Heaven Sounds Like Elgar

Last weekend for my birthday, E took me to the Boston Symphony Orchestra's performance of The Dream of Gerontius by Edward Elgar. Elgar, best known to me by his cello concerto and , composed the oratorio in 1900 to the poetic text of a Catholic cardinal. I was so clueless about the piece before going I thought it was titled something about Geronimo... Why a Brit would write about Geronimo was not something I even paused to think about, so you can see how much thought and research I put into the evening before the lights went down.

The piece requires an enormous orchestra, organ, full chorus and three soloists -- a huge ensemble as you can see from the picture taken at a 1964 rehearsal. E and I were very quickly entranced: the orchestration is lush and Wagnerian, and Ben Heppner was a revelation as a true Helden tenor. I especially enjoyed Gerald Finley as the baritone. By the end of the piece, I was convinced it was perhaps one of the most purely beautiful works I have ever heard. Truly what I imagine choirs of angels sound like. And a highlight was the incredible moment when Gerontius sees God - "for one moment" -- and in that moment all the instruments must "exert their fullest force". Wow.

Opera on Film

Well after a VERY long Christmas hiatus, I'm back with my exciting musical adventures. The past month or so has actually provided a number of experiences ripe for discussion. First and foremost, I saw three very different operas on film and the results made me excited and curious about the future of opera performance in the digital age.

Although Jenny was one of my mother's starring roles at the Met Opera, Los Angeles Opera's production of MAHAGONNY was actually the first time I've seen the opera on stage. (I was 8 at the time my mother sang it and a little too young for Jenny's seductions.) I know some of the music quite well, but I was unfamiliar with the story or any production concepts. I was prepared to really like this film, since Alex Ross included the production on his Top 10 list of performances in 2007, but I was actually underwhelmed. I think the filming of the stage production was not intimate enough for my taste: too much time was spent in the broad panning of the full stage and not enough time on the individual singers. With very little set behind them, I felt that the camera could have done a better job grounding the viewer in the scenes with intimate camera work. Instead, the singers looked like they were drowning in the plain backdrops and expansive space of the stage.

I thought Audra McDonald was marvelous and Anthony Dean Giffrey was a highlight as Jimmy, but as much as I've loved Patti LuPone in the past, she spoke her way through this role and seemed out of place with the rest of the excellent vocals.

The second opera I watched recently was the Metropolitan Opera's production of HANSEL AND GRETEL. I was a gingerbread girl myself in the Met's production many years ago and Hansel too was one of my mom's starring roles, so I have many fond memories of the candy house and the witch with the green tongue. Well, this production couldn't be farther from that fairy tale ideal. Although certainly not what I would have chosen as a representation of the Grimm story, I didn't mind the dark interpretation as much as I thought I would. And I thought it worked exceptionally well on film. E and I attended the New Year's Day screening in HD while we were in Utah for Christmas; I was surprised and delighted by the enthusiastic and sold out crowd in the middle of Murray, UT, and the whole experience was mind-opening and completely fabulous to someone like me who grew up loving opera but in a technological age. I can't wait for more of the Met's HD broadcasts.

Lastly, I finally got around to watching the Met's EUGENE ONEGIN, the HD version broadcast on PBS that I had TiVoed. I had missed it in the theaters but had heard rave reviews of Hvorostovsky as Onegin. Ramon Vargas was a bit disappointing as Lensky, but Renee Fleming certainly delivered. As with Hansel, I again thought the filming of the stage production was effective, even though, like Mahagonny, the set was minimal and it would have been easy for the characters to have been lost among the plain backdrops. The final scene was riveting.

My overall conclusions from these three experiences is that the Met has an advanced aptitude for filming staged opera for the movies. Both on screen and on TV, the two Met productions were much more effective than the LA Opera production. It is thrilling to me to think about the possibilities for this art form as it continues to be transferred to advanced viewing techniques: first of all, the possibilities for directors and settings of the opera seem limitless, a theory the Met has already explored by hiring Hollywood and Broadway directors. Could Tim Burton direct a feature film of Electra, produced by the Met? (Seeing his Sweeney Todd over break made me remember the Covent Garden production I saw of the opera where blood ran down the corrugated metal walls.) How about Joe Wright over a production of Tristan and Isolde? As if Atonement wasn't sad enough...

And then questions arise about the singers. Will some singers embrace the film format while others will shy away from it? To what degree will appearances dictate casting in the future? Will the voice no longer reign supreme if the singer is required to appear in the next theater down from Reese Witherspoon or Meryl Streep?