A MASKED BALL – REVIEW OF CANADIAN OPERA COMPANY PRODUCTION

A scene from A Masked Ball. Photo: Michael Cooper

Reviewed by James Karas

During the curtain calls for the Canadian Opera Company’s production of A Masked Ball at the Four Seasons, the man behind me blurted out a “boo” with such force that it startled me. Vocal disapproval of a performance or a production is not unusual in opera, but this one seemed more ferocious than most. Before we get to that barbaric review, let’s give praise where it is deserved.

Let us praise Canadian soprano Adrianne Pieczonka for a moving, vocally stunning and flawless performance. She is Amelia, the hapless wife who falls in love with Riccardo (Dimitri Pittas) but does not want to be unfaithful to her husband Renato (Roland Wood).

Amelia and Riccardo meet in a graveyard at night and sing the gorgeous and lengthy duet “Teco io sto.” It moves from the breathless, to the ecstatic, to the sublime and makes huge demands on the soprano and the tenor. The duet displays an outstanding soprano meeting the emotional and vocal demands and, unfortunately, the comparative inability of Pittas to match her. It’s not that he has a bad voice; it’s just that he cannot keep up with Pieczonka.

For an outpouring of emotion and vocal splendour, her rendition of “Morro, ma prima” where she pleads for her husband to let her see her son before he kills her is simply outstanding.

Dimitri Pittas has a good voice at midrange but he cannot soar to the high notes as effortlessly as a first-rate tenor should. He does not have a particularly big voice and although he can do well in certain roles when paired up with a Pieczonka he simply does not measure up.

Roland Wood has a rich baritone voice and his Renato, the would-be-jilted husband of Amelia is very good. He moves from faithful servant and best friend of Riccardo to murderously jealous husband and assassin.

Mezzo-soprano Elena Manistina has the meaty role of Ulrica a.k.a. Mme Arvidson (check name of hotel below). She has a couple of dramatic arias that she delivered with relish but she was ill-served by a sorceress’s den that looked like a hotel basement. 

Soprano Simone Osborne played and sang a perky Oscar. He/she is Riccardo’s attendant who unwittingly betrays his master’s costume at the ball.     

Directors Jossi Wieler and Sergio Morabito created this production for Berlin’s Staatsoper Unter den Linden. The opera was originally set in Sweden and involved the assassination of a king. On the objections of the censor, the locale was changed to colonial Boston. Wieler and Morabito decided to move the action to 1950s America and squeeze a political scenario about a wise and benevolent leader concerned with racial issues and social justice while practicing infidelity. If they had called Riccardo Kennedy everyone one would have got the message without reading the programme notes. The interpretation, if you can call it that, is at best a stretcher.

The set by designer Barbara Ehnes represents the United States in the 1950's. It is meant to be the ballroom of the Arvedson Palace Hotel. On the left there is a stage at the back; on the right rear there is a bar with a balcony on top; at the front there are theatre chairs and red and white stacking chairs. The basic set, with minor changes, serves as the den of the black sorceress Ulrica, the graveyard where the gallows are and the house of Amelia in addition to a ballroom.

The costumes by Anja Rabes were modern, of course, but she showed an unusual attraction towards pajamas and housecoats. I have no idea why.

The set(s), the costumes, the general approach left one at sea as to what in the world was supposed to be going on. The singers, especially Pieczonka, and the Canadian Opera Company Orchestra under Stephen Lord gave us terrific entertainment but in the end there were some seriously flawed aspects.

No doubt the gentleman behind was simply trying to express his frustration at those unfortunate aspects of the production and he chose a less than usually civilized method of articulation.

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A Masked Ball by Giuseppe Verdi opened on February 2 and will be performed eight times on various dates until February 22, 2014 at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, 145 Queen Street West, Toronto, Ontario. Tel:  416-363-6671. www.coc.ca

LAND OF SMILES - REVIEW OF TORONTO OPERETTA THEATRE PRODUCTION

Keenan Viau  as Chi Fu, centre, with the Ladies of the Chinese Court in The Land of Smiles. ­Photo: Gary Beechey

Reviewed by James Karas

           

“You are my heart's delight, /And where you are, I long to be” Prince Sou-Chong sings to Countess Lisa in the most famous aria from Franz Lehar’s The Land of Smiles but if you expect the two lovers to live together happily ever after, you would be wrong. Lehar gave his 1929 romantic operetta a bittersweet ending. Be that as it may, you should long to be where the Toronto Operetta Theatre has produced this gem at the Jane Mallett Theatre.

