Opera Gazet - Operarecensies & Gebakkenluchtdetectie

Lucia di Lammermoor

Lucia di Lammermoor at La Scala

Lucia di Lammermoor. As Lucia, Rosa Feola lived fully through the gamut of emotions. She made use of every nuance in Kokkos’ staging, and every one of her appearances led logically to her sad demise. At every turn, vocally and theatrically, Feola’s Lucia remains a fragile figure, a victim of the manipulations of others causing her to doubt her lover’s fidelity. The Brünnhilde of Götterdämmerung comes to mind; both will sacrifice their lives through delusion. Observing Feola was a moving experience, made richer through the musical dissolution of her consciousness. The top notes were more than there, and delivered almost naturally, and in character with the crazed sad, desperate demise. An absolutely wonderful Lucia.

De Maestro

De Maestro

De Maestro. Een legendarisch voorbeeld van een akoestische en fysieke nachtmerrie is de \\\\\\\”Scena delle maschere\\\\\\\” (Don Giovanni): Donna Anna, Don Ottavio en Donna Elvira zingen het trio \\\\\\\”Protegga il giusto cielo\\\\\\\”. Voor deze balscène componeerde Mozart drie verschillende on-stage orkestjes die tegelijk met het orkest in de bak spelen. Elk groepje speelt in een andere maatsoort, resp. in 2/4, 3/4 en 3/8. Tegelijkertijd lopen de solisten zingend door de feestgangers. Lekker dan!

The Merry Widow

THE MERRY WIDOW

The Merry Widow. The secondary romantic coupling was, curiously, just that little bit more consistent, and thus endearing; Alexandra Flood was simultaneously dignified and coquettish as Valencienne, and John Longmuir gave us an ardently sung Camille de Rosillon. David Whitney as Baron Mirko Zeta and Benjamin Rasheed as Njegus were also a highlight… a funny and intelligently drawn double-act to rival the best of them. The remaining cast was faultless — the definition of a secure and mature ensemble.

Aix

Aix !

Aix! This brings us moments of wonder and just as many moments of extreme irritation. This time, he shows us how this song of death is in fact a song of life. Some sequences are exceptionally beautiful, others more repetitive and less necessary. Typical Castellucci!

La Scala’s Far West ‘Carmen’

La Scala’s Far West ‘Carmen’

La Scala’s Far West ‘Carmen’. Nearly every solution or off-the-mark innovation seemingly failed to captivate us as there was little sympathy for the personages as perceived, and they were surprisingly almost always projected through excessively old-fashioned stock mimic gesturing. This was especially so for the chorus who were never present in their prescribed roles, and were often asked to carry out bizarre, invented scenarios, unrelated to the main flow of action and with total regard to the words they were singing. In Carmen, they are essential characters inserted within the plot and must remain so.

“Gelijk Ik hoor, oordeel Ik'

“Gelijk Ik hoor, oordeel Ik, en Mijn oordeel is rechtvaardig.” Baruch 6:30.

“Gelijk Ik hoor, oordeel Ik\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\”. Een hoofdredacteur die bijklust bij een operagezelschap dat hij moet evalueren, dat is wel schokkend, maar niet in de juiste zin. Dat is een typisch kenmerk van de ons-kent-ons snobistische operakliek die kritische recensenten tegenwerkt en financieel benadeelt, maar een site minzaam tegemoet treedt die de lezersforumfunctie uitschakelt vanwege de nadeligheid voor banden met zangers en operahuizen.

Tannhäuser

Tannhäuser – Musically Strong, Scenically Unconvincing

Tannhäuser. Vocally, the performance did not consistently rise to the level one had hoped for. Eric Cutler, in the title role, struck us as somewhat one-dimensional over long stretches. He sang with considerable commitment and sustained the part with stamina, but his Tannhäuser lacked real interpretative differentiation. This was already evident in the Venusberg scene of Act I. In “Dir töne Lob!”, in particular, the contrast was striking: the harp played its introduction and accompanying figures with extraordinary delicacy and beauty, shaping the music with a refinement that seemed to open up precisely the sensuous and inward expressive world the passage requires. All the more disappointing, then, was the tenor’s entry, which seemed comparatively blunt and effortful, as though little had been taken from the atmosphere the orchestra had so carefully prepared. Sheer effort and volume often appeared to count for more here than tonal nuance, verbal inflection or any real shaping of the musical line.

