AMIGOS DE LA ZARZUELA

Amaya Arberas, Alejandro Olmedo, Anna Tonna, Gabriela Granados, and Ricardo Rosa

Just as Spain is kind of a part of Europe but not exactly, so zarzuela is kind of an opera but not exactly.  Nor is zarzuela just one thing. This amalgam of operatic singing, popular song, spoken word, and dance can be thought of as Spain's response to the singspiel of Germany, the operetta of Austria, the opéra comique of France. Moreover, zarzuela in the baroque period was very different from zarzuela of the romantic period. Just as in European opera, the focus shifted from stories of mythic heroes and shepherdesses to stories about real people.

So, we are learning about an art form which evolved from the 17th c. to the 20th c.  To our knowledge no new zarzuelas have been written since WWII. Zarzuelas written in the New World began to show signs of revolutionary ideas, as opposed to the conservative maintenance of the status quo. We have much to learn and if this topic interests you, a good place to start is, of course, Wikipedia.

Yesterday afternoon we attended a festive gala produced by Amigos de la Zarzuela. What impressed us most about every singer was the quality missing from Friday night's recital at Carnegie Hall. The four singers employed body and soul to communicate with the audience. The involvement was fierce and we loved that quality. It felt so special to be drawn into their world.

Soprano Amaya Arberas, reviewed several times and very recently (reviews available through the search bar), sang 20th c. Cuban composer Rodrigo Prat's "Ana Maria Belén" from Maria Belén Chacón. One could believe her living the role, such was the level of intensity of involvement.

Her performance of the strophic "Carceleras" from Ruperto Chapí's 19th c. Las Hijas del Zebedeo was flirtatious and featured a marvelous vocalise, showing off Ms. Arberas' bel canto strengths.

But perhaps the selection we enjoyed the most was her duet with mezzo-soprano Anna Tonna.  Francisco Asenja Barbieri also composed during the 19th c. and "Niña que a vender flores" from Los Diamantes de la Corona was given a fine performance with the two voices joining in perfect harmony.

Ms. Tonna also had a fine solo in "De la Serrania: Loa al fandanguillo" a canción written by Modesto Romero in the early 20th c. The song is a passionate one and Ms. Tonna sang it with ample sazón, negotiating the turns without sacrificing the flamenco flavor.

Speaking of flamenco flavor, dancer Gabriela Granados contributed two lovely dances to the program. This was not the modernized overly-choreographed flamenco that has been boring us lately.  Nor was it the brooding authentic flamenco with its passionate heart-breaking singing.  Rather it was one classically trained dancer focused on communing with the music and with the audience.

The first number was the "Fandango" from Amadeo Vives' early 20th c. zarzuela Dona Francisquita. Ms. Granados employed no extravagant effects but danced with classical grace using castanets and footwork to fine advantage. Her second number was one she choreographed herself to Isaac Albeniz' "Tango". Gone were the castanets with a flirtatious fan taking its place.

Tenor Alejandro Olmedo has an expansive style and some wonderful training in the bel canto style which was revealed in the way he handled the beautiful pure vowels of the Spanish language. We enjoyed his "Te quiero morena" from Jose Serrano's El Trust de Los Tenorios.

The popular "No puede ser" from Pablo Sorozábal's La Tabernera del Puerto was sung with heart and soul and a wide range of feeling tone.

Ricardo Rosa has a sizable baritone with a pleasing vibrato. He sang "Mi aldea" from Jacinto Guerrero's early 20th c. zarzuela Los Gavilanes. Mr. Rosa must have a special affinity for the works of Guerrero; he joined voices with Ms. Tonna for a romantic duet from the composer's La Rosa del Azafrán.

His performance of the drinking song "Oh Licor que das la vida" from La Leyenda del Beso by Reveriano Soutullo y Juan Vert was performed with rhythm and panache.

One of our favorite zarzuela duets is that between the duchess and the dashing colonel from Federico Moreno Torroba's Luisa Fernanda which we just heard a few days earlier sung by singers from Argentina. We can well understand why it frequently winds up on recital programs because it is a charming flirtatious piece. Ms. Arberas and Mr. Olmedo brought the flirtation to vivid life.

The pianist for the evening was Maxim Anikushin. One would not expect so much Spanish sabor from a Russian soul but there it was! Mr. Anikushin seemed to be having as much fun as the dancer and singers. He opened the program with Antonio Soler's 18th c. piece, a relatively sedate Sonata.

