A Masked Ball
Squirrel is using his Parterre Pulpit to make a pitch. If the Met wants to produce a work that has never been seen in New York, they could do worse than a new production of Carl Nielsen‘s excellent comic opera Maskarade. It’s easy listening for sure, melodically akin to La boheme or Lehar, but marked by Nielsen’s mature style – folk-song simplicity, and a love of cacophony and unlikely orchestration.
The Met has been beat to the US premiere by Sarasota Opera, who offered a Danish-language production in 1995 (which Squirrel saw when he was still just a small squirrel). But this opera is ready for the Big Time, having been produced in recent years at the Bregenzer Festspiele, Salzburger Festspiele, and Covent Garden. So who will get there first, The Met or City Opera?
To hear more, there is a wonderful 1970s recording, recently re-released on Da Capo
UPDATE: A member of the kære publikum has pointed out that Maskarade was indeed given a New York performance by the Bronx Opera in 1983, and reprised in 1999. Thanks for pointing this out. Sarasota still has the American Danish language premiere, and the work still awaits a major US stage with a top professional cast.
Perhaps this post is not really so much about which operas have never been done in NYC, as much as a post about how much Squirrel wants Maskarade done (professionally) in NYC?
Monsieur L’Ecureuil:
It’s good to want.
the web team happens to Lo-o-ooo-ve Nielsen, so this suggestion gets a strong buy from the geekette.
Responding to Camille, I missed the Lyric Symphony and was not much impressed when I saw Der Zwerg and Die Florentinische Tragodie. I don’t know Toten Augen at all.
I quite agree the Met should do Les Huguenots, a proven crowd-pleaser, and I enjoy Die Konigin von Saba for all its weirdness, but I don’t think the latter is likely to conquer New York again, Jewish though it be. Besides, the last time the Met did Saba, the entire city caved in and burned down (including sets and costumes) within 24 hours. It was only San Francisco (they were on the 1906 tour), but the Met has understandably been disinclined to risk it since. I saw the AOS concert performance in … well, whenever it was. Sulamith brought down the house.
Elisabetta is not Grade A Rossini, IMHO. Donizetti and Pacini and Gomes handled that story much better. (Also Benjy Britten.) The Rossini I’d like to see return – at NYCO – is Ermione. I’ve never seen a staged Guillaume Tell, but they say it’s pretty dreary if you don’t cut it to ribbons. (I’ve seen the last act staged, and that was exciting.)
She brought down the house in a GOOD way, not the 1906 way.
VIVE ROBERT LE DIABLE!!
(Die Vogel, today on QXR, was good I’m toldn by un petit oiseau ami).
All right, I’ll settle for Ermione instead of Elisabetta, but above ALL, I would LOVE to see Robert le Diable, if only for the Dancing Dead Nuns! Quelle joie!
Guillaume Tell, aussi — mais — it most probably does get tedious, 5 acters tend to tedium.
Huguenots this past summer, though, kept my attention throughout, probably because of its staging and the fact that I know chances are slim of ever seeing it again.
Wonder why Met revived Prophete instead, oh yeah, hOrne, etc.
And un tres grand bisou for letting me know about Maria di Rohan next summer — I look forward greatly to that treat!
Merci bien pour votre conseils excellents, mon tres sage Monsieur!
Merci pour votre mots gracieuses, Camille.
I always love a good Huguenots, and last summer’s was particularly fine IMHO, and held my attention throughout, probably because they cut the ballets to a minimum. They certainly kept everything else. I’d love to see Robert, because I’ve never seen Robert. Thanks to Unnatural Acts of Opera on this very site, I am also intrigued by Das Nachtlager in Schlesien. Prophete was a bit of a mess (the ballet was terrible) but Horne (and at one glorious performance Florence Quivar) had a gay old time, and McCracken was pretty good. The chose that one to revive because it only has three big starring roles, not the seven Huguenots calls for – but Huguenots is no tougher to cast than Don Carlos, and every opera house on earth tosses that one off. SFO managed L’Africaine … which is less rewarding for just as much work.
