Night After Night

Francesca da Rimini at the Metropolitan Opera House, March 4, 2013

Marcello Giordani, Eva-Maria Westbroek and Mark Delavan, by Ruby Washington/The New York Times

Francesca da Rimini at the Metropolitan Opera House, March 4, 2013
The New York Times, March 7, 2013

I don't often get much direct response to my Times reviews in the form of email; usually that's reserved for social-media channels and the occasional comment here on the blog. In this case, though, two notes I received after this review came out – one on my home address and one via the Times – left me disappointed that I'd failed to clearly convey the real motivation behind the question with which I closed the review: "Still – why?"

So, to be perfectly clear, I wasn't actually questioning why the Met would devote its considerable resources to an also-ran of the operatic repertoire. Fact is, I think the Met could stand to explore such byways more frequently. A diet of nothing but consensus masterpieces, however well done, could grow deadly dull in time, and the Met does tend to trot out its greatest hits and recent reimaginings rather frequently.

The music in Zandonai's Francesca da Rimini is inventive and ravishing, no two ways about it, and I also meant what I wrote about the clever economy of its dramatic pacing. The production is an old-school eye-popper of the sort we see infrequently now, apart from Zeffirelli revivals, and the directing is basically agreeable, though I absolutely agree with John Yohallem's observation regarding one particular scene, well-stated in his astute review on Parterre Box:

David Kneuss, who restaged the production, has the Malatesta army in Act II stand at attention staring up at Francesca and Paolo as they confess their immoral love to each other, which can’t be the ideal way to keep it secret from Gianciotto. At least turn the soldiers around, hey?

The question at the end had everything to do with the two principal performers, both of them honorable artists. Eva-Maria Westbroek's sound could be impressive, but lacked a certain floating quality that her character warranted; more importantly, her enunciation lacked clarity and incisiveness entirely.

As for Marcello Giordani – who, as I've revealed before, was my ur-tenor ages ago at Houston Grand Opera, where he made an indelible impression as my first-ever Duke of Mantua in a Rigoletto that literally changed my life – I wonder if it was his recent troubles in Les Troyens that made him seem so cautious and troubled here? I have immense respect for Giordani, but this was not a comfortable evening for him.

So, to complete the thought I tried to telegraph in that final, lingering question, why did the Met devote such evident resources to this revival without the proper principal artists to bring out what's best about the opera itself?

 

Time Out New York interview with Lauren Worsham

Lauren Worsham, by Kristin Hoebermann

Interview with Lauren Worsham
Time Out New York, Feb. 21–27, 2013

An excruciatingly short snippet from a lengthy, wide-ranging and brilliantly fun conversation with Lauren Worsham (full name: Lauren Worsham Jarrow), who plays Flora in New York City Opera's stylishly spooky production of Benjamin Britten's opera The Turn of the Screw.

Worsham caught my eye and ear in Brooklyn Village, a wonderfully creative multimedia concert event staged by the Brooklyn Philharmonic at Roulette (reviewed here), then shook me to the core in a Peak Performances staging of David T. Little's opera Dog Days at Montclair State University (reviewed here).

Since both of those events made my list of Top 10 events for 2012 in Time Out, talking to Worsham about her City Opera assignment was a no-brainer. We covered her Texas roots, her training at Yale University, her early jobs, her relationship with opera and her flamboyantly stagey rock band, Sky-Pony, which she leads with her husband, theater composer Kyle Jarrow.

Someday, I'd love to get around to transcribing and posting the entire interview. Don't hold your breath right now, though. Instead, look out for Worsham as Guadalena and Manuelita in City Opera's production of Offenbach's La Perichole at City Center, April 21, 23, 25 and 27. And watch this video of Sky-Pony in action at Joe's Pub, then see the band's schedule for your next chance to witness it live… as of this writing, it's March 30 at Pianos on Ludlow Street.

Powder Her Face at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, February 15, 2013

Allison Cook and William Ferguson in Powder Her Face, by Sara Krulwich/The New York Times

Powder Her Face at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, February 15, 2013
The New York Times, Feb. 18, 2013

New York City Opera opened its latest season with a brash, intelligent and sexy staging of English composer Thomas Adès's notorious debut opera, Powder Her Face, which struck me as a finer, deeper and more nuanced work on stage than it had previously on record.

Having missed City Opera's 2011-12 season entirely due to the company offering so few performances – four of each production seems to be the new norm, certain lackluster celebrity events aside – I was glad to catch up here, and even gladder to see the fine results the company managed to pull off despite its considerable financial woes and other concerns.

The present season's second offering, Britten's The Turn of the Screw, was just as good, maybe better. (My Time Out New York interview with Lauren Worsham, who played Flora, will be in the next post here.) Two more presentations of worthy curiosities – Rossini's Moses in Egypt and Offenbach's La Perichole – arrive in April, both at City Center in midtown Manhattan.

Much has been written about City Opera's travails and wrong moves, a lot of it warranted. But on this kind of evidence – and on a few choice whisperings about future plans – I refuse to give up hope for this diminished but still vital institution.

