OPERA
Winter Journeys in Song and Opera
Heartbeat Opera, DiDonato & Nézet-Séguin, and NYFOS
BY DAVID SHENGOLD
Despite an often-enchanting
score, “Der Freischuetz”
by Carl Maria
von Weber has never taken
root outside of German-speaking
countries because of its rather
parochial village milieu. Louisa
Proske and Chloë Treat’s production
at the always-fascinating
Heartbeat Opera (seen December
14 at Baruch University’s black
box theater) transposed it to gunhappy
Trump-era West Texas,
with an emphasis on toxic masculinity.
Mostly this worked very
well, though for young American
performers the chance to channel
contemporary vernacular dialogue
can prove both a liberation and a
trap and occasionally did so here.
But the ensemble playing — especially
given doubled leading roles
— compelled respect.
Daniel Schlosberg’s inventive
arrangement for seven players did
remarkable justice to Weber (cellist
Clare Monfredo notably eloquent in
“Und ob die Wolke”). His and William
Gardiner’s electronic gloss on
the demonic, infl uential Wolf Glen
(here “Wolf Canyon”) scene brought
forth duly weird special effects that
actually brought this tough scene
off. The performance artist azumi
O E made a novel, scary Butoh-infl
ected Samiel, the piece’s resident
devil.
In budding Heldentenor Ian Koziara,
Heartbeat had a world-class
Max, idiomatic, musical, and comfortable
at all dynamic levels who
should also be appearing in this
part (and Wagner’s Erik and Froh)
on international stages. Summer
Hassan fi elded a beautiful, stilldeveloping
voice with a pulse in
Agathe’s lovely music, which anticipates
Wagner’s Elsa and Elisabeth.
There is much promise here.
An engaging actor, light bass
Derrell Acon handled Kaspar’s
music deftly in the small venue.
Quentin Oliver Lee, solid enough
as Max’s rival and chief pesterer
Kilian, proved — dramatically and
vocally — utterly commanding as
Ottakar, here the state governor.
Derrell Acon’s Kaspar tempts Ian Koziara’s Max in Heartbeart Opera’s production of Carl Maria von
Weber’s “Der Freischuetz.:
The four Bridesmaids — also
handling the female chorus parts
— sang delightfully. Among them,
soprano Claire Leyden motivated
absolutely every move and utterance
to a degree rare in opera.
She’ll sing the lead — created by
Frances Alda — in Victor Herbert’s
1914 Met opera “Madeleine” at
Christ & St. Stephen’s Episcopal
Church in early March.
The denouement of “Freischuetz,”
in which a Hermit (gifted
AVA student Eric Delagrange, with
a really fi ne bass voice that he
tends to overdrive) absolves the
guilty Max of wrongdoing basically
because he’s “one of us,” can play
uneasily. Proske and Treat smartly
made the Hermit a fantasy double
of Max; early in the opera he’d been
so persecuted by the village that
he here turned — at the prospect
of exile and losing Agathe — into
an unhinged mass shooter, contravening
Weber’s heavenly lilting
fi rst fi nale. The opera’s unfamiliarity
may, however, have worked
against most spectators grasping
this revisionist solution.
The company tackles Verdi’s
“Macbeth” in Brooklyn in May.
Revered locally for work in
many other kinds of music, Joyce
DiDonato and Yannick Nézet-
Séguin daringly jumped into the
RUSS ROWLAND
Schubert Lieder pool in the deep
end, programming “Die Winterreise”
December 15 at Carnegie Hall.
The mezzo proved in particularly
fi ne, largely mellow vocal form, and
Nézet-Séguin showed himself to be
an excellent collaborative pianist,
only once or twice turning up the
volume over-emphatically in postludes.
DiDonato, never one to hew to
tradition for its own sake, enacted
the cycle in a dramatic concept
that sounded intriguing but somewhat
spurious in advance: instead
of embodying the abandoned lover,
she positioned herself — via projected
titles and her stance at a
table, reading — as the recipient
of her erstwhile suitor’s letters. By
and large, she pulled it off through
subtle movements and infl ections.
The one downside was that we
didn’t always get to see her expressive
eyes, focused as they were on
the letters. But when she fi nally got
up and embodied the wrenching fi -
nal “Leiermann” from the beloved’s
point of view, it was a moving coup
de théâtre. For one whose only signifi
cant German roles — and not
frequent ones — have been Richard
Strauss’ Octavian and Komponist,
she treated the text with care and
subtlety. A colleague complained
about her opera house level volume;
but not everyone in Carnegie
Hall is in orchestra press seats and
people up top do like to hear!
It was salutary to see a huge
hall full — and with many young
people, a rarity at most Lieder recitals
— for an afternoon of a stern
Schubert cycle. Whether or not any
“Winterreise” belongs on Carnegie
mainstage is a separate issue. For
those unconvinced by the gambit,
the great Peter Mattei brings it to
Zankel January 31. Meanwhile,
the JDD/YN-S collaboration is
viewable on line for months (at tinyurl.
com/yx3wygkd ) and highly
recommended. Let’s hope they can
fi nd their way to offering some
more Schubert Lieder locally, as
this was such a fi ne afternoon musically.
Merkin Hall hosts New York
Festival of Song’s always questing
concerts. November 19’s event
proved particularly intriguing. Redoubtable
artistic director Steven
Blier presented the major musical
numbers from two short, politically
aware music theater works by
composers whose careers became
interlinked: Kurt Weill’s 1933 “Der
Silbersee” and Marc Blitzstein’s
1941 “No For An Answer.” Blier
and associate artistic director Michael
Barrett accompanied, sometimes
solo and sometimes duo.
The two works confounded my expectations:
Weill’s allegorical fable
proved pleasant but rather generic,
but Blitzstein — whose agit-prop
“The Cradle Will Rock” I’ve always
resisted — created in “No For An
Answer” a fascinating portrait of a
working class immigrant community
and also of a diffi cult upper
class marriage. The songs showed
unexpected depth and narrative
surprises and were very moving,
making one want to see the show
sensitively cast and staged.
Sari Gruber showed acute skills
as a singing actress; the lower and
middle parts of her distinctive instrument
still function beautifully.
An experienced crossover performer,
Rebecca Jo Loeb brought a
well-modulated mezzo and mean-
➤ OPERA, continued on p.25
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