Opera Review: It's Almost Like Love

The Cleveland Orchestra presents Tristan und Isolde in concert.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Walking the parapet: Gerhard Siegel and Nina Stemme as Tristan und Isolde at Severance Hall.
Below, Franz Welser-Möst conducts the Cleveland Orchestra.
Photo by Roger Mastroianni © 2018 The Cleveland Orchestra.

Tristan und Isolde is not an ordinary opera. Wagner's work stripped almost all the action and plot away from the legend of the medieval knight and the Irish queen and their illicit affair. Aside from one sword-thrust, there is very little action. Everything is internal in this mysterious opera, with turbulent swirls of chromatic orchestration bringing the psychological inner life of the characters to vivid life. In other words, as the Cleveland Orchestra proved on Thursday night, this is a perfect opera for the concert hall.

Concert Review: Tryst and Interruptus

The Boston Symphony Orchestra explores (part of) Tristan und Isolde.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Torn between two lovers: Andris Nelsons (with baton) conducts Camilla Nylund (center) and Jonas Kaufmann (right)
in Act II of Wagner's Tristan und Isolde. Photo by Hilary Scott © 2018 Boston Symphony Orchestra.

It might be his good looks. It might be his magnetic stage presence. It might be his voice.  Or it might be his rash of cancellations at the Metropolitan Opera in the last few seasons. Either way, tenor Jonas Kaufmann, who hasn't sung Wagner on a New York stage since 2013, has a fan following. They were out in force at Carnegie Hall on Thursday night to hear him sing opposite Camilla Nylund, the Boston Symphony Orchestra and music director Andris Nelsons in a concert performance of Act II of Wagner's Tristan und Isolde.

Opera Review: Their Reverence For This Lovely Flower

The Bayerische Staatsoper presents Der Rosenkavalier.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Table for one: Adrienne Pieczonka as the Marschallin in Der Eosenkavalier.

Richard Strauss' Der Rosenkavalier is his most beloved opera. Strauss fused rigorous compositional technique, catchy waltzes and superb vocal writing  to a charming, sentimental libretto by his longtime collaborator Hugo von Hoffmannsthal. On Thursday night, the Bayerische Staatsoper brought this opera to the stage of Carnegie Hall under the baton of its boss Kirill Petrenko. This was the opera companys first concert performance at the New York venue in its long history.

Concert Review: Oceans of Love and Time

Jaap van Zweden pairs Dark Waves with Wagner.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Jaap van Zweden in orchestral ecstasy.
Photo by Chris Lee © 2018 The New York Philharmonic.

When Jaap van Zweden was announced as the new music director of the Philharmonic, he was seen by pundits and punters alike as a firm, conservative voice designed to return America's oldest orchestra to its role as guardian of the standard European repertory of the 19th and 20th centuries. This week, he confirms that hope with a performance of Act I of Wagner's Die Walküre. However, the program opens with the New York premiere of Dark Waves, a masterful 2007 composition from Pulitzer Prize-winning composer John Luther Adams.

Opera Review: Truth And Consequences

Le Villi and La Navarraise at the Bard Festival.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Sean Pannikar (left) and Talise Trevigne in a tense moment from Puccini's Le Villi.
Photo by Cory Weaver © 2016 Bard Music Festival.

This summer's Bard Music Festival is focused almost entirely on the music of Giacomo Puccini, the Italian opera composer who stands at the end of a four hundred-year tradition of opera as that country's dominant art form. From his early competition pieces to the unfinished wonders of his final opera Turandot, Puccini was the climax of a long line of composers and somehow the end of the road.

Opera Review: Get Out of Jail Free

Bel Canto at Caramoor mounts Beethoven's Fidelio.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Pablo Heras-Casado conducts the Orchestra of St. Luke's
in Fidelio at Caramoor with Paul Groves (center) as Florestan and Elsa van den Heever as Leonore.
Photo by Gabe Palacio © 2016 Caramoor Festival of the Arts.

