Carmen is arguably the most popular opera in the repertoire – and I have often asked myself why. I don’t mean that as a snob, I like Carmen. What I mean is: what in it that makes it so appealing? Unlike Nietzsche, I don’t feel driven to life after watching to hour of abuse and murder of a woman just because there are Mediterranean rhythms around it. But Nietzsche was not really off the mark. My father, for instance, disliked opera in general because he found it “gloomy”. So when he asked me to make an opera playlist for him, he said “please nothing sad or somber – choose something from Carmen!” As a matter of fact, even Carmen’s murder scene isn’t gloomy at all – she dies triumphantly, we hear the cheering from the corrida de toros on the background. Then there is the reinstatement of the grand fateful musical motive of Carmen and Don José’s first scene before Bizet quickly ends it.
A great share of the reason why the audience sees Carmen as “uplifting” is its “Spanish” setting – the reason for the inverter commas is the fact that there is not one Spanish artist involved in the creation of Carmen. Merimée, Meilhac, Halévy and Bizet are very much French. So how Spanish Carmen really is? I guess Spaniards may consider it convincing enough, if a bit on the folkloric side. And this is why I was curious about Calixto Bieito’s 1999 production, since 2017 in use in the Paris Opera. Bieito is Spanish – and seems to have made a point of cleaning the story of mantillas, peinetas and fans by placing it at the 1970’s or 1980’s. It is an old production and it is therefore difficult to know what remains from the director’s original ideas, but I have to say that I was disappointed by what I saw. As far as I can tell, this is a traditional production of Carmen without the mantillas, the peinetas and the fans. I don’t know, considering Bieito’s reputation of shaking the audience from their bourgeois sensibilities, this came dangerously close to a show for tourists. Maybe we’ll still have to wait for a Spanish woman director to bring us closer to the work’s Spanish-ness (or lack thereof),
I find it impossible to assess a musical performance in the Opéra Bastille’s horrendous acoustics. I dream that his building – an architectonic eyesore, to make things even worse – share the fate of the building that stood at the same location until 1789. As it is, all I can say about Fabien Gabel’s conducting is that he made all the sensible choices in circumstances like that: in a hall where the orchestral sound never blooms, what’s the point of lingering? He pressed forward in a way that did not make his singers’ lives difficult, helped his light-voiced cast as much as he could and tried to cope with a rather unruly chorus. In the end, it felt like a glittery, superficial and not truly moving account of this story and this music. Maybe I have been spoiled by too many performances of Carmen with German orchestras in decent acoustics, and it makes a hell of a difference!
It is unthinkable that a French mezzo soprano with Gaëlle Arquez’s voice, acting skills and physique do not sing the title role in Carmen. Indeed, her voice is warm and appealing and she phrases with unfailing elegance. What she does goes beyond good diction; she colors the text, stresses the right syllables in a way that makes it crispy and meaningful, always in exemplary style. This alone made this performance worth the detour, even if in the end of the day, one cannot really say that the role is close to her personality. There is something vulnerable and poised in Ms. Arquez’s vocal and stage presence that suggests rather a Werther’s Charlotte than a factory girl who’s not afraid to use her knife. In a way, Adriana Gonzalez’s Micaela sounded less fragile in comparison. She has an Angela Gheorghiu-like veiled soprano with exquisite floated high mezza voce, a strong lower register and some full high notes. There were tiny glitches here and there: unfocused patches and some miscalculation with breath support. Yet this did not spoiled the audience’s good impression of her.
Michael Spyres started off as Don José at his most Gedda-ish, but curiously from his aria on.adopted a darkened barítonas tone that projected less efficiently. Only in the last scene – the most difficult for a lighter tenor – he sensibly shifted to a brighter sound for exposed high notes. Predictably, his was a stylish performance, sung in excellent French, if a bit short in slancio. Lucas Meachum falls the slot of singers who find the part of Escamillo a tad low-lying and somehow lacks a bit alpha male exuberance, but other than this offered a commendable performance. Among the small roles, I must single out Andrea Cueva Molnar as one of the best Frasquitas I have ever heard,
I HEAR VOICES 
Again, glad you went. Would like to go hear Adriana González sometime. These Strauss songs are excellent – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKoAMdU-6oc
– I always thought it was Bizet’s orchestration that made this opera so special; as you write, that orchestration is most appreciated with a 1st class orchestra with favorable acoustics — that is until I went to see Victoria de los Ángeles sing it on a very good night. She didn’t have a “Carmen” personality either (she was also more of a Charlotte) but from where I was sitting in the front by the pit she seemed to make some kind of telepathic communication; the entire performance was dominated by her warm, almost maternal magnetic stage persona. That was about 50 years ago. She sang it with much more elegance & subtlety than I hear nowadays on broadcasts. No, I never went back to see Carmen again. She was the one and only forever beloved Carmen for me.
Hi, Jerold!
1 – I’ll check the clip with Adriana González. Thanks!
2 – I guess that Carmen is such an easy money for opera houses that they hardly ever really try. The best Carmen the I’ve ever seen was predictably a festival performance. But curiously the first time I really noticed the orchestra was ages ago in Leipzig. And the chorus with a lifetime experience with Bach made everything sound fresh and clear. It was a revelation!
3 – I guess that Carmen is a role done with so much exaggeration that a little restraint is always welcome. The thing is that, differently from de Los Angeles, Arquez is not Spanish, and somehow I have the impression that she felt compelled to try the whole set of clichés (especially in the context of a production with a Spanish director). She did it well, within the limits of her personality, but I would bet she would have done it differently if she had a choice. I’m speaking here of acting – vocally she was comme il faut. One could say that card-reading scene would have benefited from more spacious low notes – but the Carmens who shine there usually suffer in the end.
So true about the card scene vs. the final duet. Before I saw de los Ángeles I went to see Carmen at NYCO with a soprano as Carmen. Despite the lack of resonance in the lowest notes of the card scene, her final scene was riveting – all I could think of was Brünhilde’s oubursts in the 2nd act of Götterdämmerung.