About us / Contact

The Classical Music Network

New York

Europe : Paris, Londn, Zurich, Geneva, Strasbourg, Bruxelles, Gent
America : New York, San Francisco, Montreal                       WORLD


Newsletter
Your email :

 

Back

Deaths in Venice

New York
Metropolitan Opera
09/24/2008 -  & Sept. 27, Oct. 2, 6, 9
Amilcare Ponchielli: La Gioconda

Deborah Voigt (La Gioconda), Olga Borodina (Laura Bedoero), Ewa Podles (La Cieca), Aquilles Machado (Enzo Grimaldo), Carlo Guelfi (Barnaba), Orlin Anastassov (Alvide Badoero), Tony Stevenson (Isepo), David Crawford (Zuane), Ricardo Lugo (A Monk), Richard Pearson (A Steersman), Robert Maher, Roger Andrews (Singers), Mark Pershing, Joseph Pariso (Faraway voices), Letizia Giulian, Angel Corelia (Principal dancers)
Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, Ballet Corps, and Chorus, Daniele Callegari (Conductor)
Margherita Wallmann (Original Production), Peter McClintock (Staging), Beni Montresor (Set Designer, and Costumes after the original designs), Wayne Chouinard (Lighting Designer), Christopher Wheeldon (Choreographer), Holly Hynes (Additional Costumers)


(© Beatriz Schiller/Metropolitan Opera)


Gioconda at the Met last night was one of those all-too-rare vehicles where nothing was cheapened. The set design for each act was opulent and sumptuous, with enough velvet banquettes, huge ships , glittering, chandeliers and grandiose Venetian courtyards to make a Zeffirelli sob with jealousy. Credit here was due to Beni Montresor, who apparently took both costumes and sets from the original 1876 production. And yes, in my score, complete descriptions are given for every act. Nothing was minimized, no “symbolic posts” were used for the great halls in the palace or the variety of galleons in the starlit harbor.




The visual Gioconda (no relation, by the way, to the Mona Lisa, who happened to be from a family with that name) was spectacular in the best 19th Century Paris Opera or La Scala way, and oh, how I would have enjoyed this as silent film. Not that the singers were bad, not at all. But the opera itself is written during that strange hiatus which makes loving it difficult




Like the relatively forgotten Mannheim composers (“Sorry, buddy, our all-Stamitz program has been sold out for month!”), Ponchielli, a poor relation of the Paris grand grand opera composers, matured after the great vocal period of Verdi, and before the exotic chance-taking of his own student Puccini. The result was a strange amalgam of realism and absurdity of character, melodies which never came near Verdi, and only great spectacle to make up for its talented but less than genius composer.




Typical is the silly first scene in Act Three, where Laura comes into her husbands grand chamber, he is nice for two minutes, then suddenly turns and tells her to drink a vial of poison. Laura, a pretty strong character in her town right, says (or sings) “Okay”, and he stomps out. Coming into the chamber now is La Gioconda herself, who hates Laura but doesn’t want her to die (since Laura helped save Gioconda’s blind mother in Act One), tells her that she thought she would be getting the vial vile, so she had prepared a sleeping draught instead which she should take.



This is followed by a ballet.



Still, some people love it, and most of the audience sat through to the 12.15 am ending, if only to hear Deborah Voigt sing one of the most beautiful arias (actually more a monologue) called, naturally Suiciddo.




The opera was not boring, nor were the voices really bad. Yet it is a strange opera, since the titular soprano role has few chances to show her stuff until the last act. Ms. Voigt made the Wagnerian best of it, capping off Act One with a hissed out “Betrayed!!!”, and finishing with a drawn-out death.




Nearly stealing the show was Olga Borodina as Laura, her contralto belting out her love scenes in Act Two. Strangely, Ms. Borodina didn’t come out for the between-acts bows. We shall never know the reasons. But the real honors go to the great Ewa Podles, in a voice filled with character for her one aria Voce di Donna.




The opera has two villains, which librettist probably put together for his wonderful Iago later in Verdi’s Otello. And for which Puccini obviously modeled Scarpia. Both Carlo Guelfi as the skulking Barnaba and
Orlin Anastassov as the magisterial husband of Laura who puts her to death had lovely lyrical voices. But they hardly seemed terribly villainous. Finally, Aquilles Machado made a lyrical Enzo. He has the second most popular piece, the honestly beautiful aria, He made the high A flat sound as difficult as a high C, but it was still a good performance.




Yet the real honors go to the good direction—and the incredibly fine Metropolitan Opera Ballet Corps with their two soloists in Act Three. A word, though, about this ballet. Great operatic composers are know to the public by a single song or chorus: Wagner’s Wedding March, Verdi’s La Donna è Mobile, Rossini’s Largo al Factotum. Amilcare Ponchielli? That resonant baritone aria Hellu Muttah, Hello Fatah, of course. That song is the Űretext version, of course, not to be confused with the Disney corruption of Dance of the Hours in the form of (sigh) hippos dancing.



But if anybody expected the audience to start up and sing the words , they were stunned from the beginning of this ballet. It was, like the sets, purely classic, and done with such elegance, beauty, and grace, with such astounding work by Letizia Giulian and Angel Corelia that one had to pity those who only heard the opera on Sirius.




For this was an opera to be seen as much as heard. Conductor Daniele Callegari, making his debut here, gave it a good lift (after a rather slow Act One), but the music usually doesn’t really live up to some of the brighter moments. The visuals, though, are as beautiful as anything produced by the Met.



Harry Rolnick

 

 

Copyright ©ConcertoNet.com