This summer San Francisco Opera will perform Christoph Willibald Gluck's Iphigénie en Tauride in a co-production with Lyric Opera of Chicago, where it premiered on September 29, 2006. This week Seattle Opera and the Met announced a co-production of the very same opera, to premiere on October 13, 2007 in Seattle and November 27, 2007 in New York.
The Opera Tattler
Reviews of Performances and their Audiences
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*Notes*
The final performance of Carmen this season was on the 9th. The standing room area was fuller than it has been in a long time, not unlike the opening night of a season. The performance was adequate, though Hadar Halévy still gasped a few times and danced badly. However, Marco Berti was most impressive, and I hope he returns soon.* Tattling *
Normally I would not attend an opera this popular on closing night, because it is bound to be crowded. However, I had promised some friends we would go, and there were six of us, four braving standing room. We got to the opera box office well before 9am, and there were already 5 people in line. We made it in time for the 6:20pm entrance time, and saved our places on the railing. When we returned, a person had shoved the programs holding two of my friends places onto my coat. When I confronted him I was told that clothing only indicated a saved place if it was a seat, and I was speaking nonsense. We continued to argue, and I tried asking 3 ushers for assistance, none of whom were helpful at all. The person did end up leaving some time during Act I.Leave a Reply
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Deutsche Oper Berlin apparently lost the heads of Muhammad, Jesus, Buddha and Neptune from the controversial Idomeneo production. Nevertheless, the revival went ahead today with newly created heads.
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* Notes *
The last opera of the year at San Francisco Opera will be Manon Lescaut this Sunday. Overall, this production was the best of the seven, because the cast is strong and the set design is neither distracting nor nonsensical. It is interesting to note that Carmen sold out for the last three performances, and the singers sharing the title role are both newcomers. Manon Lescaut was not completely full yesterday, nor is the final performance sold out, despite Karita Mattila. Perhaps this opera is too obscure, when I've mentioned it in passing, many people have not known of it, nor of Abbé Prévost's book.I am quite curious to hear Karita Mattila sing in Wagner, I have only heard her sing music that I am not particularly interested in, Puccini this time and Janáček a few seasons ago. Her voice has such beauty and intensity. This time around I noticed that tenor Misha Didyk has a lot of vibrato, but not so much to ruin his intonation. He also sounds better when warm, his Act I performance is certainly not as good as in the others.
* Tattling *
Someone came to the stage when the curtain was supposed to rise, and he assured us that Karita was fine, but some orchestra members were stuck in Bay Bridge traffic. Subsequently, the curtain time was pushed back 20 minutes.Because of the late start, there were no latecomers in the boxes. However, some girls decided to come into Box X toward the end of the intermezzo between Acts II and III. I was sitting at the back of the box as to not crowd anyone, and one of the girls sat directly in front of me and perched on the chair so that all I could see was the back of her head. To add injury to insult, the girls whispered throughout Act III, though they did leave after the act was finished.
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* Notes *
The Adler recital last night started off with the overture from Bernstein's Candide. This was followed by a most terrible butchering of Händel's Alcina Act III, Scenes 2 through 7. Soprano Elza van den Heever was a shrill, nasal, and gasping Alcina. Mezzo-soprano Kendall Gladen was cold and too quiet as Bradamante, but she sounded much better latter in the evening, when she sang "Va! laisse couler mes larmes!" from Massenet's Werther. Counter-tenor Gerald Thompson did not have control of his voice as Ruggiero. The rest of the evening went better, soprano Kimwana Doner sang "Tacea la Notte Placida" pretty well, though her voice is thin in her higher range.Baritone Eugene Brancoveanu is certainly the star of the Adler Fellows, he sang "Mira di acerbe lagrime" with Doner and a scene each from Billy Budd and Eugene Onegin. His tone is full and warm, not too much vibrato, and never harsh. of the others, soprano Melody Moore and tenor Sean Panikkar were fine as Mimi and Rodolfo. Moore's voice has an effortlessness that is lacking in many of the others. Panikkar strained his higher notes when accompanied by the full orchestra, but his voice is lovely. Bass Jeremy Galyon and tenor Matthew O'Neill show promise, and they were hilarious when they broke out into random Italian, shuffling chairs as Sean Panikkar took the stage. Soprano Rhoslyn Jones annoyed me as Frasquita in the current production of Carmen, as her voice is incredibly loud and wavering. However, she wasn't terrible in the Eugene Onegin excerpt, when she sings piano her voice is pretty, but the forte bits can be frightening.
