IPHIGENIA IN AULIS AND IPHIGENIA IN TAURIS – REVIEW OF 2024 AIX-EN-PROVENCE DOUBLE BILL PRODUCTION

 Reviewed by James Karas

The House of Atreus has been a most generous contributor to writers and composers by providing them with fascinating subjects for works of art. Agamemnon, Clytemnestra and their children Electra, Iphigenia and Orestes are all ripe subjects for an endless number theatrical and operatic works. Christoph Willibald Gluck wrote two operas about the travails of one daughter, Iphigenia, in her youth in Aulis and twenty years later in Tauris.

The two operas were not intended to be performed as a double-bill, but the Aix-en-Provence Festival has decided to pair the two works as a sort of operatic marathon lasting five and a half hours. Yes, there is s upper break in the middle.

The drawing card for the double-bill is Dmitri Tcherniakov, the brilliant Russian director. He has given the two operas a similar production with an ant-war stance that one may want to relate to the Trojan War but in the modern-dress production, he is no doubt thinking of modern conflicts like the Israeli-Hamas conflict in Gaza and the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The two operas are different but have much in common as well. They deal with the same main character in a life-and-death situation. At Aulis, Iphigenia has been chosen as a sacrifice to the goddess Diana for the latter to give favourable winds for Agamemnon to sail to Troy to rescue his brother’s wife Helen. Tcherniakov leaves Iphigenia’s fate somewhat ambiguous but if we find her in Tauris twenty years later, we know that she has been spared. 

Aix-en-Provence Festival. Photo: © Monika Rittershaus

In the barbaric kingdom of Tauris, Iphigenia has become a priestess in a temple dedicated to Diana, the goddess for whom she was slated to be sacrifices at Aulis. When two strangers arrive at Tauris, they are ordered to be killed, or one of them at least. The candidate for sacrifice at Aulis becomes a potential executioner in Tauris. At Aulis she is given as a sacrificial victim by her father. At Tauris she is ordered to murder unknowingly her brother Orestes or his best friend Pylades. She is in danger of being killed herself. It is thus possible to view the two operas as the different sides of a coin.

For the opening scene of Iphigenia in Aulis, Tcherniakov has devised a dream sequence played during the overture. We see a frantic Agamenon (done superbly by Canadian baritone Russell Braun) in a nightmare dreaming of his daughter’s execution. He dithers between killing his innocent daughter which will follow, of course, with the killing pf countless innocent Trojans. He decides to do both, but his daughter is probably saved by the goddess Diana for whose sake she was to be sacrificed.

Both operas are dominated by American soprano Corinne Winters as Iphigenia. She has a lovely voice and sings in a measured and mellifluous way in Aulis and much more forcefully in Tauris. It is a marathon performance by any definition, and she deserves a standing ovation. French soprano Veronique Gens sings the powerful Clytemnestra with marvellous tones. Australian tenor Alasdair Kent plays and sings a clownish Achilles. 

Soprano Soula Parassidis from Vancouver, a rising star, sang the role of the goddess Diana in both operas with vocal beauty.

In addition to directing, Tcherniakov designed the sets for both operas. For Aulis, the set consists of several playing areas constructed from steel posts with highly imaginative and changing lighting by Gleb Filshitinsky. The same style is used for Tauris, but it is in post-war ruins compared to its previous condition.

Baritone Florian Sempey as Orestes and tenor Stanislas de Barbeyrac as Pylades competed in their display of manly friendship and willingness to die for one other. They displayed the same prowess vocally in their outstanding performances.

Finally let me praise, perhaps more than anyone, Emmanuelle Haïm conducting Le Concert d'Astrée. She was on her feet for the full five and a half hours but that is the least for which she deserves praise. She conducted exemplary performances of both operas in an unforgettable evening.

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Iphigenia in Aulis (Iphigenie en Aulide) and Iphigenia in Tauris (Iphigenie en Tauride) by Christoph Willibald Gluck opened on July 3 and will be performed in repertory until July 23, 2024, at the Grand Theatre de Provence, Aix-en-Provence, France. www.festival-aix.com

JAMES KARAS IS THE SENIOR EDITOR, CULTURE OF THE GREEK PRESS

SAMSON – REVIEW OF 2024 AIX-EN-PROVENCE FESTIVAL PRODUCTION

 Revised by James Karas 

Go to Aix-en-Provence and see the premiere of an opera by Jean-Philippe Rameau and Voltaire called Samson. If you were in Paris in 1733 you could have almost seen it, but the church gave a resounding NO to the production and that was the end of it. Until 2024, that is. The history of the opera is almost as interesting as its first production this year at the Aix-en-Provence Festival.

