So – it finally happened! After 14 and a half months, yesterday I was at a full scale opera again , at Covent Garden. The last time I heard an opera, or indeed an orchestra, was the Marriage of Figaro, given by Opera North on 14 March 2020 at the Salford Lowry Theatre……..Since then – in September and October 2020 – four string quartet concerts, two song recitals and a solo violin performance…..only……
I thought the performance of La Clemenza di Tito I went to on Sunday May 23 at the Royal Opera House was tremendous. Mark Wigglesworth kept the music moving and lively, yet always with enough space to appreciate the inner voices in the orchestra. It was wonderful to hear an orchestra again, and the seats we were in – front row of Amphitheatre – offered really good sound, with a nice thwack from the timpani when needed. The voices, after months of tinny laptop sound, seemed extraordinarily loud and – well – real.
But above all the production by Richard Jones kept me constantly engaged and watching what was going on on stage. The production was set in what looked like Fascist Italy – possibly Titus as a Mussolini-type. I haven’t seen Clemenza since the famous ROHCG performances in the mid-70s’s with Colin Davis, Janet Baker, Lucia Popp, Yvonne Minton and Frederica von Stade. Despite all these stars, I found it a dreadful; bore – I kept looking for the wit and vitality of the Magic Flute, or Cosi Fan Tutte, and not finding it. In a classical traditional production (John Copley, I think) that 70’s production seemed to emphasise the rigidities of opera seria. I think I understood that the music by itself was often beautiful, and had many of the numbers been found within Don Giovanni or Marriage of Figaro they would be well-loved showpieces of the repertoire, but the plot and context wholly undermined the work. Richard Jones and his designer produced a context that emphasised the cramped and boxed nature of the life the leading characters were living, and the ridiculousness of the classical forms / the anger lying hidden behind the facades – there were some very sinister figures in hoodies who appeared from time to time. The senators following Titus looked like fascist or communist small-town politicians, while Titus himself seemed gradually to exchange genuine compassion and pity for an exalted view of himself that, at the end, had him running round the stage in gleeful celebration of his own compassion, while the rest of his retinue suddenly drew their knives, the reality of power behind the façade of the ‘good’ Emperor. The other characters were carefully drawn, their emotions real and understandable. Sextus and Servilia seemed to be working class people – footballer and pasta shop girl – elevated by the whims of Titus to be a friend/a potential bride of the Emperor. Vitellia was also understandable, her bitterness and anger clearly expressed
But all this would have been rather besides the point if the singing had been indifferent. But it wasn’t – though the stand out star was Emily D’Angelo as Sestus, all the singers without exception were never less than good, and both Nicole Chevalier as Vitellia and Edgaras Montvidas were particularly impressive.
A really tremendous performance, then…… Fingers crossed there will be others over the next few months – I am going to Don Giovanni in July.
John's musical journey 