Il trovatore - Royal Opera House, 13 April 2009 (first night)
If the first night singing didn't quite hit dress rehearsal standards (I wonder why?) it was still the high point of this otherwise dismal production. A stop-start narrative and half-cooked characters make Il trovatore not the easiest opera to stage. Nevertheless, it's musically strong, truly inventive and a production that steers the audience away from too much left-brain analysis can capitalise on the thrills buried not too far beneath the surface.
But not this one. The monumental sets with their giant pillars and furnaces and gratings are handsome but randomly irrelevant - a palace patio, a railway station, an industrial pizzeria. And when a character really needs some help from the furniture, there's nothing there. How can Leonora mistake Luna for Manrico when they're both in plain view in front of her? Now if Roberto Alagna had been given a nice pillar to hide behind, we would all have sniggered less.
Not that there is much action. Characters barely engage with each other, movement is restricted to stock operatic gesture. It's as if they've all rehearsed on different continents from an Acting for Dummies video and come together for the first time tonight.
Add murky lighting, top off with thumb-twiddling set changes every twenty minutes, and what little momentum is built up in the turgid, static scenes evaporates. The final nail in this particular coffin is the unintentional comedy of the last scene, with everyone writhing on the floor like salted slugs.
Oh well, at least the sword fights (always a ROH strong point) provided a few seconds thrill.
Dmitri Hvorostovsky's dignified Luna provided the vocal highlight. Am I abusing my power? Luna asks himself as he realises there's only one way he's ever going to get the girl. This is no cartoon villain, as Hvorostovsky's noble military bearing emphasises, but a victim of his own desires.
Roberto Alagna's vocal production didn't have the ease of the rehearsal, and he often seemed disengaged - though he did manage to pull out his big numbers with a certain panache. And I was touched to see what a generous colleague he proved to Malgorzata Walewska, another singer whose form had dipped somewhat. At least she managed to whip up some gypsy passion (an emotion sorely lacking elsewhere). Her harsh, throaty vocals wouldn't pass muster in every role, but they added a certain dramatic integrity to her Azucena.
Sondra Radvanovsky was the clear audience favourite. She showed much more emotional involvement in her character than she had at the rehearsal, but at the expense of a degree of vocal control. It's a big, jolie-laide sort of a voice, and I'm not sure yet if I actually like it, but right now Radvanovsky's miles ahead of any other Leonora.
Mikhail Petrenko (Ferrando) and Monika-Evelin Liiv (Ines) were again strikingly impressive.
Not so Carlo Rizzi. Although the Royal Opera House orchestra played cleanly and accurately for him, he just could not keep them together with the singers, racing ahead for every cabaletta, dragging his heels behind whenever the pace slowed. But though he took a maximalist line, with changes of pace or scoring highlighted (often grotesquely so), nothing could compensate for the depressingly inert spectacle on stage. Time to throw this particular baby on the fire if you ask me.
I should perhaps point out that the majority of the tourist-heavy holiday audience were massively enthusiastic about the whole thing - there's clearly no accounting for drink taste.
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I went on Friday night (last) and I'm afraid I am not as gracious as you. I can't stand Sondra Radvanovsky's voice (am I the only one?) Is it a bit harsh to say that she was like a singing foghorn? She just replaces vibrato with volume and there is no elegance to her lines. I also thought Carlo Rizzi'z conducting was haphazard, I venture to say that the orchestra were playing as if the didn't like the conductor. But despite all that. Il Trovatore has such rich and wonderful music that it manages to transcend any abuse. :-)
Posted by: Clive Robinson | 21 April 2009 at 08:37 AM
Does she have good and bad nights? I thought her singing tonight the best I've heard from any soprano in a long time. Yes a dark steely element that sometimes hovers on the edge of the line between beauty and ? but she seemed SO in control of the voice tonight, and when she opened up .... wow - transcendentally beautiful. And the steely element seemed to provide a foundation for immense strength and control. And magnificently emotional, lovely soft singing .... I'll stop now!
Posted by: Kit Gill | 25 April 2009 at 11:36 PM
I'm a bit late to the party, but I watched the 2002 ROH Il Trovatore DVD last night. It also featured Rizzi and Hovorostovsky, and the same production.
In addition, I saw the Met Trovatore live in March 2009 with Hovorostovsky & Radvanovsky.
I'm glad I'm not the only person who cannot stand Radvanovsky's voice. Well, Anthony Tommasini doesn't like it either, but Radvanovsky seems to get rave reviews from everyone else for her Leonora.
Rizzi's conducting was painful to watch/hear on that 2002 production. He was too fast for many of the arias, esp in the prologue.
Hovorostovsky voice is beautiful, and his acting believable.
Posted by: y2k | 24 September 2009 at 07:59 PM