Don Carlo
The Metropolitan Opera
Conductor: James Levine
Cast: John Botha, René Pape, Olga Borodina, Dimitri Hvorostovky, Patricia Racette, Samuel Ramey
Performances through December 23rd

Verdi’s Don Carlo returned to the Metropolitan Opera last week in the classic John Dexter production. The house has presented this production several times in recent memory, but not with a cast this strong. The crown in the jewel that is this current revival is the German bass René Pape, who sang King Phillip for the first time at the Met . It’s a role he’s presented all over Europe, including in a controversial and bloody 2004 production at the Berlin Staatsoper and he triumphed in this star-studded production. Almost his equal was the bright-voiced and clarion Johan Botha singing the title role. Botha, a South Aftrican tenor, was also debuting the role at the Met. He certainly had the strength and accuracy to carry the role and performed credibly better that the most recent Met incarnation, Richard Margison, who sang in last season’s revival and back in 2001. But despite a big and seemingly inexhaustible voice, Botha gave a performance that would certainly seem too bright and sweet for some tastes. But it works, since Carlo is somewhat of a neurotic and indecisive would-be-hero in the tradition of Hamlet. Judging by this performance, we have much to look forward to in Botha’s Walther in Die Meistersinger this spring.

Don Carlo is an ensemble piece, which means that the burden of a great performance is placed pretty much equally on all of the five leads. Two of them took the entire first act to warm up, but eventually did stunning work in the four – yes, four – subsequent acts. The Russian baritone Dimitri Hvoroskovsky and Patricia Racette both struggled to hold their own against Botha in the first act. In Racette’s case, the chemistry with Carlo seemed off. There seemed to be lack of communication in the first scene, where princess Elizabeth of France (Racette) – who is engaged to Don Carlo – comes upon him unawares in the forests of Fontainebleau. Racette also took deep breaths and just seemed generally out of sorts. Hvorostovsky – who stars in next month’s revival of Onegin – co-starring as the revolutionary Marquis of Posa, got off to a wobbly start in his first scene with Carlo as well. It was only in his lower range that the full richness of his voice could be discerned. In contrast, Olga Borodina, in the scene-chewing role of Princess Eboli, stared off on the right foot and stayed there all evening. Rounding out the cast was the inexhaustible Samuel Ramey as the Grand Inquisitor.
With such an impressive array of vocal talent, the evening proved a rich if uneven treasure trove of stunning musical moments. Borodina’s sassy and inspired interpretation of “Nei gardin” was assured and aristocratic. The pompous climax of the act two auto-da-fé, complete with a massive chorus (as well as heretics) looked and sounded terrific. Pape’s finest hour came in his deeply moving Study Scene aria “Ella giammai m’amo.” His deep, velvety and lulling voice underscored his character’s tragic sensibility. The subsequent confrontation with the Grand Inquisitor was a Don Giovanni-esque symbiosis of two darkly powerful voices. Borodina’s “O don fatale” was powerful and nuanced, while Hvoroskovsky bade Carlo farewell with his heroic “Per me giunto” and equally elegant death.
Few of the Met’s monumental stagings have stood the test of time as well as the 1979 John Dexter production, which is historically faithful without being overstuffed: a perfect companion to the sublime music. James Levine did full justice to Verdi’s best score with a deeply expressive and detailed interpretation.

It is often complained the Pierre Boulez takes an overly analytic, clinical even approach to conducting music. This is perhaps no more evident than in his interpretation of Gustav Mahler, whose music he has long championed. In dispensing with the late-Romantic techniques and approaches of other conductors, Boulez often can bring a fresh perspective to Mahler, by treating him like a mid to late 20th century composer. Stripping away the sentimentality and expressiveness can make the music seem frigid at times.      On Friday night, however, Boulez brought the Chicago Symphony Orchestra to Carnegie Hall for a curious performance of Mahler’s Seven, that was anything but cold.
However, the warmth seemed to be generated more by an erudite music scholar than a committed performer. Throughout the five movements of this moody epic, Boulez seemed to be telling the audience to listen very carefully.
    It was a quirky and unorthodox performance that went beyond categories of like or dislike. With his highly surgical reading, Boulez gets you to wonder what makes Mahler tick. But in asking myself that question on Friday night, I wondered additionally, what made Boulez tick.
    Boulez, who is 81 this year, has behind him a long and distinguished career as both a conductor and composer. Prior to turning to music (studying with Messiaen, among others) he studied mathematics. This early training is evident in the Serialism of his early works and his methodical and calculating conducting style.

