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Der Bajazzo Dazzles in Berlin
One Way Street in Sicily
At the Deutsche Oper, the singers were celebrated and director David Pountney was booed.
Berliner Morgenpost
25 April 2005
By Klaus Geitel/ translation: Monica B.
Bloody murderous plays: The two one act operas “Cavalleria Rusticana” and “Pagliacci” are considered to be show pieces of Italian verismo. Director David Pountney has shifted the operas into the present, locating them at the edge of a Sicilian interstate.
They are the Siamese twins of opera: “Cavalleria Rusticana”, musical homicide over lost honor, and “Pagliacci”, a composition full of murder motivated by jealousy. Time and again, attempts have been made to try and separate the two bestsellers of verismo music theater surgically. But in contrast to real Siamese twins, they have always grown back together again and, to top it off, have felt comfortable about it. They are and remain inseparable. That’s the way we like them.
In his staging, director Davis Pountney has now welded them together even more solidly. When at the bleak, hopeless conclusion of “Cavalleria” Turiddu’s dead body gets thrown off the Sicilian interstate bridge-splash! - it stays there untouched, mourned in silent yet persevering laments by Mamma Lucia. Even through the intermission and beyond.
When the curtain goes up for “Pagliacci”, it is still lying there, and Tonio steps confidently over it during his prologue. Later during the intermezzo to Leoncavallo’s one act opera, Mascagni’s hot dog stand is still being rolled across the stage mournfully. Not a bad idea.
Sadly, as “I Pagliacci” unfolds, the inventions of busy outward activity interrupt each other, cut each other short with ever greater frequency. Robert Innes Hopkins, the stage designer, cannot bring himself to rest. Somebody is working on the stage in one way or another constantly. If it is not hauling this or that onto the stage, it’s taking it away again right off. The interstate support arches form a sort of switchyard for all those bright ideas and staging conceptions. The stage literally whirls in front of one’s eyes. It doesn’t produce a mouse but instead irritation and confusion: two annoying ladies, who –at least at the opera house- absolutely have to keep their mouths shut. Here they deliberately open them wide to speak up. In the end, they are responsible for encouraging the audience to join them in shouts of disapproval (boos). Nevertheless, it remained a lazy, idle booing.
Just consider how Pountney moves the choruses, has them march up happily cheering and waving little flags, arms swaying back and forth, almost carnival-style and later has them incite the murderous goings on: that sets a strong accent, makes a strong statement. On top of that, their singing is excellent.
Generally speaking, these two one act operas have always been singers’ operas par excellence, and Ion Marin at the (conductor’s) podium lets them be. With his orchestra, he strikes sparks from the scores that ignite above all else the vocal chords of the singers. Their sound is heard all the way through the bank—they would not, to boot, let themselves be ignored, even by unwilling ears. “Cavalleria” sounded as if it wanted to be heard not only in Sicily but all the way up in Naples. This pleasantly harmonious sound is more than big, it is colossal-it floors you.
Vocal power has the right of way on the Mascagni super highway. Peter Seiffert, long since evolved into a young heroic tenor, loves and mourns and angers and despairs in a voice chock-full of emotion. Each note, each vocal tone a jewel, a vocal ‘sunny boy’, floating along on well-calculated breathing. Belcanto made in Germany.
Georgina Lukács puts her rich, full mezzo-soprano, on occasion a bit shrilly sounding in the high notes, up against it. The two fire each other up, as they well should, to triumphant singing success, in which Claire Powell, the effective Alberto Mastromarino and the entirely enchanting Ulrike Hetzel as Lola also have a share. End of chapter one.
The second chapter opens at last: truly impossible to ignore, José Cura with his voice of the century, a voice that comes along only once in a hundred years. It reminds of fanfares, the trumpet flourishes of Judgment Day, but it does not intimidate Nuccia Focile, the unfaithful Nedda, in the least. Charmingly, she stands her ground vis-à-vis the perma-threat. She does not let herself be induced to trump that. The only woman in this party, roped together (like mountain climbers but) by music, she sings her part with undisputed beauty and above all with intelligence and common sense.