Since its inception, the Bel Canto at Caramoor program has focused on providing opportunities for young singers and reviving rare operas, usually in Italian but occasionally in French. On Sunday afternoon, with Orchestra of St. Luke's music director Pablo Heras-Casado on the podium in the Venetian Theater, the summer festival offered Fidelio, the only completed opera by Ludwig van Beethoven.

Concert Review: The Royal Tasting Table

Mozart opera served tapas-style in The Illuminated Heart.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Burning down the house: Christine Goerke (center) sings Elettra in The Illuminated Heart
as Louis Langrée conducts. Photo © Richard Termine for Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts.

For an arts organization trying to interest new listeners in opera, the hardest thing to do is to convert skeptics to the power and beauty of this 500-year-old art form. Presumably, that was the intent behind The Illuminated Heart, a glitzy 75-minute arrangement of Mozart arias and ensembles that kicked off the 50th anniversary celebration of Mostly Mozart at Lincoln Center. Exactly the length of an old-fashioned CD, this program reminded one of those Mozart compilations that flooded record shops in 1985 following Amadeus' eight Oscar wins.

Opera Review: The Bride Wore Yellow

Bel Canto at Caramoor mounts La Favorite.
by Paul J. Pelkonen
(This review is presented in collaboration with our friends at OperaPulse.)

Clémentine Margaine (center) and Santiago Ballerini in La Favorite.
Photo by Gabe Palacio for the Caramoor Festival.

Sometimes it takes an exceptional revival to bring an opera back from the grave. That's what happened Saturday night when the annual Bel Canto at Caramoor series turned its attention to Donizetti's La Favorite, a show that held the stage in Paris from its premiere in 1840 until 1894. This performance, held on July 11 featured the Orchestra of St. Luke's under the baton of Will Crutchfield. For the performance of this difficult work, Mr. Crutchfield assembled  a slew of strong young singers execute the original French version of this opera with style and flair.

Opera Review: It's Not Easy Bein' Green

The Cleveland Orchestra brings Daphne to Lincoln Center Festival.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Franz Welser-Möst (right) conducts Regíne Hangler and Andreas Schager (left) in a scene from Daphne.
Photo by Stephanie Berger © 2015 Lincoln Center Festival.

In bringing the Cleveland Orchestra to play Daphne at the Lincoln Center Festival, conductor Franz Welser-Möst has declared his intention to one day restore this potent and moving Richard Strauss opera to the repertory. On Wednesday night, Mr. Welser-Möst may well have succeeded in getting the opera back on the radar of New Yorkers who may know Rosenkavalier and Salome but have ignored not to delve into the considerable riches of the later Strauss catalogue. In this performance Daphne proved to be  an engrossing, enchanting 100-minute opera, a feast for the ears and an unheralded example of this composer's fertile late style.

Festival Preview: Get Thee to a Nunnery (or Monastery)

Caramoor unveils its summer opera lineup. 
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Opera in concert at Caramoor's Venetian Theater.
Image © 2015 Caramoor Performing Arts Festival.

Located off a quiet suburban lane in Katonah, NY, the Rosen Estate is a gorgeous folly, an exercise in Renaissance Italian architecture slapped square in a corner of Westchester, NY. Happily, it is also home to Caramoor, a performing arts center whose annual festival features the best of opera, orchestral and chamber music.

Opera Review: Unfinished Business

Peter Eötvös' Senza Sangue bows at the Philharmonic.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

He's back: Alan Gilbert (right) and the New York Philharmonic return to Avery Fisher Hall.
Photo by Chris Lee © 2015 New York Philharmonic courtesy 21C.

On an ordinary evening in an unnamed European city, a woman stops at a news kiosk to buy a lottery ticket. This unassuming beginning is the start of Senza Sangue, the opera for two singers that had its New York premiere last Friday night at the New York Philharmonic. Unusually, this new 45-minute opera was paired with Schubert's Symphony No. 8 in B Minor, the so-called Unfinished. Alan Gilbert, looking relaxed after a month spent touring Europe with the orchestra, conducted.

