Récital Joyce DiDonato

Bis: "Parto, parto", La Clemenza di Tito, Mozart

Joyce DiDonato ended her 10-day recording session with the Orchestra of the Opéra de Lyon by providing us Lyonnais with a glimpse of this new album, whose highlight was, for me, her exquisite rendering of Gluck's da capo aria from La Clemenza di Tito, "Se mai senti sporarti sul volto". She was here able to fully express the desperation of Sesto on his way to death. The aria in itself is beautifully written to start with (the oboe is literally to die for), but her interpretation was really mesmorizing.

Of course she excelled with her collatura in pieces such as "Non più mesta" from La Cenerentola, or "Amour, viens rendre à mon âme" from Orphée et Eurydice (adapted by Berlioz) - she can, indeed, "braver le trépas" with strength and determination.

It was no surprise either that she ignited the audience with her wonderful spirit, and her obvious love and devotion to the music. She took a few minutes before the last aria to share with us the impressions she had of her stay - and it seems she has discover the hidden treasure of Lyon - its food. She praised Maestro Ono for his musicality and attention to details, and I quite agree with her.

The orchestra sounded quite improved and much more focused than before Ono arrived two years ago. 

Sure there were some slight issues (the cellos and double bass were sometimes a bit off), but the musicality of the orchestra has grown tremendously, and they were able to convey nuances and a vitality that were indeed refreshing.

Poulenc's Sinfonietta was vibrant and exciting under the baton of Ono, but the overture of Gluck's Iphigénie en Tauride was for me, the highlight of the orchestra. It started a bit heavy with the strings, but after the first few bars, the music really came to life and illuminated the whole opera house.

Overall a wonderful evening.

Sneak peak: Lyon 2010-11 season [Villazon to direct Werther]

Even if the new season hasn't been revealed yet, the big news is already buzzing through town: Rolando Villazon will direct his first opera in Jan/Feb 2011 in Lyon, Werther (with Karine Deshayes).

I wonder if, having sung the role so many times, he thinks he can bring a vision to Massenet's piece. I doubt it, but of course, I wouldn't want to miss it either...

Next season will also feature :

• Tristan und Isolde conducted by Kirill Petrenko, with Gary Lehman
• Verdi's Luisa Miller directed by David Alden, conducted by Kazushi Ono, with Ermonela Jaho
• Poulenc's Les Mamelles de Tiresias, played with Darius Milhaud's Boeuf sur le toit (both rarities) conducted by Lyon-born Ludovic Morlot (premiere in Lyon)
• Stravinsky's Le Rossignol conducted by Kazushi Ono
• Mozart/Da Ponte trilogy in March, shown separately over the past few years, conducted by Stefano Montanari
• Rossini's Otello conducted by Evelino Pido [1]
• Rachmaninov's Aleko and Monna Vanna
• a Joyce DiDonato recital 

This 2010-11 season looks nothing like the current one, thank God.

[1] A new concert-versions cycle is announced for the next few years with Pido: after Donizetti's queens-cycle, this one should be all about Bellini.

Salle Pleyel, 2008-09

The new season of the Salle Pleyel in Paris has been released. Of course the symphonic concerts are plethoric, but a few operas in concert version are scheduled, as well as some interesting recitals. Opéras en concert - oratorio

• Richard Wagner, La Walkyrie (act I), Aug.25 2008 Daniel Barenboim conducting the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra Waltraud Meier : Sieglinde René Pape : Hunding Simon O'Neill : Siegmund
• Giuseppe Verdi, Aïda, Oct.7 2008
• Olivier Messiaen, Saint-François d'Assise, Oct.31 2008
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Idomeneo, Nov.29 2008 René Jacobs conducting the Freiburger Barockorchester
• Arthur Honegger, Le roi Arthur, Feb.12 2009
• Claudio Monteverdi, Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria, May 4 2009
• Claudio Monteverdi, Vespro della Beata Vergine, June 12 2009 Jordi Savall conducting Le concert des Nations
• Georg Friedrich Haendel, Jephtah ,June 16 2009