Friday night’s concert was performed without intermission –as not to diminish from the symphony’s integrity. However, the orchestra tuned up between movements, like surgeons sharpening knifes during an operation.  

    Though Boulez conducted the piece without a baron, his presence onstage was often like a giant metronome. The Chicago musicians are to be commended for delivering he kind of crisp, clear and accurate playing that his interpretation demanded. The first movement could be very sterile, with a monochromatic texture that made the work sound transparent. Uniform pacing and dynamics often revealed musical intricacies but came at the expense of emotional effect. Boulez treated the various elements of the orchestra with surpring equality. Even in the glorious tenor horn solo, with its rich sustained tones, wasn’t much favored over the other instruments. I guess you could call Boulez an egalitarian in that respect.

    One of the upshots of such clarity was that the piece retained unmuddled even at incredible volume. Equalizing the instruments made some details pop out unexpectedly; the ostinato in the violins and with heavy, loud arpeggios in the harps and highlighted intricate detail work in the winds, tympani and percussion. But such emphasis could seem excessive. For instance, before the tenor horn reentered with the main theme, the ultra-slow arpeggios in the violins seemed rather cumbersome. And in trying to make themselves heard over the strident strings, the winds could be piercing and shrill. The highly metrical, unvaried characteristic of the tempo made for an interesting yet puzzling experience.

The second movement seemed almost exaggeratedly slow in tempo. Boulez seemed to dissecti the music measure by measure: transfiguring it in the process. The lush theme sounded more like a danse macabre than the shimmering night music that Mahler indicates. As usual, Boulez tried to put melody and accompaniment on equal footing. His account of the scherzo was jerky with especially heavy staccato. The folk themes sounded almost Fellinieque. The harshly plucked mandolin solo in the second Night Music movement was cold and expressionless.

Boulez tore into the finale with heart-thumping pace. The horns did marvelous work while the rest of the instruments struggled to be heard over them. The reading of this movement was angular, precise and carefully articulated but lacked the emotional commitment to save is from sounding meandering and bombastic. There was crispness and attention to detail, but little momentum.

All in all, Boulez’s academic approach to the Mahler Seven made the work sound more like a dissection than a proper performance. And while it was different and instructive, I still can’t decide whether I like it.  

A.J. Goldmann

1900 (Paramount, SRP: $19.95)

Thanks to Paramount Home Entertainment, two hard-to-find masterworks by Bernardo Bertolucci make their long-overdue DVD debuts this week: the chilling and brilliant political thriller “The Conformist;” and the overstuffed, deeply flawed epic “1900” (Novecento) in its legendary uncut version.

When “1900” was released in 1976, Paramount forced Bertolucci to make over an hours’ worth of cuts, bringing the running time down to four hours. The 2-disc DVD set presents the same “director’s cut” that was screened at the New York Film Festival in the early 1990’s and slapped with an NC-17 rating. It includes scenes that would qualify as pornography (and child pornography) in the United States. In an interview included on disc two, Bertolucci argues that that the film doesn’t exploit sex, but merely aims for realism.

Long, dreamy and uneven, “1900” is an experience like no other. The all-star international cast includes Robert DeNiro, Gerard Depardieu, Bert Lancaster, Donald Sutherland, Dominique Sandra and Sterling Hayden (many of whom are dubbed to hilarious effect, in both English and Italian). It tells the story of the 50-year friendship between the landowner’s son, Alfredo (DeNiro) and the farmer boy Olmo (Depardieu) throughout all the political and social turmoil of the early 20th century. Bertolucci structures the film around a seasonal conceit: Olmo and Alfredo’s childhood is spent in the summer; they come of age in the fall; the fascist nightmare is a long, relentless winter, and the liberation is a vibrant springtime. In many ways, the film’s true star is cinematographer Vittorio Stotaro, who keeps things visually breathtaking throughout this lumbering and often-embarrassing film (Sutherland turns out a particularly hammy performance as a trigger-happy fascist).     

    The film is spread out over two discs. The second includes a couple of interviews with Bertolucci and Storaro. In the second of these, Bertolucci calls “1900” “the greatest utopia I’ve created in my life as a film director.” Indeed, Bertolucci is a director who loves to paint in broad strokes (as in “The Last Emperor” and “The Sheltering Sky”), and his strokes have never been broader than in “1900.”