Die Vogel was lovely this afternoon, with some wobbling from certain singers – but the chorus was terrific, and that’s the best music in the opera. I only heard the last half as a splendid Curlew River with Langridge and Keenlyside was on another channel. Ah, operacast, which provides almost too much choice!
WAIT a minute — wasn’t it Carmen, with Fremstad and Caruso, the night of the Great Earthquake of ’06? You’re saying it was Koenigin von Saba instead?
Please elucidate.
The season (14 operas in 14 days – 2 matinees) opened on April 16 with Konigin von Saba. The reaction was delayed. The night of the 17 was indeed Carmen with Fremstad and Caruso. Caruso, usually not a high note tenor, took a mezzo voce C in the flower song and held it, slow crescendo, for three minutes by the clock. The house went wild. At 4am, the San Andreas Fault went into high gear. A four-poster bed caved in on Emma Eames, who seized the phone and tried to reach Conried to see if she was still expected to sing the Countess at the matinee. She wasn’t.
The film “San Francisco” is often shown on TV incorrectly on the night of the 18 or the wee hours of the 19, thus precisely 24 hours off.
Anyway, Carmen (and Caruso, and Eames) all revived, but Konigin von Saba bit the dust. Forever, as far as the Met was concerned. And they never have done Gounod’s La Reine de Saba, but I’ve seen that one, too – it’s based on Masonic mythology and is quite weird.
LA REINE de Saba IS. QUITE wonderfully weird (I refer you to the website on Charles Gounod — sorry, don’t know the web address, it’s the most official looking one and run by his descendant). There you will find a long rant about la Reine. Masonic intrigue…shades of Dan Brown.
I’ve heard La Reine on We Beg At Intervals @ 6 am, so it’s hard to have formed an opinion. Mostly, though, it’s a gros dindon, I fear. Tant pis!
Tant pis encore that Robert was never done when Junie Anderson and Sam Ramey were in top form some twenty years ago now.
Mignon, incidentally, shall be done next year in Paris, which excited me to the point of planning a tour until I saw it would feature Marie Lenormand, whom I felt was very poor indeed as the Page in Huguenots this summer. She had the only real hit number in the opera and she couldn’t sell it.
Mr. Lick, you are Donald Grout’s reincarnation! So nice to chat about French opera, which nobody gives a hang about nor gives any respect to anymore.
P.S. — did you ever hear the story that G. Charpentier stole ” Depuis le jour” from another composer who brought it to him for his review, but apparently died soon thereafter? Therein explaining the dearth of any decent music throughout the rest of the work. By the way, the score to Julien, which even Caruso didn’t manage to get into the repertory, is REALLY FUNNY!
By the way, that note that Caruso swelled in Carmen must have been a B flat (you are referring to the aria, n’est-ce pas?). There is no high C in the score, I believe.
A bientot!
My first time hearing Maskarade, though I’ve heard about it several times. Thanks for the clip. Sounds like a lot of fun.
Bronx Opera did Maskarade again in 1999.
http://www.metoperafamily.org/operanews/_archive/998/Forecast.998.html
http://www.bronxopera.org/BxOPast_Seasons.html
Thank you very kindly, Empia Razza, for clearing that up, as I did not intend anything other than presenting facts — that the work had been done since ’83 –just couldn’t substantiate the date. So, thanks for the clarification and assist!
Was it done in English? I’m recalling that singer said so. I remember him because of his enthusiasm for the work — apparently he felt it had real merit.
Also, is it MaskArade, or MaskErade? I thought it was the latter.
Anyone know fer sure, fer sure?
Maskarade was given in English, the translation was not good, the orchestra was not terribly adept, and the humor just didn’t get to me. So I am not a fan of Maskarade and puzzled that it has any repute outside Denmark. Kirsten Flagstad spoke highly of the composers David og Saul (or is it Saul og David?), and that was on the radio recently, but I missed it. It is not often staged, because the bass has to throw a spear narrowly missing the tenor.