Then he moved on to Isaac Albeniz' far more exciting Asturias, which served to set the Spanish tone for the evening. The A-section gave the piano an opportunity to sound like the guitar while the B-section was more lyrical.

He also performed Joaquin Larregla's most famous work for piano "Viva Navarra" in which melodies tumble forth, awakening memories of oft heard Spanish music.

The fine program drew to a close with a spirited toe-tapping finale--the quartet from Agua, Azucarillos y Aguardiente. Water, sweetmeats and booze.  Sounds good to us!

(c) meche kroop

BECZALA AND KATZ AT ZANKEL HALL

Piotr Beczala (photo by Johannes Ifkovits)

He dazzled us as Vaudémont in Tchaikovsky's Iolante at the Metropolitan Opera last season and he seemed to dazzle the audience last night at Zankel Hall in his New York recital debut. Sadly, we were not dazzled. There is a great difference between opera and art song. One of the cardinal rules of a song recital is engaging the audience. There are no sets and costumes to help the singer along.

Although this marvelous tenor seemed very much connected to the songs he chose, he failed to connect very well with us and that may be attributed to his use of the music stand for the entire recital, even for the encore. Perhaps he was anxious or too busy to commit the works to memory, but we found the constant glancing down and turning of pages distracting; it left us feeling that we were witnessing a rehearsal, not a performance.

We have lost interest in song recitals held at Stern Auditorium because of the difficulty of achieving intimacy in such a large space; we decided to focus on the vocal series held at Zankel Hall and the even more intimate Weill Recital Hall. At a song recital, we are not at all interested in the fame of the singer; we want to feel what the composer felt when he set the text; we want to feel what the singer feels when he sings it.

That being said, the program was well chosen and we got to hear songs in Polish by a composer with whom we were unfamiliar. Mieczyslaw Karlowicz was a contemporary of Rachmaninoff and his work exhibits the same sort of lush melodic invention. They seemed to us like "popular" music (we mean that in the most positive way) in that they are incredibly accessible. One wants to sing along! But who but a Polish artist could negotiate those mouthfuls of consonants!

The poor composer died young and has yet to achieve great renown abroad. We hope Mr. Beczala's performance will change all that. We want to hear them again.  And yet again. They are romantic in nature and replete with the melancholy so extant in music from Poland, whose history has not been a cheerful one.

Dvorák's Gypsy Songs remain among our favorite song cycles and hearing them in Czech is a special thrill. We recently reviewed such a performance by Jamie Barton whose voice touched our heart and made our feet want to dance. Last night we had no such reaction.  Neither Mr. Beczala nor his collaborative pianist Martin Katz evoked the wild gypsy spirit which can embrace both joyful abandon and deep sorrow.

Sergei Rachmaninoff's songs are always a treat and we got to hear a quartet of them with "Sing not to me, beautiful maiden" (please forgive us for not giving you the Russian!) evoking the deep feeling of estrangement that we identify with "In der fremde" from Schumann's Liederkreis Op. 39. Once, we had this feeling listening to a Bhutanese folksong and inquired about the meaning; yes indeed, it was about a man separated from his family!

The first half of the program was the performance of Schumann's Dichterliebe, Op. 48, a loose chronicle of a love affair gone wrong, for unknown reasons. The songs have great variety of rhythm and dynamics and offer the singer an opportunity to express a variety of moods.

There is a beautiful moment of suspension between the tender opening song "Im wunderschönen Monat Mai" and the following "Aus meinen Tränen spriessen". Mr. Beczala captured the rapturous excitement of "Die Rose, die Lilie, die Taube, die Sonne" in which the words tumble out right on top of each other.

In terms of vocal production, Mr. Beczala sounded secure in the middle and lower registers but sounded strained in the upper register. His German diction was good enough to be understood but fell short of perfection.

We would like to share our observations about his collaborative pianist Martin Katz. Because we were feeling less than totally involved with the voice, we paid more attention to the piano. We have often experienced Mr. Katz as being heavy handed, having nearly drowned out baritone Jesse Blumberg when they performed Schubert's Winterreise and Die Schöne Müllerin.

Last night his touch was a bit lighter and we could appreciate just how fine a pianist he is. In the ponderous "Im Rhein, im heiligen Strome" he played the Bach-like chorale in a manner that evoked the cathedral in Köln. In "Und wüsten's die Blumen, die kleinen", his piano sang of the poet's agitation while Mr. Beczala sang the descending scale passages.