The Yeomen of the Guard at City Center, January 18, 2013

Laurelyn Watson Chase, Stephen Quint and the NYGASP chorus, by Richard Termine/The New York Times

The Yeomen of the Guard at City Center, January 18, 2013
The New York Times, Jan. 22, 2013

I've written several times before about my abiding love for the Gilbert & Sullivan canon, and for the work done on its behalf by the New York Gilbert & Sullivan Players, most recently when I covered their production of The Sorcerer at John Jay College in December. But of The Yeomen of the Guard, a show I didn't know well and hadn't seen staged previous, the following lines came to mind unbidden when I circulated my tiny review on social media:

Of "Yeomen," a rarity,
Observed with all due charity,
The music's bliss,
The tale, amiss –
Unfortunate disparity!

Soldier Songs at Pace University, January 11, 2013

Zac Ballard and Christopher Burchett in Soldier Songs, by Ruby Washington/The New York Times

Soldier Songs at Pace University, January 11, 2013
The New York Times, Jan. 15, 2013

So glad to have seen David T. Little's first musical-theater piece, especially having been so deeply impressed and moved by his subsequent opera, Dog Days (reviewed here and mulled further here). The presentation was jointly produced by Pace Presents, which is doing some mighty fine work these past few years, and Prototype: Opera/Theater/Now, a hugely ambitious and very successful new festival concocted by Beth Morrison Projects and the performing-arts center HERE.

Soldier Songs wasn't the only Prototype presentation reviewed in the Times: you can read Tony Tommasini's appreciation of Sumeida's Song here, and Zack Woolfe's review of Bluebeard here. And you'll also want to check out Heidi Waleson's overview of the entire festival for the Wall Street Journal, here.

The Barber of Seville at the Metropolitan Opera, December 18, 2012

Isabel Leonard and Rodion Pogossov, by Andrea Mohin/The New York Times

The Barber of Seville at the Metropolitan Opera, December 18, 2012
The New York Times, Dec. 24, 2012

That's right: not exactly Rossini's flawless Il barbiere di Siviglia, but the Met's new family-friendly shortened Barber in English. I'm grateful for a spot-on headline – Just a Little Off the Top for Rossini’s Old ‘Barber’ – and for timely Twitter comments from @OperaTeen, which allowed me the chance to add to Harry Rose's burgeoning renown.

"Curtains Fall, But Operas Reverberate": New York Times year-end essay

Einstein on the Beach at BAM, by Sara Krulwich/The New York Times

"Curtains Fall, But Operas Reverberate"
The New York Times, Dec. 16, 2012

A year-end essay for The New York Times about the two events that had the most enduring impact for me in 2012: Philip Glass and Robert Wilson's Einstein on the Beach, which lived up to and surpassed a quarter-century's worth of personal expectations in a revival at the Brooklyn Academy of Music; and Dog Days, the first full-length opera by David T. Little, with a powerful libretto by Royce Vavrek and an explosive stage conception by Robert Woodruff, presented by Montclair State University as part of its ambitious Peak Performances series.

It bears mention that neither of these shows is at an end. Einstein on the Beach continues its triumphal world tour; it's in Amsterdam right now, with dates ahead in Hong Kong and Melbourne, at the very least. As for Dog Days, I'm aware of no firm future dates, but rumor has it you should keep an eye on the ambitious Fort Worth Opera. Meanwhile, Little's Soldier Songs opens for its first fully staged New York City run on Friday, January 11, as part of the inaugural Prototype festival of new opera and musical theater, and a reading of the libretto for his next stage work, Artaud in the Black Lodge, is scheduled for February 9 at HERE.

Curlew River and Riders to the Sea at the Juilliard School, December 9, 2012

Kyle Bielfield in Curlew River, by Ruby Washington/The New York Times

Curlew River and Riders to the Sea at the Juilliard School, December 9, 2012
The New York Times, Dec. 11, 2012

A tremendous double bill of Britten's church parable Curlew River and Vaughan Williams's opera Riders to the Sea, presented by what might just be the most consistently stimulating company in New York City. Watch out for tenor Kyle Bielfield, who'll be featured in the first concert of Juilliard's Focus! 2013 festival, an overview of postwar British music, on January 25 at Alice Tully Hall. You'll find an article by Joel Sachs about the festival here.

The Sorcerer at Gerald W. Lynch Theater, December 1, 2012

Stephen O'Brien in The Sorcerer, by Richard Termine/The New York Times

The Sorcerer at Gerald W. Lynch Theater, December 1, 2012
The New York Times, Dec. 4, 2012

Few companies in my experience do Gilbert & Sullivan as honorably and charmingly as Albert Bergeret's New York Gilbert & Sullivan Players, whose annual three-show residency at the New York City Center is underway as I type this. There's one more performance of The Mikado, tomorrow night, followed by four performances of H.M.S. Pinafore and four of The Yeomen of the Guard.

La clemenza di Tito at the Metropolitan Opera House, November 16, 2012

Lucy Crowe and Kate Lindsey, by Sara Krulwich/The New York Times

La clemenza di Tito at the Metropolitan Opera House, November 16, 2012
The New York Times, Nov. 20, 2012

After a jam-packed run-up to an unusually relaxed and personally productive four-day weekend, time for a bit of catching up before the deluge commences anew. You've got three more chances to see this fine production of Mozart's Clemenza, which I'd take to be as strong and convincing an argument of the work's merits as can be made; for those not in New York, the Met's HD transmission is scheduled for this Saturday, Dec. 1, at 1pm.