A few details will have to suffice. In 1734 Voltaire approached Rameau, the greatest composer of the time, to put together an opera. He completed the libretto and Rameau composed the score by midyear. The Catholic Church ruled that an opera on a religious subject was out of the question. Voltaire kept the libretto and it’s easily available, but Rameau did not keep the score. But he did use parts of the music in other operas.

In 2024 director Claus Gutz and conductor Raphael Pichon decided to adapt the libretto and hunt down Rameau’s music and in the end create a new work, a retelling of the Samson story that finds its roots in the Bible, in Voltaire and Rameau, in today’s world of war and inhumanity. It is a unique take that is difficult to pin down but full of fascination.   

Both Voltaire and Guth-Pichon set Samson in “the present” but Voltaire starts with Bacchus. Hercules. Virtue, the Followers of Virtue and Voluptuousness surrounded by Pleasures and Loves. Guth-Pichon gets rid of all of them. 

Samson, Aix-en-Provence Festival 2024 (c) Ruth Walz

The opera opens in the present with Samson’s mother, a non-singing role played by Andrea Ferreol. She is at Samson’s grave in the ruins of the temple that he brought down in the final outburst of his strength killing a countless number of people. She wants to understand what happened. She will go back in the life of her son to try and understand what has happened.

We learn that she could not bear a child, but she became pregnant and God informed her  that her son will have superhuman power. The Hebrews are the slaves of the Philistines and looking for a liberator. Samson (Jarett Ott) appears wearing white attire and not in the biblical description of covered by the skin of a lion that he killed with his bare hands.

The Philistines wear black, and the Hebrews are in white clothes but there is no pronounced dichotomy between good and evil. In fact, Samson sees the beautiful Timnah (Lea Desandre), a Philistine, falls in love with her and marries her. There is an inexplicable row during the wedding celebration and Samson reacts with horrendous violence. Timnah leaves Samson and his mother is at a loss to understand her son’s behaviour.

These are times of trouble in general and between the Hebrews and the Philistines in particular. We do not know the particulars, but we do see Samson the recluse coming back. The Philistines know his superhuman strength and send the beautiful Delilah (Jacquelyn Stucker) to seduce him and find the source of his power. As the Bible tells us and the whole world knows, Samson betrays his greatest secret and tells Delilah that his strength lies in his long hair. Delilah is paid for her treachery to her lover Judas-like with gold pieces thrown at her. Like Christ’s betrayer, she kills herself.

Samson, Aix-en-Provence Festival 2024 (c) Ruth Walz

Samson is shorn and blinded and kept like a weak slave in the temple of the Philistines. They of course celebrate their great victory, but Samson regains his strength and brings down the temple killing all the Philistine and himself.

We see his mother again on the spot where he is buried under the rubble of the temple, reemerging from the past and trying to understand her son’s behaviour in the past and in his final act.

Much of the singing of Samson falls on American baritone Jarett Ott. He goes through the emotional and vocal demands of the opera with apparent ease. Guth and Pichon do not make it easy to understand the person, despite repeated references to chapter and verse of the Book of Judges of the Old Testament. Ott sings with resonance in an admirable performance. Soprano Jacquelyn Stucker and mezzo soprano Lea Desandre sing gorgeously as the two women that attracted the Hebrew Samson to marry them. Special kudos to the Pygmalion Chorus and Orchestra under the direction of Pichon.

The production required some extraordinary sets, lighting and special effects. The brilliant Guth and Pichon are responsible for the concept of the opera and the attendant musical and dramatic details. Without them nothing would have been possible. Extraordinary light and video effects by Bertrand Couderc, sets by Etienne Pluss, Costumes by Ursula Kudma, sound by Mathis Nitschke, all added to the outstanding production values.