Pleasant surprises by her side: Kenneth Tarver presents himself, the reincarnation of tenoral amiability, with a vigorous voice. Markus Brück sounds a Silvio of remarkable vocal beauty, to whom Pountney of course assigns the coward’s role of the lax lover: a guy on the sidelines of passion. Promptly, he is eliminated, stabbed to death: “La commedia è finita”. Afterwards, cheers for the singers all the way around. And the usual boos for the director.
(At the bottom of the page, there is this still: Passionate, glorious singing. Daring, adventurous staging)
*
José Cura shines as Pagliaccio at the Deutsche Oper Berlin
F.A.Z
27 April 2005
by Eleonore Büning / translated by Martina
José Cura, who in addition to possessing an exquisitely controlled and big voice also has a breathtaking stage presence, shaped his "Vesti la giubba" with an intensity that went far beyond the usual macho-kitsch-sobbing caused by betrayal and jealousy, and lent to the character of Pagliaccio unexpected depth, significance, almost something "Faust-like".
*
Cura Shines in Opera Double Bill
Bloomberg
26 April 2005
April 26 (Bloomberg) -- José Cura and Peter Seiffert together on the same
stage: this is as star-studded as a night at the opera in Berlin ever gets.
The bankrupt capital's cultural budget seldom stretches to big-name singers.
And it's rare to get a cast as excellent as that the Deutsche Oper has
mustered for the double bill of ``Cavalleria Rusticana'' and ``Pagliacci.''
It's also not that common to find famous opera singers slumming it beneath bridges. U.K. stage director David Pountney's new production sets all the action between the concrete pylons of a half-finished freeway overpass. As a modern translation of what 1890s audiences perceived as sordid realism, it makes sense.
Pietro Mascagni's ``Cavalleria Rusticana'' (1890) is set in a Sicilian village, and Robert Innes Hopkin's 1950s sets and costumes find a suitable metaphor for the institutional degradation of idyllic rural settings. These villagers continue their ancient rituals regardless.
Life-sized icons of Mary and Jesus, complete with flickering electric candles, are carried over the concrete with earnest reverence. Why the statues are abandoned on the tarmac for the duration of the Easter service is unclear, but no matter. The effect is gloriously innocent kitsch.
Grappa and Elvis
Mama Lucia (the formidable Claire Powell) runs a grimy takeout stand under the bridge, a glow-in-the-dark Virgin next to the grappa bottle. As her good-for-nothing son, Seiffert is a dead ringer for Elvis: big hair, gold chains and all. Seiffert makes a high-voltage Turiddu, forceful and persuasively Italianate. This is fervent, faithful singing.
He is matched in vehemence by Georgina Lukacs, teetering on heels too high for her as spurned lover Santuzza, plausibly desperate. Turiddu has traded her in for the thinner model, Ulrike Helzel's cheaply provocative Lola, whose husband Alfio (good- natured Alberto Mastromarino) drives a three-wheel vegetable truck. The production abounds in such gags, all of which could have been omitted.
Pountney aims for gritty naturalism, yet is hampered by a chorus that stands around with stiff self-consciousness and a stage weighed down by clutter. In what should be a heart-stopping moment, Turiddu's bloody corpse is hoisted over the freeway rail and tumbles to the road below. But the ``corpse'' is so obviously a feather-light straw puppet, the act so unlikely and the execution so amateurish that the moment fails.
Scorching Notes
Ruggero Leoncavallo's ``Pagliacci'' (1892) opens with Tonio addressing the audience directly, explaining that this is a story from real life. Pountney takes this as his point of departure for a deliberately anti-realistic examination of the opera business, with its glamorous stars, eager public and obsessive fans. The pylons of the previous opera are twirled around by stagehands, intentionally unmasking the illusions of the stage.
Enter José Cura in a vintage Renault, playing himself, the celebrated opera star, transposed to the 1950s. As the jealous clown Canio, Cura delivers his top notes with lingering relish, moves suavely and glosses over details in the score. He is scorchingly intense in the dressing-room aria, and a smoldering presence the rest of the time. His Nedda, Nuccia Focile, is the consummate diva, immaculately tailored and grandly melodious.
