Love has a bitter core, Vanessa
In fact, this is a scene from Lyric Opera of Chicago's new Die Frau ohne Schatten, which by the way your doyenne will be hearing next week. Expect a full report the first week of December.
Speaking of Vanessa, here's a representative of The Younger Generation of the Gays with his take.
Labels: gay gay gay gay gay, meine nippen sie küssen so heiß, voigt
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2:26 PM
26 Comments:
No tag for Brewer on this post? Gold Dust Man is, after all, her prize in this picture.
Many thanks, Cieca, for the fun review from [i]der Jungling[/i] of [i]Vanessa[/i]. But I have to defend the libretto from this charge: " ...he's a gold-digging, smooth-talking user (a character point we must take Erika's word for because there's not evidence for it anywhere else in the libretto.)" After he seduces the aunt, date-rapes the niece, etc. we are not justified in suspecting his noble intentions? Please.
And our tender-footed observer certainly shows his youth with this one: "There's no reason for her to freak out, I mean she didn't even like the guy." Oh, oh my. The scars we veterans could show to expand such naîve consciousness! And where would opera be if human emotions were so simple?
I saw Mesdames Brewer, Voigt and Grove on the opening last Friday. You're in for a real treat - the singing is sublime...
Can't wait! My ticket for December 12 is in my hot little hands!! My first hearing of Brewer...
Memo to Der Jungling (tm Dirkva): You are not worthy to lick the dirt-encrusted soles of Martin Bernheimer's shoes clean with your bare tongue, you impertinent welp. At least MB doesn't rely on text-messaging talk to get his point across. Plus, purple text on a black background? No, no, NO.
Please come back to Los Angeles, Mr. Bernheimer, and replace that PR hack Mark Swed, Peter Hemmings is no longer at the opera, cowering in the Dot's offices.
Anonymous, how are the male voices in the Chicago Frau?
I'm with Mr. Holland on this one.
I followed the link to Martin Bernheimer's review in The Financial Times, and I thought Bernheimer's discussion of both the text and music of "Vanessa" was spot-on.
I have long thought Martin Bernheimer the best music critic we have, and I have long thought "Vanessa" a competely meretricious work. The only fun in hearing "Vanessa" is trying to decide, moment by moment, which is worse: the words or the music. Not even Kiri Te Kanawa, singing (beautifully) the title role in the same production used by NYCO, could bring this cheap piece of goods to life.
"Vanessa" will be fifty years old next year. How many professional stagings has it enjoyed, since inception, in Germany? In France? Italy? The UK? Please correct me if I am wrong, but I believe the answer, to all of the above, is "zero". (The Chandos recording, from the UK, was taken from a concert performance, not from a stage presentation.)
Doesn't this say something about the work's lack of merit?
The gentlemen sing quite well, but I really went to listed to the ladies. Barak (Franz Hawlata) is quite a good actor in the scenes between him and Frau Brewer. Very tender scenes in Acts I and III between the two of them.
The gold dust boy looks like one of Voigt's usual dates.
If there had been this many hot, naked or half-naked men onstage when I was singing opera, I would have stuck with it longer! There are so many hot men on this site now, I sometimes feel like I'm looking at one of my treasured (and expensive) porn sites. Not that I'm complaining, mind you. Opera and porn - my two favorite hobbies. Someone should write a Gordon Merrick opera and combine them. How about An "Idle For Others"?
Drew80 said...
' "Vanessa" will be fifty years old next year. How many professional stagings has it enjoyed, since inception, in Germany? In France? Italy? The UK? Please correct me if I am wrong, but I believe the answer, to all of the above, is "zero"'
Well, you're entitled to your ( in my view misguided) estimate of VANESSA, but it's been done in Italy ( Spoleto, with Ivana Tosini and Mietta Sighele) and in France (Strasbourg, with Brenda Harris ) and Monte-Carlo (with te Kanawa and Elias). As for Germany, the little opera house in Gera (Thuringia) just premiered a production in late October.
Was it someone here, or someone somewhere else who called Vanessa "the American Adriana Lecouvreur?" La Cieca personally thinks the piece is perhaps a bit more "the American Tote Stadt or even "the American Aegyptische Helena," but you see where I'm going with this.
La Cieca, this may not be the reference you are seeking, but I think it was Andrew Porter who wrote that "Vanessa" was bad Cilea.
I love the fact that The Younger Generation of the Gays refers to Anatol as a "trick."
This scene drew titters in the audience this evening. Musically, the performance is phenomenal. The staging, though, veers towards ridiculous. Who knew "Frau" was a ballet with vocal accompaniment? Especially in Act III, there were times I wanted to rush down the aisle to get out of Debbie Voigt's way. At the end of Act II, as I tried to move between the supertitles and the Baraks, I was distracted by two suspended boy toys in the background.
