Il Viaggio a Reims in Sydney

Rossini's Il Viaggio a Reims is not your usual opera with a plot (however absurd) and beginning, middle and end. Instead it is a spoof on opera,  a very long (3 hour) sing with a great deal of repitition.   To the credit of Opera Australia and their collaborators (Dutch National Opera, Amsterdam Opera, Royal Danish Opera) the audience was entranced from beginning to end. Phenomenal singing and an ingenious staging. Bravo!

Andrea Chenier in Sydney

Australia is a long way from Europe so the three lead singers in this concert performance of the opera Andrea Chenier, Jonas Kaufmann, Eva-Maria Westerbroek and Ludovic Tézier, had long flights behind them. I admire the fortitude of singers who are prepared to travel so far to sing to us. All three were magnificent on Thursday night  and the audience showed their appreciation by applauding wildly whenever there was a suitable break in the performance, and sometimes when there was a less suitable gap.

List of singers

All the singers performed well and since my seat was fairly near the front I heard all clearly. How those at the back fared I don't know as the acoustics in this building leave a lot to be desired.

Singers leave the stage after bows were taken.
I was too busy applauding to take a better photo earlier.

The flower decorations were as magnificent as the singers

Donizetti's Anna Bolena in Sydney

My ticket for Donizetti's opera Anna Bolena was accidental, a swap for one earlier in the year that I couldn't attend. I had no expectations. I knew neither of the lead singers and had read no reviews so I was amazed and thrilled to be transported by a most wonderful performance.

All of the singers were excellent and all gave believable theatrical performances. Ermolena Jaho sang Anne Boleyn. Her voice seemed lighter than that of Romanian Carmen Topciu who sang the part of Jane Seymour with aplomb. Topiciu seemed a bit wooden at first but I grew to like her portrayal of the character as the opera wore on. Anna Dowsley sang the young and naive Lord Rochford with verve, humour, and excellent voice. My only quibble was the characterisation of King Henry. Teddy Tahu Rhodes sang King Henry well but his parts all seem to include swagger and macho baring of chest. It would be helpful if Opera Australia would consult a woman when they direct men who woo women, then we might get more believable wooing theatrics.

The stage set was digital effects on moving panels could also do with some tweaks. I found all the bugs and flapping birds and butterflies diverting rather than helpful. Dear digital team, please remember that the audience has fertile imaginations and needs rather less help from you.

Bravo to Opera Australia and all of the cast. Anna Bolena is a long opera, three and a half hours with one interval, and the long passages of repetitive singing that added little to the story could have been wearing, but because the singing and direction were both excellent (and the costuming - bravo to the designer) it didn't feel too long at all.

The photo below of the cast taking bows shows some of the stage panels. The lack of colour in the costumes (Carmen Topciu taking the bow was in bright red) is just a comment on the failure of my phone camera to record colours in a dark theatre.

A Salome to die for

Wow! Wow! Wow!

I just saw the most fantastic Salome. I had been running on empty today but this opera and music has completely revived me. Now I sit in a tiny Italian restaurant with a candle, a glass of wine and spaghetti, trying to absorb what I have just seen.

The scene and costume designer of Salome, Rosalie, died on 12 June this year ( just a few days ago)  and this production was her last work. The cast dedicated the evening to her.  She is well known for her work and judging by the quality of this production she deserved every accolade she has received.

I had seen the American Met of Salome as a movie. All I remember of that production was an alluring dance and Salome singing to a dreadful severed head. Any explanation of why Salome acts as she does remained a mystery. Perhaps seeing Salome simply as evil seductress (the whore/saint divide) makes sense to the Americans.

In the Leipzig production Salome's behaviour is no longer a riddle. She is shown in the middle of a decadent society with an dissolute mother and abusive step-father. The dance which is central to the opera is no longer a dance of seduction but a story of Salome's abuse as a child. The step father sits taking photos on his smart phone during the dance performed by Salome and figures with masks, including two small girls.

The score is very moving and particularly so when played by the Leipzig orchestra conducted by Ulf Schirmer, who has a reputation as the best Strauss conductor alive. What better place to hear a Strauss festival?  What better place to hear an inspired Salome.

Last but not least, all credit to the marvellous Swedish soprano Elisabet Strid  who sang and acted this difficult role with such persuasiveness. Brava Brava!

Elisabet Strid takes a bow, with cast of Salome

Sol3Mio in Sydney: a lesson in opera promotion

"I didn't think I liked opera!" said the young man from Colorado. 