Similarly, he produced a haunting hurdy-gurdy sound in "Das ist ein Flöten und Geigen". In "Hör ich das Liedchen Klangen", the quiet song grew into grand grief. In "Ein Jüngling liebt ein Mädchen", the piano goes for a false jolly sound while the vocal line expresses suffering. We also enjoyed the harplike arpeggios of "Am leuchtenden Sommermorgen" and "Die alten, bösen Lieder".

As encore, Mr. Beczala made an effort to connect with his American audience by singing the oft recorded "Bless This House", written in 1927 by May Brahe with lyrics by Helen Taylor. It seemed to us a strange choice but the audience seemed to appreciate it.

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GENDER QUEER OPERA

Kristin Gornstein

Last night we entered a room jam-packed with young people primed to enjoy opera under the most original circumstances.  The occasion was a benefit drag performance of Miss Handel, an evening of (mostly) Handel's music performed by artists who were not only vocally skilled but outrageously and winningly outfitted in period costumes. Sequins, feather boas, powdered wigs, beauty marks, and size 12 pumps were exhibited in abundance but never distracted from the fine musical values.

Heartbeat Opera, founded by Co-Directors Ethan Heard and Louisa Proske, is one of the small boutique opera companies that have been springing up lately, perhaps stimulated by the demise of New York City Opera. Last year we were completely won over by their highly original Daphnis et Chloé (review archived and available through the search bar).

Last night's extravaganza was wildly entertaining and drew a mostly young crowd. We wondered how many of them had not enjoyed opera before; we further wondered if Handel's music acquired some new fans from among the newbies. We tend to think so and applaud any and all attempts to cultivate a young audience.

As far as musical values, we found nothing to criticize. Co-Music Directors Jacob Ashworth and Daniel Schlosberg produced the lovely baroque sounds of violin and harpsichord, augmented by Hsuan-Fong Chen's oboe, Sarah Stone's cello, and Jude Ziliack's violin.

The superb singing was done by Kristin Gornstein, Lauren Worsham, Stanley Bahorek, Scott Mello, and John Taylor Ward. Ms. Gornstein is known to us through her work with Lachlan Glen's Schubertiade and Ms. Worsham through her performances with Steven Blier's New York Festival of Song. The male voices were new to us but everyone excelled in the baroque genre. It is astonishing how the artists could camp things up and strut around in drag while still maintaining vocal quality.

The gender bending mistresses of ceremony were Ato Blankson-Wood (new to us) and James Cusati-Moyer (whose performance last year as the devil in Stravinsky's Soldier's Tale blew us away). The pair introduced each number in oh-so-clever rhymed couplets written by dramaturge Antigoni Gaitana and Mr. Heard. The identically gowned ladies faced each other through a mirror frame and lip-synched "Myself I Shall Adore" from Handel's Semele. It was hilarious.

The other numbers were all sung and perhaps our favorite was "Iris, hence away" from Semele, sung by Ms. Gornstein. Not all arias were sung in English and we particularly enjoyed the one in Italian.

The only non-Handel number was the final duet from Bernstein's Candide, a particularly humorous example of the exchange of clothes and gender roles. It was deliciously raunchy.

Obviously a mountain of imagination was substituted for a molehill of a budget. The production was designed by Seth Bodie, Jon Carter, Reid Thompson, and Oliver Wason.

It is incredibly gratifying to see how much can be done with a small budget and how exciting it is to experience opera up close and personal. The skin tingles and, YES, the heart beats! What a perfect name for this company.

We heartily recommend this production if you can possibly snag a ticket for one of the two remaining shows tonight.

(c) meche kroop

MORE FROM ARGENTINA

Natalia Suriano and Gonzalo Llanes Mena

Having just reviewed a recital of young singers from Argentina, we were very much in the mood to hear even more Argentinean music; so last night we showed up at the Consulate General of Argentina for a recital by two young artists from Argentina. This pair, unlike the visiting artists of the prior evening, are studying here in New York at the Manhattan School of Music.

The program was not operatic but rather composed of art songs and the audience comprised mainly Argentineans who were over the moon hearing songs of their homeland. If anyone but us was troubled by the singer's use of a music stand, one would never have known about it.

When the otherwise engaging tenor Gonzalo Llanes Mena looked at the audience we felt the connection that we so enjoy that makes a song come to life.  But every time he looked down at his score, that connection was broken. It was a short recital, just an hour, and we couldn't understand the reason for not memorizing the songs, since none of the works were modern or esoteric. Just sayin'!

