Rose Hall at
Jazz at Lincoln Center. Orchestra (Seat
A109, $85.50).
Conductor –
Pacien Mazzagatti; Tosca – Latonia Moore, Cavaradossi – Raffaele Abete, Scarpia
– Carlo Guelfi, Angelottiii – Christopher Job.
Musica Sacra,
Kent Tritle, conductor
Brooklyn Youth
Chorus, Dianne Berkun Menaker, Artistic Director
About 10 days
ago I got an email from NYCO Renaissance announcing that NYCO had come out of
bankruptcy (about 3 years ago) and it would be staging Tosca later that
month. They were also offering half
price tickets. Since the start time was
a bit early at 7 pm, Anne couldn’t make it.
The announcement
made a big deal out of the production set and costumes would hark back to the
premiere of the opera in Rome in 1900.
Indeed when the curtain first opened, the audience applauded as it was
greeted by a rather elaborate set depicting the interior of a cathedral. On closer inspection, many corners seemed to
have been cut: the walls shook when people walked on them, the water colors
were hastily done; nonetheless, this was not the typical austere staging that I
was expecting. The costumes were also
period, although they looked more French than Italian – of course the setting
was the Napoleonic era, so perhaps the French were everywhere.
The auditorium
was quite small, seating around 1100 people, and to my disappointment was still
sparsely occupied at 5 minutes to curtain.
When I discovered that my seat in the first row, I was tempted to get
one of the many empty seats, but then decided it might be fun to be up
close. Turns out it was also in the
center, I could have easily reached the conductor’s head. I had a great view of the action on stage;
the downside is I had to try hard not to make a sound. The other thing I noticed was people were
quite well dressed: many suits and ties.
To this amateur
music critic, the performance was uniformly excellent. Being close to the stage helped, and the
small auditorium certain made acoustics a non-issue.
The comedic
nature of the opera is often overlooked as the audience anticipates the deaths
that are to come. To their credit the
artists made the audience laugh on many occasions, I chuckled when Cavaradossi,
at Tosca’s insistence, dabbed dark paint on the eyes of the portrait he was
working on. One other thing of note was
the execution was carried out with a single pistol, instead of the oft-employed
firing squad. Actually that would make
the whole “fake scene” more believable.
Come to think of it, the Tosca we saw in Australia also used a pistol,
although in that case the strange staging was the most prominent aspect.
The singing was
good. Moore had sung several roles at
the Met, and she certainly had a beautiful and strong voice. With a permanent scrawl on her face, her
acting skills could use some coaching. “Visse
arte” usually starts in a wistful manner; she started out forte and ended
fortissimo. It actually worked as the
Act ends with Tosca stabbing Scarpia to death.
The other principals all did a great job. Scarpia could have been more sinister,
though.
We saw a Met
production a few months back, and in my opinion there isn’t that much daylight
separating the two. The only noticeable
different is Tosca leapt out of a tower in full view in the Met
performance. I will look for a review
later, but I would characterize this a success (if attendance isn’t a factor in
the evaluation.) I do wonder if it is
wise to throw so much money into this, given the precarious financial situation
the company no doubt is in. Of course,
if this doesn’t go well, then there is no future anyway.
The review in
the New York Times, with its “wait-and-see” attitude, doesn’t bode well for
this renaissance. The reviewer also had
a lot to say about the singers (different cast) and the conductor. He obvious approaches opera differently than
I do.
I got to Time
Warner quite late, and the long lines at Whole Food Market meant I had only
time for a sandwich. Given the short
intermissions, I was back in Jersey City at around 10:30 pm.
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