Recitals

• June Anderson, Paolo Olmi conducting l'Orchestre National Bordeaux Aquitaine, Oct.1 2008 Rossini, Donizetti, Verdi, Bellini
• Joyce DiDonato, Christophe Rousset conducting Les Talens Lyriques, Dec.9 2008 Haendel
• Cecilia Bartoli, Sergio Ciomei at the piano, Dec.20 2008 Rossini
• Rolando Villazón, Paul McCreesh conducting the Gabrieli Consort & Players, May 5 2009 Haendel
• Deborah Voigt, Ingo Metzmacher conducting the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, June 24 2009 Debussy, Wagner, Malher, Strauss

Another (semi)-cursed Ariodante

Joyce DiDonato
Photo : GTG/Pierre Antoine Grisoni

It seems there's definitelly something wrong with the directors' approaches to Haendel's Ariodante.

The new production currently playing in Geneva, starring Joyce DiDonato and Patricia Petitbon, received some mixed reviews; the critics love the cast and conducting, they hate the staging and directing.

Says La Tribune de Genève; " Pas d'artifices, de magie ou de propositions charmeuses sur scène. On connaît Pierre Strosser pour son attachement à la couleur de la nuit, à l'économie rigoureuse des mouvements et à la plongée dans les méandres intimes de l'être humain. Son Ariodante se situe donc évidemment à l'opposé du divertissement."
Last sentence: "His Ariodante has obviously nothing to do with entertainment".

Rocco Zacheo, from Le Temps, is even more critical: " Trois heures d'ascèse visuelle, puis, les pupilles retrouvent enfin l'irrigation en images qu'elles réclamaient. Un breuvage qui opère loin de la scène. L'épreuve a été rude dimanche soir. Une partie du public n'a d'ailleurs pas résisté et s'est mis à déserter la salle à la fin du deuxième acte. Les restants - les résistants, on aurait envie de dire - n'ont pas caché leur désapprobation à Pierre Strosser à la fin du spectacle. (...) son Ariodante de Haendel, présenté en première au Grand Théâtre de Genève, va loin, très loin dans le dépouillement, dans l'épure. (...)

Au cœur du malaise que provoque cette nouvelle production de la maison genevoise, il y a donc un dispositif avare en surprises. Pierre Strosser fait appel à toute la verticalité de la scène et la pare de noir. (...) Au milieu, scène dans la scène, une sorte de tatami accueille une table et un échiquier. Ce sera tout, pendant les quelque trois heures que dure le chef-d'œuvre de Haendel. L'immobilité de ce biotope est à peine bousculée par l'utilisation esquissée et inaccomplie de la vidéo. En début et à la fin de chaque acte, des personnages en costumes font leur apparition au rythme de coups de pinceau projetés sur les surfaces noires. Une dernière trouvaille, enfin, avec le continuo (clavecin, violoncelle et luth) disposé dans un coin et qui accompagne les récitatifs.

Cette avarice de moyens indispose. "

Patricia Petibon
Photo : GTG/Pierre Antoine Grisoni

Both critics are ecstatic about the cast, on the other hand; says Rocco Zacheo, " cet Ariodante marque en revanche le triomphe absolu de la musique. Le salut vient avant tout d'une distribution féminine renversante. Dans le rôle-titre, la mezzo américaine Joyce DiDonato porte à elle seule le spectacle. Sa présence a de l'aplomb et sa voix fruitée et corsée donne une épaisseur inouïe à son personnage (un long frisson traversera la salle à la fin du sublime «Scherza infida in grembo al drudo»). A ses côtés, Patricia Petitbon (Ginevra) éblouit avec des ornementations assurées et un timbre cristallin, tandis que, dans un registre moins expressif, Amanda Forsythe fait preuve d'une belle souplesse."