Voltaire and Rameau may be rolling in their graves but also applauding the fertile imaginations and talents of the 21^st century creators of the premiere of their opera.
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Samson by Claus Guth and Raphael Pichon based on the lost opera by Jean-Philippe Rameau and the libretto of Voltaire continues in repertory until July 18 2024 at the Théâtre de l'Archevêché, Aix-en-Provence, France.  http://festival-aix.com/

JAMES KARAS IS THE SENIOR EDITOR, CULTURE OF THE GREEK PRESS

MADAMA BUTTERFLY – REVIEW OF 2024 AIX-EN-PROVINCE FESTIVAL PRODUCTION

 Reviewed by James Karas                                                            

The Aix-en-Provence Festival is in full swing (July 3 to 23, 2024) offering an eclectic selection of operas and other musical entertainments in the gorgeous weather and in the beautiful medieval city in southern France after which it is named.

Puccini’s Madama Butterfly is one the selections from the standard repertoire that gets an idiosyncratic production by German director Andrea Breth. Some of her choices appear inspired, others arbitrary and some simply confusing.

First the singers. The big drawing card is Ermonela Jaho, the Albanian soprano with the luscious and big soprano voice. She gave her all as Cio-Cio San (Madama Butterfly), the 15-year-old Japanese girl who falls in love with and marries B. F. Pinkerton, a swaggering and irresponsible American naval officer. Jaho manages a lovely tremolo to express tenderness and love. And oh, the longing in “Un bel di vedremo” when she imagines the return of Pinkerton’s ship in the harbour, his climb up the hill and her delirious happiness. We know that he spent one night with her and disappeared for three years, and she had his baby.

Jaho is about 50 years old, and she has been singing for more than 30 years. But she did not disappoint. From the happy child bride to the determined and faithful American wife and finally the crushed human being she played our emotional strings like a virtuoso. In the final moment of the opera when the orchestra played the last beat, Madama Butterfly’s head dropped, and she collapsed dead. The audience gasped, the lights went out and we jumped to our feet in a standing ovation.

Pinkerton is one of the most odious characters in opera and British tenor Adam Smith does a good job with his stentorian voice. But he tries too hard to reach his high notes and his voice becomes harsh and in fact cracks a couple of times. He is otherwise fine. He wears a suit in the opening scene but does put on a navy jacket in the end. The fact that he is a naval officer emphasizes his disgusting conduct and there is no reason for the singer not to appear in all his glory in that outfit.

Decency is represented by Sharpless, the American consul, sung by Belgian baritone Lionel Lhote. He must maneuver between his compatriot’s evil and the innocent Butterfly with vocal steadfastness and moral equanimity. We like what the character does and how Lhote achieves it.

Madame Butterfly, Aix-en-Provence Festival 2024 (c) Ruth Walz

Japanese mezzo soprano Mihoko Fujimura’s performance as Suzuki is praiseworthy. She is Butterfly’s maid who is not divorced from reality as Butterfly is. Admirable work by Fujimura.  Italian tenor Carlo Bosi’s looked and acted like an American real estate agent but he sang well and his characterization enhanced the role. In short, the production had a fine cast. 

Now for some unfriendly comments about Breth’s handling of the plot. Whenever Breth could choose between static and kinetic she opted for the motionless. There are opportunities for the singers to move around but Breth tries to restrict such luxuries. What she does do is have characters walk on and off the stage for no explicable reason. They slowly shuffle or are brought on by a rotating conveyor belt. I could not figure out what they were doing,

When Pinkerton’s ship arrives in the harbour, we see a man holding the small replica of a ship in his hand while the revolving conveyor belt brings him around. Other characters less obviously do the same. Are they figments of Butterfly’s imagination? Are we watching a psychodrama about her imagination? In other words what is going on?

Breth and Set Designer Raimund Orfeo Voigt want the action to take place in an enclosed area. That is an acceptable approach, but the area is separated from the audience by upright girders. These frequently block the face of the singer and that is annoying. Did no one notice this unnecessary nuisance which increases in intensity every time a performer’s face is blocked? The production gains nothing by telling us that all action takes place in an  enclosed space. All else about the set design is fine.

A final bow and standing ovation are due to the Choir and Orchestra of the Opéra national de Lyon led by the master conductor Daniele Rustioni.
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Madama Butterfly by Giacomo Puccini continues in repertory until July 22, 2024, at the Théâtre de l'Archevêché, Aix-en-Provence, France  https://festival-aix.com/fr

James Karas is the Senior Editor, Culture of The Greek Press