Markus Bruck's Silvio conveys the most emotion. Pountney has cast him as a hideously gawky fan who wears sandals with socks and clutches a plastic bag. But Bruck's singing is so lyrical and refined, the nuances so expressive and the tone so beautiful, that we care more about him than about anybody else on the stage.
Choral Aerobics
The chorus sings with gestures more suited to a step-aerobics class or a primary-school play. At this point, Pountney's concept falls to bits. Canio dispatches Silvio and then does in Nedda for good measure. Neither murder shocks.
In his quest for an intellectualism presumably pitched at a German audience accustomed to theater directors' excesses, Pountney misses the emotion of the work without making any major cognitive contributions.
Conductor Ion Marin leads the evening with heavy-handed vigor, aiming more, it seems, for velocity than for accuracy or polish. The singers, in the end, steal the show.
The double bill of ``Cavalleria Rusticana'' and ``Pagliacci'' is in repertory at Deutsche Oper, Berlin, through June 24.
*
Inseparable Pair
Deutschlandfunk
24 April 2005
At this new production of Berlin’s Deutsche Oper, there are some first-class singers to be admired...
Above all, there is José Cura as Canio, also known as Pagliaccio (the clown), a tenor who isn’t just a shining presence vocally but also has excellent stage presence as an actor. One can argue about his characterization of Canio, who turns from the initially brutal macho who steps out of an old Citroën into a sobbing weakling on account of the unfaithfulness of his wife Nedda.
*
Return to the Fountainhead: To the Sources of Passion
Sicilian* twilight at the Deutsche Oper. “Cavalleria Rusticana” and “I Pagliacci”
Berlin Zeitung
25 April 2005
by Klaus Georg Koch / translation
Monica B.
[…..]
After the intermission (about 30 minutes) with refreshments in the foyers, we get to see the second act, “I Pagliacci” by Ruggero Leoncavallo (1892). “Der Bajazzo”, as the work is called in German, is merely the carbon copy of “Cavalleria Rusticana”. Stage director Pountney points that out relentlessly, unsparingly. While his staging of “Cavalleria” still sparkles and bubbles over with fresh images and creative ideas, clichés stake a claim on “I Pagliacci”. Leoncavallo’s troupe comes on stage as a gang of Mafiosi. The enormous segments of the overpass structure begin to swivel and turn. Pure, unadulterated theater.
José Cura sings the part of Canio. Just like Alfio, Canio finds himself cuckolded. His wife, too, loves another man. Cura breaks the rule whereby all those deceived, cheated, victimized must love Pasta Alla Norma. But he too roars all over the place. The evening belongs to those neurotic couples. There is something about his vocal organ that surpasses, transcends the average, run-of-the-mill power voice. The way he takes the passaggio from middle to upper register in his desperation aria is as hard and fast as Schumacher stepping on the gas pedal of his red Ferrari in a curve. Cura would be the singer for a really big role. His portrayal of the jealous Canio is intimation of that. We witness this world-class tenor disdainfully making short shrift of the text of his role. Passion has many chairs fly across the stage. Ion Marin, hair flying, puts fire under the orchestra. The sound comes from the pit energetically, high pressure style--a broad stream whose flow the conductor knows how to regulate with sensitivity. In the grip of passion, the instruments melt into one like the smelt in a red-hot furnace. At the end, the script has Canio stab his wife Nedda (soprano Nuccia Focile) together with her lover. We will see: in that respect the evening has a surprise in store for us.
[…..]
*
Deutsche Oper Registers a Hit with Cura, Seiffert, and Pountney
Die Welt
26 April 2005
By Manuel Brug / translation: Monica B.
Only two tenors. But boy, some more tenors they are! One looks like he moves furniture for a living and sings accordingly: Peter Seiffert, Turiddu in “Cavalleria Rusticana”, is direct, straight forward, penetratingly powerful, loud and passionate. The other, José Cura, has his Canio be a feisty Mafioso behind sunglasses—a macho always on the jump, neurotic and plagued by self-doubts; his top notes piercing the lush orchestral sound now and then like a laser knife. At the conclusion of this sumptuously rich evening of joyful sound and strong singing, Seiffert and Cura take their bows at Berlin’s Deutsche Oper, embracing and laughing: Look here, it’s me!