Jill Grove was fantastic. Robert Dean Smith proved that Strauss tenor roles can be sung sweetly and effortlessly - who knew??? The women were tremendous - both really hitting their marks in the final act. It was a glorious showcase for Lyric Center members and grads - every supporting role was perfection. (Look out for Quinn Kelsey - did I hear a future Wotan???)
All that said, Hawlata crushed me. At the end of Act I, I was seriously biting my lip to hold back audible sobs. When the curtain fell, I just let it rip!!! I've heard his Ochs and Daland, neither of which prepared me for his Barak. Gorgeously sung - beautiful legato, warm timbre - and perfectly portrayed. Oh, how I'd love to see his Sachs...
Drew80 said...
"La Cieca, this may not be the reference you are seeking, but I think it was Andrew Porter who wrote that "Vanessa" was bad Cilea."
So someone who considers THE ICE BREAK and THE KNOT GARDEN the height of post-Britten opera is a reliable judge of American scores? Porter unsurprisingly also found BABY DOE worthless...
Meanwhile, VANESSA had its British reduced orchestra staged premiere in 1999 at the Lyric, Hammersmith. Since the Barbican concert with Brewer, Graham and Burden ( why on earth didn't NYCO get *him*. or Brandon Jovanovich, to play Anatol, instead of the Graf Elemer they had?). the Bloomsbury Theatre staged it full out with the ENO soprano Claire Pendleton in the lead.
Well, you can hear Hawlata's Sachs on the Bayreuth broadcast this past summer. "Overparted" would be putting it kindly. And he also was clearly having trouble both in the opening night performance and the final dress rehearsal with the top notes of Barak's role.
Very Interesting photo. Voigt doesn't look slim at all. Three fat bags and a golden boy. I know it's Frau, but it could just as easily be the three ladies and Tamino from Flute, or maybe the three witches and Macbeth.
Don't let the picture fool you - Voigt looks terrific. Sure, she'll never be Danielle deNiese but her figure is much like Jeritza's. On stage, she looks - and acts - very youthful. From the back of the orchestra she looked nearly half her age.
Two Isoldes go head to head in Frau
It is not often that you go the opera, and scene after scene, two Sopranos who are generally cast in the same roles, outsing each other in waves of glorious sound. And not in a competitive manner, they just happen to grow into their respective roles as the evening progresses.
Of course there are quibbles to be had, as there often are with any parts such as the Empress and the Farberin. Voigt fumbled slightly on the opening high D, Brewer was slightly veering into sprechtstimme in conversational dramatic moments, rather that sing the line. But the two of them are ideally suited to their roles. And this production shows why Voigt and Brewer, although both vying to be the Prima Isolde Assoluta of the moment, have inherently different instruments. Voigt can pull out a lyric extension of melting beauty, easy high notes, and legato of stunning quality. Brewer's voice had the sheer power and heft needed to blow out your eardrums. In a Brunhilde match up, the former would be ideal for Siegfried and Gotterdamerung's first part, while the Latter would be exceptional in Walkure and Gotterdammerung's closing scene.
Robert Dean Smith proved that Heldentenors and Screaming tenors are not synonymous. He poured out generous sound, while spinning marvelous legato lines. He also has exceptional emotion in his voice. If his acting skills can be faulted, the intense colors of his voice are an ample substitute.
Franz Hawlata almost stole the show from under the women. His first two acts were crushing of humanity, and the voice was just stunning. He made me believe the first two acts of Frau were really about the humanity and love of this man. It is sadly unfortunate that he fell apart in the third act, cracking several times in both the duet and the quartet.
Jill Grove was the less thrilling of the main characters. She let lose some stunning chest voice notes, and a few glorious high notes. But there were many rough passages in between these moments. It sounded at time as if she did not know whether or not to dip into chest voice; her mixed voice often sounded shrill.
The production is lovely, and very much utilizes the fairy tale idea to its advantage. Magic, illusions and mystery are at the heart of this staging. There are dancers that represent the spirits of Keikobad's realm. I never found them distracting, although I am not sure I understood their presence at all times.
The sets and the lighting are gorgeous, and the sparkling orchestra was led with a masterful hand by Andrew Davis.
This was, overall, one of the most magical evenings one could hope for.
Speak for yourself, Anonymous! This Chicagoan is most certainly NOT easily pleased.
Justanother got it right on the musical end but I found the production often ludicrous. When the curtain fell on Act II, I burst out laughing.
My mother put it even better - Girl in a Golden Cage meets Cirque du Soleil, with Mary Poppins thrown in during Act III. The stage was often cluttered with far too many dancers. Why were Barak and his wife shunted off to the far rear of the stage at the opera's close, while swarms of supers filled the stage. Were they ALL born children greeting each other?