Joyce DiDonato & Patricia Petibon
Photo : GTG/Pierre Antoine Grisoni

Sylvie Bonier, from La Tribune de Genève, adds " C'est ainsi dans la fosse rehaussée que se tissent les délicatesses haendeliennes, sous le geste accueillant de Kenneth Montgomery. Le chef a disposé L'OCG de profil, ce qui permet une écoute fine entre le plateau et les instrumentistes, et une direction attentive aux moindres frémissements vocaux. Le résultat est saisissant tant l'OCG se révèle d'une parfaite sensibilité baroque et d'une technique irréprochable. Dans cet écrin de rêve, les voix féminines se situent au plus haut. Joyce Di Donato, splendide Ariodante aux couleurs vocales et à la virtuosité limpides, place la barre à grande altitude. Mais Patricia Petitbon (Ginevra bouleversante et charismatique) et Amanda Forsythe (Dalinda à la musicalité vibrante) la suivent de près."


Then, there's the Resmusica critic : a true bashing of director Pierre Strosser.
Says Jacques Schmitt: "cette mise en place est ratée. Non pas dans les (rares) idées qu’elle véhicule mais dans l’impossibilité du metteur en scène d’aller au bout de celles-ci. Ratée au point de fâcher. Avoir en main l’un des plus beaux opéras de Haendel pour un tel gâchis est rageant."

Love is in the air

Backstage at the Opéra de Paris, Il Barbiere di Siviglia, 2005
Joyce DiDonato's official website

I am very relunctant to know anything about opera singers outside of their various performances. As soon as you learn about their lives, they fall down from the pedestal their singing puts them on.
They become humans.
Unperfect fallible humans.
Suddenly, their aura is less bright and overwhelming.

It's been quite a while since I know Joyce DiDonato is blogging.
I was never compelled to go and enter her personal world.
For starters, I like her as a singer.
I really like her.

But she's American. Worse than that: from Kansas.
And I admit I fully live up to the French cliché of anti-Americanism.
I do think mainstream-America consists of a bunch of uneducated rednecks who pride their superiority on the second amendment and a puritanism so hypocritical it's scary. A nation that elects George W. Bush twice is definitelly not one I portray as advanced.


Joyce DiDonato doesn't come close to matching those preconceived ideas of mine about the United States and the opera singers.
Her blog is an attractive journal of her professionnal life displaying great photographs, interesting memories sharings, an acute opinion about music and operatic scores, as well as a great inside into her open-minded conception of life.

It's a delight to get to know her that way.
A true delight.

Opera All-star Night

Jennifer Taylor for The New York Times

According to the New York Times and Anne Midgette, Diana Damrau and Joyce DiDonato were the unchallenged stars of the Richard Tucker Foundation Gala held last Sunday.

Chosen extracts:
" Ms. DiDonato, having flown in from Switzerland for the day to pinch hit, evidently decided to make her trip worth everyone’s while, especially with an “Una voce poco fa” from Rossini’s “Barbiere di Siviglia” that was among the most spectacular vocal feats this listener has ever heard, thrown off with ease, a sense of fun and pinpoint control. "

By the way, Joyce DiDonato explains in her blog how she fill in for Susan Graham, resulting in a 29-hour frenzy : " I'm booked on a round trip ticket leaving in 14 hours, arriving in NY 4 hours before the Richard Tucker Gala at Avery Fisher Hall, set to return immediately after the concert, arriving in Geneva tomorrow just in time to step off the plane and into my first orchestra staging rehearsal of that Handel opera back in Geneva. By my calculations, that's 29 hours. Yes, I know. I'm nuts."


But back to the gala:
" Ms. Damrau offered a “Glitter and Be Gay” from Bernstein’s “Candide” that was over the top in every sense, including the top of the staff, above which she floated with starry radiance. You might have called it too campy (and a little hard to understand) had she not had the vocal goods to back up her active wooing of the adoring audience.

Ms. Damrau even overshadowed Renée Fleming."