Opera—the real thing. In this self-doubting, dogged city, it has been a long time since one has been able to enjoy it quite as much as tonight. Once again now, things have worked extremely well with these two short verismo operas by Mascagni and Leoncavallo, which are usually presented together.
[…..]
Now the second tenor goes looking for his author. And finds an unfaithful wife who defies him, portrayed by the vocally glistening Noccia Focile. She has the hots for a sandal-wearing nincompoop instead of her egocentric husband. The duet with the disarmingly shy and bashful Markus Brück seems the only genuine moment in this evening of shattered illusion.
[…..]
*
Whose Sobs Are the Most Beautiful?
Duel of the tenor giants: Peter Seiffert and José Cura at the Deutsche Oper in Berlin
Der Tagespiegel
25 April 2005
For the final curtain call, they came out onto the stage arm in arm: Peter Seiffert took his hand and ran it across the white make-up on José Cura’s cheek, then proceeded to paint the markings of a clown on his own face. Two of the world’s best tenors together on the same stage—that’s just like a final match between Germany and Argentina for the world championship. Different from soccer, however, is that in the opera, a duel of the giants is only possible in two successive finals. That’s the case here, for example, with the verismo double header “Cavalleria Rusticana” and “I Pagliacci” on the program. Both one act operas sport signature roles for tenors; in both, the topic is love, honor and jealousy in Southern Italy: under those circumstances, men turn into animals. In the new staging at the Deutsche Oper, Peter Seiffert’s Turiddu falls victim to the knife of the cuckolded Alfio, while José Cura’s Pagliaccio stabs not only his wife but also her lover to death. Parallel to the action on stage, the two male divas play out a duel--in successive time frames. The matter in dispute is quite bloodless: who sobs most beautifully, laments most loudly, and can sustain his top note the longest.
It is a fair contest because both singers are at the height of their game just now: Seiffert has the added bonus of the local matador, the hometown favorite, because he sang his way into the tenoral major league while he was a member of the Deutsche Oper ensemble from Tamino up to Lohengrin. And he makes a show of putting it out there, heaves the sound of his notes into the auditorium with the ease of a vocal heavyweight. Blow him away, Italian style! Immense jubilation. Halftime. Then it is José Cura’s turn--and he scores before he even opens his mouth. While the designer, Robert Innes Hopkins, forces the German into a gaudy showman’s Elvis costume, the Argentine-a cool, cigarillo smoking macho-is allowed to taxi onto the stage in a shiny black old-timer. Just like his South American soccer buddies, he starts to work magic immediately and moves around (hops, skips and jumps) that it's a joy to watch. From shrill laughter, he plunges into tears and lamentation, pulls himself up to soar with a tearjerker of a melody, and then tops that with-how could you miss it?-a brilliant, daringly sustained ‘firecracker’ of a high note. Bravo, Don José.
That must have been what the singers’ wars were like back then, around 1890, at the time when Mascagni and Leoncavallo brought out their short operas. When the word “staging” still had a totally different meaning. They were sporting events of highest entertainment value, joy fests for voice freaks. Small wonder that staging director David Pountney got hit with boos on Saturday night. He has put himself in the position of sitting between all chairs: the traditionalists find his view of these works too modern; the progressives much too conventional.
[…..]
By the way, as far as the power play Seiffert-Cura is concerned: It is sad to say, the fun will be short-lived. They are slated to face each other four more times still: on April 27 and May 1, 5 and 8. Then in June already, the Argentine will be replaced with Janez Lotric from the minors.
*
Miracle Voice - Powerful Presence
Leipziger Volkszeltung
April 2005
Tobias Wolff/translation: Monica B.
[…..]
Musically, the evening was not defined by (Ion) Marin but a divine team of singers: José Cura as Canio, a marvel of a voice with tremendous stage presence, who even in his aria did not go for a narcissistic vocal portrayal but integrated it –fast paced-completely into the action on stage. [….]
*
Der Bajazzo Dazzles in Berlin
Who can keep from crying along in the face of so much bad fortune.....
