Metropolitan Opera at Lincoln Center. Balcony (Seat C118, $87.50).
Story. When it is
thought that the Roman Emperor Claudio is lost at sea, his wife Agrippina wants
to have Nerone, her son from a previous marriage, installed as the new
Caesar. She does this by encouraging
Nerone to do charity work and recruits help from Pallante and Narciso by
promising them sexual favors. As it
turns out, Claudio was saved by Ottone and has promised Ottone the throne. Meanwhile, Claudio, Nerone and Ottone are all
enamored to the courtesan Poppea, who loves Ottone. Agrippina tries to turn Claudio against
Ottone by telling Poppea that Ottone is willing to give her up for the throne,
and have Poppea telling Claudio that Ottone is standing in the way. Pallante and Narciso also discover
Agrippina’s deceit, and decide to cooperate.
When Claudio returns to the city, he calls Ottone a traitor, others also
abandon him. Eventually Poppea also
finds out Agrippina’s plot and plots revenge.
Agrippina finds a way to revive her plan: she gets Pallante and Narciso
to agree to murder each other, and Claudio to agree to give Nerone the
throne. When Ottone and Nerone visit
Poppea, she convinces them to hide in separate closets. Claudio then enters, and Poppea convinces him
that Nerone is the one who is his rival, and she reconciles with Ottone. Pallante and Narciso also reveal to Claudio
Agrippina’s plot. Confronted by Claudio,
Agrippina extricates herself with an elaborate defense. Claudio decrees that Poppea go with Nerone,
and that Ottone be the next emperor.
Poppea declares her love for Ottone, who refuses the throne. Nerone is thus crowned the next Caesar.
Conductor – Harry Bicket.
Agrippina – Joyce DiDonato, Nerone – Kate Lindsey, Pallante – Duncan
Rock, Narciso – Nicholas Tamagna, Lesbo (a servant of Claudio) – Christian
Zaremba, Ottone – Iestyn Davies, Poppea – Brenda Rae, Claudio – Matthew Rose.
Continuo: Harpsichord – Harry Bicket, Cello – David
Heiss, Theorbo/Archlute/Guitar – Daniel Swenberg & John Lenti, Harpsichord
Ripieno & Onstage Solo – Bradley Brookshire.
Joyce DiDonato's images were used a lot in promoting the opera.
This opera premiered in Venice in 1709, and over 300
years later, the Met is putting this on the first time this season. We saw the sixth performance.
Most of my prior exposure to Handel’s opera was with the
NYC Opera, and I had at best a lukewarm feel towards them. My encounter with Giulio Cesare at the Met
was mostly positive, if memory serves.
Tonight’s performance added to my appreciation of his work in the genre.
This is a comedy with a dash of humanity thrown in. All the characters have flaws, but they
try. No one dies. One could make the case that Agrippina deserves
to die, or at least punished severely, given how she is the instigator of all
the troubles, but she doesn’t. Instead
she reconciles with Claudio. The
real-life Agrippina became a domineering mother of Nero, and was eventually
murdered by him.
The opera is quite heavily promoted. It was relatively easy to include this opera
as part of our subscription as DiDonato is the headlined singer. The opera was quite enjoyable. Even one may expect such a story to be a
tragedy, as a comedy it also worked.
The story was originally set in Rome (Claudio died 54
AD), the Met production “updates the action to the current day: an era in which
sly posturing and questionable tactics continue to drive political discourse.” From that statement one might expect some
commentary on the current political situation; however, I didn’t get any of the
political satire the production team was trying to convey, if that was their
intention at all. The “update” allows
for regular costume of suits and dresses worn by the musicians. As far as the set was concerned, the center
piece is this flight of stairs at the top of which sits a throne. Columns are moved around the stage so it
would denote a palace, a courtyard, a bedroom, and other scenes. As a bedroom we have a painting of a woman’s
partial face that reminds me Warhol’s painting of Marilyn Monroe. Looks low budget, but provides the backdrop
for the singers to move around, and there are enough hard surfaces to help
project the singers voices. At the beginning and the end of the opera there are these tombs (with the characters' names on them). Not quite sure what they mean: the futility of it all?
The only visual reminder of Rome is the image of Romulus and Remus nursing at a wolf projected onto the curtain. Of course the origin of the myth is from around 750 BC.
The orchestra was on the small side, but dominated by the
two harpsichords, one played at times by the conductor, the second harpsichordist
was also on stage for a while, it was interesting to see a virtuoso
harpsichordist working. I overheard
someone complaining the harpsichords’ sound dominated the orchestra; there is
some truth to that. Also used were
period instruments the theorbo, the archlute (I thought it was simply a lute),
and the guitar. Overall the music was of
high caliber.
DiDonato didn’t disappoint, both as a singer and an
actor. Nerone was sung by a mezzo-soprano,
she also did well as an actress. A side
remark is many actors smoked, and in Nerone’s case also took drugs. Was that necessary? And all those middle fingers! Narcisco and Ottone are sung by countertenors. Altogether there are three men’s roles sung
by voices that cause confusion (for me).
The plot is a bit on the convoluted side, and not that easy to follow.
Curtain Call. From left: Narcisco, Claudio, Nerone, Agrippina, Maestro Bicket, Poppea, Ottone, Pallante, and Lesbo.
A couple of years ago I saw a Vivaldi opera at Zurich
opera. I was very impressed with how the
singers maintained their strong voices during the rapid runs typical of the
composer. Handel requires a similar
technique (think all those 16th notes in Messiah), here the singers
often didn’t quite measure up in that the could do that only in a softer
volume.
All in all a very enjoyable evening. We drove in, dinner was takeout eaten in car.
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