Opera Review: The Da Vinci Coda

The American Symphony Orchestra presents Max von Schillings' Mona Lisa.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

American Symphony Orchestra music director Leon Botstein visits the Louvre.
With apologies to Leonoardo Da Vinci. Original photo by Ric Kelleher.
Photo alteration by the author.

Leonardo Da Vinci's Mona Lisa is one of the most famous paintings in history, featuring in bad suspense novels, Hollywood adaptations of same, and countless Internet memes. On Friday night at Carnegie Hall, the American Symphony Orchestra under the baton of conductor and scholar Leon Botstein, unearthed the 1915 opera of the same name by the long-forgotten composer Max von Schillings. This was the first New York performance of Mona Lisa since 1923, when it was mounted at the Metropolitan Opera.

Opera Review: The Music of the Future

Juilliard presents Gluck's Iphigénie en Aulide.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

The cast of Iphigenie en Aulide at Juilliard.
(L.-R. Ying Fang, Virginie Verrez, Brandon Cedel, Yunpeng Wang.)
Photo by Marty Sohl © 2015 The Juilliard School.

The composer Christoph Willibald Gluck was a key figure in the transition from the baroque era to the so-called classical period that followed. The agency of this revolution was opera, specifically his seminal works Orphée et Eurydice and  Iphigénie en Aulide. The latter of these was his first work for the Paris stage and was presented Tuesday night in a new production at the Juilliard School's Peter Jay Sharp Theater.

Opera Review: The Young Poisoner's Handbook

Angela Meade's Lucrezia Borgia bows at Caramoor.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Pretty poison: Angela Meade is a deadly Lucrezia Borgia at Caramoor.
Photo by Dario Acosta © 2012 AngelaMeade.com

Although Gaetano Donizetti was one of the most prolific and popular composers of the 19th century, only a handful of his 71 operas have survived into the regular repertory of the world's opera houses. A recent revival of interest in bel canto repertory has led to a Donizetti revival, with operas like Anna Bolena and Maria Stuarda emerging from the fog of history.

Recordings Review: Green-Eyed Monsters of the Midway

Riccardo Muti and the CSO record Otello.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

In concert: Riccardo Muti (on podium) conducting Otello at Orchestra Hall in 2011.
Photo by Todd Rosenberg © 2011 Chicago Symphony Orchestra,

From the slip-case of the CD with an enormous, brooding profile of Riccardo Muti to the opening bars of the conductor's new (2013) recording of Verdi's Otello, it is clear that the fiery Italian conductor is working hard to put his personal stamp on the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. This Otello (recorded in 2011 during a run of four concert performances at Orchestra Hall) is Mr. Muti's second recording on CSO Resound, the orchestra's own label. (Unbelievably this is Mr. Muti's first Otello on CD, and the CSO's second. Under Sir Georg Solti made an ill-advised set with Luciano Pavarotti(!) in the title role in 1991.)

Opera Review: Re-light My Fire

The American Symphony Orchestra presents Feuersnot.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

It's either a virgin...or this as Feuersnot by Richard Strauss gets a rare hearing.

The early operas of Richard Strauss (that is, the two he wrote before the whirlwind success de scandale of Salome) are incorrectly dismissed as juvenalia. Take Feuersnot the one-act comedy that the composer wrote (right after Ein Heldenleben) as a riposte to his home city of Munich and its notably conservative musical establishment. On Sunday afternoon, New Yorkers were able to judge Feuersnot for themselves, as the opera received a much-neeeded airing from Leon Botstein and the American Symphony Orchestra.

Opera Review: Reign of Error

The Opera Orchestra of New York presents Andrea Chénier.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Roberto Alagna sings with the Opera Orchestra of New York in Andrea Chénier.
Photo by Stephanie Berger © 2013 Opera Orchestra of New York.

