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SF Opera’s Nixon Media Round-Up

Sf-opera-nixon-acti-scene2-2012Production Web Site | SF Opera’s Blog

Reviews of San Francisco Opera’s Nixon in China (Act I Scene 2 pictured left with Chen-Ye Yuan as Chou En-lai, Ginger Costa-Jackson as Nancy T’ang, Buffy Baggott as Second Secretary, Nicole Birkland as Third Secretary, Simon O’Neill as Mao Tse-tung, Patrick Carfizzi as Henry Kissinger, and Brian Mulligan as Richard Nixon; photograph by Cory Weaver) look great.

Performance Reviews: MusicalCriticism.com | Not For Fun Only | Opera West | San Francisco Chronicle | San Francisco Classical Voice | San José Mercury News | SFist

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2 responses to “SF Opera’s Nixon Media Round-Up”

  1. cedichou Avatar
    cedichou

    and late: http://sfist.com/2012/06/12/sfist_reviews_nixon_in_china.php …

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  2. knights-tale Avatar
    knights-tale

    An absolutely brilliant production of a mediocre opera. I had never seen nor heard “Nixon in China” and was looking forward to it after finding “Doctor Atomic” compelling (if not excellent). I have to say I was bored through much of it.
    I found the libretto too precious for my taste, too often choosing the more artful when a more straightforward choice would have been more interesting and more dramatically cogent.
    Adams can cobble together gorgeous chords and the undulating quality of his music (so akin to Philip Glass) can be both unsettling and beautiful. But he clearly had no idea how to write for the voice. This was most frustrating in Pat Nixon. I’d like to think the blandness of the vocal writing was meant to mirror her stoic and staid appearance in public. But after a while it just became too much.
    The production itself was stunning. I was a little surprised when I first heard that SF Opera wasn’t going to create a production for John Adams’ operatic homecoming, but why try to improve on perfection? Sets, lighting, costumes, all of it combined for perhaps the best production in the Gockley era; too bad SFO didn’t actually create it.
    The singing overall was strong, with Chen-Ye Yuan (Chou-en Lai) and Simon O’Neill (Mao-tse-Tung) taking top honors. SFO needs to re-engage these two right away, the former for Verdi, the latter for Wagner. Hye Jung Lee was a kick as Madame Mao. Brian Mulligan has a lovely voice but it doesn’t have enough character yet to play such a characterful person as Nixon; the same for Maria Kanyova as Pat. Mulligan should continue to set his sights on the French repertoire as his clean lyric baritone is well-suited to it.
    But in the end, I don’t think the opera itself justified the production it got. A note in the program revealed that former SFO director Terence McEwan said “over my dead body” to the idea of “Nixon in China” coming to San Francisco. I think he was proven right.
    Besides, bringing the production go SF gave David Gockley another reason to get his name out in front, so to speak, since he gave the work its premiere. In addition, his hand in the English-language libretto for “The Magic Flute” seems to be guaranteeing him a marquee summer.

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