24 April 2005
Andrea Hilgenstock/ translation by Monica B.
Berlin. It’s finally here: the high point of the Berlin opera season. Not in a long time have singers like these been heard. Not in a long time has such clever, powerfully graphic staging been seen. David Pountney has accomplished this miracle, together with stars like José Cura and Peter Seiffert. He has molded one grandiose piece out of the twin-pack of “Cavalleria Rusticana” and “I Pagliacci”.
[…..]
The “Pagliaccio” was Caruso’s signature role; but once you hear Cura, you don’t need Caruso. If you’re still not moved to tears during his famous aria ‘Vesti la giubba…’, which describes the artist’s lot of having to hide his heartache behind a mask, you’re given opportunity to cry along by the director, who reinforces the musical opening of the floodgates for tears visually. The fab, movable set is by Robert Innes Hopkins.
*
Belcanto Duel Between Machos
Two star tenors and the concept of murderously emotional naturalism
Bietigheimer Zeitung
Christoph Müller / translated by Monica B
April 30, 2005
[…..]
But to bail him (Pountney) out with the public over the definitely controversial staging—that is yet again left for the singers to do. In “Cavalleria Rusticana”, Peter Seiffert belts it out with all he’s got and turns a macho cold shoulder toward the legions of supernumeraries that are just about crushed by the Madonna statues they carry around. But it is the international star from Argentina, José Cura, who makes “Pagliaccio” the winner in the contest for the tenor crown by molding him-vocally as well as in his characterization/interpretation-more poignantly and sensitively. In direct contrast to the somewhat ostentatious Lohengrin Teuton, he is a debonair Mediterranean type who makes a self-destructive ‘cosa nostra’ mafioso with heart out of the circus comedian.
*
German Opera Berlin: “Cavalleria Rusticana” and “I Pagliacci”
Kulturradio
Kai Luehrs-Kaiser/ translation: Monica B.
2 May 2005
[…..]
This prominently staffed double premiere brings together two of the most famous tenors in the world today. José Cura is probably the best Pagliaccio at present. On the one hand, one cannot endorse or confirm the clichés that herald Cura as a ‘testosterone bombardero’ or worse, as the singing Argentinean bull; on the other hand, nuances are not his cup of tea. With the volume turned way up, he storms toward his goal, and produces tearful gargling sounds (during the famous ‘Ridi, Pagliaccio…’); his is a tenoral clean sweep even on an evening where he is actually holding back. Tenor show-offs may not be the last word of wisdom on this subject or the ideal solution. But they aren’t a bad match for the role of the raving mad clown.
[…..]
Kai Luehrs-Kaiser/ translation: Monica B.
Das Opernglas (June 2005, pp. 9-12)
[...] As far as the production itself is concerned, one might have left the theater after the first part of the premiere [i.e. Cavalleria Rusticana] without any regrets. […]. However, this would have been a grave mistake, since Pagliacci – like Cavalleria – was superbly sung. And as if the Deutsche Oper Berlin were able to draw on star singers on end, yet another star tenor, José Cura, was engaged – and that in one of his best and most critically acclaimed roles. In addition to the sensual, unmistakable color of his voice, the sheer power of his delivery, and his radiant top notes, Cura once again impressed with the absolute ease of his vocal performance. It is a shame that this gifted actor was not really challenged in this production. His first entrance alone – sporting a mafioso outfit, complete with a cigar – was “Hollywood”-like. […] Ovations for the singers in the end, for Seiffert and Cura in particular; boos for the production team.
(U. Ehrensberger)
Der Neue Merker (May 2005, pp. 53-54)
[...] Now what about the second tenor of the evening? José Cura does not only possess a phenomenal voice, he is also a media star (he may even have inspired director Pountney to this production). His first appearance on a Berlin stage was expected with great anticipation – and as is fit for a true star he enters the stage in style at the beginning of Pagliacci: in a black limousine – an elegant Beau who hurls out his greeting powerfully, while constantly attacking Tonio and maltreating his wife. He displays so much superiority that his despair later on seems surprising. But the way he expresses these feelings vocally is absolutely terrific. He used his warm-timbred voice, which can also shine on high notes, to great effect, particularly on the second night. Unfortunately he is singing no more than four nights in Berlin, and we will not hear him again before the fall of 2006 – hopefully in a better production then.
