Photograph by Barbara Mallon
Così fan tutte, the final of Mozart and Da Ponte’s three operatic collaborations, is a difficult work to stage. The plot, wherein two younger troopers set out, underneath the steerage of an older, extra skilled pal, to check the constancy of their fiancées, is misogynistic and borderline abusive, beginning with the title: “Ladies are like that.”
Briefly, Ferrando (the tenor) loves Dorabella (the mezzo, normally); Guglielmo (the baritone) loves Fiordiligi (Dorabella’s soprano sister). The troopers’ pal Don Alfonso urges the troopers to disguise themselves as Albanians and seduce the opposite’s fiancée, whereas he connives with the sisters’ maid Despina to additional the plot. Additionally, some cash rides on the result.
Sure, it’s terrible, and the troopers simply don’t deserve their fiancées. Nonetheless, Così is extraordinarily humorous and filled with nice music, and presents a director a spread of approaches. You’ll be able to stage it as pure farce, stretching what’s constructed into the plot to extremes. You’ll be able to take it severely, permitting actual like to develop between the switched {couples}, with any variety of penalties – though, after all, the opera takes place over a ridiculously quick time interval.
The sisters can work out the plotting early on and reply accordingly or they are often harmless (silly?) sufficient to be taken in by the troopers. (The troopers aren’t too shiny themselves, contemplating how simply Alfonso manipulates them into testing their lovers.)
In different phrases, the director has to have a viewpoint. At Livermore Valley Opera’s manufacturing of Così, seen at its opening efficiency on Saturday, Feb. 28, director Robert Herriot’s viewpoint didn’t snap into focus till a lot too late within the opera, when he injected a wonderful twist ending into the plot. However alongside the way in which, it was onerous to see a by means of line within the relationships among the many two pairs of lovers, and the plot wasn’t taken to any of the attainable extremes. Possibly he was aiming for the farcical aspect, as a result of there have been loads of laughs and sight gags.
Normally, the efficiency felt as if maybe one other rehearsal or two was wanted. Conductor Alexander Katsman’s tempos had much less snap than normal for him and the orchestra often scrambled to remain collectively. There have been extra pit-stage coordination issues than I’ve heard earlier than at Livermore Valley. And by some means the efficiency didn’t fairly elevate off till the doorway of the Albanians, properly into Act I, although the trio “Soave sia il vento” (Mild be the breeze) was sweetly sung and shifting. With extra rehearsal time, Herriot, whose work within the firm’s Don Giovanni I loved, may need additional strengthened the staging.
Nonetheless, there was a lot to get pleasure from within the efficiency. As Despina, mezzo-soprano Courtney Miller used each little bit of vocal and bodily wizardry to make the character’s two dress-up scenes, because the Physician and the Notary, laugh-out-loud centerpieces of the opera. She was dramatically a delight all through, although her high is brief for a job normally sung by a lightweight soprano, and the ensembles would have been higher balanced with such casting.
Photograph by Barbara Mallon
Soprano Meryl Dominguez (Fiordiligi) and mezzo-soprano Megan Potter (Dorabella) labored collectively properly because the sisters. Dominguez sailed by means of “Come scoglio” (Like a rock) with aplomb and sang a touching “Per pieta.” Potter’s a great actor, however vocally the position wasn’t an awesome match. Her voice had an oddly squeezed high quality now and again and the position’s higher notes had been a stretch.
On the male aspect, the state of affairs was comparable. Baritone Samuel Kidd, a pleasant Schaunard in final yr’s San Francisco Opera La bohème, was a hearty, although not very seductive, Guglielmo. Sid Chand’s voice is extra that of a personality tenor than a romantic lead; “Un aura amorosa” (A breath of affection) would have benefitted from extra float and heat.
Eugene Brancoveanu deployed his shiny, stunning baritone successfully as Don Alfonso, and but appeared under-directed in a job that gives nice alternatives for such a talented and skilled actor.
The refrain, underneath the path of Bruce Olstad, sang properly.
Two performances stay, at 2 p.m. on Saturday, March 7 and Sunday, March 8. The five hundred-seat Bankhead Theater, the place the corporate performs, is a splendidly intimate venue, and people performances could properly go extra easily than than the primary.
Lisa Hirsch
Lisa Hirsch studied music at Brandeis College and Stony Brook. She studied flute severely for plenty of years and has sung all kinds of music in lots of choruses. She has written about opera and classical music for San Francisco Classical Voice, Opera Information (RIP), Opera, and the San Francisco Chronicle. She blogs about these topics at Iron Tongue of Midnight, which additionally contains lots of her images.
Although she has attended San Francisco Opera and different firms because the early Eighties, her opera obsession actually began within the early 90s, when she began listening to historic singers.