Mr. LLanes Mena engaged the audience by explaining each song in his own inimitable and humorous style in charmingly accented English; this served to include audience members whose Spanish is less than fluent.

His sound is a sweet one but not a slight one, and he had the "garlic" to get across Tosti's "A vucchella", after explaining that Tosti loved all kind of women and this song about a dried-up flower was written about an elderly woman!

His German diction was fine in "Bist du bei mir", attributed to Bach but likely written by Stölzel; he certainly did not neglect the correct pronunciation of the "ch" sound. We wish we could say the same thing about his French diction in Reynaldo Hahn's "A Chloris" but we cannot; the even French line was nowhere to be found and several nasal vowels were mispronounced.

One cannot blame singers not born and raised in the USA for wanting to sing Broadway songs but they just sound peculiar to our ears when sung with a foreign accent.  We wonder what the native born French think of our American singers when they sing in French!  Actually, we don't wonder; we've been told that the French singing that we found acceptable was NOT music to French ears!

In any case, "Be My Love" (Brodzsky/Cahn) was on the program and our game tenor was joined by an excellent soprano, Anna Mayo, and they gave it their all. We do love good harmony and enjoyed the performance. Ms. Mayo has a brilliant voice and a smooth portamento that we admired.

Lerner and Loew's "On the Street Where You Live" was given a charming introduction and gave the superb collaborative pianist Natalia Suriano an elaborate piano arrangement into which she could sink her teeth, or rather her fingers.

It was no small delight that Ms. Suriano provided a piano solo of great distinction--selections from Enrique Granados' Escenas románticas. Our favorite of the three was the "Mazurca".  Perhaps it was only the rhythm that evoked our feeling but we would be surprised if Granados had not learned a great deal from Chopin's music.

Her playing of this melodic music was highly expressive and her fleet fingers met all the technical demands of the devilishly difficult "Lento con éxtasis".

The remainder of the program comprised popular songs of Argentina, likely from the 20th c. Our tenor sported a handsome poncho and ingratiatingly explained its usefulness. We particularly liked "Cuesta abajo" (Gardel/LePera), a tango from a film of the 1930's with the same title.

Suitable for this pre-Halloween week was "Zamba para la viuda", a ghost story which Mr. Llanes Mena explained for the audience.

We were fortunate to hear more from the songwriting team of Carlos Gardel and Alfredo Le Pera--the encore piece "Mi Buenos Aires Querido" in the tango rhythm for which that song writing team is famous. It was at this point that the packed house went wild with enthusiasm. We tried to imagine being an expat and hearing singers from the USA singing Broadway numbers.

No, there were no zarzuela arias but we left satisfied that we learned more about Argentinean song.

(c) meche kroop

YOUNG SINGERS FROM ARGENTINA

Marcelo Ayub, Dr. Alejandro Cordero, Nicolás Romero, Gustavo Vita, and Constanza Diaz Falú

Last night we had the privilege of being welcomed by the Americas Society to hear a recital by three young singers from the training division of Teatro Colón, one of the leading opera houses in the Americas. This seems to be something like the Apprentice Program of the Santa Fe Opera or the Merola Program at the San Francisco Opera.

A benefactor named Dr. Alejandro Cordero has underwritten the New York recital of young artists from this Instituto Superior de Arte del Teatro Colón for eight years. These three were chosen by audition and the program was a most agreeable one, comprising familiar opera arias and, happily, some Spanish and Latin American music at the end.

We were most impressed by soprano Constanza Diaz Falú who, of the three, seemed most performance ready. Ms. Diaz Falú has the kind of well-focused bright soprano that we love to hear singing Mozart and Rossini. She negotiated the fioritura effortlessly and has a most engaging stage presence.

Her "Der Hölle Rache" from Mozart's Die Zauberflöte left nothing to be desired; her technique was excellent and her portrayal of the angry Queen of the Night was completely apt. Quite different but equally wonderful was "Ah! Donate il caro sposo", Sofia's lovely aria from Rossini's early one-act comedy Il signor Buschino with its excellent ornamentation--lovely even without the English horn solo.

Her rendition of "Glitter and Be Gay" from Leonard Bernstein's Candide was full of charm but we found the accent (British English combined with Spanish) a slight drawback.

She also performed the part of Zerlina in "La ci darem la mano" from Mozart's Don Giovanni with bass Gustavo Vita as the vile seducer of Seville. Her stage presence was so winning that she swept the otherwise wooden Mr. Vita right along with her.