(Käthe Wegler-Heinze)
Pagliacci in Berlin
Opera
Barry Emslie
For [Director David] Pountney, Pagliacci is clearly a mesh of discourses where theatrical imagination and mundane reality flood into each other. Even Leoncavallo’s title (that is the Italian plural – the singular German Der Bajazzo should be ditched) implies that the world of the theatre is not to be unproblematically limited either to Canio or even to the troupe as a whole. In fact, from the moment Tonio introduces us to the drama, a solo which was not there in the first version and which succeeds in placing yet another frame on the receding reflections of plays within plays, it is only intellectual laziness that allows us to imagine that everything is unambiguous as to what is show and what is real. Whatever Pountney is, he is definitely not intellectually lazy. Here, employing a short work seldom admired for its depth, he has produced an intriguing and highly complex encounter between the imaginative world and what verismo as the theatrical concept might mean with respect to both that world and ‘real life’. And this has all been accomplished without apparently interfering with a note of the score or a line (well, perhaps with one exception – see below) of the text.
But inevitably there has been a violation and deepening of the traditional characterizations. The key figure is Silvio (Markus Bruck). Although linked to the troupe, he has no actorly place in it. In Pountney’s (re-) reading he is Nedda’s groupie, but so absolutely devoted to the diva that he is fixated on the theatrical image (that picture on the advertising poster) rather than the actor/woman. He is thus the only unambivalent character in the work, the only one who – like many opera fans, actually – is so uncoupled from real life that he is unaware of the deeper contradictions of the theatre-world where he otherwise finds refuge. As a result he is the one who is sacrificed at the end.
One of the principal pay-offs of this extraordinary interpretation is that the pain felt by characters aware of the dislocations of their ‘operatic’ worlds was unusually present on the stage. Of course suffering has always been the defining quality ascribed to Canio, and here it was amazingly well realized by José Cura. At first the voice sounded a little threadbare, but that soon disappeared and ‘Vesti la guibba’, central in every way to this production, was unusually brisk threnody sculpted by floods of secure, burnished sound. But chief among Cura’s achievements was his ability to keep so much of the pain before us as he and Nedda negotiated the final burlesque. In this Nuccia Focile’s fine physical and vocal acting was critical in that matters were never reduced to the simple trick of ‘real singer Nedda’ and ‘character Colombina’. The emotional range of these figures, at least under Pountney’s direction, made such reductions impossible. At the end, as the hopelessly unknowing Silvio had his throat cut, the famous question as to whom the last bitter line truly belongs was resolved by Pountney in the only appropriate manner – ambivalently. Tonio began it then Canio interrupted him and finished it.
Piacenza
CAVALLERIA and PAGLIACCI
Strong Colors and Theatricality
Piacenza
by Walter Baldasso / translated by Monica B
[.....]José Cura was the star here, a Canio de-luxe in a vibrant, ringing, heart-felt performance; with a mellow, fully rounded voice that was agile and showed interesting accentuation, beautiful phrasing and flaring bursts in the height.[.....]
José Cura Gave An Absolutely Beautiful Performance
Thunderous applause yesterday at the Municipale for the premiere of the “Cavalleria” and “Pagliacci” double bill
The Argentinean tenor proved splendid, the best on stage along with Mastromarino
La Cronaca
Piacenza / 23 May 2005
By Corrado Ambiveri/ translation: Monica B.
[…..]
Yesterday, at the Municipale, the two operas-representative of veristic musical theater-bagged-as was easy to foresee-a resounding success, also thanks to the valorous commitment of some artists.
[…..]
Tenor José Cura asserts himself totally in “Pagliacci”, and he is totally successful. Vocally dazzling, Cura presents the image of a Canio in love but tormented at the same time.
An actor of extraordinary effectiveness, the Argentinean singer got a genuine ‘standing ovation’ at the end as confirmation of his superlative performance.
Last Updated: Friday, August 19, 2005
© Copyright: Kira
