Berlioz and Nagano: Beauty & Frustration at Place des Arts

by Paul E. Robinson

The Berlioz Requiem requires an enormous orchestra with extra brass and percussion. It's a costly work to undertake and is necessarily a rarity on the concert circuit. Over the years, nevertheless, I have had the good fortune to hear a fair number of performances; the two best I ever heard – or expect to hear – were both conducted by the same man: Seiji Ozawa.

The first Ozawa rendition I heard was in Salzburg with the Orchestre de Paris and the second at Tanglewood with the Boston Symphony. On both occasions Ozawa effortlessly coordinated the four required brass groups situated around the hall. He not only achieved monumental and thrilling climaxes, but also captured the ethereal quality of the work which is its dominant characteristic.

Since Kent Nagano was at one time Ozawa’s assistant in Boston, I expected great things from Nagano’s own performance of the Requiem this week at Place des Arts in Montreal. I was disappointed, but I don’t think the fault was entirely, or even primarily, Nagano’s.

I have come to believe that music reviewers should begin their reports by stating the location of their seats. The same concert can sound very different depending on seat location. This is especially true of a work like the Berlioz Requiem. Berlioz’ concept was for a large chorus and orchestra to be positioned in their usual places on stage, with four brass groups stationed around the hall. In Place des Arts, for this performance, there were brass ensembles placed on either side of the main floor (Parterre). The other two groups were placed at the first balcony level (Corbeille) at the very front of the two aisles. Anyone sitting on the ground floor about half way back probably got a very good sense of what Berlioz had in mind.

In the Dies Irae movement – specifically, the section called Tuba mirum ("Wondrous sound the trumpet flingeth") – the brass groups let loose a barrage of fanfares suggesting the majesty and terror of the day of judgement. Berlioz’ music is cleverly conceived to be at once powerful, awe-inspiring, and conflicted. If one is fortunate enough to have a seat more or less equidistant from each of the musical groups, the effect makes your hair stand on end. Unfortunately, my seat was in one of the worst locations for an ideal appreciation of these wondrous happenings - just a few feet away from one of the Corbeille brass groups. I heard this group just fine, but not as part of the whole, and so missed the intended effect. For me, and quite possibly for many of the people in my section, this ‘isolated’ effect was simply annoying and unpleasant!

But after all, these quadraphonic effects are really a small, if extraordinary, part of the Berlioz Requiem. Elsewhere in the piece, Nagano achieved an exquisite lyricism. The choir, prepared by guest chorus master Michael Zaugg, gave him nearly everything he wanted. In later performances the sopranos will probably do better with their first entry than they did on opening night.

The members of the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal (OSM) played impeccably, with flutist Timothy Hutchins performing miracles of breath control. Those famous flute/trombone chords are always treacherous in terms of intonation but the OSM musicians nailed most of them spot-on.

I have already blamed my seat location for some problems with the Dies Irae, but other weaknesses have to be laid at the feet of the hall’s dreadful acoustics and/or Kent Nagano’s direction.

Berlioz’ score for the Requiem calls for eight sets of timpani. There were only four in this performance. Nonetheless, even four timpanists can produce a bigger sound than I heard in this performance. The effect here was one of four grown men beating on tubs of marshmallows. Totally ineffectual. As for the soft cymbal strokes – a magical touch in this work and one which Wagner borrowed in Lohengrin – Nagano apparently added a Dada-esque mime episode to the Requiem. One percussionist was seen to rub two large cymbals together - but not a sound was heard. In the Salzburg Ozawa performance mentioned earlier, each of the eight timpanists executed the delicate swish with a small pair of cymbals and the sound was both exotic and otherworldly.

With a new hall for the OSM already under construction, complaints about the old one are admittedly a waste of breath. Best to talk about what Place des Arts acoustics do provide. For soft singing and playing, they are acceptable and much of the Requiem is comprised of quiet music. A case in point was the Sanctus, played and sung as beautifully as one is likely ever to hear it. Tenor Michael Schade was wisely brought down to the front of the stage for his solo. Had he been stuck back in the chorus, he might have burst a blood vessel trying to make himself heard. Nagano’s tempo was expansive, but Schade filled out the phrases with beautiful and meaningful sound.

The performance apart, I was quite taken with Dujka Smoje’s programme notes. I hope members of the audience took time to read them. They are somewhat academic, but enormously thought-provoking. I don’t recall ever hearing Berlioz’ Grande Messe des Morts described as “an atheist’s mass,” but Smoje has a point. He argues that the Requiems of Verdi and Brahms could be similarly described, and he might have added Britten (War Requiem).

So why did all these great composers use traditional liturgical texts if they didn’t believe a word of them? Smoje argues that “the religious frame is only a pretext for the reconciliation with the finitude of man.” It is not necessary to be a Christian to reflect on the mysteries of life and death, good and evil, and the human condition. Believers of all faiths - and philosophers too - have been preoccupied with these matters for centuries. The true believers more often embrace firm and comforting conclusions. Philosophers and composers like Berlioz, Brahms, Verdi, Britten and Mahler go on wrestling with the questions. The words of the last movement of the Berlioz Requiem – the Agnus Dei – speak of paradise and eternal peace, but the music is not quite so reassuring.

