May 05, 2008

Troy to Remember

In years to come, Sunday's big, blazing, two-concert, five-hours-plus-a-dinner-break, season-ending account of Berlioz's Les Troyens by the Boston Symphony Orchestra will probably not acquire quite the "I was there, man" stature of, say, James Brown's 1968 show at the Garden, but it certainly felt like an event, certainly the biggest event yet of James Levine's tenure as music director, and certainly one of the biggest events in Boston classical music in quite a while. It was, in fact, enough of an occasion that I think the BSO could have raked in some extra cash selling commemorative, rock-tour-style t-shirts.


I totally would have bought one of those.

Whenever Levine conducts music he really loves, he gets more energetic, as if the performance is a generator that he's plugging into. So it's worth noting that he was as kinetic as I've ever seen him in Boston. Levine did right by the opera in casting: the only qualm was Marcello Giordani, who ran out of steam in the fifth act—more shouting than singing—but even he was impressive for four-fifths of the day, giving Aeneas a ringing charisma. Anne Sofie von Otter's mezzo-soprano is perhaps a touch ethereal for Dido, but she didn't try and compete with the orchestra, instead confidently drawing the drama to her, with a stage presence and an unfailingly intelligent musicality that anchored the human dimension of Part II. (This was a fun-loving queen, too, if her exuberant toe-tapping during Act IV's dances of Egyptian girls and slaves was any indication.) Her two duets, with Giordani and with (I predict) future star Christin Marie-Hill, as Dido's sister Anna, were ideal demonstrations of Berlioz's penchant for grand-scale intimacy.

Eric Cutler was a crowd favorite, negotiating Iopas's song with ease. I also liked Philippe Castagner's ardent memories of Troy at the opening of Act V, after which David Kravitz and James Courtney held their own in the opera's only bit of comic relief, wishing to stay in Carthage for reasons far less exalted than Aeneas. The comparatively terse spectacle of Part I doesn't offer as much opportunity for vocal treasure—Yvonne Naëf, as Cassandra, sang through a head cold—but as Chorebus, Dwayne Croft's trombone-like baritone ideally suited his ardent, persistent rationalization of Cassandra's warnings. (It struck me that Part I is, in a way, an enormous proof of the rule that one's fiancée is always right.)

In the midst of some ravishingly meticulous sounds from the orchestra, the surprise was how much power they were able to unleash: from the second balcony, parts of Part I were possibly the loudest things I've ever heard in Symphony Hall. The playing not only demonstrated the depth of the BSO, but the depth of Boston's freelance community, as the stage doors kept drawing open to reveal yet another offstage ensemble. The orchestra has an institutional affinity for Berlioz that somehow gets passed down in Lamarckian fashion, but Les Troyens is a horse of a different color, as it were; the performance seemed to mark the transition from Levine's honeymoon period into a new era at the BSO.

A century-and-a-half on, Berlioz's stubborn ambition still causes polarized reactions. I've been on a real music-and-cinema tear lately, which explains my latest hypothesis: being a fan of Berlioz is strongly correlated with being a fan of David Lean movies. If you're the type that responds to the luxurious pace and painterly compositions of Doctor Zhivago or The Bridge on the River Kwai by wishing that David would just get on with the story already, you're probably best off sticking with Rossini. But if your idea of a good time is rearranging your work schedule to make room for a two-hour drive to catch a screening of a 70mm print of Lawrence of Arabia, then Hector's your man. Les Troyens is the Lawrence of Arabia of operas; there might be grander or even longer operas in the repertoire, but none of them can quite match Berlioz's magnum opus in the way it uses its epic pace and canvas to draw you in, to give you the room to absorb atmosphere and notice detail, to shape the human drama with such richly-apportioned care.

One last thought, for any and all prospective divas out there: do you think you can pull off a regal presence while wearing what is essentially a purple silk bathrobe? Because Anne Sofie von Otter can. Let that be the standard to which you aspire.

8 comments:

Civic Center said...

Great writing as usual but I'm afraid I don't agree with one of your analogies, since I can't stand bloated David Lean movies (anything after his two Dickens films) and adore Berlioz, particularly "Les Troyens." I envy you the concert.

tjarrett said...

What a wonderful review of the concert. I have to ask a leading question, though: what did you think of the chorus?

Matthew said...

sfmike: Well, it is just a hypothesis. Maybe it's not a commutative property: Lean—>Berlioz, but not necessarily Berlioz—>Lean. (Of course, now that I've proposed that, no doubt someone will turn up who hates Berlioz but LOVED Ryan's Daughter.)

Tim: I did neglect to mention the TFC, didn't I? My bad! I thought you sounded thrilling overall. There were times in Part I when, to my ear, the women and, to a certain extent, the tenors were trying to pump out too much volume, and the vowels started to spread and the tone became a little flat, not in intonation so much as resonance—the higher partials just getting squeezed out of the sound. But Part II? Great stuff. And the diction was knife-edge sharp all day.

S said...

Do you mind if I use your image to make some T-Shirts at Cafe Press?

Or would you do so yourself so I can buy one? ;-)

Civic Center said...

You mean there was somebody who LOVED "Ryan's Daughter?" Now that's a scary thought. Excuse me while I get in my boat and found a new civilization. "Italie! Italie! Italie!"

rbonotto said...

Matt:

Sounds great, but you missed another type of great concert across town -- the NY-based American Festival of Microtonal Music hit Boston with two concerts Saturday and Sunday, and the Sunday night one featured Joshua Pierce and Dave Eggar, the latter as both 'cellist and 'actor' in a microtonal version of the Odysseus legend, complete with shamran, bagpipes, organ, dancers, singers, and a multitude of 50 instruments, conducted by Johnny Reinhard. It was at the St. Paul's at Park Street, and I had a great time. Don't know when or if they'll be back. There were also work by Chiari, Vick, and Ekimovsky's "Balletto," which featured Reinhard conducting the orchestra like an Italian interpreter (including kicking motions). I think you and Moe would have a great, if slightly disconcerted, time.

Matthew said...

s: Let me mull that over—at the very least, I'd want to spend more than five minutes on the design. (I mean, what exactly is going on with the perspective on that horse, anyway?)

Robert: I know, it was on my radar; I was working Saturday, and Sunday, well, suffice to say I had my tickets for that one months in advance. Next season for sure. (I kept missing all the BMS concerts this year, too.)

Lisa Hirsch said...

Chiming in to say: I'll take the horse too if you print up t-shirts.