The Conceptual Cabinet of Curiosities

Het conceptuele rariteitenkabinet van het Regietheater

Het Conceptuele Rariteitenkabinet van het Regietheater. Ironie is het duizenddingendoekje van de hedendaagse regie. Handig, veelzijdig en vooral populair bij mensen die hun Morgenmuffeligkeit tot levensmotto hebben gemaakt en niet meer geloven dat schoonheid zonder aanhalingstekens kan bestaan.

The Conceptual Cabinet of Curiosities

The Conceptual Cabinet of Curiosities

The Conceptual Cabinet of Curiosities. Irony: the favorite Swiss Army knife. Contemporary directing harbors, likely out of incompetence, an almost pathological fear of sincerity. You see it time and again: comical extras during tragic music, sexually charged actions in formal scenes, ugly sets to strip the music of its noble aura.

Simone Boccanegra (English)

Simone Boccanegra (English)

Simone Boccanegra. And then there’s Jetske Mijnssen’s direction. We have to admit: we’ve seen worse. The director “transposed” the opera to 1871, the year the revised version premiered. Two questions arise: 1) Why relocate? 2) Why 1871? The idea that the nineteenth-century costumes and sets place the characters in a world closer to Verdi himself than to medieval Genoa is utter nonsense. What is closest to Verdi is his own opera, and that is set in Genoa in the 13th (or 14th?) century.

Turandot in New York

Turandot in New York

Turandot. I love traditional productions as much as the next fellow, but I take Regie productions one at a time. Claus Guth’s Freudian look at Salome was the most potent and disturbing iteration of that opera I’ve ever seen, while the Met’s Carrie Cracknell-conceived Carmen is absolute junk – no Spanish flavor, and a second act that takes place in a moving railroad boxcar! If the audience is puzzled or disgusted, you’re doing something wrong. Worse, even, was Simon Stone’s Lucia di Lammermoor, now taking place in a run-down town in the American rust belt, peopled by drug addicts and cameramen filming the action. Wretched.

Simon Boccanegra

Simon Boccanegra

Simon Boccanegra.
Er was ook een regie, en we moeten zeggen: we hebben het erger gezien. Zij “verplaatste” de opera naar 1871, het premièrejaar van de herziening. Twee vragen vliegen ons gedachtenraam binnen: 1) Waarom verplaatsen? 2) Waarom 1881? Dat de negentiende-eeuwse kostuums en decors de personages in een wereld plaatsen die dichter bij Verdi zelf staat dan bij het middeleeuwse Genua is je reinste kul. Wat het dichtst bij Verdi staat, is zijn eigen opera, en die speelt in Genua, 13 eeuw (of 14e?), naar wij dachten.

ELEKTRA

ELEKTRA (English)

ELEKTRA. Nothing is happening on stage. And the costumes do everything they can to maintain this sense of nothingness. Elektra is a car mechanic clad in overalls; she’s trying to fix the family car, but the damn thing won’t start, so she just sits down on a low wall to sing a little. Needless to say, in addition to the car, the inevitable video projection also made an appearance. In short, where are we here, what are people doing here, and why not? What artistic catastrophe is unfolding here?

ELEKTRA

ELEKTRA

ELEKTRA. Op het toneel gebeurt niets. En de kostuums doen er alles aan om deze nietsigheid in stand te houden. Elektra is een overall gehulde automonteuse; ze is bezig de auto van de familie te repareren, maar het kreng (de auto) wil niet starten, dus gaat ze maar een potje zitten zingen op een muurtje. Onnodig te vermelden dat er naast de auto ook de onvermijdelijke videoprojectie haar opwachting maakte. Kortom, waar zijn we hier, wat doet men hier en waarom niet. Welk artistieke catastrofe vindt hier plaats?

Pelléas et Mélisande

Pelléas et Mélisande. Sara Blanch was a superb Mélisande, attempting a diverse role, one requiring stamina, a middle voice, and total immersion in a character on stage for almost all the opera. She seems to be the same person on the outside, but is the victim of changing moods, and thus so it is in the music that we discover her performance’s beauties.

Wij van WC-Eend

Wij van WC-Eend….

Wij van WC-Eend. Wanneer medewerkers van externe recensiewebsites tegelijk bijdragen leveren aan Odeon, wordt de discussie over journalistieke onafhankelijkheid gevoelig. In dit kleine cultureel ecosysteem van “opera in Nederland” lopen kritiek, toegang, netwerk en institutionele belangen door elkaar heen. Opera is tenslotte niet alleen een kunstvorm, maar ook een sociaal stelsel van foyers, premières, ons-kent-ons en daaruit voortvloeiende wederzijdse afhankelijkheden..