I was sitting next to his wife and she told me they had bought tickets to the concert because her parents were visiting Sydney from the States and they wanted to go to a concert while they were here.

Sol3Mio (their Facebook photo)

"I thought these guys looked good," she said "but I had no idea we would be getting two for one, voices and comedy!" 

Sol3Mio are brothers Pene Pati and Amitai Pati and their cousin Moses Mackay, three New Zealanders of Samoan descent. They are classically trained musicians but they love just about anything that can be sung and on Saturday night they sang everything from their trademark Yellow Bird to a piece by Coldplay and Puccini's Nessun Dorma. 

Sydney audience dancing in the aisles with
Sol3Mio (photo from their facebook page)

The audience loved them.  Not only are they handsome fellows with lovely voices, they are funny. Very funny!  There is a strong Kiwi flavour to Sol3Mio's humour but that didn't stop the Americans enjoying it. In fact it would be hard for anyone not to enjoy the three members of Sol3Mio, they are just such genuine and unassuming people as well as having wonderful voices.

They all love opera and are wonderful opera ambassadors. 

Pene Patti has just won second place in the Neue Stimen (new voices) competition in Germany which is a major accomplishment (see him sing here) and Amitai Pati has just won the New Zealand Aria competition. These are only the latest of the many awards this group have garnered.

You don't realise they are so tall until you have
your photo taken with them (and I'm not short!)

My name was one of three drawn out of a hat for a chance to meet them before the concert and I can report that they are as delightful in the flesh as they appear to be in all their youtube videos.

I hope they scale operatic heights and I am sure that on their way there they will create many new opera fans. 

Go Sol3Mio!

Madam Butterfly in Munich

How wonderful it is to be in an opera house where you can hear well from every seat. I saw Madam Butterfly from the very back row of the Parterre which is tucked in under the balconies but I heard and saw everything perfectly.

It was a production I really liked. Joseph Calleja sang Pinkerton and Christine Opolais sang CioCio San to a packed house ( not a seat free) and great applause. What a pleasure!

The opera house itself was a surprise. Such a severe reception area, then velvet covered handrails leading to an opulent theater. The handrails were like a transition between the two.

Opera at the (Pearl Beach) Arboretum

 Opera in the Arboretum

It was a picture postcard perfect day for the 10th anniversary of the Pearl Beach Opera in the Arboretum, something the organisers and guests knew to appreciate after the rain and storm of last year.

The sell out crowd was convivial. Everyone brought a chair and many brought a picnic. The artists were splendid, their voices soaring up through the trees.

This year there was no kookaburra in competition, though a friendly magpie swooped in low over the crowd for a closer look.

Explaining the Tristan Chord

The Tristan Chord, the beginning of modernist atonal music. Here the wonderful Stefan Mickisch explains the Tristan Chord to Stephen Fry.

It is Bayreuth opera time again and if you are one of the fortunate ones going and Mickisch is presenting his 'play and tell' shows, be sure to go along. I have heard lots of people explaining Wagner, some with great musical abilities, but Mickisch outshines them all. He is competent, amusing and humble. A true musician. In 2006 I drew Mickisch as he talked - portrait below the video.

Stefan Mickisch plays and explains

Portrait of Stefan Mickisch In 2006 I attended a seminar given by Stefan Mickisch in Bayreuth. I drew several small portraits as he spoke and showed him afterwards. He asked me if he should sign one and, after a little hesitation (remembering the Helen Clark portrait) I said 'Well yes, why not'. I value this little picture, painted as Mickisch played. It reminds me what a nice (and very erudite) person I had the honour of listening to.

What is of more value than trust?

People worry that computers will eventually control mankind but we should be worried about ourselves, not computers.  We have created systems that no one seems to be able to control and these systems give no value to the things that really matter, such as trust and community.

You used to be able to trust banks; now they need controls which we seem unable to enact. Will we survive them?   We used to trust research organisations. Now the CSIRO is mired in scandal and its money-minded managers will find out just how valuable trust actually was. Can they survive the damage? 

The Australian Government is withdrawing funding for art schools and opera Australia has taken to putting on musicals. Are we headed for another dark ages? Do we care?

It is time to start caring about things again, and fighting for the things we care about. Culture for example.The Australian Chamber Orchestra has a wonderful outreach program in schools ... but they are having to defend music from attacks by people who should know better). A small theater has opened in Newtown, putting on wonderful stuff but they are struggling.

