm less convinced. Midori's technical control is impeccable, but in both the Tchaikovsky concerto of the first night and the Britten of the second, it smothered any spontaneity. The jarring brutality superimposed on the finale of the Tchaikovsky was no substitute. Elsewhere, Midori's self-effacing charm ultimately frustrated - it's not enough just to play louder than the rest of the guys. I longed for a bit of her character to peep through.

The first concert's closer, Stravinsky's Firebird Suite, was a test the LSO passed with flying colours. All soloists, especially the horn and flute, were superb. Daniel Harding sustained the narrative drive and vitality without compromising the rich tapestry of orchestral texture.  He's a storyteller, for me consistently impressive in opera if more varied elsewhere, and this is the sort of thing that shows him at his best.

The second concert ended with a curiously deflated reading of Brahms'  2nd Symphony. Recalling Harding's idiosyncratic and rather wonderful Brahms 4 here with the LSO a couple of years ago, I'd hoped for the same sort of verve and clarity. It wasn't laden with the sort of dull gravitas that so often makes Brahms a bore, but it hardly sparkled either, meandering shapelessly along. Rather like Harding's mismatched suit, with its green-black jacket and red-black trousers (yes, black comes in different shades) it passed muster at a glance, but the parts didn't quite add up to a satisfying whole.

Slipped unexpectedly in front of the first concert was a new five minute piece by Edward Rushton called Everything goes so Fast. Why the LSO don't pre-announce their new music 'extras' or include them in the concert programme is beyond me. It confuses the audience, denies young composers valuable publicity, and, worst, makes it look as if the LSO is ashamed to be connected with the work it performs. Big mistake. Anyway, the idea in this particular piece, a process of textural decay, seemed too slender to sustain a full five minutes' exploration, so subtle that it was almost imperceptible, and undermined rather than underlined by the rhythmic monotony. Perhaps it looked better on paper. To the ear it sounded more like a work in progress than the finished article.

Eugene Onegin at Covent Garden - the forecast is cold and wet

Eugene Onegin - Royal Opera House, 8 March 2008

Marina Poplavskaya, now 30, has been singing the part of Tatyana since she was 18. And she's Russian. Not a difficult casting choice, then. This is her biggest Covent Garden role to date -- unfortunately framed in a dull, uninspired production. First seen in 2006, but looking more like a '70's relic, or the Met on a budget, its period setting is dominated by bare minty walls and the main novelty, a Vegas-scaled water feature. This massive puddle nearly fills the first act stage, pushing the action out to a thin strip at the front of the stage and a tired-looking grassy knoll at the rear. Tatyana's mid-act letter scene is accommodated by a hut-like bedroom, which has to be ludicrously manhandled out of the 'river'.

Scrim-projected paintings open each act  (for the first, Jeune Homme Nu Assis au Bord de la Mer by Hippolyte Flandrin, left). They connect tenuously with the action, and indeed with Tchaikowsky's own life but, crucially, they don't help tell the story, and their dreamy repose jars horribly with the austere sets and the contrastingly lavish and lurid costumery.

Tatyana's dream scene at the start of the second act is almost brushed over as it melds confusingly with the following ball scene, animal-masked apparitions seemingly becoming part of the later celebrations.

But this is perhaps the most attractive part of the production, thanks to the beautiful and detailed costumes, like a Berwick Street haberdasher's window with their authentically Russian bold colour palette. The problem here was that the large crowd clustered into the compressed space sometimes obscured the real action. The snowy wastes of the following duel scene worked better in all respects.

The water feature is trotted out again for the final act, only this time it is frozen over and packed with skaters. Opera on Ice!  Complete with back-projections of olde St Petersburg. Although this created some symmetry with the first act and successfully points out how youth, with all its possibilities, has given way to the rigid strictures of age, etc etc, its main effect is simply to get in the way, again. There was also, curiously, no sense of the passage of time, of the fact that this act takes place some years later than the first.

The only unqualified success of the production concept is its generosity to the singers, who for the most part perform standing up and facing forward at the front of the stage, so nothing gets lost. And as it's strongly cast, from top to bottom, the vocal performances became the highlight of the day.

Marina Poplavskaya has enormous presence, and she made a commanding Tatyana. The unrelenting steely power of her voice was most effective in the drama of her final confrontation with Onegin. Doubt and vulnerability seem to come less naturally, but she is enough of an actor to convey something of Tatyana's shy bookishness in her physical performance.

Gerald Finley's solid Onegin provided the warmth in this coupling. His suavity on the initial encounter with Tatyana wasn't fettered by condescension, and his desperation and passion were plain to see in the finale. He faltered a little in the duel scene,

Piotr Beczala, with his clear, flexible tenor, conveyed Lensky's ardour and impetuosity well, and he captured something of the self-regarding nature of Lensky's 'poetic soul'. Ekaterina Semenchuk (ex-wedding singer made good), despite a richly-coloured and exceptionally controlled vocal performance, somehow failed to make any clear impression as Olga.

