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The Telegraph, 07 Apr 2015 |
By John Allison |
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Mascagni: Cavalleria rusticana, Leoncavallo: Pagliacci, Salzburg, 28. März 2015
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Cavalleria Rusticana/Pagliacci, Salzburg Easter Festival, review: 'thrilling' |
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Jonas Kaufmann was on stellar form – twice – in this 'Cav&Pag' double bill, says John Allison |
Italian verismo at the Salzburg Easter Festival? It may not be the
first combination that comes to mind, but the celebrated Easter Hymn
in Cavalleria Rusticana does make Mascagni’s opera natural
programming here.
Coupled, as per tradition, with
Leoncavallo’s opera Pagliacci – and boasting casts led by the star
tenor Jonas Kaufmann (in his double-role debuts as Turiddu and
Canio) under the uber-conductor Christian Thielemann – this popular
double bill has helped the festival to post its best figures since
2002.
As both a stage and film director, Philipp Stölzl
reflects in his productions on how cinema usurped opera’s place in
the popular imagination of Italy a century ago. Dividing the stage
into six segments and mixing live video into the picture, he
references the era of black-and-white movies and also Caruso’s first
best-selling record – “Vesti la giubba” from Pagliacci.
A
northern European expressionism replaces the original Sicilian
settings, making Mascagni’s “rustic chivalry” something more urban.
In the Leoncavallo, meanwhile, the transatlantic style of the artist
Lyonel Feininger is never far away, a reminder that it was in New
York that “Cav and Pag” were immortally paired for the first time.
Cutting back and forth between the simultaneous scenes, Stölzl
captures the essential claustrophobia. His are surely among the most
original and meticulously detailed stagings in the performance
history of these pieces.
As lover in “Cav” and cuckold in
“Pag”, Kaufmann is on ardent, Italianate form. He is joined in the
Mascagni by Liudmyla Monastyrska, a Santuzza of warmth and thrilling
amplitude; Ambrogio Maestri as a hulking mafioso figure of an Alfio;
Annalisa Stroppa as a seductive Lola; and the veteran Stefania
Toczyska as Mamma Lucia.
In Leoncavallo’s opera, Dimitri
Platanias brings a smooth baritone and keen dramatic intelligence to
Tonio, and Maria Agresta her mettlesome soprano to Nedda.
This popular success represents a grand finale for the outgoing
Intendant, Peter Alward, the former president of EMI Classics who
has rescued the festival from the twin blows of financial scandal
and artistic shame – the latter, at least, looked likely when Simon
Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic waltzed off to Baden-Baden in
2013.
Alward’s coup was to sign up Thielemann and the Dresden
Staatskapelle in their place, and the Dresdeners surpass themselves
here with their golden sound.
Thielemann’s hot-blooded
interpretations give him another chance to prove himself in Italian
opera, something he is returning to after years of being
pigeon-holed as a Straussian and Wagnerian.
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