So you don’t care for MaskArade because it was done poorly, in the bronx, and the actors weren’t funny?
It’s possible that Maskarade has more champions who are also familiar with his orchestral works, his 4th and 5th Symphonies are sort of landmarks of the early modernist variety. He has a very unique melodic voice, individual a la Dvorak (but not actually similar to Dvorak) and a cleverness of orchestral setting that is all his own. The fifth has a sortof free-notated snare drum that tries to put the orchestra out of business, but the orchestra surmounts it with an enormous explosion of bach-style chorale harmonies; the fourth is a spiky, dramatic grand symphony with two sets of timpani that “do battle” in the finale.
I think if you hear these works, Maskarade makes better sense.
It’s Saul og David.
Maskerade and Maskarade seem to be used variously.
I know I originally noted the work years ago as Maskerade. But little does it matter.
What matters more to me is Mr. Hans Lick’s opinion, as he is extraordinarily knowledgeable with many many years of careful listening experience and not just another flash in the pan.
I gave a listen once or twice to MaskErade
on QXR, I believe, but bailed after the first act. Perhaps it is a work that needs to be seen as well as heard?
Thanks to Squirrel I shall give it another try, and thanks for your suggestion about the symphonies.
The Washington Opera did The Tsar’s Bride some twenty years ago or so.
I could mount an entire season with operas that the Met hasn’t produced ever or for some time. Louise, Mignon, La Wally, L’Amico Fritz, Mefistofele, Lodoletta, Leoncavallo’s La Boheme, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Roberto Devereux, Maria Stuarda, Anna Bolena, William Tell, Linda di Chamonix, Iolanta, Robert Le Diable, Les Huguenotes, Iris, Il Turko in Italia, La Favorite, I Lituani, Rienzi, Palestrina, Vanessa, Il Secretto di Susana, Amelia goes to the Ball, L’Assessino della Catedrale, Esclarmonde, I Capuletti ed i Montecchi, Genoveva, Medea, Alcestis, etc., etc. And that doesn’t include mounting a well-cast Tosca, Aida, Fanciulla, etc., etc., if appropriate singers were ever to appear again. It would be like hearing a new opera for many.
The Tsar’s Bride was done twice in Washington, was it not? If so, I went the second time around was bored. I wish someone would revive Ginestera’s operas, esp. Bomarzo, which premiered in Washington in the late 1960s.
I can only assume you’ve never heard Ginastera’s Beatrice Cenci, a NYCO premiere. It made me want to scream in the composer’s face: “If the Renaissance upsets you so much, stop writing about it.” He wrote three operas and none are worth reviving.
Beatrix Cenci =
Not good
.
Povera figlia meritava di meglio.
Bomarzo was riveting.
I’d love to see a Muette de Portici and an Aniara (no, seriously)
Muette de Portici is charming – Auber usually is. Aniara would interest me, too.
I think both of these operas could take advantage of the “bigness” problem everyone is always talking about with the Met stage. With the dancing, rebelling, and erupting, Muette could fill the place up. And I imagine you could demonstrate the vastness of space quite eerily on that vast stage.
SFO did Tsar’s Bride about a dozen years ago with
Netrebko, Borodina, and Hvorostovsky. I really enjoyed it, both ladies sang much more lyrically then they do today. Sorry, I used to find Borodina’s singing really beautiful, silken, etc back then. Now it is all balanced on the bottom part of her range and the middle is muddy and the top squally and white, the higher notes lunged at.
What luxury casting that production had! I wish I’d been around to see it.
I’ve amended my original post with Hans Lick’s corrections. Hans, your arguments are interesting – I agree that Tiefland would be fun! (Can anyone sing those parts? Even Wagner seems to be a stretch these days) And yes, Die Gezeichneten is a no brainer — Met Futures, what do you know??
While we are on the subject, how about bringing back a Guillaume Tell, and Louise?
I gather Tell is a great bore, and was thought better excerpted even in Rossini’s lifetime. He himself thought only the overture and Act II would survive. Louise is one of those operas with one good aria – the rest is junk, bad Massenet. R.I.P.
