OPERA INDEX COMPETITION WINNERS RECITAL

Lawson Anderson, Brittany Nickell, and Michael Fennelly

We have often written about the generous dispersal of funds by Opera Index, and the care with which the young singers are selected for awards. The excellence of last night's recital at the National Opera Center came as no surprise. Luminaries of Planet Opera gathered to hear the "stars of tomorrow"; but we call them "stars of right now". They were introduced by President Jane Shaulis.

Soprano Brittany Nickell impressed us as a graduate student at Manhattan School of Music with her large and stunning instrument. Bass-baritone Lawson Anderson burst onto our radar screen just two years ago and dazzled us with his Mozart and Wolf, Borodin and Gounod. We heard potential in his Wotan but he didn't sound quite ready.

Well, hello Wotan! What progress he has made recently, coached by Valentin Peytchinov! We haven't enjoyed a Wotan since James Morris retired the role and we are sure that Mr. Anderson has received some input from Mr. Morris.  Truth to tell, if his casting were announced today we would be first in line for tickets!

Mr. Anderson has a dark mature sound and did a fine job in "Abendlich strahlt der Sonne Auge", creating a mood of authority.  As he invited Fricka to join him in their new home at the end of Das Rheingold, we thought "We'd follow him anywhere". We did follow him all the way through "Wotans Abschied", observing his gorgeous German, fine phrasing, and smoky tone.  But what we admired most was his ability to create an entire panoply of moods by means of gesture and vocal coloration. 

Wotan has been out-argued by Fricka and must punish his favorite daughter Brunhilde by depriving her of immortality. He must convey anger, sorrow, love, regret, and everything in between. Personally we cannot enjoy The Ring Cycle unless we have come to care deeply for the all-too-human Wotan with all of his flaws.  Morris succeeded and so did Mr. Anderson.

We were very impressed by the orchestra! Well, it was "just" Michael Fennelly playing his own arrangements of Wagner's score on the piano but it sounded like the Full Monty!

We were glad Mr. Anderson also included a few selections from Schubert's Winterreise which we so enjoyed hearing him sing in toto just two weeks ago. He also reprised an aria from Borodin's Prince Igor--"Ni sna, ni otdyha" in enviably fluent Russian.

Mr. Anderson is magnificently versatile and gave the audience a good taste of his Mozart. He made a fine Figaro expressing his rebellion against the Count in "Se vuol ballare" from Le Nozze di Figaro, and a very seductive Don Giovanni in "La ci darem la mano". His Zerlina was Ms. Nickell.

We wrote about this compelling soprano when she was studying at Manhattan School of Music and also witnessed her performance in a Marilyn Horne master class. We love her brilliant upper register with a fine vibrato that seems to contribute overtones upon overtones. What is special is that there is no loss of power at the lower end of the register, but rather a seamless quality from top to bottom. 

We had previously heard her "Robert, toi que j'aime" from the Meyerbeer opera Robert le Diable and admired her facility with French; we were delighted to hear it again. We heard impressive Verdian inclinations in "Come in quest'ora bruna" from Simon Boccanegra. Recalling her fine performance in Conrad Susa's opera The Dangerous Liaisons, we formed the opinion that Ms. Nickell is more of an opera singer than a lieder singer, although that may come along later.

The three Duparc songs she offered last night were finely rendered with delicacy and sensitivity and a lovely pianissimo; but it seemed to be an effort to hold herself back to fit the Gallic model--like driving a Lamborghini in city traffic. Of the three chansons, we preferred "L'invitation au voyage" in which the composer had more text and more time to develop his compositional ideas with dynamic variety. And Mr. Fennelly's piano was again, a revelation.

We thought that the Strauss songs were a better fit for Ms. Nickell's sizable soprano. We heard the timely "Frühling" and "Beim Schlafengehen" with its lovely piano interludes, from Four Last Songs. We thought that sleep was used as a metaphor for death. Even better was "Wie umgibst du mich mit Frieden" from Die Liebe der Danae, an opera we have never heard.

There is one aspect of performance that we hope Ms. Nickell will work on, and that is acting.  Offstage she has a lovely warm smile but onstage there was a constant expression of distress on her face. Of course we do not know what she was thinking or feeling during the performance but we wanted more variety.

In the Duparc we wanted a more languorous interpretation and we wanted to see Zerlina's flirtatious side. We believe that holding different images in mind during the performance could only spill over to a better palette of vocal colors, something that Ms. Horne, if we remember correctly, also brought up in the master class. Now we just remembered something from Ms. Horne's wise advice which Ms. Nickell seems to have followed. She was advised to "enjoy the melisma". Listening to her Strauss, we surely did!

(c) meche kroop

A RAINBOW OF SONG

Atsuko Nieda and Antonio Signorello

It was a short recital at The National Opera Center but all the bases were covered in terms of repertory for an Italian tenor.  Accompanied by pianist Atsuko Nieda, Antonio Signorello, who hails from Catania in Sicily, appeared under the auspices of New York Lyric Opera Theatre. Elizabeth Heuermann is the General/Artistic Director of this organization and we have enjoyed her creative directing on a number of occasions as well as her vocal performances. (The last time we heard her was in the role of Adele in Die Fledermaus.)

We hope she was not responsible for Mr. Signorello's changing scarves for each aria and canzone. Every color of the rainbow was represented and perhaps the color was meant to relate to the lyrics, but we found this bit of stage business to be quite distracting.

