Out West Arts: Performance at the end of the world

One of the many things I love about Baroque opera in particular is how malleable it is. This is as true today as it was then. Take Lyric Opera of Chicago’s new production of Handel’s Rinaldo as an example. Handel wrote the work in record time. It was his first Italian opera for the London stage in 1711 and he recycled large amounts of music from works he had previously written while living in Italy. The work was a hit despite negative critical reaction, and Handel reworked the piece several different times over the next 20 years to meet the needs of various productions. Today his operas are treated in much the same fashion. Cuts are commonplace, and interpolations are made for various reasons. Rarely do opera companies or stage directors feel the need to emulate the settings or time periods of the works with anywhere near the rigor they do with operas from other periods.


Like much of Negrin’s work, the show is sharply angular, dark with colorful lighting, and dressed like some post-apocalyptic motorcycle gang. The set is dominated by a giant wall that lights up in sections interrupted only by a multi-story sculpture of the city’s Italian name, Gerusalemme. That cast often climb up and over that sculpture, but perhaps the most arresting visual moments are set around the motif of a giant black harpsichord box that is repeatedly lowered from above and tilted to reveal the inside to the audience when the lid is open. The harpsichord comes to represent the prison of the sorceress queen, Armida, one of the opera’s two villains. Armida opens the box and colorful balloons sprout from it by the dozens to lure in Rinaldo’s lover Almirena who becomes trapped inside and held hostage. Soprano Julia Kleiter sings two of her arias while entangled in the strings inside this giant harpsichord which is an image that sticks in one’s head. Later the Armida, an excellent Elza van den Heever, thrashing about in the throws of a rageful rejection of her affections will “play” this giant instrument while clowning around with the orchestra’s own harpsichordist.

Sometimes the absurdity of it all doesn’t quite work out. Louis Désiré's costumes can be particularly ridiculous, Rinaldo and the Christians in duster coast and leather, Argante and the Muslims in jackets and long skirts made up of Oriental rug remnants. Baritone Luca Pisaroni sings the role of Argante and once again is trapped in a costume that does everything in its power to work against his natural good looks. There's unexpected bursts of tafeta from Almirena's outfit as well like something that would get a contestant booted off Project Runway or better yet, RuPaul's Drag Race. The stage action is frenetic to the point of distraction at times. But there are some campy moments as well including a sequence where Rinaldo, played by countertenor David Daniels clad in a sleeveless leather vest, is held back by a bevy of dancers wearing matador-style capes as he does a spit-take following an unwanted kiss from the amorous queen Armida. Cooties indeed.

With so much to look at, one might forget there was an opera going on, but there was and musically there was a lot to like. Conductor Harry Bicket is no slouch and he got a good steady performance from the orchestra. Not all the vocalists were with him at all times with mezzo Sonia Prina, who sang the role of Goffredo, often going commando with her own tempos. Van den Heever has a big bright voice that may have been a bit large scale for this sort of show, but she could at least be heard easily in the big house. Better yet she proved to be a comic actress of the first rate digging into the wild lovelorn fluctuations of Armida with brio. Perhaps the vocalist who had the best evening was the wonderful Iestyn Davies as Goffredo’s brother Eustazio. Davies projected well with a bright easy tone and the agility to manage the coloratura pyrotechnics allowed for in the score. He’s boyishly handsome and even with his Mad Max outfit all eyes were on him. He’s the next great countertenor and there’s no reason he shouldn’t be in top-billed roles starting today. By contrast, while David Daniels is still an exciting performer to watch, the vocal details are increasingly in softer focus for him.

But even with its weaker spots, this Rinaldo provides many of the kicks people who love opera live for. It’s preposterous, yes, but it’s fun, attractive to look at and often beautiful to hear. And even if you don’t think or don’t know if you love opera you should see it. It might just put you in the other category. The show runs through March 24th.

Labels: Lyric Opera Chicago 11/12

Should opera companies be in the business of staging musicals? Yes, I know there is a fine and arbitrary line between “opera” and the rest of “musical theater,” but I believe most people would see a difference between Parsifal and Jersey Boys without needing a PhD to parse out the grey area in between. American opera companies have delved into this breach over the years in good economic times and bad featuring works that are decidedly outside of the standard opera repertoire. The works that fall into this category do so for several reasons. They may be works whose composers have acquired a certain musical and intellectual caché, like Sondheim. Or they may be works that were composed as operas, like Porgy and Bess, but came into the world in a commercial musical theater format and then get a belated high-art make over. And then there are those works whose words and music that were so groundbreaking or that have become such staples of American culture that they achieve a status commensurate with other works typically seen on the opera stages.