Tell is appallingly long, but GREAT. A musical masterpiece from beginning to end. With or without cuts, it belongs at the Met.
Squirrel, or as the French say, M. Ecureuil (you’re a better man than I if you can pronounce that!), who would you have sing the title role of Louise, who
conduct it?
It has to be taken seriously, as in the recent Paris
production, and done with dignity; then it’s magic!
Best Louise soprano I ever saw, Arlene Saunders; best sung, Carole Neblett; worst, Sills – too old too little
voice left, production “assembled by Rudel.” Oops.
So, who’s your cast? Is the Met maybe too large a
hall for Louise? I wonder?
The Met is too large a hall for EVERYTHING, but no more too large for Louise than anything else, I don’t think.
I was going to say, Mireille Delunsch, then went looking to see who sang Louise at the Paris production you reference, and voila! Delunsch. Although in this video clip, though she is formidable, she sounds a bit more mature than I would have expected.
(Also, god bless Jose van Dam!)
My favorite part of the opera.
Mireille Delunsch is such an admirable artist with such an intersting repertory. She doesn’t have quite the voice, but almost, to pull it off. I think she lookd lovely and very appropriate in the role.
But Jose van Dam is fantastic and steals the show. What a force.
Maybe a lot of the music is not inspired as Mr. Hans Lick says, but this is certainly compelling theatrical music.
Grand merci for posting, Monsieur Ecureuil
http://www.rohcollections.org.uk/production.aspx?production=1467&row=0
Saw it then – cannot remember a note of it…
wow, really? you must have been having a bad night.
first time I saw it, I left singing Leander’s aria, the choral scene from act 2, and the love duet – for days.
Rossini’s Otello
ELisabetta
Giovanna D’Arco
Anything Auber
Anything Gretry
Die Lustigen Weiber von Windsor
Mignon
Boccacio
Grand Duchesse of Gerolstein
La Perichole
Beatrice et Benedict
Chabrier’s Le Roi Malgre Lui (stupid plot but gorgeous music)
Ok are these really works you want to see staged at the Met, or just all the obscure pieces you’ve ever heard about?
because Beatrice et Benedict – egads! No thankyou very much!
Lustigen Weiber von Windsor? Sorry but since Grandma and Grandpa died, nobody cares for German dialogue anymore.
I would trade the Met’s Benvenuto Cellini for a good Freischutz though!
Squirrelly One –
Freischutz should be done @ Met, absolutelyLast done in very early seventies with a pearly Lorengar — it is occasionally played on SIRIUS .
BUT, there is the matter of the pesky dialogue auf deutsch, that you mention in re Lustigen Weiber — if you have one, why not the other??
These days, with the Met Titles, the fact that Grandma and Grandpa are no more, is no longer a valid reason
And I though the purpose of attending the opera was hearing the music? Have you heard Lustigen? The music is gorgeous. Listen to the recording with Edith Mathis, Helen Donath, and Hanna Schwartz. We could have our choice of luxury casting options for virtually all of the roles, not only for Frau Fluth and Frau Reich, but I can think of any number of tenors I’d love to hear as Fenton.
Yes you are right. I agree with Met Titles we should probably get to know them both. I just think Freischutz is more the no-brainer. Where has it gone?
And to echo Sanford’s retort (to me, ironically!) – if Magic Flute, why no Freischutz!?
The problem with German dialogue isn’t making it understood via titles, it’s that most singers can’t perform it in a huge house like the Met and make it anything to the audience other than time-wasting in which they will unwrap their candies. It’s a different skill to sing in a language and to declaim convincingly in it.
Freischutz is tough to stage. I’ve seen it three times, at the Met, at the NYCO, and the film from Hamburg. Now I’ll admit that all three were a looong time ago but all three failed for me.
It’s not just the long stretches of dialog, there is an awful lot of “Pleasant Peasant”
(ala I Love Lucy) in it. And the Wolf’s Glen scene is really, really hard to pull off. Not saying it can’t be done, but it can look pretty comical (particularly the film as I recall) rather than scary.
