New from Opera Rara - Gounod La Colombe, Donizetti Le Duc d'Albe

Latest recordings from Opera Rara - Gounod La Colombe and Donizetti Le Duc d'Albe.  Read a full and detailed review HERE IN OPERA TODAY by Claire Seymour.


photo courtesy Macbeth Media Relations

Leoncavallo- Zazà Opera Rara, Ermonela Jaho

Opera Rara brought  Ruggero Leoncaallo's Zazà to the Barbican, London .With Ermonela Jaho in the star role, and the forces of the BBC SO and BBC Singers, plus good cast, this was a high profile occasion: Opera Rara does things in style. Hopefully, there'll be a reecording. Zazà deserves it.

Claire Seymour has reviewed this Opera Rara  Zazà for Opera Today in detail. "Charismatic charm, vivacious insouciance, fervent passion, dejected self-pity, blazing anger and stoic selflessness: Zazà – a chanteuse raised from the backstreets to the bright lights – is a walking compendium of emotions.  Ruggero Leoncavallo’s eponymous opera lives by its heroine.

The much loved Ermonela Jaho (who is coming back to the Royal Opera House next year as Suor Angelica, had "incredible commitment and vocal allure.  She ran the emotional gamut from predatory sensuality to euphoric happiness to anguished sorrow, utterly convincing us and drawing us into her tragic journey.  The lower-lying passages may sometimes have made less impact, and occasionally Jaho strayed sharp at the top, but who cares when one is enveloped by surging, supple lyrical outpourings that are by turns glossily luxurious and exquisitely delicate."

Charismatic charm, vivacious insouciance, fervent passion, dejected self-pity, blazing anger and stoic selflessness: Zazà - a chanteuse raised from the backstreets to the bright lights - is a walking compendium of emotions. Ruggero Leoncavallo’s eponymous opera lives by its heroine. Tackling this exhausting, and perilous, role at the Barbican Hall, Argentinian soprano Ermonela Jaho gave an absolutely fabulous performance, her range, warmth and total commitment ensuring that the hooker’s heart of gold shone winningly. - See more at: http://www.operatoday.com/content/2015/11/leoncavallo_zaz.php#sthash.x53YZrhX.dpuf

Charismatic charm, vivacious insouciance, fervent passion, dejected self-pity, blazing anger and stoic selflessness: Zazà - a chanteuse raised from the backstreets to the bright lights - is a walking compendium of emotions. Ruggero Leoncavallo’s eponymous opera lives by its heroine. Tackling this exhausting, and perilous, role at the Barbican Hall, Argentinian soprano Ermonela Jaho gave an absolutely fabulous performance, her range, warmth and total commitment ensuring that the hooker’s heart of gold shone winningly. - See more at: http://www.operatoday.com/content/2015/11/leoncavallo_zaz.php#sthash.x53YZrhX.dpuf

Charismatic charm, vivacious insouciance, fervent passion, dejected self-pity, blazing anger and stoic selflessness: Zazà - a chanteuse raised from the backstreets to the bright lights - is a walking compendium of emotions. Ruggero Leoncavallo’s eponymous opera lives by its heroine. Tackling this exhausting, and perilous, role at the Barbican Hall, Argentinian soprano Ermonela Jaho gave an absolutely fabulous performance, her range, warmth and total commitment ensuring that the hooker’s heart of gold shone winningly. - See more at: http://www.operatoday.com/content/2015/11/leoncavallo_zaz.php#sthash.x53YZrhX.dpuf

Charismatic charm, vivacious insouciance, fervent passion, dejected self-pity, blazing anger and stoic selflessness: Zazà - a chanteuse raised from the backstreets to the bright lights - is a walking compendium of emotions. Ruggero Leoncavallo’s eponymous opera lives by its heroine. Tackling this exhausting, and perilous, role at the Barbican Hall, Argentinian soprano Ermonela Jaho gave an absolutely fabulous performance, her range, warmth and total commitment ensuring that the hooker’s heart of gold shone winningly. - See more at: http://www.operatoday.com/content/2015/11/leoncavallo_zaz.php#sthash.x53YZrhX.dpuf