At the same time, I felt the cast was left at loose ends. The singing was tremendously effective but the singers seemed to have had little to no real direction. Perhaps the director spent too much time dreaming up his choreography. Hawlata seemed the only singer completely embodying his character. Voigt had some lovely moments but, at other times, seemed to be merely placing her arms.
Still, the production is a triumph. Maybe Hawlata's Sachs had problems at Bayreuth, but his Barak is profoundly moving and gorgeously sung. I won't quibble on a few notes - the man's really a bass, not a bass-baritone.
Drew80 has broken this old woman's heart!!! My late husband, (sob), John, had a saying, "every queen is entitled to love one bad opera". He had in mind, of course, Queen Victoria, and her insane fondness for "The Maid of Artois" -- Vicki was a well trained and for her time quite sophisticated musician (Mendelssohn was certainly impressed -- she played some of his pieces for him at sight), and constantly had operas and concerts given for her.
I ADORE Vanessa and I reject all attacks on it (sob!). Granted it's libretto is the campiest ever, line for line, not even La Gioconda -- hilarious -- comes close. And the story is ludicrous (see La Gioconda again)-- and are we sure that piece of trade, calling himself, Anatol, is really the son of the 'real' Anatol, as opposed to an opportunist who overheard something at a party, or who was a trick of the 'real' Anatol, who you just know had to be bi, after diddling Vanessa, a very strange fish indeed.
And yes, Sam didn't have many ideas, though he knew Richard Strauss, Korngold, Rachmaninov, Puccini, Sibelius like the back of his hand, or do I mean the nib of his pen? But I LOVE IT, I think it is beautifully made in its way (just like West Side Story, which contains a lexicon of musical tags from the Western Canon), and I think the sheer hopeless silliness of those queens taking themselves so seriously is --- touching. Sob.
I am now covering my mirror.
I can't wait to see it next week (11/30). Dearest Cieca, when are you attending?
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I fully join Mrs John in her love for *Vanessa*. But -- and I know I expose myself to obloquy here -- I go further: I have never understood the popular disdain for the libretto. Its thought and diction are utterly consistent (which is rare enough in our beloved art), it gives the composer the opportunities requisite for his style, and it lets opera singers act like opera singers (not, to be sure, according to any modern ideal of the legitimate theater -- the distinction of opera from which is all too little appreciated these days).
Certainly the characters are all drama queens. So what? Given the rather melodramatic (to misuse that term in the now customary manner) style of utterance, much of the thought is -- dare I say it? -- quite profound. I would adduce, off the top of my head, Vanessa's "Love has a bitter core, Anatol. But let me taste its bitterness with you. I will never ask too much if you will offer all." Yes, it's very drama-queeny, but if you've never felt that emotion, I don't know whether to pity you or look on your imperviousness to romance with awe-filled admiration.
Or, in the climactic ensemble: "To love is all of these, but none of these is love. The tide is not the moon ..." usw. Who has not been tempted to mistake the accessories of love for the thing itself?
As for the unlikeliness of the plot: What's so wrong with that? This is in the tradition of something called opera -- often based on myths that also rarely pass the Hemingway test. The relevant desideratum is that it provide the opportunity for something that I can only think to call, with a complete lack of disdain, "operatic truth." This, I feel, *Vanessa* does in plenty.
Is it possible that I knew this opera too well, too young? That my taste has been formed by something that should be beneath me? I hardly think so. After all, I watched televised soap operas as a child who "should have been outside skinning my knees" without having my taste in legitimate drama corrupted. I did graduate study in English and Comp. Lit. without eminent professors ever detecting my low-brow tendencies. But I'm willing to learn and would be pleased if someone would get analytical on my ass about the libretto, instead of perennially making blanket supercilious noises about it.
As for the musical style: what manner was Barber to adopt except the style of one Samuel Barber? Should he have tried to emulate Berg or Bartok or some other composer whose operas had acquired good reputations? Can he have been anything but correct in employing his own justly admired style?
As I've said in another thread, the old Red Seal recording with its ineffable cast rings in my head with astonishing immediacy anytime I invoke it, and sometimes when I don't. Laugh if you will at my piety towards this work. My devotion is, I have to admit, extreme enough to merit a degree of ridicule from the unsusceptible. It is of such a nature that, regrettably, I could not bring myself to attend the recent performances at NYCO.
I CANNOT WAIT TO SEE & HEAR THIS!!! I have tickets for the 20th. I haven't been to Chicago in ages, but the combo of Debita & Christine is a must see. I have found that Ms. Brewer gets better exponentially when she has another soprano to play against. My most favorite moment in all of opera is the top of Act III. With a voice as beautiful as hers I know that I am going to be in tears. I guess I am just a Frosch freak because I am seeing Ms. Brewer again in February in Paris in the same opera. BTW does anyone know anything about Eva-Maria Westbroek? She's singing the Kaiserin in that production.
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