Il Trovatore is supposed to be opera’s most ludicrous libretto: nobody makes rational choices, it is difficult to understand if parents have their children’s welfare in mind, people commit gruesome crimes, there is a nonsensical war nobody really understands and one sometimes laughs of horrible things, even if the joke is on oneself. So, yes, on a second thought, you can’t help believing that real life must have a very poor libretto too. From that point of view, Adele Thomas’s new production for the Opernhaus Zürich (and the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden) has something refreshing about it. Although it looks dangerously close to Monty Python’s Jabberwocky – with medieval costumes, duh-gags, very silly choreographies and supposedly-on-purpose stock gestures, it does confront the audience with the question “is this really laughing stock?”. Leonora sings the Miserere surrounded among dismembered corpses and the closing scene’s grotesque is glaringly distasteful. Yes, on reading my own words here, I myself feel like watching it, although I have just seen it and – to be honest – there is a lot of room to improvement there. Ms. Thomas says in her interview she admires Shakespeare’s ability to mix comedy and drama – and reminds us that Verdi too was a great admirer of the Bard – but on watching this production, it doesn’t seem that this director shares with Shakespeare the ability she admires so much. The level of slapstick is so high – and the Personenregie obsessed with making every person on stage produce a movement corresponding to every note in the score is so fidgety – that the result is ultimately all over the place, failing to share the director’s sincere belief in this work.
The rather crude staging offered a strong contrast to Gianandrea Noseda’s almost too refined account of the score. The orchestra produced rich, full sounds of an almost Wagnerian quality. Yet the maestro was able to render all of Verdi’s discreet little touches often overseen but essential to show you that the image of “the big guitar” orchestration is rather the result of bad conducting. However, a truly efficient performance of Il Trovatore must have something raw, something punchy about it, a splash of garish, with really loud anvils and exhilarating tempi in all those dramatic confrontations. It simply sounds dull with the Brahms Requiem approach. That said, I still prefer what Mr. Noseda has done this evening to what he did years ago at the Met in a performance where his single concern seemed to be helping the cast. Curiously, at least in terms of orchestral volume, that didn’t seem to be the case this evening, although this cast was consistently lighter in tone and power than his singers in New York (an old timer might say that the NY cast was already light compared to what one would hear in an opera like this in the 50’s and 60’s).
Marina Rebeka is a singer I first knew as faultless Mozartian – and “Mozartian” was an adjective I would use to speak about her even when she was singing 19th century repertoire. I can’t say if this is positive or negative, but she didn’t make me think of Mozart at all this evening. Her voice did not sound instrumental, but vibrant in a fast-vibrato-ish way, her low register not always truly connected to the rest of her voice (and often hard to hear) and mezza voce essentially non-functional. On the positive side, for a singer often accused of coldness, she delivered her text with theatrical awareness and, given her non-Mozartian mood, often chose passion over subtlety. She predictably shone in passages involving coloratura, where most sopranos just make do. The casting of Agnieszka Rehlis made me think of some old Italian recordings where the Azucena was clearly a contralto stretched with Verdi’s demands of exposed dramatic high notes. Ms. Rehlis’s mastery of the passaggio and absolutely natural low register seem to be the hallmark of a true contralto – she never needed to overcharge her chest resonance to be heard over the orchestra. Her voice is spontaneously dark and rich. Maybe that is why she felt comfortable for the filigree rarely heard in Stride la vampa. Nonetheless, forceful as her acuti were, they felt stretched and bottled up (what is expected of a contralto in a role truly in the mezzo soprano range). And Azucena must feel like a force of nature, it must be an overwhelming voice. It has to peel the paint off the walls, I’m afraid.