The unthinkable happened on Sunday night, at the Opera Orchestra of New York's concert presentation of Umberto Giordano's Andrea Chénier, starring Roberto Alagna in the title role. This was the company's first performance of the season at Avery Fisher Hall.

Opera Review: The Invisible Head

The Cleveland Orchestra mounts Salome at Carnegie Hall.
by Paul Pelkonen

The girl who has everything: soprano Nina Stemme.
Photo © EMI Classics.

The finest opera performance of the spring 2012 season in New York was at Carnegie Hall last night, when the Cleveland Orchestra presented a complete performance of Richard Strauss' Salome, under their music director Franz Welser-Möst.

Salome needs little introduction. Strauss' first successful opera (he used to brag that it paid for his villa) uses the composer's stunning orchestral gifts to bring the story of the Princess Salome and her unhealthy obsession with Jokaanan (John the Baptist) to vivid life. In a concert setting though, the traditional props: Herod's death-ring, the executioner's sword, and the prophet's bloody, severed head are invisible. It is up to the orchestra to tell the story.

Mr. Welser-Möst, who also serves as music director of the Vienna State Opera, accomplished an astonishing effect in this performance. Somehow, his Cleveland players sounded "Viennese", putting a lilt under strings and winds, and driving the work with a light, frothy texture. The big brass themes for Jokaanan (John the Baptist) were played with sonorous beauty, and the vague Orientalisms of the Dance of the Seven Veils appeared in sharp relief.

Opera Review: Never Listen to the Tenor

The Collegiate Chorale presents Moïse et Phaoron.

Moses supposes: James Morris utters prophecies in Moïse. 
To his right, Ginger Costa-Jackson as Marie. Photo by Erin Baiano, © 2011 The Collegiate Chorale.

James Bagwell led the Collegiate Chorale and an all-star cast of singers across the Red Sea last night. The ensemble kicked off its 2011 season at Carnegie Hall with the 1827 Rossini rarity Moïse et Phaoron. The concert performance featured bass-baritone James Morris as Moses, Rising sopranos Angela Meade and Marina Rebekah sang key supporting roles.

Rossini first wrote Mosé en Egitto for the Italian stage in 1817. Ten years later, the French version was reworked and revised for Parisian sensibilities. The result is unique Rossini: a four-act retelling of the Book of Exodus that inserts a conventional love story in between scenes of chained Israelites and Egyptians battling the ten plagues. At the climax, the Pharaoh charges into the waves of the Red Sea at his son's urging. The moral is: never listen to the tenor.

Marina Rebekah and Erik Cutler in Moïse.
Photo by Erin Baiano, © 2011 The Collegiate Chorale.

A crack cast was on hand to do justice to Rossini's work. Bass-baritone James Morris was imposing as Wotan, using his rich, still pliant baritone to lead his people out of bondage. Bass-barihunk Kyle Ketelsen was impressive as the Pharaoh, and more than a match for Mr. Morris until meeting his watery end.

This is French opera, which means you need two divas, not one for the principal female roles. Angela Meade was Sinaide, the Pharaoh's wife. This was another triumph for the fast-rising American singer, who displayed rich, potent tone in the slow section of her big Act III aria. She was a little more steely in the fast second section, a duet with tenor Erik Cutler, but one wished she had more music to sing.

In the larger soprano role of Anaïs, soprano Maria Rebekah was not to be outdone. Another fast-rising star (last heard as Donna Anna in the Met's middling new production of Don Giovanni, she made the most of the big Act IV aria "Quelle horrible destinée." She shared good onstage chemistry with tenor Erik Cutler despite the narrow concert setting and Mr. Cutler's constant fiddling with a creaky music stand.