TOT’s General Director, Guillermo Silva-Marin, delivers a lively production albeit within the limitations of his resources. He has a tiny orchestra awkwardly lined up in front of the stage, very few props to make a set and a limited budget for just about everything. That does not seem to deter him or the company and they forge ahead producing operetta in Toronto for almost thirty years.

The principal singers of The Land of Smiles are Prince Sou-Chong (Ernesto Ramirez), the Chinese Ambassador to Vienna and Countess Lisa (Lara Ciekiewicz), the pretty daughter of a general. The two are deeply in love and Captain Gustl (Adam Fisher) who is also in love with Lisa is sent to the pasture of unrequited love.

Tenor Ramirez is Mexican and somewhat short of a romantic hero. His singing was good but his transitions were not always perfectly smooth. He appeared awkward but that is how the Chinese aristocrat may have felt in Vienna.

Soprano Ciekiewicz has a luminous voice and the good looks and aristocratic bearing to play the young Lisa. The singer is no doubt older than the character but that is almost inevitable.  

    

Adam Fisher looks the part of the military officer that you expect to find in a Viennese operetta  and sings quite well.

Vania Chan was very good as Princess Mi, Sou-Chong’s sister. She is the only Oriental in the cast and she sang and acted very well.

Domenico Sanfilippo as Colonel Bloch and Keenan Viau as the “testicularly challenged” Majordomo provided a good part of the comedy of the operetta.

The Vocal Ensemble was exceptionally good as was the Orchestra under the baton of Derek Bate.

The Land of Smiles takes place in a palace in Vienna and in a palace in Peking in the imperial heyday of both cities. Adequate or remotely realistic sets in the small Jane Mallett Theatre would be unthinkable and Silva-Marin does his usual: a lot with very little. A few flower arrangements, a couple of chairs and a curtain and you have the feel of an aristocratic venue. For the Peking scene he has a large gold throne and a few other touches to take us to China.

The costumes from Malabar for the Vienna scenes and from Tang Silk Whispers for the ladies’ Chinese costumes are suitable.

Silva-Marin adds a few lines of his own to the libretto and generates energy and captures some of the bitter sweetness of the plot. Lehar and his librettists Ludwig Herzer and Fritz Beda-Lohner went beyond the usual operetta plot and brought in some commentary about cultural differences and intolerance.

The Vienna and Peking of this operetta and any other operetta never existed but it’s nice to imagine that they did even for one evening through the lens provided by Lehar and transmitted to us by Toronto Operetta Theatre.   

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The Land of Smiles by Franz Lehar opened on December 27, 2013 and ran until January 5, 2014 at the Jane Mallett Theatre, St. Lawrence Centre for the Arts, 27 Front Street East, Toronto, Ontario. Tel:  (416) 922-2912. www.torontooperetta.com

FALSTAFF LIVE IN HD FROM THE METROPOLITAN OPERA - REVIEW

Jennifer Johnson Cano, Ambrogio Maestri and Stephanie Blythe in Verdi's "Falstaff." 

Photo: Ken Howard/Metropolitan Opera

Reviewed by James Karas

The Metropolitan Opera delivered an exceptional production of Verdi’s Falstaff in its last transmission for 2013.

Falstaff has ten roles, 4 women and 6 men. The women easily outclass and outsmart the men and control the action of the opera around the mock-heroic fat knight.

The men with the exception of the lover Fenton are scoundrels or idiots. The women are smart, scheming and in the end triumphant.

Ambrogio Maestri made a masterful Falstaff, singing with assurance, ease and resonance. He is a big man with expressive and naturally comic features which he puts to splendid use. Despite his size, Maestri moves with grace and comic finesse. A seriously funny and fine performance.

The merry wives of Windsor, those chatty ladies who will outwit Falstaff with hilarious results, are Meg Page (Jennifer Johnson Cano), Alice Ford (Angela Meade), Mistress Quickly (Stephanie Blythe). They are not just vocally adept but are also physically perfect for the roles. Attractive, oversized, gossipy, funny. 