Mr. Vita has a substantial bass but looks awkward onstage and comes across as effortful.  This interfered with his connection with the audience. He seemed to connect well with his material but it didn't translate. It seemed as if he needed someone onstage with whom to come alive. We were wondering if some kind of body work would be of assistance--some instruction in dance or movement that would loosen him up.

Nicolás Romero has a pleasing tenor and sang "Amor ti vieta" from Umberto Giordano's Fedora--with passion. We liked him even better in "E lucevan le stelle" from Puccini's Tosca in which he employed dynamic variety to good effect.  He also did well with Cardillo's "Core 'ngrato" and Casalino's "Non ti scordar di me". two audience favorites. 

Mr. Romero sings effortlessly in the upper register, even with forte passages, but we wanted to experience more breath support in the pianissimi to prevent his sound from dwindling.

Our favorite however was "La roca fria del calvario" from José Serrano's wonderful zarzuela La Dolorosa, which we had the pleasure of seeing in its entirety about a year ago. We can never get enough zarzuela!

Singers tend to do best in their native language and we loved Ms. Diaz Falú's tender interpretation of Fernando Obradors' "Del cabello más sutil" which she sang in the Castilian dialect. 

Soprano and tenor joined voices for the lovely duet "Caballero del alto plumero" from Federico Moreno Torroba's charming zarzuela Luisa Fernanda, in which the Duchess and the handsome young Colonel are having a flirtation. The final work on the program was the trio "Uno" by M. Mores.

Pianist and Musical Director for this lovely evening was Marcelo Ayub.

We have long lauded Argentina for their tango, their fine wine, and their beef.  Now we can add one more thing--they produce some fine young singers.  Bravissimi!

(c) meche kroop

CARNEVALE DI VENEZIA

Jakub Jozef Orlinski, Amaya Arberas and Il Giardino d'Amore

Yesterday we were transported to 17th and 18th c. Venice when we trekked out to the farthest reaches of Brooklyn to hear our favorite Spanish soprano singing arias of Händel and Vivaldi.  Our pleasure was magnified by also hearing some exciting arias performed by countertenor Jakub Jozef Orlinski and by the marvelous accompaniment provided by a stellar baroque chamber orchestra playing on original instruments or copies thereof.  The founder and leader of Il Giardino d'Amore is one Stefan Plewniak who speaks eloquently through his violin.

The always fascinating theorbo was played by Etienne Galletier while the other string instruments were played by Monika Boroni, Katarzyna Kalinowska, Kinga Augustyn, Magdalena Chmielowiec, and Katarzyna Cichon. The group opened the concert with Vivaldi's Autumn and closed with Vivaldi's Summer, perhaps not a normal progression of seasons but beautifully played.

In between we thrilled to some very fine baroque singing in which both singers distinguished themselves with perfectly precise handling of the fioritura. Our favorite piece by Ms. Arberas was the well known aria "Lascia ch'io pianga" from Händel's Rinaldo, made even more famous from it's use in the film Farinelli. It's a real tear-jerker and Ms. Arberas brought out every subtle nuance. 

We also enjoyed "Ombre vane ingiusti orrori" from Vivaldi's Griselda in which the eponymous Griselda bewails her fate. We remember this opera well from Santa Fe when Meredith Arwady sang the role of the unjustly rejected Griselda.

Händel's "Agitato da fiere tempeste" from Riccardo Primo Re d'Inghilterra was given a fine performance by Mr. Orlinski and the orchestra created a fine storm of wind and water. We particularly enjoyed his interpretation of Handel's "A dispetto d'un volto ingrato" from Tamerlano which called for a variety of dynamics and tempi.

This superb group of young musicians is based in Vienna but is presently on tour and how fortunate for us New Yorkers that they made Brooklyn one of their stops.

(c) meche kroop

JUST A SIMPLE "WORKING GIRL"

Siberia at the turn of the 20th Century

We recently wrote about how a good concert version of an opera can be a very pleasurable experience.  Last night, Teatro Grattacielo's yearly entry in the verismo opera sweepstakes was Umberto Giordano's Siberia, an interesting and mostly satisfying evening for the opera lovers who crowded into the comfortable Gerald Lynch theater at John Jay College. 

This opera premiered at La Scala in 1903 and was not a hit, although it did receive positive notices in Genoa and Paris and reached the New World in 1906 by way of the French Opera House in New Orleans, where so many European operas got their American start.