Charismatic charm, vivacious insouciance, fervent passion, dejected self-pity, blazing anger and stoic selflessness: Zazà - a chanteuse raised from the backstreets to the bright lights - is a walking compendium of emotions. Ruggero Leoncavallo’s eponymous opera lives by its heroine. Tackling this exhausting, and perilous, role at the Barbican Hall, Argentinian soprano Ermonela Jaho gave an absolutely fabulous performance, her range, warmth and total commitment ensuring that the hooker’s heart of gold shone winningly. - See more at: http://www.operatoday.com/content/2015/11/leoncavallo_zaz.php#sthash.x53YZrhX.dpuf

Charismatic charm, vivacious insouciance, fervent passion, dejected self-pity, blazing anger and stoic selflessness: Zazà - a chanteuse raised from the backstreets to the bright lights - is a walking compendium of emotions. Ruggero Leoncavallo’s eponymous opera lives by its heroine. Tackling this exhausting, and perilous, role at the Barbican Hall, Argentinian soprano Ermonela Jaho gave an absolutely fabulous performance, her range, warmth and total commitment ensuring that the hooker’s heart of gold shone winningly. - See more at: http://www.operatoday.com/content/2015/11/leoncavallo_zaz.php#sthash.x53YZrhX.dpuf

Opera Rara Les Martyrs Donizetti Elder OAE

Eagerly anticipated, Opera Rara's Donizetti Les Martyrs delivered magnificently, confirming yet again Opera Rara's reputation for pioneering lesser known treasures in the repertoire. Although Les Martyrs is not unknown (there are several recordings), Opera Rara presented a new critical edition by Dr Flora Willson of King’s College, Cambridge, which restores the opera’s original French text (Eugène Scribe)  and reinstates numerous musical passages that have not been heard since its premiere in 1840.  Les Martyrs, revealed in all its glory, is a brilliantly dramatic work, combining the delights of Italian bel canto with the exhilarating audacity of French grand style. This performance, conducted by Opera Rara's music director, Sir Mark Elder, was  so good that it whetted the appetite for a fully staged production, ideally in a house large enough to give the  spectacular treatment it merits.

In 2015, Glyndebourne Festival's gala opening night present Donizetti's Poliuto, written for the Teatro San Carlo in Naples in 1838 but which was promptly banned by the King of Sicily, who objected to the depiction in popular theatres of a subject from Christian history. French audiences could cope with religious subjects being treated as opera. The libretto in both operas was based on a play by Corneille, written two hundred years previously. Donizetti, aware that Paris was the sophisticated centre of the opera world in his time, promptly revised Poliuto and created Les Martyrs. incorporating most of the original but adding elaborate divertissements for ballet, extending the overture, and creating grand choruses and  flamboyant new solos for the tenor and soprano. 

Even by their usual very high standards, The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment were in wonderful form. In the Overture, Donizetti defines the main themes which run through the opera, martial "Roman" motifs contrasting with gentler passages which later connect to love and Christianity.The Romans, like the Devil, get the most striking tunes.  Elder and the OAE magnified the dramatic impact of the score by placing horns in a box, and trumpeters arrayed above the rest of the orchestra, which played with ferocious dynamism. Period performance isn't meek.

In Act One, the Christians are cowed, operating in secret, dissidents against an overwhelming regime. When the Governor Félix announces an all-out purge, Brindley Sherratt sang with such profound authority that his voice echoed throughout the Royal Festival Hall. It was as though the might of the whole Roman Empire was behind him. A terrifying star turn, guaranteed to stun listeners into submission. Later, Sherratt showed Félix's gentler, more human side, but the impact of this first passage lingered on. Towatrds the end of the opera, the Romans mass in all their pomp and glory. "Dieu de tonnere.......Maître du monde". sang the choruses, with forcefulness that belied the small number of singers. Thirty years before Verdi, Donnizetti is writing choruses that wouldn't be out of place in Aida.

But as we know, the Christians win. Michael Spyres sang Polyeucte,  the leader who becomes an outcast, choosing faith over the material values of society. Utterly relevant, nearly two millennia later. Spyres was a hero himself. Quite possibly, he was somewhat under the weather, as his voice didn't ring with the bell-like ping the part needs ideally, but he paced himself well, and made the notes that mattered. The killer aria, "J'irai" is, thankfully, near the end, and he hit the sudden leap up the scale with such fervour that it felt he'd been injected with a burst of energy from some superhuman power. Absolutely correct in context, as Polyeucte at this point has resolved to defy the world and die for his god.  One thing that can be said in favour of concert performances is that singers can risk their voices for a single, wonderful moment without having to worry about the rest of the run. 