We loved the well-chosen program which included arias by Puccini and Verdi (what's not to love!) and canzone by Tosti, Cardillo, and Cali. We enjoyed the use of rubato in "L'ultima canzone" with its lovely vocalise at the end, and "A vucchella", both by Tosti. We would have called Cardillo's "Core 'ngrato" our favorite until we heard a song new to us--Cali's "E vui durmiti ancora", or Mattinata Siciliana.  We ourselves must have been asleep to have overlooked this gem.  Many thanks to Mr. Signorello for introducing us!

There were two curiosities on the program--from Meyerbeer's L'africaine, which we have never seen, we heard "O paradis", sung in French.  And from Franz Lehar's 1929 operetta Das Land des Lächelns we heard "Dein ist mein ganzes Herz"--in Italian! Well, that was really something!

From the world of opera, we heard arias from Verdi's La forza del destino and from Puccini's La fanciula del West and Manon Lescaut. We found Mr. Signorello's delivery to involve more "grandstanding" than that to which we are accustomed. "Money notes" were held just a bit too long with some distracting grimaces.

On a positive note, we always admire an Italianate sound and Mr. Signorello has an embouchure that any American singer would do well to emulate.  He has a darker sound than we had anticipated and he has plenty of depth in the lower register.

We had heard him sing previously ("Vesti la giubba") and he was sufficiently intense at that time. We believe he would do well to "pull it back a notch". A variety of color and intensity would be welcome. So...more color in the sound and less in the fabric!

(c) meche kroop

HAPPY BIRTHDAY NORA LONDON

Craig Rutenberg, Danielle Orlando, Nicholas Pallesen, and Angela Meade

Some songs were old and some were new; perhaps some were borrowed and many were blue.  It was a most unusual program at the Morgan Library as Nora London's birthday was celebrated yesterday.   As you have read here, the George London Foundation for Singers is renowned for supporting young singers.  Winners of the annual competition are invited back to perform in a series of superb recitals.

Both baritone Nicholas Pallesen and soprano Angela Meade have been setting the opera world on fire and garnering lavish praise and precious prizes for their dazzling vocal artistry.  Yesterday we got to see and hear them "up close and personal".

Mr. Rutenberg, a peerless piano partner, opened the program with some introductory remarks about Francis Poulenc's 1942 song cycle Chanson villageoises, written under the German occupation of France.  France under siege is a topic that cannot help but resonate with us today.  Poulenc's songs are spiky, filled with irony and somehow reminiscent of the cabaret.  We have never heard this cycle before but hope to become more familiar with its treasures.

Mr. Pallesen is a singer of great artistry, demonstrating a consummate ability to communicate the intentions of the composer.  He is equally comfortable with the charming, the frisky and the angry.  His technique is so refined that one doesn't notice it.  We found ourself overwhelmed by the drama, particularly in the bitter "Le mendiant" and the sad "Le retour du sergent".  Poverty and war are never pretty but Mr. Pallesen made them moving and upsetting.

Continuing in the French language, Ms. Meade offered a quartet of songs by Giacomo Meyerbeer that we had likewise never heard before.  Her piano partner Danielle Orlando leapt right into "Le voeu pendant l'orage" with some rumbling in the piano which shifted to some rather tinkly figures.  She is fearless in her accompanying and a perfect partner for Ms. Meade who grabs a song by the throat and doesn't let go. Her operatic expressiveness served her well in these songs of melodic richness and rhythmic intensity.  These songs also merit a second hearing.  Truth to tell, we would happily have had an instant replay of the entire recital!

This ground-breaking portion of the program was not over yet.  Mr. Pallesen and Mr. Rutenberg returned for "Ha! noch einen ganzen Tag!....Ha! welche Lust aus schönen Augen" from Der Vampyr by  Heinrich Marschner, a contemporary of Meyerbeer. This is a role Mr. Pallesen has been performing and he filled the aria with great excitement and power without neglecting German diction.  Every word was clear as crystal; consonants were crisp without cheating the vowels.  We never noticed the absence of titles.

The second half of the program took us to more familiar territory.  Ms. Meade initiated with "Crudele!...Non mi dir", Donna Anna's aria from Mozart's Don Giovanni. This was the perfect vehicle for Ms. Meade to show the ample size of her beautiful instrument, her elegant phrasing, and ease with embellishments.

Five songs by Charles Ives were then sung by Mr. Pallesen; our favorite was "Charlie Rutledge" which he sang with a Texas accent with some contributions from Mr. Rutenberg.  What fun!

The four Strauss songs chosen by Ms. Meade for the next set are very familiar to us but that never detracts from the pleasure we get from the passionate importuning "Stänchen", the joyful "Zueignung", the soulful "Allerseelen" and the enthusiastic "Cäcilie".  Indeed, Ms. Meade brought her unique communicative skills to the performance and made the songs new again.  Her voice seems made for Strauss!

To close the program, both singers joined to perform one of Verdi's father-daughter duets--"Figlia t'avanza...Tu pur lo sai" from I Due Foscari.  In this duet, a woman begs the Doge of Venice, her father-in-law, to intervene on behalf of his son.  It is beyond our understanding how he could resist!  It was such a captivating performance that we now yearn to hear the entire opera, if and when we get the opportunity.

So...happy birthday Nora London and many thanks for the fine way in which you honor your husband's memory.

© meche kroop