Show Boat, fits into that last category. The landmark musical written by Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II premiered on Broadway in 1927 with an ambition and scope that belied its comparatively lower-art point of entry into the world. It changed a lot of things in American musical theater, so that it finds its way onto a traditional opera stage at the Lyric Opera of Chicago over eight decades later would stand to reason. A musical production for an opera company can be viewed as a way of filling houses and bringing in audiences that would never dream of buying a ticket to Aida. And whether or not this was a primary motivation for this current production, which will also travel to San Francisco, Washington, and Houston, it undoubtedly looks like it will be successful in doing so. The company has put together a team both onstage and off that have an excellent track record for just this kind of project. Director Francesca Zambello has brought American musicals to Glimmerglass where she is artistic director and she is no stranger to Show Boat either. She also put together a well-traveled and extremely popular production of Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess in a similar vein that has played to sold out houses across the country. Add to her direction the musical skills of John DeMain in the pit, who also conducted a great many of those Porgy and Bess performances, and you’re clearly asking for repeated success.

And folks in Chicago have largely got what they asked for. Show Boat has been just as successful in Chicago as its predecessor due to Zambello’s remarkably unassuming, sincere staging. The material with its once radical and expansive story line about miscegenation now seems melodramatic and overly sentimental. But Zambello approaches the material with straight forward earnestness that, combined with Paul Tazewell’s candy-color costumes and Peter J. Davidson’s theme-park-ready boat and night-club sets, makes you feel like Ava Gardner is about to walk out on stage.

She doesn’t, as it turns out, but those that do have been well cast and consistently deliver performances of the very songs that make this show opera house worthy. Alyson Cambridge plays Julie LaVerne and delivers a version of “Bill” to rival any you’ve heard from Audra MacDonald or Barbara Cook. Of course, there’s “Old Man River” as well, and Morris Robinson and the chorus rescue the number from any sort of kitsch that may be kicking around in your head about it. There was plenty of sniffling in the house over this number both times it appears in the show. Angela Renée Simpson played Queenie and Broadway’s original Mary Poppins, Ashley Brown sang Magnolia both in excellent voice. And among all of this was Nathan Gunn channeling Clark Gable in style if not sound as the riverboat gambler Gaylord Ravenal. He, like the rest of the cast, was amplified for the dialog in the performance, which was subtle and well managed overall. (I know this throws some people into fits, but I’m not one of them if its done well like it is here.)

Whether or not bringing Show Boat to an opera stage is going to increase the size of the opera audience or create huge financial windfalls is debatable. However, it’s hard to complain much about a production done this well. And given the track record of the show and its creators so far, it appears that a lot of people will be seeing it in the coming years. There are four more performances in Chicago through March 17.

Labels: Lyric Opera Chicago 11/12

Please tell me that if you’ve been able to get to the Lyric Opera Chicago’s production of Boris Godunov you’ve done so. It’s a smashing one. While in Chicago over the weekend, I also got a chance to see Sir Andrew Davis lead this rich and well embellished performance with the best non-native Russian speaking cast I’ve yet heard in this opera. Of course, casting in Chicago is some of the most impeccable in the whole country and all of the principals prove as engaging as actors as they are vocalists. The title role goes to Ferruccio Furlanetto who does kings who are losing their grip like nobody else. If you’ve seen his Philip II you know what I mean. His is not a very Russian sound, of course, but the smoothness and power of his voice make up for it. He made Boris’ death one of the most engrossing I remember.

Then there’s Stefan Margita as Shuisky. I am more and more in thrall of this performer with each viewing. His performances of Loge in San Francisco were unforgettable and he should be the perfect addition to the Metropolitan Opera’s Das Rheingold cast next spring. Given how well he handled one of the most duplicitous characters in opera, it’s no surprise that his scheming, turn-coated Shuisky should radiate so much heat. Of course, this is a production, originally for San Francisco Opera under the direction of Stein Winge, that is mostly interested in the political machinations contained within the story. Thus Shuisky rises in his importance as a mastermind behind Boris’ eventual downfall. An added twist in the final stage image puts the point on this that might look somewhat overworked in lesser hands. But Margita’s ability to portray an icy manipulator with a Cheshire smile makes it work exceedingly well. (I don’t remember this gesture from the most recent revival of Winge’s production in San Francisco and the director of Chicago’s revival, Julia Pevzner, may have reinserted or re-emphasized it.)

There are many other fine performances here. The always enjoyable and big voiced Andrea Silvestrelli sang a Pimen that was as pious as Shuisky was evil. Raymond Aceto was notable as Varlaam and Erik Nelson Werner made much out of his two scenes as the pretender Grigori. Another familiar voice I was glad to hear was David Cangelosi’s as the comical Missail.