Manrico is not a role I would expect to see in Piotr Beczala’s repertoire. I had seen this Polish tenor sing Verdi before – Ballo in Maschera in Berlin some years ago. Back then – well as he sang, he sounded like a lyric tenor in a role a couple of sizes larger for him, the voice too velvety to pierce through in the most exposed passages and a bit short of metal in the extreme high notes. His Manrico still sounds like Alfredo Germont’s walk on the wild side but I’m not sure if that – in a small theatre as the opera house in Zurich – is a negative thing. Manrico is supposed to be a teenager – and Mr. Beczala’s dulcet tone, ease with mezza voce, honeyed legato suggest youth and vulnerability. Truth be said, his voice now is a bit richer than it was in his Riccardo in Berlin and, taken in consideration all nips and tucks, he offered a very decent Di quella pira. It didn’t feel heroic at all, but he delivered the short notes nobody cares to sing and even articulated the ”-mi” in the end of his final, interpolated “all’armi”. I had never heard Quinn Kelsey before and I am frankly puzzled by what I heard. His was probably the most natural voice in this performance – it is unforcedly large, firm and also pleasant… for a Mozart baritone. If he were indeed singing the role of the Count Almaviva, then the clarity, the cleanliness, the straightforwardness – the very long breath – would all have been praiseworthy. Mr Kelsey often sang in a pop-like voice, almost short of resonance, tended to phrase with restricted legato, showing a fondness for offering key notes in a straight-tone. Maybe I’m too used to Italian baritones who deliver an aria like Il balen with an increasing, seamless curve of vibrancy and richness, maybe he was not in a good day. I would need to hear him again to say something.
I would have preferred a more focused, Italianate tone than what we heard from the singer in the part of Fernando, but Bozena Bujnicka offered something more attractive what what we usually find in the small part of Ines. The chorus sang with the right balance between animation and homogeneity, sometimes a bit ahead of the conductor’s beat.
I HEAR VOICES 
Maybe it was an off night for Kelsey. It’s not a rip roaring sound but I thought his Verdi performances at the met largely but his colleagues on stage with him to shame, including a Trovatore. And that’s a much bigger house. Whether he would have sung this rep in decades prior with the completion that existed is a reasonable question, but definitely try and catch him again if you can.
This cast and conductor sound like one I would be very happy to see. Piotr hasn’t thrilled me in each of his heavier roles, but he’s getting pretty old and it’s pretty remarkable that he’s kept his voice in such pristine condition. I get a different Marina Rebeka every time I see her, but I imagine she’d do this role about as well as anyone.
A friend who saw him as Rigoletto here said he could barely recognize his voice this time, so maybe it was indeed an off night. He sounded almost like a musical theatre baritone. One could feel that there was more in that voice, but it remained a matter of guessing. He didn’t look very happy in that production either.
Rebeka is a singer I’m always curious about. And, yes, when I think about it, as I’ve seen her in very different roles, I guess I got a different version of her every time I saw her too.
Beczala is the classic case of someone who decided to be a star. A great deal of what he’s been doing since he was promoted to stardom is clearly less interesting compared to what he used to do before. The Lohengrin was probably the big exception. He was still a bit light for the part, but who cares? It was really beautifully sung. In any case, that was a direction that seemed more reasonable in terms of vocal nature than parts for a tenore di forza, something he is not.
Yes I agree about Beczala being someone who decided to be a star. I guess at this point if he’s going to sing these roles it would have to be now. It is kind of amazing in a way how well he stills these roles and in general and this point. His Ricardo was for me a huge surprise. And I loved the Lohengrin. But the artistic persona as such has kind of become more calculated. Anyway.
Rebeka impressed me greatly (and much to my surprised) with her Norma. I thought she was the best of the met trio in 2017, getting a lot farther musically and dramatically than either Sondra R. and Angela Meade, both of whom maybe had voices more typical in the role. In general her ventures into heavier Italian roles have impressed me. And can occasionally surprise dramatically. But I have to admit that while she was objectively well schooled and impressive early on, I didn’t really think she *that* great. Frittoli was the Elvira and her voice was in general poor-ish condition by that point. But she gave the classier performance and came over more effectively. Rebeka seemed REALLY green.
Beczala has a solid technique rather than one of those voices that work even if you use it wrongly – and he had his Mozart days to show us he is not operating on instrument flight rules. He didn’t give me the impression of forcing his voice at all as Manrico. When it was not enough, we were left wanting and that was it, what ultimately is better for all involved. I also can see the rationale behind his choice: if he had stuck to a Wunderlich repertoire, he would make less money. Wunderlich himself was not a star – and sometimes you really need the money, I guess.
As for Rebeka, as I said, I first saw her as an immaculate Donna Anna. That is so rare that I really forgave her a certain blandness of interpretation. For a while, it seemed she would remain in the Stimmdiva niche, but it seems she had a different idea. In the end, it’s praiseworthy that she was able to find her way in the Italian repertoire. It is just a voice the gravitation center if it is higher than some of the roles she has been singing – and she has her huffing and puffing moments in the lower register. That said, this is something we can say if many singers in Verdi roles.