Lisette Oropesa and Paolo Fanala are the young lovers Nannette and Fenton who deliver some lovely singing and outwit the older generation.

Robert Carsen’s production shows imagination and brilliance in conception and execution. He sets the story of the fat knight and the merry wives in the 1950’s. The Garter Inn becomes a fancy hotel where we find Falstaff occupying a large bed with dozens of trolleys with plates and empty bottles on them strewn around. We have a glutton and a bon vivant enjoying life to the hilt. When Pistol( Christian van Horn) and Bardolf (Keith Jameson) refuse to deliver his letters to Meg and Alice, there is a bellboy who will do it. The only complaint I have about the set is that on the movie screen it did not always appear well-lit.

Falstaff’s suite is transformed into a hotel dining room of the era. After that, we find Mistress Quickly, Alice, Meg and Nannette in a huge and meticulously arranged kitchen. In the movie theatre, we are treated to a detailed view of what seem like countless kitchen gadgets and utensils.

The ladies are well-dressed or overdressed by Costume Designer Brigitte Reiffenstuel as middle-class or better women who like to laugh, giggle and plot. The atmosphere is bright and comic and Sir John’s shenanigans and Ford’s (Franco Vassallo) jealous rages complete the comic scene. Ford shows up with a detachment of cronies and searches up and down and throws everything in sight in the air and on the floor while searching for Falstaff. A well done, comic scene.

Falstaff ends up in a stable after floating up from the waters of the Thames. There is a horse munching hay while Falstaff comes to on a pile of the same stuff. The stable is transformed into the park where Falstaff is humiliated, the lovers united and the fools shown up.

Carsen has an integrated and fully-realized conception of the opera that works exceptionally well.  

Conductor James Levine has become almost a folk hero to New York audiences who greet his appearance with wild applause. He and the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra deserve the ovation.

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Falstaff by Giuseppe Verdi was shown Live in HD on December 13, 2013 at the Coliseum Scarborough Cinemas, Scarborough Town Centre, 300 Borough Drive, Scarborough, ON, M1P 4P5, (416) 290-5217 and other theatres across Canada.  For more information: www.cineplex.com/events     

THE MIKADO IN CHRISTCHURCH, NEW ZEALAND - REVIEW

Reviewed by James Karas

Christchurch, New Zealand is a devastated city under construction but judging by the production of Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Mikado at the Court Theatre, it has lost none of its spirit or its sense of humour. The production’s whole is much greater than its parts and the end result is an energetic, funny and delightful evening out.

The Mikado is a perfect vehicle for satire and I doubt that there is any production that does not take liberties with Gilbert’s libretto to poke fun at just about everyone and everything in the city or country where it is produced. Director Ross Gumbley has taken full advantage of that license and takes shots at politicians, entertainers, radio and television announcers, construction work in Christchurch, even Michael Jackson’s hapless doctor. Some of the humour was lost on me being someone who had spent a mere week in the country but most of it came through and was funny. You don’t have to be from Christchurch to complain about all the roads being under construction at the same time – just drive around Toronto.

The production is done with one hand tied behind its back. A small orchestra is a minimum requirement for any production of the operetta. What does the Court Theatre have? A band! It consists of a piano, a xylophone and some drums but the players manage to produce some amazing music. The solos, duets, patter songs and ensemble pieces take over and the amalgam of sound is quite delightful. The task of orchestrating Sullivan’s music to fit the band of the Court Theatre was performed by Musical Director Luke Di Somma.

The quality of singing has its lacunae but again the overall effect is quite enjoyable. The star, even if he does not get most of the singing, is Matt McFarlane as Nanki-Poo, the son of the Mikado disguised as a ukulele player. He is handsome and wholesome and we want him to get the yummy Yum-Yum (Rachel Adams). Neither of them has stellar vocal talents but we are rooting for them. McFarlane has a pleasant midrange but does not venture much beyond. Adams tends to leap to her upper register and at times becomes somewhat shrill in that area.

The Mikado needs comic talent more than vocal prowess and here we are in luck. Danny Avery is the Lord High Executioner Ko-Ko who will take an online course to learn his job. Avery is a fast-moving comic who does an excellent job. Roy Snow as Pooh-Bah, the High Lord of Everything Else is very funny and has a resonant voice. He holds enough positions to make up a cabinet but his chief talent is being corrupt.  Snow engages the audience directly to good effect and laughter.