All this excellent casting does make a big difference. Winge’s production can be a bit dry at times. In an opera about pageantry with big chorus numbers, the sparse raked wooden stage that curves up into the flyspace upstage can be wanting visually. But it is also unobtrusive in the way it provides for good vocal projection and easy entrances and exits for the large chorus. There are several openings in the set's curved wall upstage and panels with Russian church iconography appear during key scenes. Still the performances here are so strong that the set and surrounding seem to vanish from focus. The interaction between these characters is the real joy of this performance. Lyric Opera has managed to put together a show that is much more than the sum of its parts with a sharp eye to casting and a strong hand in the pit. There are three more performances in the coming week.

Labels: Lyric Opera Chicago 11/12

I can’t shake the feeling there’s a changing of the guard underway on the stages of American opera houses. I suppose that is always true with various careers either taking flight or cooling off. And there is certainly always the next big thing waiting in the wings. But it is also true that a number of young American singers have been given notable high profile assignments lately commensurate with the heat surrounding their performances in smaller roles or on smaller stages. The Metropolitan Opera and New York critics are currently in the process of anointing Angela Meade as the next bel canto star without the requisite reality TV series such titles usually require these days. Meanwhile at the Lyric Opera of Chicago where superstar soprano Renée Fleming is taking her first steps in the role of administrator, the house has been integral in thrusting one of its own Ryan Opera Center alumna, Amber Wagner, into the spotlight. Wagner is making a splash in the Wagner/Strauss corner of the soprano repertory. She was slotted into a few performances as Elsa in last season’s Lohengrin that got her very good notices. And on Saturday she stepped into the headlining spot in a revival of Ariadne auf Naxos when the originally scheduled Deborah Voigt dropped out several months ago deciding instead to concentrate on her own Brünnhilde performances in New York.

It’s a good casting decision, and a deserved step up for a singer who made a far lower profile Met Opera debut this fall as Anna in Verdi's Nabucco. And from the sound of Saturday night’s opening Ariadne performance under music director Andrew Davis, there is no reason to believe that she couldn’t be the next Wagnerian superstar. She has a big, beautiful voice with ample warmth and that requisite ability to cut through a massive orchestra. Her acting appears to be developing by leaps and bounds as well. She was much more assured this time than previously. The top part of her range still didn’t strike me as completely opened up, but there was no shouting or strain and she held the stage well against a large ensemble cast. She may not have been a marquee name going into this run, but these performances will undoubtedly bring her one step closer to that point.

To complement Wagner, the company cast an array of young Americans in most of the major roles. Brandon Jovanovich sang Bacchus. He seems to pop up in just about anything these days, and though he an interesting singer, as with his turn as Siegmund in San Francisco last summer, he sounded a little thin for this particular role. Anna Christy, a Chicago favorite, sang Zerbinetta with a lot of flair and solid coloratura technique. However, she sounded rushed in her extended Act II aria with Davis granting her little extra space for flourishes other singers milk with abandon. René Barbera and Matthew Worth were also included in the cast as Brighella and Harlekin respectively. There were outliers in this cast of young Americans including Eike Wilm Shulte as the Music Master who was quite good opposite the other big name in the cast, Alice Coote as the Composer. Coote also has a knack for a wide variety of roles in most corners of the mezzo repertory. Her composer had the requisite power and musicality but not quite the lyrical brightness I’ve seen her muster before in Baroque roles or as Massenet’s Charlotte in Werther. She too seemed hampered somewhat by Davis’ rather restrained conducting that lacked a greater dynamic range and lushness.

But really all of these minor issues could be less noticeable if it wasn’t for the staid and uninspired staging from John Cox who was greeted with cool applause during the curtain call. The opera is set in the 18th century and Cox uses the stage-within-a-stage conceit for the production. And while all of this is certainly within the letter of the libretto, the look is tired and predictable. Act I is inexplicably dominated by a large wheel used to raise the curtain and scenery on the back stage of the set while Act II has all the pretty costumes and stand and deliver singing you could ask for. Cox has a better take on the comic elements of the story, and when Zerbinetta and her boys show up to deface the set or merrily prank Ariadne, the show is at its best. Cox seems unsure about what to do with von Hofmannsthal’s more serious moments. He sometimes covers them up with concurrent visual gags either about the set or the characters, which is preferable to when he just elects to ignore them and let them pass. But for many in the cast including Wagner, there are surely many other notable productions of this and other operas that lie ahead. And now is the time to enjoy hearing the career of a major vocalist unfold here in Chicago where Ariadne auf Naxos runs through December 11.

Labels: Lyric Opera Chicago 11/12