The Double Life of Veronique (The Criterion Collection, SRP: $39.95)

    The Polish director Krzysztof Kieslowski was five years away from death when he broke onto the international scene with “The Double Life of Veronique” (La Double Vie de Véronique). Acknowledged today as one of the greatest of modern auteur, Kieslowski labored since the 70’s in relative obscurity until “Véronique,” which premiered at the 1991 Cannes Film Festival and won three awards, including one for its lead actress, Irène Jacob. “Veronique” paved the way for the incredible success of Kieslowski’s subsequent three films, “Blue” (1993) “White” (1994) and “Red” (1994), known collectively as the “Color Trilogy.”
    On the DVD front, The Chicago-based Facets Multimedia has been the chief promoter of Kieslowski’s body of work, including early works such as “Blind Change” and “Camera Buff,” as well as his monumental ten-hour television programme “The Decalogue.” Miramax has since released the “Color Trilogy” in a minimal DVD set.
    The good folks at Criterion have joined in to honor Kieslowski, with their beautifully packaged 2-DVD edition of “The Double Life of Veronique.” The curious plot tells of a young singer in Poland, Weronika and her exact double Veronique, a Paris-based music teacher.
    Most importantly, the film looks and sounds superb. “Veronique” is a film to be savored for its saturated palate and moody, interior atmosphere. The crisp, high-definition transfer does justice to Slawomir Idziak’s cinematography: everything from a frosted windowpane to Veronique’s naked body is framed and captured with heightened delicacy. Composer and long-time Kieslowski collaborator Zbigniew Preisner’s haunting and operatic score establishes film’s brisk yet meditative pace. The result is a film that would be overly stylish if it were not so profoundly moving.  
    The film historian Annette Insdorf (who teaches here, and is, perhaps more than anyone else, responsible for establishing Kielowski in the contemporary canon) provides a feature-length commentary. While highly informative, it is often long-winded and obtuse. More successful are the extra features: documentaries both by and about Kieslowski and interviews with collaborators and friends, which only add to the set’s appeal.      

Techno beats were heard at Carnegie Hall during a concert by the Pittsburgh Symphony’s Orchestra concert on Tuesday night. The unexpected beats were a “pre-recorded intrusion” in Sofia Gubaidulina’s otherwise astonishing and powerful “Feast During a Plague,” which was being given its New York premiere. 

It was one of two mains works on the program (the other being Brahms’ Violin Concerto) conducted by Sir Andrew Davis, the orchestra’s Artistic Advisor (they currently lack a single musical director). The premiere was prefaced by a muscular performance of Beethoven’s “Coriolan Overture..” Davis led with very British style: refined, crisp and a little jesting. The orchestra played with seamless unity and appropriate dramatic flair.

“If the Coriolan Overture can be considered theatrical, then ‘Feast During a Plague’ is positively apocalyptic,” Davis stated in an announcement made before performance. He called the premiere “a piece with a tough message.” He delivered on the promise that the performance would be the “surprising and shocking.”
   
The Russian-Tatar composer Sofia Gubaidulina is known for her idiosyncratically spiritual music. Yet there was nothing at all religious about “Feast During a Plague,” a cacophonous and menacing piece that sounded through-and-through profane. Fleeting melodies, chilling harmonies and unexpected orchestral couplings combine in a sinister work with starkly alternating textures.  Jaunty and Charivariesque, it is a thoroughly wicked display of theatrical dissonance and experimentation: Basses snapped back their strings while harps provided inconstant solace; cutthroat violins played with ironic glissando, and twined in and out like a phonograph.  The thoroughly engaging work is full of nightmarish arpeggios, cackling trumpet and wailing horns and often builds to moments of incredible tension. Thrilling in its dramatic force, it, the work seemed almost like a modern-day “Sacré du Printemps,” until the unexpected – and unsuccessful, in my view - techno beats. The audience seemed thoroughly confused.
   
    After intermission, came the Brahms, with soloist Joshua Bell. This was a performance to savor, full of wild lyricism and dazzling pyrotechnics. Bell tore into the piece with fearless energy. It was a sharp, direct performance, both technically assured and interpretatively sophisticated and full of coloristic variety. The cadenza was full of intricate amblings and subtle variation in tempo. In the Adagio, Bell showed his more lyrical side, which was tasteful and refined in spite of pervasive vibrato and occasional flourishes. Davis led the orchestra in a clear-headed reading that softened the tension often felt between soloist and conductor. The appreciative crowd rewarded Bell with ovations after the first movement and at the piece’s proper end.
 