As the Pharaoh's son Amenophis. Mr. Cutler met the most difficult casting requirement in this opera, an old-fashioned bel canto tenor who can sing with pliability, accuracy and still be heard over the orchestra. He did a splendid job, despite looking corralled in the close quarters of the concert seating.

The American Symphony Orchestra was on hand to play this score, which is one of Rossini's most innovative. It points the way forward to works like Verdi's Nabucco and Berlioz' Les Troyens, particulary with its use of woodwind textures, rhythms in the strings, accenting harp and heavy brass. This last was represented by the ophicleide, an archaic tuba that lends the music a different tonal quality than modern brass.

Mr. Bagwell commanded these forces in a vibrant, though cut reading of this fascinating score. He was helped by a superb performance from the Collegiate Chorale, who took on the roles of chained Hebrews or oppressive Egyptians as necessary. Though they played both sides of this Biblical drama, they did so with maximum commitment to the truth and power of this little-heard music.

Opera Review: Fox on the Runway

The Cunning Little Vixen at the New York Philharmonic

Isabel Bayrakdarian makes her escape in
The Cunning Little Vixen. Photo by Chris Lee.
© 2011The New York Philharmonic

This week, the New York Philharmonic ended their marathon 2011 season with Leoš Janáček's The Cunning Little Vixen, an opera that pits mankind against the animal kingdom as represented within a Czech forest. Thursday night's performance, under the baton of music director Alan Gilbert, offered a sumptuous reading of the score, with the orchestra supporting a first-class cast.



That cast was led by soprano Isabel Bayrakdarian, making her Philharmonic debut in the title role of the vixen Sharp-Ears. Ms. Bayrakdarian displayed an agile soprano instrument with a pleasing tone and the right amounts of light and shade. She also manipulated the complex costume (including a nearly prehinsile fox-tail) easily, coping with the challenging choreography on the somewhat limited stage.

She was well matched by the veteran British baritone Alan Opie as The Forester, the game warden who serves as antagonist, captor and foil to the Vixen. Mr. Opie was joined by Joshua Bloom in the brief role of Harasta, character tenor Keith Jameson as the Schoolmaster and bass Wilbur Pauley in the mirroring roles of the Badger and the Parson. The animal cast also features mezzo Marie Lenormand as Sharp-Ears' vulpine love interest, and members of the Metropolitan Opera Children's Chorus as a menagerie of bugs, butterflies, and beetles.

They gave good sunflower: Alan Gilbert conducts The Cunning Little Vixen.
Photo by Chris Lee © 2011 The New York Philharmonic

The costumes, also designed by Mr. Fitch, combined animal and insect characteristics with everyday items: cargo pants for the Vixen and her mate. Latex skull-caps with scarlet punk-rock mohawks for the Rooster and Chickens. Backpacks for all the insects (presumably to hold their folded wings) and appropriate peasant gear for the Forester, the poacher Harasta, and the denizens of the little tavern that represents the world of man in this opera.


The Vixen is the second collaboration between Mr. Gilbert and director Doug Fitch, who paired on last year's successful staging of Ligeti's Le Grand Macabre. The team took a lighter approach with the Janacek piece. Mr. Fitch's design turned the vast stage of Avery Fisher Hall into a giant patch of sunflowers, with cleverly placed cloth scrims and Vari-Lites providing a suitable forest atmosphere. The aisles of the concert hall and a black, tongue-like extension expanded the acting surface into the house, giving the large cast of insects, animals and humans enough room to cavort.

The effect of dappled light and raw natural beauty were also present in Mr. Gilbert's sensitive reading of this brief, but treacherous score. Whether playing the folk melodies generated by the Cricket and the Butterfly, or accompanying the soaring voices of the Vixen and the Fox in their love duet, Mr. Gilbert spent most of the night conducting in a comfortable pocket.

He was bold with the score, speeding tempos when necessary, producing a marvelous kinetic energy in the Act II wedding. The final scene featured impressive playing from the Philharmonic horns, depicting offstage hunting parties with authority and noble, firm tone.