Joyce El-Khoury sang Pauline, Polyeucte's wife. Her part is blessed with some very beautiful moments, some decorated by superb writing for the two harps, passages which had the ethereal quality of light: divine light, perhaps, because Pauline has to choose against her father, her faith and her place in Roman society. El-Koury (who impressed in Opera Rara's Donizetti Belisaro) negotiated the elaborate trills and passagework that create Pauline's feminine sensibility. Pauline's a very strong personality, though (think about her Dad) so one might, ideally, want more characterization; bel canto is, after all, good singing.

Sévère, Pauline's former beloved, was sung by David Kempster. Sévère is a Roman hard man and hero, but his love for Pauline is so great that he wants to save her. Kempster moderated the force in his singing, creating convincing compassion. Clive Bayley sang Callisthènes and Wynne Evans Néarque, who, at the end, sang beside the chorus, as if among the angels, flanked by the OAE trumpeters.  Les Martyrs is written with elegant symmetry. The solo parts, duets and ensemble are neatly patterned, as if the singers were dancing with their voices. 

Photo : Russell Duncan
See also Robert Hugill's review in Opera Today.

Donizetti Les Martyrs - Opera Rara next week

Opera Rara presents Donizetti's Les Martyrs (READ MY REVIEW HERE)  at the Royal Festival Hall, London on 4/11. Mark Elder conducts the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. Any Opera Rara production is an occasion : serious bel canto fans would have booked for this as soon as tickets went on sale (especially since Bryan Hymel was originally scheduled to sing the the heroic Polyeucte. Michael Spyres stepped in a while ago : he's very good, too. Joyce El-Khoury sings his wife Pauline. Event of the year, for many

Opera Rara's Les Martyrs  would also be a wise choice for anyone planning to go to Glyndebourne's 2015 Donizetti Poliuto. Poliuto was written for the Teatro San Carlo in Naples in 1838 but promptly banned by the King of Sicily, who objected to the depiction in popular theatres of a subject from Christian history.  Poliuto (aka Polyeucte, or Polyeuctus) was a third century Roman who converted to Christianity and was beheaded as a martyr in Armenia. Relatively little is known about the saint, so the opera treats the story as drama. The libretto in both operas was based on a play by Corneille, written two hundred years previously. French audiences could cope with religious subjects being treated as drama

The part of Poliuto was written for Adolphe Nourrit, Rossini's favourite, but his voice had deteroirated.  In despair, he jumped out of a hotel window and died, aged only 37. Donizetti, however, decided to rewrite the opera for Paris, the then pinnacle of operatic sophistication.  Poliuto then became Les Martyrs, incorporating most of the original with an elaborate new ballet score, extending the overture and choruses, and adding flamboyant new solos for the lead tenor.  A neat way to learn the difference between Italian and French grand opera.  Although Les Martyrs is not unknown (there are several recordings), Opera Rara will be using a new critical edition by Dr. Flora Willson of King’s College, Cambridge, which restores the opera’s original French text (Eugene Scribe)  and reinstates numerous musical passages that have not been heard since its first performance.in 1840. 

In true Opera Rara tradition, the company will record the opera in the studio in the week prior to the performance, marking its 23rd complete opera release by Donizetti to date.,Joyce El-Khoury (Pauline), who made her recording debut with Opera Rara with Donizetti’s Belisario in 2012, was recently nominated in the Young Singer category of the 2014 International Opera Awards. She is joined by Michael Spyres (Polyeucte), David Kempster (Sévère) and Wynne Evans (Néarque) who make their Opera Rara debuts with the recording and performance of Les Martyrs. Also featured in the cast are Brindley Sherratt (Félix) and Clive Bayley (Callisthènes), who have both previously worked with the company. (photo credit Russell Duncan).

The brain-child of Patric Schmid and Don White, Opera Rara has been in the business of bringing back forgotten operatic repertoire since its conception in the early 1970’s. The operas of Donizetti in particular continue to remain a core focus, with the company celebrating its 50th complete opera recording recently with the release of his opéra-comique Rita. Watch out for the forthcoming recording, but prepare by experiencing Les Martyrs live next week !