Metropolitan Opera – Debussy’s Pelleas et Melisande. January 22, 2019.

Metropolitan Opera at Lincoln Center.  Balcony (Seat C104, $92.50).

Story.  Golaud, widowed grandson of King Arkel, meets Melisande near a fountain, brings her to the castle, and eventually marries her.  Pelleas, Golaud’s half-brother, is asked to look after Melisande.  They go to a well in the park, and Melisande accidentally drops her wedding ring in the well when the clock strikes noon.  She is urged by Pelleas to tell her husband Golaud the truth.  When asked by Golaud, she lies, and is asked to take Pelleas to the park to retrieve her ring.  Later, Pelleas is at Melisande’s window and tells her he is leaving.  Golaud appears and asks them to stop behaving like children; later Golaud tells Pelleas that Melisande is pregnant.  Eventually Golaud gets so suspicious that he quizzes his son Yniold if anything has happened between Pelleas and Melisande, and Yniold hasn’t seen anything.  Regardless, Golaud is suspicious and abuses Melisande on one occasion.  Pelleas and Melisande visit the well and profess love for one another, while they kiss Golaud appears and kills Pelleas.  Melisande gives birth prematurely and admits that she loved Pelleas before she dies.  King Arkel remarks that it is the newborn baby’s turn.

Yannick Nezet-Seguin – conductor.  Golaud – Kyle Ketelsen; Melisande – Isabel Leonard; Arket – Ferruccio Furlanetto; Pelleas – Paul Appleby; Yniold – A. Jesse Schopflocher.

Today is Sunday January 27, and I have three writeups to do before a (possible) concert tomorrow; thus this will be a rushed job.  And the bottom line for this opera?  Most of the little impression it left on me has faded by now, five days later.  I do remember when I walked away at the end of the performance, I asked “why?”  And that question is at many levels.

We can start with how a conductor reacted after being asked of P&M will ever be a success, the answer was “It was never intended to be …”  Debussy evidently thought popular success equaled artistic failure, going so far as to entertaining the formation of a Society of Musical Esoterism.  He intended for the opera to be performed in Paris’s small avant-garde theaters and private homes.  Ironically, P&M premiered in Opera Comique, and gave him international celebrity.  This success may have stopped Debussy from writing a second opera.

The play the opera is based on is a Symbolist drama.  I don’t really know what that means, other than it might mean one is to read into the words ideal beauty in an ideal world.  That may explain why the story doesn’t try to answer what many would consider obvious questions.  One of them relates to Melisande’s background, we know she is beautiful, but simply appears near the fountain as the story begins.  Another question would be when did P & M fall in love?  They kiss once (per the Met synopsis) and Pelleas is killed.  If the Program Note had not mentioned it, I wouldn’t catch the sheep being led to slaughter is meant to represent how destiny leads to P&M’s deaths.

The story in the opera develops in a series of 15 short vignettes spread over five acts.  A typical scene would last 10 to 15 minutes.  The basic setup are several walls.  As the stage rotates, the space would become the prop for a particular scene.  Works okay, although they could have spent a bit more money on the set.  There are many stretches of vocal silences, filled with beautiful Debussian orchestral music.  Indeed I thought many passages that reminded me of La Mer, especially at the beginning.  There is little, if any, choral singing in the opera.

Most of the voices came through quite well to our seats in the balcony.  The only singer I know about, Paul Appleby, was the sole exception.  His voice was so weak that I expected someone would announce that he couldn’t continue.  He finished the performance, and I don’t know if he was not well.  I have heard Appleby several times in the past, and don’t recall not liking his performance, so this was an exception.  The boy soprano did a great job.

Music Director Yannick Nezet-Seguin at curtain call, flanked by Appleby and Leonard.

The New York Times review has a lot of good things to say about the performance.  He contrasts what Nezet-Seguin wants in how the orchestra sounds with the “old sound.” (In simple words, more bass.)  He also mentioned how Appleby sounded weak with the low notes.

It was a cold night (if I recall), so we had dinner at East Szechuan Garden.  Traffic was light, as it tends to be during the winter months after Christmas.