Juliet Reynolds-Midgley plays Katisha, the Mikado’s daughter-in-law-elect. She is the virago who wants to marry the handsome prince and we have to find a way of disposing of her. Aha, let her marry the Lord High Executioner and keep the laughter going.

The role of the Mikado is played by a woman, Lynda Milligan. She is encased in a Union Jack and you can and should see Queen Victoria in her rather than a Japanese monarch. Milligan plays the Mikado as an overdone and comic character, full of bluster. Well done.

The Male and Female Ensembles who seem to be made up of many amateurs do an exceptional job. They sing, they dance, they cavort, and they are wonderful. The imaginative choreography was done by Stephen Robertson.

The set and costume designs were also by Robertson. The set consisted of round platforms with a raised walkway at the rear and a small bridge on the right. There was even a joke about the money being spent on costumes instead of musicians. The costumes were good.

Ross Gumbley gets the laurel wreath for his imaginative re-working of parts of the libretto, his energetic directing and the highly entertaining production.

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The Mikado  by W. S. Gilbert (libretto) and Arthur Sullivan (music) opened on November 23, 2013 and will run until January 14, 2014 at The Court Theatre, Christchurch, New Zealand.         

http://www.courttheatre.org.nz/shows/the-mikado

FALSTAFF FROM OPERA HAMILTON - REVIEW

Reviewed by James Karas

Opera Hamilton tackled a big one for its fall production: Verdi’s comic masterpiece and last opera Falstaff. The rich music and orchestration test the mettle of the best orchestras; there are some fine vocal passages but no show-stopper arias; the action takes place in five different locales that require five different sets including a set for Windsor Park.

How much of that load can a small regional company carry? In the case of Opera Hamilton, the answer is quite a lot. No doubt there were some obvious places where the production showed the strain of lack of funds and some issues with directorial choices. But in the end the production was quite enjoyable.

The thirty-piece Opera Hamilton Orchestra under David Speers was quite effective in tackling the score. The Opera Hamilton Chorus was not taxed by the score but it did its job well.

The singing was uneven but there were some highlights. Canadian baritone John Fanning played the fat knight of the title to excellent comic effect and vocal splendour. He has a fine, mellifluous voice that rolled out effortlessly and a fine command of the comic business of the lecherous and cowardly Falstaff.    

His lechery has two targets in the lovely-voiced Mistress Meg Page (Ariana Chris) and the lively Alice Ford (Lynn Fortin). The name Mistress Quickly conjures marvelous images but in Shakespeare’s The Merry Wives of Windsor on which the opera is mostly based and in Falstaff this is a misnomer. She is another middleclass woman rather than a lady of easy virtue for pecuniary emolument as she appears in Henry IV. The three ladies sang well as they ran around comically conjuring tricks to humiliate Falstaff.

The best singing was produced by soprano Sasha Djihanian as Nannette Ford, the sweet and pretty girl who is in love. Djihanian has a sweet and pretty voice reflecting the role she is playing and she gave us some beautiful singing. Her lover Fenton (tenor Theo Lebow) was not quite as effective vocally and appeared more oafish than ardent. But when he sang “Dal labbro il canto estasia” and the two sang “Labbra di foco!” we heard some beautiful sounds.

Bass-baritone Jon-Paul Décosse and lyric tenor Jeremy Blossey were used for broad conic relief as the lowly servants Pistola and Bardolfo. 

Canadian baritone James Westman played the jealous, scheming, stupid Ford who wants to catch his wife in flagrante delicto and marry his daughter to an older man. Westman is funny and fuming and delivers his Jealousy Aria “E sogno? O realta” with fervour.   

Director Allison Grant takes a conservative and sensible approach to the opera. She eschews cheap gimmicks in order to get laughs. (for a funny opera, it has very few belly laughs). The humour does develop naturally and there is no reason for gimmicks for the sake of laughs.

Grant chooses to underplay the final scene to the point where it becomes almost static. There may be good reason for that but there is also a missed opportunity to generate energy and humour before the curtain falls. This is the scene where Falstaff is humiliated by the townspeople disguised as elves and spirits. Thrashing an old rascal may not be very funny and Grant did not find the happy medium between cruelty and humour and settled for a rather sedate approach.