The libretto is a bit strange (Thanks, Founding Executive and Artistic Director Duane Printz, for a fine translation), not making many issues clear until late in the opera. One would expect more from the fine librettist Luigi Illica who served Giacomo Puccini so well; it is unclear whether the libretto is his original creation or whether he adapted the story from Leo Tolstoy's novel Resurrection.

Perhaps this early 19th c. story might have made more sense to the early 20th c. audience who witnessed it. The tale concerns the beautiful Stephana, mistress of the young Prince Alexis who has furnished her with a beautiful palace and servants and gifts. We do not figure out until much later that the disagreeable Gleby discovered the poor young woman on the streets, recognized her beauty, seduced her, taught her the ropes (so to speak), and sold her to the Prince in exchange for a liberal pension.

It is, of course, in Gleby's interest to ensure her availability to the Prince and he is distressed when she stays out all night. The reason for her failure to live up to her duties is her true love for the soldier Vassili who thinks she is an ordinary working girl of the innocent variety, not the kind of "working girl" she really is.

She has kept her palatial home secret but young Vassili, called to war, comes to the palace to bid farewell to his mother (or so we think) and discovers Stephana who is upset to be found out. Alexis is also upset by Vassili's presence and the two draw swords. Alexis is either wounded or dies.

Vassili is sent to prison in Siberia and Stephana follows him (in a troika and swathed in furs) having given up her glamorous life. This seems to be partly out of love and partly to seek redemption.

Life in Siberia is virtually unendurable but she loves it there because of her love for Vassili and a renewed sense of purity she feels.  But the lovers plan to escape and are caught, perhaps because the jealous Gleby has also arrived at the prison and rats her out (or so we think). She is shot and dies (happily) in Vassili's arms.

Undoubtedly, the libretto could have been more clearly written. Nonetheless, the music is gorgeously orchestrated and was superbly sung by a really good cast. The deservedly famous tenor Raul Melo sang with clear ringing tone and high passion. Stephana was gloriously sung by soprano Marie Masters whose star is on the rise. The strange and undeveloped character of Stephana was effectively filled in by this fine young artist.

Highly impressive as the slimy Gleby was baritone Daniel Ihn-Kyu Lee who injected 57 varieties of sliminess into his superb voice, creating an unforgettable villain. We enjoyed mezzo-soprano Jessica Grigg as Nikona, Stephana's anxious servant, and soprano Megan Monaghan in a small role as a woman looking for her father in Siberia.

Baritone Joseph Flaxman excelled in two roles: as a banker in the service of the Prince, and later as an old man who wants to help Stephana escape. Tenor Scott Joiner was the servant Ivan and later The Cossack; tenor Wesley Morgan portrayed Prince Alexis and later portrayed The Sergeant, bass Damian Savarino was Walinoff, also in the Prince's retinue and later, The Inspector.

In the Siberian  part of the opera we would meet The Captain (bass-baritone Sean Cooper), who also portrayed The Governor with appropriate stentorian sound. All the parts seemed well cast and excellently sung.

And what about the music? What made the strongest impression melodically was the "Song of the Volga Boatmen".  This is a traditional Russian song, collected by Balakirev and published in 1866; it has been appropriated by composers of many nationalities and here was most effective in expressing the despair of the Russian peasants in pre-Revolutionary Russia. It is heard many times in the course of the opera. The Cantori New York Chorus did well by it, under the direction of Mark Shapiro.

Conductor Israel Gursky commanded The Teatro Grattacielo Orchestra who did justice to Giordano's  colorful orchestration. When Vassili describes the living conditions in Siberia, the orchestra tells as much as the words. For example, the woodwinds do a great job of illustrating the "unrelenting winds". And a tuba lets us know about the howl of the wolves. (It was at this point that we decided that Siberia does not need to be on our "bucket list").

On the Sunday of Russian Easter in Act III, the chimes and the sextet of mandolins (YES!) took us right where we needed to be. 

There were few arias as set pieces, but Stephana's Act III aria "Qual vergogna tu porti", directed at Gleby, gave her a chance to open up her generous instrument and shine with a variety of emotions. Mr. Lee's high point followed shortly thereafter in "La connobbi quand'era fanciulla" when we finally learn about the origins of their relationship, or his interpretation thereof.

Melo's best moment was in "Stephana!..Dio!" in Act II when she arrives in Siberia. The pair also have a lovely romantic duet.

We only get these treats once a year, generally in October. Most of the luminaries of Planet Opera were in attendance and post-opera conversation was stimulating. 

(c) meche kroop