Update:

Gtl Torn T has put some extracts of the gala on his blog, including "Una Vocce poco fa" (Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia) sung by Joyce DiDonato and "Glitter and be gay" (Bernstein's Candide) sung by Diana Damrau. I must admit Damrau doesn't surpass Natalie Dessay in that aria.

Which is the best recent Maria Stuarda?

is the question I'm on since my last encounter with this Donizetti's opera (my biaised point of view, of course).

Here are the contenders:

1. 2007, Opéra de Lyon

Maria Stuarda: Ruth Ann Swenson
Elisabetta: Iano Tamar
Leicester: Dario Schmunck
Talbot: Giovanni Furlanetto
Conductor: Evelino Pidó
Choeurs et orchestre de l'Opéra de Lyon

Broadcast on France Musique Oct.13, of the Sept.28th performance, available on request by mail.

Fantastic Talbot, average Leicester & Elisabetta, great Maria Stuarda.
Ruth Ann Swenson was almost booed in Paris for her shy high notes; since I've never been a fan of high notes anyway (too aggressive to my sensitive ears), I must admit I prefer the performance she gave this year rather than the one in New York in 2001, where, no doubt, her high notes were totally different.
Conducting good, with some moments of brilliance and some way too slow and heavy.

2. 2006, March 30, Roma
(photos of the production here, review in Italian here)



Maria Stuarda: Mariella Devia
Elisabetta: Enkelejda Shkosa
Leicester: Claudio Di Segni
Talbot: Enrico Turco
Conductor: Riccardo Frizza
Orchestra del Teatro dell'Opera di Roma

Bad Leicester, average Elisabetta and Talbot, disappointing Maria Stuarda (Devia definitelly not at her best here); horrific conducting; there's a difference between a dynamic rythm and rushing things up that Riccardo Frizza has no clue about whatsoever.
The tempi are dreadful and a disgrace to Donizetti's music.

Definitelly a version to forget.


3. 2005, April 2, Geneva
(review in French here and there, YouTube extract here and there [dress rehearsal])



Maria Stuarda: Gabriele Fontana
Elisabetta: Joyce DiDonato
Leicester: Eric Cutler
Talbot: Giovanni Furlanetto
Conductor: Evelino Pidó
Orchestre de la Suisse Romande
Choeurs du Grand Théâtre

Pidó conducts as he always does; no surprise here and no real differences from this year's performance in Lyon or the 1999 one in Parma.
Joyce DiDonato is a great Elisabetta; Eric Cutler is disappointing, switching back and forth from mediocre to good. Giovanni Furlanetto also doesn't live up to my expectations (especially since his performance in Lyon); Gabriele Fontana is also average.

4. 2003, November, Liceu, Barcelona
(review in spanish from Mundoclasico here, YouTube extract here and there)

Maria Stuarda: Edita Gruberova
Elisabetta: Sonia Ganassi
Leicester: Juan Diego Flórez
Talbot: Simon Orfila
Conductor: Friedrich Haider
(review in French here)

Fantastic JDF, good conducting.
I have a problem with the timbre of Edita Gruberova, so after a while, I find it painful to listen to her; Sonia Ganassi average and forgettable, so is the performance of Orfila.

5. 2001, May 13, Carnagie Hall, New York
(review of Anthony Tommasini from the New York Times here)

Maria Stuarda: Ruth Ann Swenson
Elisabetta: Lauren Flanigan
Leicester: Gregory Kunde
Talbot: Patrick Carfizzi
Conductor: Eve Queler
Opera Orchestra of New York
Opera Orchestra Chorus

Ruth Ann Swenson's voice at her prime, but her performance is too cold and monolithic; she definitelly lacks any kind of emotion.
Gregory Kunde is an unbearable Leicester, Patrick Carfizzi a less than average Talbot. Eve Queler's conducting is way to heavy and swampy (strange way to describe it, I know, but it really feels like all the musicians are stuck in a wet, low and spongy land).