Lets get on our hind legs and support them and other local organisations who care.Forget the Olympics, lets bring back sport and music programs to schools. Find ways to keep small and medium firms in family ownership to protect them from merger-manics who stop making the products we like because they don't make enough profit. Support our local farmers.

Parsifal: wonderful singing/playing but otherwise disappointing

I had looked forward to the Met Opera Parsifal (the movie version) for months as Parsifal is my all time favorite opera, but to my surprise I was disappointed with the Met Opera version.

Jonas Kaufmann - Met Opera website photo

The singing was wonderful and hearing Jonas Kaufmann sing Parsifal was a treat. Kaufmann says his grandfather had all the Wagner scores and used to play and sing all the parts, so he loved it from the word go. Most of us come to Wagner's music after a long (or very long) journey via other composers and I am trying to imagine what it would be like knowing Wagner's music so young. In Kaufmann's case it has resulted in a tenor who sings all his roles with intelligence and his Parsifal was no exception.




What a pity with such an excellent cast (Gurnemanz-René Pape, Kundry - Katarina Dalayman, Amfortas -Peter Mattei,  Klingsor Evgeny Nikitin) that the production was pedestrian. The unrelenting Christian allusions were not alleviated by any alternative interpretation and it seemed all too facile to me. Perhaps I was unwittingly comparing the first Parsifal I saw, the Schlingensief version in Bayreuth in 2009, which I thought quite stunning.

At the time I saw the Schlingensief version I was one of the few who loved it. (I wrote about it for the Wagner Society of NSW at the time (since removed from their website I think, but you can still read it in Blue Tulips (see blue-tulips.com).)


Incidentally, there is a great sung version of Parsifal Act 1 from Radio Nederlands on YouTube.

Music magazines

As I wrote from Sydney, I couldn't find a single music or art related magazine in the Sydney Airport magazine/book store. I was looking for Opera Today to read the article on Christine Goerke, one of the singers I sketched in New Zealand.

I checked at the book store at the Graz railway station and there I found four different magazines about opera, two about musicals, one about ballet and so many art related magazines I didn't bother to count them. There were just as many titles about computers, sport, cars etc as in Sydney of course, it's just that the offering was more balanced. Opera Today was not one of the four available opera magazines so I left with Das Opernglas.

Maybe Lyndon Terracini (Opera Australia artistic director) could arrange that at least one store in Sydney carries opera titles, perhaps the opera house store? Would that be too much to ask? 

Ruhig atmen

Love this picture taken at a German opera house. This is what the singers see before the curtain rises.  Translation: Breath calmly, take a deep breath, don't stress!

Curtain (from a Facebook friend's page)

There is a lot more to singing than meets the eye.

Glass and Gandhi

Today I saw Philip Glass's opera Satyagraha about Gandi's life in South Africa, the latest of the New York Metropolitan Opera productions.  (If you are an opera fan and have not yet discovered the Opera in HD series being played at movie houses all over the world two weeks after opening night, you are missing something very special.)

Satyagraha reminded me of Wagner's operas because it plays on two levels at once. The words sung by Gandi and other characters in the opera are all discourses from the Indian philosophical text the Bhagavad Gita and are sung in Sanscrit. (Surtitles translate the essentials). The story is told in action and improvisational puppetry, performed in this instance by the wondrous The Skills Ensemble.

Satyagraha: Photo form the Metropolitan Opera Website

Sanscrit text and puppetry action sounds weird but it works. The weaving of philosophical questions through the action turns out to the intellectually and emotionally very satisfying. The music is both meditative and thrilling. If you have a chance, go and see it.

Review by Opera and Medicine 
Review by Jeffrey Johnson

Music to lull you to sleep

I have 'discovered' Maria Callas and in such a strange way.

For months the best way to put bub to sleep was to sit her on my lap in front of the computer watching Rene Fleming sing "D'amore al dolce impero". She would watch the video (which shows just an album cover) and nod off

Then one day last week she suddenly became bored. I tried playing her Waltroud Meyer singing Liebestod but the poor little mite started to cry! Whether it was the music or the gory production I don't know, but I quickly changed back to "D'amore al dolce impero", this time the Callas version. The changing photos in the video were enough to hold bub's attention until she slept.

I never really liked Maria Callas before but I love this video:



And just for the record ... here is Rene Fleming's version which I just about know by heart by now.