    The  final piece, Richard Strauss’ “Till Eulenspiegel” seemed almost an afterthought. (A steady stream of visitors made its way to the exits after Mr. Bell’s final bows). Remarkably, though, the orchestra succeeded in injecting new life into this popular and over-played tone poem. The Pittsburgh musicians proved they had energy in them yet and gave an engaging and playful performance. Davis had a great sense for the work’s drama. He jumped about excitedly and nearly doubled over while describe a descending figure in the horns. It was a satisfying close to a musically rich and programmatically helter-skelter evening.

In the 15 years that Ben Heppner has sung at the Metropolitan Opera, the Canadian heldentenor’s career has come full circle with the current revival of “Idomeneo,” the role with which he made his company debut in 1991.
Since then, he’s tackled some of the most demanding tenor roles in the repertoire, making a name for himself as the leading Wagnerian tenor of our time. He performed a now-legendary Tristan in 1999 alongside Jane Eaglin. After taking time off in 2002-2003 to lose 100 pounds, he was back at the Met, sounding as good as ever, first as Aeneas in the company premiere of Berlioz’s “Les Troyens” and then reprising Tristan. Just last year, he delivered wonderful accounts of Logenhrin, Florestan and his first-ever Parsifal.
A vocal force to be reckoned with, Heppner is the key reason to catch the Met’s current revival of Jean-Pierrre Ponnelle’s 1982 production (which is looking a little dusty these days), although James Levine’s exacting and intricate reading of the tuneful Mozart score and a few standout supporting performances don’t hurt.
Idomeneo, the earliest of Mozart’s seven mature operas, was the slowest to gain acceptance in the modern repertoire (Ponnelle’s production marked the Met’s premiere). It tells of the King of Crete, Idomeneo, who returns home after many years fighting in the Trojan Wars. In return for the king’s safe homecoming, however, Neptune exacts an oath from Idomeneo, who vows to sacrifice the first man he encounters once on soil. Sure enough, who but the king’s son, Idamante, should stumble upon his washed-up father? In the remaining two acts, Idomeneo must come to terms with his paternal duty, on the one hand, and religious obligation, on the other. But don’t worry – everyone turns out fine in the end (except for the conniving love-interest Elettra who goes mad and dies rather excitingly).
A few months ago, the Deutsche Oper in Berlin came under attack for its controversial production of Idomeneo, which featured severed heads of Buddha, Jesus and Mohammed alongside Neptune’s. Don’t expect any such provocation from Ponnelle’s production, where a massive stone head of Neptune vies with the singers for domination of the stage. The singers usually won. Heppner started out curiously understated. Singing with ease and agility, he needed some time to warm up to the role. Once he had, though, he sang with undeniable power and clarion pitch. It was a performance only enhanced by his naturalistic and unmannered acting. Singing Idamante was the formidable American mezzo Kristine Jepson. She sang with enough force and determination to communicate her character’s despair and disbelief on a down-to-earth, unsentimental level. Still, she was a little shaky upstairs and didn’t always clip the end of her phrases. The Greek princess Ilia, beloved of Idamante, was sung by soprano Nicole Heaston. She was best in her middle range and often produced shrill high notes. With her intense quiver and overacting, her performance often had the trappings of caricature. Her doomed rival Elettra, sung by Olga Makarina, was far more satisfying. Though guilty as well of over-acting, she sang with a colorful, honeyed voice that could modulated from dark to rich to sparkling. Making his debut as Arbace, the king’s advisor, was a sturdy and dependable Jeffrey Francis, though he began to show some strain in act two.
Mozart’s music is wonderfully lush and ornamental, and surprisingly through-composed for an opera seria. Taken as a whole, the work is full of surprising harmonic and melodic continuities that anticipate subsequent masterpieces, like Le Nozze di Figaro and Don Giovanni. In the pit, James Levine – a long-time champion of the work – conducted a supple yet dramatic account. The overture sounded jaunty, in a breathless fashion that stripped away any sense of pomposity. Throughout, Levine highlighted the athletic woodwinds while ensuring that the singers were audible at all times.

Idomeneo runs for two more performances at the Metropolitan Opera, through December 9, 2006 with Kobie van Rensburg (Idomeneo), Magdalena Kozena (Idamante), Dorthea Röschmann (Ilia) and Alexandra Deshorties (Elettra). James Levine conducts.