* Tattling *
People were seated during the Alcina excerpt, and the pair that stepped over me to get to Z 117 and 119 apologized as the music continued. Soon after this a woman in Z 115 decided she couldn't wait for Alcina to be over either and made us all stand so she could get out. There was a great deal of chatter the whole time, plus wonderful amounts of screaming, especially from standing room. David Gockley spoke after the intermission, and he forgot 2 of the 3 names of the departing Adlers. Thankfully, members of the audience were able to yell "Gerald" and "Eugene" for him.Leave a Reply
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The last three performances of Carmen are sold out, but the last two performances of Manon Lescaut are not.
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* Notes *
The fourth performance of Carmen this season was yesterday, and I had the chance of seeing the performance from Box A. From there I could discern that Hadar Halévy was gasping, rather than wobbling, at least, most of the time. She has a wholesome, sunny smile. Marco Berti was rather loud, but his voice is expressive, though his acting is not. On the other hand Ana María Martínez acted well as Micaëla, but was shrill in her higher register. Also acting well was Kyle Ketelsen as Escamillo. His voice is pretty, but was lost when the full orchestra played during "Toreador en Garde." Sebastian Lang-Lessing conducted at a break-neck speed in the beginning, which was thrilling and precarious. There were a few moments when the singers and orchestra were not precisely together.* Tattling *
It impresses me that even people in boxes think it is fine to speak during the overture, and I had to hush some women in Box B. One would think if one is close enough to discern the performers expressions, one would realize that one can also be seen and possibly heard. The people in Box A 5 and 6 also talked a great deal during Acts III and IV, but only during the music, never during the spoken dialogue. It was odd since they were quiet in the beginning and it was a slow crescendo to nearly full-volume by the end.* Overheard *
During the second intermission, I heard a woman ask her companions if "they were singing in French." I nearly fell out of my chair, and it made me spill my sparkling water all over the table.The talking people in Box A also had a funny conversation in which they were convinced that Sean Panikkar was not in Carmen, yet he was in the program. This is because they were looking at the Manon Lescaut program, and they did not finish figuring it out by the time Act IV started. I’m not sure why they were trying to read the program in the dark during the scene change.
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* Notes *
Il Barbiere di Siviglia closes this Thursday, and last Sunday’s performance was not bad, though I was rather distracted by reading the vocal score and not watching the stage.* Tattling *
The main problem with the balcony is the latecomers, because otherwise, the sound is rather good up there. A family of four arrived after the music started, and thus were left to stand in the back for an hour and thirty-five minutes. This was terrible for children, because they were not tall enough to see over the wall. The mother was wearing stilettos and wanted to sit, but since one cannot see from the back benches, the children would not allow her to. The father left his umbrella, coat, and program on the bench by me, and another woman came over to me, asked if it was my stuff and left in a huff when I said no.Later, this family had quite a lot of deliberations about what to do, and when it ran into "A un dottor della mia sorte," I finally hushed them. To this, the mother ran up to me, smiled and apologized aloud. At least I had fifty-five minutes of uninterrupted music in the second half.
In the morning, there was a nice man in the standing room/rush line who told us about his first opera. It was Don Giovanni at the Old Met, and he drove from Chicago, then waited in the standing room line for four hours. We discussed the last Figaro production at San Francisco Opera, and he mentioned a performance Aida which featured, in his words, beached whales as the lead singers. It was a charming morning, but there were no rush tickets, and he waited 2 hours because there was no sign indicating the unavailability of such tickets.
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These seem opposed, which is always amusing.
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