But I admit is has lots of lovely music in it.
I’m with Richard on this one. Freischutz just doesn’t seem to travel well. The tree or four times that I’ve seen it on this side of the pond,despite some beautiful and familiar music, it’s come off as quaint and dated. I think Weber is one of those transitional figures, justly famous for composing the first popular German romantic opera, but fated to be more famous for his influence on Richard Wagner. If Lorengar and Konya in the Met’s ill fated production can’t make a case for it, I’m not sure who could. The last time I saw Freischutz was in Seattle several years ago with Voigt and Lakes, but it was Dresden house singer Ute Selbig as Aennchen who made the most authentic impression. I think there’s something about it’s indigenous folkishness that defies translation. It obdurately remained a period piece. I’m content to listen to either Erich Kleiber or Furtwangler with the peerless Elizabeth Grummer and charming Rita Streich who are absolutely enchanting.
Terribly afraid that what Mr. Straussmonster says about declamation is the truth and a large part of the problem, that is, until I remembered that Fidelio and the Serail are done at the Met and somehow the dialogue was managed therein, respectively. In fact, I wished some of the Fidelio dialogue had been cut.
The real reason, I feel, is much closer to what Mme. Graciella Scusi has said relating to the period quaintness of it all. I’m afraid that most people would titter.
In the autumn of 1987, this commenter saw a production at the Vienna Statsoper, with the wonderful Gundula Janowitz singing the Agathe. I still remember the moonlight effect they created for her first aria wherein she missed the climactic high note by a mile, most unfortunately, but made up for it with a truly exquisite performance of the cavatina, Und ob die Wolke, later on. She fairly glowed with moonbeams as did her voice, when she sang that lovely music.
The Viennese didn’t have any problems that I can recall with the Wolf’s Glen Scene,and it was rather thrilling, too, but then they’ve had a lot more practice at it than either the Met or NYCO.
It’s such a terrible shame such lovely music, good for budding helden/hoch fach voices, should be left for naught and newer audiences should not have the chance to experience this work. Even if laughable these days, it is an important landmark of German theatrical music and should be accorded some kind of respect.
I mean, REALLY, who the hell needs Alfano’s Cyrano de Bergerac, and yet we got that crammed down our craws a few years back.
And I still have a ticket to share for Aprile’s recital Tuesday night.
I thought about going to this, then decided it would be like going to a high school reunion at a school I did not myself attend.
I find it hard to believe that anyone would turn down a free ticket for a world class soprano for any reason, but that reason seems more ridiculous than most. If you attend the Met or NYCO, does that mean you’re attending a reunion for a school you attended? Or the New York Phil? Or any Broadway show? Or any movie?
Sanford, I think squirrel means he/she is not going to be able to ‘fill in the gaps’ with nostalgia. I can see his/her point.
Yikes, big overreaction. I mean this is kind of a special event for some people who know her work well, and I’m not one of them.
So you don’t know her work and are being offered the opportunity to see her live… for free… and meet one of your fellow posters and turned it down. But you want people to get to know an opera (Maskarade) that most people don’t know.
I have a friend who follows this blog, whom I met through this blog, who invites me, when he can, to join him for performances. Through him, I saw Lisette Oropesa and Paulo Szot in Central Park, and Emmaline at Dicapo. Did I love Emmaline? No.. In fact, I didn’t like any of it. But I opened myself up to the experience, because it was A: new to me and I like to keep an open mind, and B: it was free. Lisette Oropesa was a new singer for me, and she was terrific. Because of La Cieca, I’ve heard more varied repertoire than I have ever listened to before. Have I loved all of it? Of course not. But when offered a free chance to hear things I’ve never listened to before, why would I decline? Yes, I had a strong reaction to your comment. I stand by it.
Surely all Squirrel means is that Millo really only appeals to her devotees these days. Isn’t that fair enough? I’d also correct 20.1.1 to read ‘a once world class soprano’. One can’t really claim she remains world class with any seriousness.