Diana Montague's Larina and Elizabeth Sikora's Filipievna were both excellent, elevating the opening scene to a convincing exploration of memory and regret. Brindley Sherratt, playing Gremin (Hans-Peter König takes over for the rest of the run), balanced authority and pathos beautifully. In the small part of Zaretsky, Vuyani Mlinde made a strong impression. Robin Leggate's campissimo Monsieur Triquet seemed to have wandered in from a different production (Gilbert & Sullivan en français?), but he provided some superbly comic relief.

In line with the general tone of the production, conductor Jirí Belohlávek gave a rather safe and uninspired reading, but it was a cleaner performance than we sometimes get at the ROH, and his dynamics and pacing showed great consideration for singers.

As with last year's rather duff Fidelio, the Royal Opera House chose a weekend matinee for the opening performance. I count myself duly warned for the future.

Daniele Gatti goes Dutch - Concertgebouw Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall

Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra/Gatti/Repin - Royal Festival Hall, 30 November 2007

Many of the packed audience in the Royal Festival Hall for this Concertgebouw visit bore telltale lapel tags indicating they were guests of the concert's corporate sponsor. Perhaps that accounted for the safe programming choices. It was no excuse though for the lacklustre performance of the first item, Schumann's Manfred Overture. We are accustomed to expect a degree of polish from the Concertgebouw, and to be fair they were technically adept (though the stage's unfriendly acoustics caught them out with a couple of early ensemble lapses). But Daniele Gatti seemed content to let them drift along in workmanlike fashion, as damp, cold and grey as the weather outside.

They seemed ready to tackle Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in similar fashion, but here soloist Vadim Repin leavened proceedings with an enthusiastic and lyrical performance, even if the fireworks of the virtuosic finale exploded in a rather orderly fashion.

Gatti ventured rather more boldly with Tchaikovsky's Symphony No 5, showing with his extreme tempo shifts and daringly suspended silences a willingness to engage with its dramatic element. But it wasn't until the fabulous horn solo in the slow movement that there was a real sense of anything more than scrupulously following the dots. This seemed to galvanise the performance into real bite and drive, even in the dolce con grazia waltz which followed, sweet but not over-sugared. The grandeur of the finale unrolled inevitably.

Perhaps there was a little too much Italian flash and not quite enough Russian soul about the performance - and the Concertgebouw without maestro Jansons are like chips without ketchup - but it was an satisfying performance if not a particularly memorable one.

Quality don't come cheap - Muti brings Chicagoans to London

Chicago Symphony Orchestra/Muti - Royal Festival Hall, 5 October 2007

That Mitsuko Uchida gets everywhere. After Tuesday's LSO concert, here she was again, tucked away at the back of the stalls, understated in black and teal Issey. I spotted a number of other musicians too, here to catch the first of two nights from the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Riccardo Muti -- as usual looking glossily ex-footballer chic, and amazingly youthful for a man pushing 70.

Although the first half of tonight's programme was familiar -- Tchaikovsky's Pathétique Symphony, the second was less so -- Hindemith's Nobilissima Visione Suite and Scriabin's Le poème de l'extase. Perhaps this accounted for the fair number of empty seats. Or perhaps it was the eyewatering ticket prices, nearly all in the £45+ range. Even the handful of cheapest seats (restricted view, no legroom) were £17. The Southbankers make the right noises about inclusion, but for most people I speak to, cost is the #1 reason why they don't attend concerts.

The CSO have been touring this programme around Europe for the last couple of weeks, and it was reflected in the bleached and blowdried sheen of their performance, almost antiseptically flawless in its precision of intonation and ensemble, polished from top to bottom -- no passengers here.

The Tchaikovsky was actually a little too perfect, honed to near-lifelessness. Muti has to be congratulated for avoiding the temptations of sentimentality, but this interpretation veered towards complete inscrutability. Though the tutti pauses did make me draw breath -- many orchestras over-anticipate these and sort of sag into them then lurch out again. The CSO disappear in a puff of smoke, then flick back on -- pure magic.

Even the CSO's polish couldn't buff the ugly layers of Hindemith's Nobilissima Visione, but they triumphed with the orgiastic thrills of Scriabin's Le poème de l'extase. Denying bombast and with, for once, the arid acoustics of the refurbished Royal Festival Hall working in its favour, Muti rolled the densely embroidered score from one climactic crest to another in ecstatic splendour. Whew! I needed a cigarette afterwards (and I don't even smoke), and judging by the applause I wasn't the only one.

Instead, after a cryptic extended introductory speech from the maestro himself, we got a suitable musical substitute - Schubert's Rosamunde overture, delivered with tender poise.

For a (depressingly truthful) perspective on this concert, and on London, from the other side of the platform, check out CSO bassist Michael Hovnanian's fascinating blog -- he should be one of the guys pictured below.