NEWSREEL
- In a co-production with the Theater Wien in Austria, the Opéra
National de Lorraine in Nancy, France has programmed for its Easter
2009 evocation, Georg Friedrich Händel's most popular and
one of his strongest oratorios, The Messiah. This new
creation by Claus Guth (mis en scene), Ramses Sigl (choregaraphy),
Christian Schmidt (decor) and Konrad Kuhn (drama), with its jubilant
contemporary touch, proved also suitable for adaptation for television.
It was videoed and broadcasted by the cultural broadcasting French
channel, Arte, on 13 April 2007, the same day it went into Premiere
in 1742 in the New Music Hall in Dublin, Ireland. Jean-Christophe
Spinosi is conducting the three-act oratorio and the choir arrangements
are by The Ensemble Matheus and the Arnold Schoenberg Chorus.
The Messiah was first performed, on 13 April 1742. In Nancy
the performances run till the 30th of April 2009.
on-line
tickets available
Argo Spier,
Opera Pages
Consulting editor, Joneve McCormick, USA
*
USA bits -
USA bits - The city of Nancy is within easy reach by train
from Paris, Strasbourg and Luxembourg (TGV Est Européen
– 1.30h from all). It is situated in the French
arrondissement of Lorraine. The Opéra National
de Lorraine is located off La Place Stanislas, which received
World Heritage status some years ago. La Place Stanislas
was build by a Polish King exiled in Lorraine, Stanislas
Leszczinski, and is becoming a well-known tourist attraction.
A visit to the City, in combination with attending the
Opera and experiencing the Art Nouveau buildings on La
Place Stanislas, lit nightly, is added value for the American
cultural traveller to Europe.
*
USA bits - The Opéra National de Lorraine
in Nancy is stage to many a renowned vertuosi. Sopranos
Nicola Beller Carbonel and Natascha Petrinsky recently
performed in the opera. Natascha Petrinsky's voice, stage
presence and 19th and 20th century repertoire makes her
a sought after soprano in Europe's leading theatres and
concert halls. And she has performed among others, in
the La Monnaie Brussels, La Scala Milano, the German State
Opera Berlin, Covent Garden London, Teatro Real Madrid,
the Royal Albert Hall and the Bayreuth Festival. Nicola
Beller Carbonel sang with Peter Edelmann
in Johann Strauss's Wiener Blut in the Opera
national de Lorraine in 2007.
Opéra
national de Lorraine
Ticket Hot-line - 0033 (0)3 83 85 33 11
1,
rue Sainte-Catherine
54000 Nancy
|
sought after composer
Nicola
Luisotti's 'real and
authentic search into the past'
[Press - Meeting
with Nicola Luisotti, Music Director San Francisco 2009 - 2014
Date: 2007-01-27 - Occasion: Ill Trittico - Puccini
Text: Argo Spier - Wordcount: 1000]
“I
have made every effort to restore music to its true role
of serving poetry by means of its powers of expression”
- Gluck, Alceste journal (1769) |
LUISOTTI INTERVIEW
My
meeting with Nicola Luisotti on the 27th of January 2008, just
before he went onstage to conduct Puccini's Il Trittico
in Frankfurt, was a memorable and uplifting experience. His enthusiasm
for his work and his respect for the works of the 'Masters' (composers)
has such serenity that one cannot but admire him as a person as
well. He is open and friendly and so elated with what he is doing
that this too spreads contagious energy. But Nicola Luisotti has
no 'time on his hands' to waste. He is a very busy and sought
after conductor - an 'up-coming young talent' with an impressive
curriculum vitae - much appreciated on both sides of the Atlantic.
From the 2009/2010 Season until 2014, he will be the Music Director
of the San Francisco Opera, USA. And this Season he still has
engagements (with his Puccini Cycle) in various Opera Houses across
Europe and also in Tokyo, Japan. He will be conducting Truandot
in Covent Garden, England, Don Carlo in Geneve, Switzerland
and Macbeth in Munich, Germany. He will also be at The
Metropolitan in New York again the 29th of February 2008, conducting
La Boheme.
Getting to his office on the first floor, entering through the
'Opernpforte' on the right side of the Willy-Brandt Square in
Frankfurt, I had to go through the usual formalities. I was met
at the stage door by a representative of the Chief Press Officer
and chaperoned to Mr. Luisotti's office. He was playing the piano
when my host knocked at the door. As an 'opener' I suggested we
refer to Manfred Honeck's 'slender and transparent' approach in
conducting Berlioz's Les Troyens in December, 2007 in
Stuttgart. But as I was asking the question I realised it was
an irrelevant one. There is something charismatic about Luisotti
that invites communication on a 'different level'. When I told
him my question was irrelevant he just laughed and said that every
conductor has a different approach and that the issue isn't the
'attitude' of a conductor but how the conductor is able to revive
what is past.
"The composer is watching!" he said, and smiled again.
He is of the opinion that a conductor has to search hard into
the past to be able to revive the authenticity of a work of a
composer long since passed away. To him purity and honesty are
the ‘real’ issues to consider. And he reminded me
that the conductor has "a terrible responsibility towards
the composer as well as to the audience". This responsibility
is vast in scope. He spoke of the "time consuming aspect
of the process" and the "plain hard work" that
a conductor has to put in to reach for an authentic re-creation
of what the composer had created.