Posts from overseas

Posts from overseas

Posts from overseas. Although many British critics were also shocked by the scene, Opera Gazet’s fierce, principled activism against this production drew considerable criticism within the British opera community, including on English-language forums and platforms. The accusation of prudishness: British opera lovers and progressive critics accused Keegel of having \’narrow-minded, Victorian morality\’.

La flûte enchantée

La flûte enchantée

La flûte enchantée. This opera is also clearly a coming-of-age story, a tale of initiation, which explores the path towards knowledge and wisdom, towards fulfilment. It has also been described as a Masonic narrative, reflecting Mozart’s involvement in Freemasonry through a wealth of characteristic symbolism found in both the libretto and the score.

Le Nozze di Figaro

Le Nozze di Figaro

Le Nozze di Figaro. Het toneel is onderverdeeld in een souterrain en een verdieping daarboven, vanaf nu aan te duiden als ‘beneden’ en ‘boven’. Beneden is de wasserij met kluisjes voor het personeel en een morsige matras, alles overgoten met een flets tl-licht. Boven zijn de vertrekken van de Graaf en Gravin, steriel als een museumzaal met opzichtige kunst. De Graaf (Björn Bürger) draagt handschoentjes en heeft in onbewaakte momenten perverse interactie met een kunstwerk, net als het personeel trouwens.

Götterdämmerung

GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG

Götterdämmerung. Hagen’s hunting party wanders across a bare stage of a forest, with a huge boar hung by its feet above the stage. Hagen’s spearing of Siegfreid is not credible as the hero hardly turns around enough to watch those Batman-caped ravens flying off to Valhalla. Then, we come to a most questionable staging of Siegfried’s ‘Funeral March,’ wherein Sieglinde and Siegmund returning from the beyond; she with a 20-foot-long white linen shroud used to symbolically embalm the son she last saw while giving birth. Then, for seemingly hours, the parents break into tears, their bodies shaking violently in emotion. Wotan the Wanderer also returns, broken spear in hand, approaching Siegfried’s corpse, then only to fall to the ground in shock upon discovering who has been killed. None of this was needed.

Among the endless drivel of directors, a sublime exposition of what opera is really about.

Lucia di Lammermoor

Lucia di Lammermoor at La Scala

De Maestro

De Maestro

The Merry Widow

THE MERRY WIDOW

Aix

Aix !

La Scala’s Far West ‘Carmen’

La Scala’s Far West ‘Carmen’

“Gelijk Ik hoor, oordeel Ik'

“Gelijk Ik hoor, oordeel Ik, en Mijn oordeel is rechtvaardig.” Baruch 6:30.

Tannhäuser

Tannhäuser – Musically Strong, Scenically Unconvincing

The Conceptual Cabinet of Curiosities

Het conceptuele rariteitenkabinet van het Regietheater

The Conceptual Cabinet of Curiosities

The Conceptual Cabinet of Curiosities

Simone Boccanegra (English)

Simone Boccanegra (English)

Turandot in New York

Turandot in New York

Simon Boccanegra

Simon Boccanegra

ELEKTRA

ELEKTRA (English)

ELEKTRA

ELEKTRA

Pelléas et Mélisande

Wij van WC-Eend

Wij van WC-Eend….

Posts from overseas

Posts from overseas

La flûte enchantée

La flûte enchantée

Le Nozze di Figaro

Le Nozze di Figaro

Götterdämmerung

GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG

Opera Gazet distinguishes itself as an online opera magazine by maintaining a critical and independent stance in its reviews and articles. Founded in 1999 by Guillaume Maijeur, it is one of the oldest opera review websites in Europe. The magazine focuses on covering significant new opera stagings throughout Europe, America and Australia, and is known for its editorial policy that often critiques modern productions that deviate significantly from the original libretto and composer’s intent. A key feature of Opera Gazet is its commitment to artistic integrity and its resistance to the excesses of "Regietheater", where directors make radical changes that make the operas in question recognizable only by the music. This position has put it at odds with the Dutch National Opera, which is the only opera house in the world that does not provide press facilities for Opera Gazet reviewers. Moreover, Opera Gazet prides itself on a diverse team of reviewers from various countries, bringing a wide range of perspectives to its content. This diversity allows the magazine to cover a broad spectrum of opera productions across different cultural contexts. For opera enthusiasts seeking detailed, independent, and often provocative insights into opera productions, Opera Gazet remains a valuable resource.