The performance really falls flat.


6. 2001, October 5, Stockholm

Maria Stuarda: Lena Nordin
Elisabetta: Ingrid Tobiasson
Leicester: Joseph Calleja
Talbot: Anders Bergström
Conductor: Pier Giorgi Morandi
Royal Opera House Stockholm

A real surprise here; good conducting (with moments of greatness), good Elisabetta, good Talbot, good to great Maria Stuarda, suprisingly great Leicester: I don't like Joseph Calleja's timbre and way of singing, but it works great in the role of Leicester. Had Juan Diego Flórez not sung the role, he would be my top performer.

Definitelly a recording to keep.

7. 1999, March 18, Teatro Regio di Parma

Maria Stuarda: Giusy Devinu
Elisabetta: Enkelejda Shkosa
Leicester: Juan Diego Flórez
Talbot: Simone Alberghini
Conductor: Evelino Pidó

Great JDF, though I prefer the performance he gave in Barcelona in 2003, that has more nuances; good Maria Stuarda; forgettable Elisabetta; the Pidò conducting pretty much the same as always.





New productions still to come in 2008:

• Milano, Scala, January 15, 18, 20, 22, 26, 30, February 3 & 7
  Beginning of sale: Nov.15
  
  Maria Stuarda: Mariella Devia
  Elisabetta: Anna Caterina Antonacci
  Leicester: Francesco Meli
  Talbot: Carlo Cigni
  Conductor: Antonino Fogliani
  


• Liège, Théâtre Royal de Wallonie, April 30, May 3, 6, 8 & 11.
  
  Maria Stuarda: Patrizia Ciofi
  Elisabetta: Marianna Pizzolato
  Leicester: Danilo Formaggia
  Talbot: Federico Sacchi
  Conductor: Luciano Acocella
  

Productions I haven't been able to hear:

• 2006, October, Berlin, Staatsoper Unter den Linden
  
  Maria Stuarda: Elena Mosuc
  Elisabetta: Katarina Karnéus
  Leicester: José Bros
  Talbot: Christof Fischesser
  Conductor: Alain Altinoglu


• 2005, April, Caen (France), coproduction with Geneva
  
  Maria Stuarda: Gabriele Fontana
  Elisabetta: Marianna Kulikova
  Leicester: Eric Cutler
  Talbot: Giovanni Furlanetto
  Conductor: Nicolas Chalvin


• 2003, January, Teatro Campoamor Oviedo
  (review in French here)
  
  Maria Stuarda : Ángeles Blancas
  Elisabetta: Judith Borrás
  Leicester: Joseph Calleja
  Talbot : Alberto Arrabal
  Conductor: Roberto Tolomelli
  
  
• 2002, December, Opernhaus Zürich
  (press reviews in German here)
  
  
  Maria Stuarda: Angeles Blancas
  Elisabetta: Carmen Oprisanu
  Leicester: Fabio Sartori
  Talbot: László Polgár
  Conductor: Marcello Viotti
  Chor des Opernhauses Zürich
  Statistenverein am Opernhaus Zürich
  Orchester der Oper Zürich
  


• 2002, January, Teatro Valli - Reggio Emilia
  (review in French here, in italian there)
  
  Maria Stuarda: Carmela Remigio
  Elisabetta: Sonia Ganassi
  Leicester: Joseph Calleja
  Talbot: Riccardo Zanellato
  Conductor: Francesco Maria Carminati
  Orchestra Stabile di Bergamo "G. Donizetti"
  Coro del Circuito Lirico Regionale della Lombardia
  Performance in Bologna recorded on CD
  

So, what's the chosen version?

Best overall performance: Stockholm, 2001

Best Maria Stuarda: Ruth Ann Swenson, Lyon, 2007
Best Elisabetta: Joyce DiDonato, Geneva 2005
Best Leicester: Juan Diego Flórez, Barcelona 2003