“The conductor must put life into what’s dead,”
he said. "It’s a question not only of the composer's
music that has to be resurrected in a performance but the composer
himself must be made to be 'there’. As if he is in the audience,"
he explained.
When asked how he would describe his own approach to conducting,
he replied without any hesitation: “Real and authentic.”
And when I asked him about the relationship between the libretto
and the music of an Opera and referred to the age-old dialogue
about it - since Gluck's time, 1769 - he gave me a startling metaphor
that I will remember for years to come. I had referred to a debate
between Pietro Metastatio and Chevalier de Chastellux in which
Metastatio had said, "…when music vies with poetry
to take the principal role, it achieves the destruction of both."
His answer was almost zenith: "Arms can destroy what the
mouth says." One can picture the conductor violently conducting,
using his arms (or not using them enough). And there's the soprano,
tenor or baritone singing, forming the 'beautiful' words the librettist
poet has written with her/his lips. And suddenly there's the concept
of destruction hanging in the air like a shout or a warning. What
comes or doesn't come from the 'mouth' now is all of a sudden
a 'physical threatenening' by the 'corpus', the conductor and
his 'arms', the conducting itself. Music also now is something
alive, a living organism. There's conspiracy and danger in the
room. The metaphor states the power of the conductor and it is
also a dire reminder to be on guard against 'irresponsible conductors'
misusing their power and excellence. The metaphor conveys that
the conductor is the one who decides 'what lives' and 'what is
killed and destroyed'.
After this turn in our conversation and just before we ended the
interview, we started to talk about 'creative energy' and 'that
special moment of transcendence' that comes into play in performances.
I was now perfectly at ease and taken by his comments, his innovative
vision and the patient guidance he assumed in the conversation.
For him to refer to this 'moment when it all come together' in
a performance, the past, future and present and when magic happens,
was exciting.
"If you send energy to the public,” he said, “They
send it back to you.” And I perfectly understood what he
meant.
The three Operas of Il Trittico, Il Tabarro, a verism
with social criticism, Suor Angelica, a tragedy of alienation,
and Gianni Schicchi with its burlesque approach
to social supremacy, form a unity representing the composer's
exploration of the human condition sine qua non were most enjoyable.
It was in Suor Angelica that I noticed how the crossover
and transcendence came about and manifested. I enjoyed it enormously
... as did the full-house audience. It is quite understandable
why the Oper Frankfurt has mostly sold-out performances with all
its operas. There is something serious going on during its performances,
the past appears in the erzats and starts to live. This, and the
superior operatic value that it continues to add to its performances
draws the public ... which recognizes well what is going on.
That's why
they come. They come for the authentic and the real.
Argo Spier
Eine
florentinische Tragödie
ARCHIVE
- There is again a reason this season for Oscar Wilde
lovers to flock to the Opera in Frankfurt. In October and November
two one act operas by Alexander Zemlinsky (1871-1942), Eine
florentinische Tragödie and Der Zwerg, are
being preformed in the Staatsoper Frankfurt. Both are based on
stories from the pen of Oscar Wilde and the two together offer
opportunities for most enjoyable evenings. Their successes last
year resulted in a retake of the productions this year, with new
casting.
Conducting
by Friedemann Layer
Production and stage setting for both opera are by Udo Samel,
Ludivine Petit and Alan Barnes.
Rising
in rank
ARCHIVE
- The German Ministry of Wissenschaft, Forschung und
Kunst Baden-Württemberg honoured singers world-wide
in Stuttgart in March 2007 with the title of Kammersänger,
among them the Bostonian, Mark Munkittrick. Tenor Helmut Holzapfel
from South Africa and Wolfgang Schöne from Germany also received
the title.
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| USA
bits - Last year's production of Eine
florentinische Tragödie und Der Zwerg triggered
responses such as 'an evening worth an ovation' and 'visual
opulence and dramatic art'. With operas from Giuseppe
Verdi, George Benjamin, Benjamin Britten, Giacomo Puccini,
Paul Dukas, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Leoš Janácek,
Matthias Pintscher, Ludwig van Beethoven and Jörn
Arnecke the Oper Frankfurt has a broad spectrum of classics
and 'newer' operas to offer on its program in the Season
2007-2008 - See
list for the Premiers.
USA
bits - Modern
city with two Opera Houses
- Frankfurt's 'old Opera House' is a lovely 18th
Century building situated inside the new heart of the
city. The 'new Opera' is called the 'Städt Buhne'
and is located at the Willi-Brandt-Platz, where the new
city starts, and near the old famous 'Stadtsmitte'. Both
Opera Houses are within easy reach with the U-Bahn and
Metro lines and Opera goers find ample 'Tief' parking
facilities in the 'Buhne's' underground parking garage.
From the foyer of the 'Städt Buhne' at night there's
a spectacular view of the new city skyline with its glowing
high rise buildings. It is quite feasible to visit both
the city and the Opera in one day and move the next day
to either Stuttgart or Köln for another evening at
the opera. |
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