The set designed by Troy Housie consists of a series of panels hanging from the ceiling and a few essential props on the stage. The panels are manipulated to indicate locale changes but don’t look for Herne’s Oak in Windsor Park. All is left to the imagination.

The costumes were traditional Elizabethan and they were rented from Malabar.   

Falstaff is not any easy opera to produce successfully. With its lack of traditional arias, its fast movement and rich music, it is anything but an easy comic piece to sit back and enjoy. This production started slowly in the steely Dofasco Centre but picked up speed and energy in the more broadly comic scenes. When Falstaff got his first comeuppance and was dumped in the Thames there was genuine laughter.

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Falstaff by Giuseppe Verdi opened on October 19 and was performed four times until October 26, 2013 at The Dofasco Centre for the Arts, Hamilton, Ontario. 

LA BOHÈME FROM CANADIAN OPERA COMPANY - REVIEW

(l-r) Dimitri Pittas as Rodolfo, Grazia Doronzio as Mimì, Joyce El-Khoury as Musetta and Joshua Hopkins as Marcello. Photo: Michael Cooper 

Reviewed by James Karas

The Canadian Opera Company provides a traditional production (that is a compliment) of Puccini’s La Bohème at Toronto’s Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts. Its strengths are a well sung Mimi (Grazia Doronzio) and Marcello (Joshua Hopkins), fine directing by John Caird. The set design is very good except for the first act and the orchestral playing is sound. I doubt that there were too many tears streaming down the cheeks of the audience but most people rightly enjoyed a viewing of the old weepie.

Italian soprano Doronzio appeared small and frail just as one would imagine Mimi to be. Her voice emanated from her like a flower captured in time-lapse photography. She would start slowly and tentatively as in “Mi chiamano, Mimi” and then her voice would blossom and become evocative, full of emotion and a delight to hear.

Her lover Rodolfo, sung by American tenor Dimitri Pittas was good but not as successful as Doronzio’s portrayal. The two worked well in their first act love duet “O suave fanciulla” but he was not always consistent in his singing. Pittas sounds fine in mid-range but his voice sounded strained at times in the upper register. Otherwise, he made a believable Rodolfo but unfortunately, his despairing cry of “Mimi! Mimi!” at the end of the opera was simply lost. I am not sure if it was a miscommunication between singer and conductor but the heart-wrenching shout simply misfired.

Canadian baritone Joshua Hopkins sang an exceptional Marcello. His fine, sonorous voice and sympathetic portrayal of the painter stood out and was a pleasure to watch.

Caird directed the four starving artists (the other two being bass-baritone Christian Van Horn as the philosopher Colline and baritone Phillip Addis as the musician Schaunard) very judiciously, providing humour and drama, and making them believable. The friends engage in tomfoolery and a pranks against their landlord Benoit and Alcindoro, Musetta’s foolish admirer (both played by Thomas Hammons), all done in good form and adding a fine balance to the tragic love story.   

La Bohéme needs three sets: a scene in a garret where the artists live and work; a crowded street scene in the Latin Quarter and scene on a snowy morning outside a tavern on the outskirts of Paris. Set and Costume Designer David Farley has chosen to decorate the garret with a large number of overlapping canvases covering most of the rear stage. The set looks like a large storage garage instead of a cold attic. The smoke coming out of the stove in the centre of the room is a nice touch but aside from that, there is nothing to convince as that this is an attic.

The set does have the advantage of being convertible quickly into a street scene. Some of the  canvasses are hoisted up to the rafters, the other are turned around and in a matter of seconds we are at the Café Momus celebrating Christmas Eve. The first act is not particularly long and the quick set change saves us the trouble of having to wait long for entertaining second act.    

The Café Momus scene is done well with a boisterous crowd, a fine rendition of “Quando me’n vo” by Musetta (soprano Joyce El-Khoury) in a beautiful and provocative pink gown. There is a lot going on in this scene and Caird manages the whole thing with expertize. (There will be a cast change near the end of the run and El-Khoury will sing Mimi for the last four performances.)

Carlo Rizzi conducts the Canadian Opera Company Orchestra and Chorus as well as the Children’s Chorus which makes a lively appearance in Act II.

Caird He handles the entire production from the intimate love scenes to the crowd tableaux soundly in this well-done production with its several issues. If only we were not cheated of the heart-wrenching “Mimi! Mimi!”

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La Bohème  by Giacomo Puccini with libretto by Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica opened on October 3 and will be performed twelve times on various dates until October 30, 2013 at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, 145 Queen Street West, Toronto, Ontario. Tel: 416-363-6671. www.coc.ca

PETER GRIMES FROM CANADIAN OPERA COMPANY WITH BEN HEPPNER - REVIEW

Scene from COC production of Peter Grimes. Photo: Michael Cooper

Reviewed by James Karas

The Canadian Opera Company has judiciously chosen a real chestnut (La Bohéme) and a more complex if less popular work, Benjamin Britten’s Peter Grimes, for its fall season. The latter is given a well-sung and directed production despite some faux pas in the set design and the characterization of Peter Grimes by tenor Ben Heppner.

Peter Grimes is an orchestral masterpiece that requires superb choral singing and has a richly-textures and complex plot. The title role requires a strong tenor voice and a singer with acting ability. Heppner usually has no problem in either category but in this performance, he fell short in his characterization of the hapless man.

Grimes is a fisherman whose young apprentice died during a storm at sea. Even though the death is ruled accidental, the townspeople turn on him. Peter Grimes is a loner, an outsider, who longs to belong to the community in which he is considered a misfit. As a result, he is angry and full of incipient violence as he dreams of making money and being able to marry and belong to his community.

Heppner appears like a roly-poly misfit who sings well but who displays no anger and no violence. His characterization lacks forcefulness and a Peter Grimes without those characteristics is incomplete. In fairness, I should mention that Heppner was indisposed for the opening of Peter Grimes on October 5 but took over the role on October 8 and that may have played a part in his performance or the original Director Neil Armfield (Denni Sayers was the revival director) simply miscalled the characterization of the opera’s anti-hero.

Bass-baritone Alan Held brought in the strongest performance as Captain Balstrode, the retired skipper. Held provided the vocal vigour that we expected from Heppner as well as a convincing performance as one Grimes’s few friends in the town.

Soprano Ileana Montalbetti was a very well sung and sympathetic Ellen Orford, the schoolmistress that Grimes dreamt of marrying. She exuded sweetness and humanity in the midst of the town mob and was the vision of Grimes’s possible salvation.

There is a marvelous conjunction of emotions and actions at the climax of the opera in Act 2. It is a sunny Sunday morning on a street by the sea and we hear a church service in the background. Ellen is comforting the new apprentice. Grimes wants to exploit him in order to make money and win the respect of his community. We hear beautiful bits of the Gloria and Benedicite as Grimes becomes furious and strikes Ellen. The music grows dissonant, the drums strike ominously as Grimes intones angrily “So be it – and God have mercy upon me.” His fate is sealed in a marvelous scene that is done splendidly.   

There is a silent character of a doctor in the opera sometimes called Dr. Thorp and at other times Dr. Crabbe. The libretto is based on George Crabbe’s poem The Borough and Armfield has chosen to name the character like the poet. He uses him as a silent Chorus throughout the production. Dr. Crabbe sees everything and says nothing and I found it an interesting approach by the director.

Britten makes major demands on the orchestra and the chorus and here they both performed brilliantly under conductor Johannes Debus.

The production uses a single set designed by Ralph Myers. It consists of a large room that can be an assembly area in a town hall or be converted into a tavern or a street scene. There is a stage at the back of the room that is brought forward for the scene in Grimes’s hut. The set works well for the other scenes but the hut is supposed to be an upturned boat on the edge of a cliff. In this production, it looks as if Grimes’s is living on a stage. We lose the effect of the dangerous location of the hut and the inevitable tragedy that results from it.  

The latter is a minor glitch but Heppner’s characterization is more significant. That did not prevent the production form being quite a fascinating staging of a difficult opera. 

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Peter Grimes by Benjamin Britten with libretto by Montagu Slater opened on October 5 and will be performed seven times on various dates until October 26, 2013 at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, 145 Queen Street West, Toronto, Ontario. Tel:  416-363-6671. www.coc.ca