Paul E. Robinson is the author of Herbert von Karajan: the Maestro as Superstar, and Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music, both available at Amazon.com.

Knowlton Festival 2009: The Incomparable Sumi Jo in Bellini’s La Sonnambula

by Paul E. Robinson

Kent Nagano (photo: above) is music director not only of the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal (OSM), but also of the Bavarian State Opera. His operatic interests are broad and all-encompassing, and he is always looking for new challenges.

For the Knowlton Festival, Nagano has chosen to focus on one particular aspect of operatic literature, the so-called bel canto composers who flourished in Italy in the early part of the nineteenth century. Nagano’s interest in this music paid great dividends last year with very good performances of Bellini’s Norma. This year we heard another Bellini opera, La Sonnambula (The Sleepwalker), dating from 1831. Again, Nagano delivered the goods.

La Sonnambula and much else in the bel canto repertoire has been mercilessly parodied by Gilbert and Sullivan. The stories are silly and the music too often begins to sound like the same simple-minded patterns repeated over and over. These operas also became corrupted by self-promoting divas who took the elaborate ornamentation to the realm of total absurdity with their own interpolations. In recent years singers of the stature of Maria Callas, Joan Sutherland and others showed that when one makes a real effort to get back to what the composers intended, many of these operas can be seen in a new and positive light.

Festival Celebrates Unique Beauty of Classic Bel Canto
Nagano is doing for the bel canto operas what the period instrument specialists have been doing for music from earlier periods. He is searching for the correct style of singing and orchestral playing. He has discovered that Bellini’s operas are less like early Verdi and more like what came before in Schubert and Mozart. This means toning down the bombast and easing up on the vibrato, especially in the string playing. It also means shortening the notes. The result is that the Bellini orchestra becomes a somewhat more robust classical or Mozart orchestra. Similarly, the singing is scaled back to become more lyrical and far more intimate.

The Knowlton Festival has become the summer home of the OSM but even this fine, hard-working ensemble has limits in the number of services it can provide. For La Sonnambula the OSM is replaced by a ‘Festival Orchestra,’ made up of some of Québec’s finest free-lance players. I have no idea how much rehearsal was needed, but the results were very fine indeed. The Festival Orchestra responded to Nagano’s meticulous direction as if they had been playing together for years.

Sumi Jo Heads Cast of Consummate Bel Canto Stars
Performances of La Sonnambula are usually mounted as vehicles for star sopranos. There is no doubt that without a first-rate singer in the role of Amina, the production is unlikely to be successful. At last year’s festival, Sumi Jo (photo: right) was sensational in a concert of operatic excerpts and this year she easily topped that appearance. Her virtuosity was nearly impeccable and her soft singing, exquisite. In the tradition of the finest bel canto artists, she is able to use the ornamentation to convey the feeling of the moment, whether it be joy or sadness or something in between.

She was not alone. Nagano had chosen a superb cast, each of whom was well-schooled in bel canto style. Tenor Barry Banks has technical challenges of his own in the role of Elvino and tossed them off without any difficulty. Riccardo Zanellato as Rodolfo was a commanding presence and cultivated a conversational style of singing perfectly suited to the role. There wasn’t a weak link in this fine cast and the OSM Chorus, functioning in the opera much of the time as a sort of Greek chorus – G & S had a field day with this kind of thing – were precise and animated.

Simple, Effective Staging and Surtitles Enrich Concert Version
This performance was a concert version of the opera with some effective bits of staging by François Racine. Another positive element was the surtitles system set up behind the chorus. The texts, in both French and English, were large enough to be easily read from the back of the tent and always related to what was being sung. We may take surtitles for granted in opera performances but in fact this job must be put in the hands of a highly-skilled professional. In so doing, the Knowlton Festival team enormously enriched the experience for its audience.

A second performance of La Sonnambula is scheduled for Saturday, August 15. Anyone with the slightest interest in opera, bel canto, and great sopranos should be there. At press time, there were a few seats available but when the word gets out about what Sumi Jo, Kent Nagano and their colleagues are up to in Knowlton, those who delay buying tickets may well be disappointed.

Paul E. Robinson is the author of Herbert von Karajan: the Maestro as Superstar, and Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music, both available at Amazon.com.

Knowlton Festival 2009: Rising Stars and Heroic Strauss

By Paul E. Robinson

Knowlton was awash with tourists and classical music-lovers this weekend. The tourists are a familiar sight in these parts, drawn by the beauty of the location, the antique stores and boutiques selling lavender products and a tempting variety of other country fare. The music-lovers, however, are a relatively new phenomenon, attracted by the Knowlton Festival. On the basis of what I have heard so far I don’t think they would be disappointed.

At its Saturday evening concert in the Chapiteau (photo above: bar area) the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal (OSM) under Kent Nagano offered another lyrical and transparent Brahms performance – this time the Fourth Symphony – and earlier in the day there was some fine singing to be heard in two different locations.

Cagli's Master Class an Education in Bel Canto Technique

The morning event was held in the charming Old Brick Church in West Brome. Bruno Cagli (photo: right), the president of the distinguished Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, presented a master class in bel canto with some young singers he had brought with him from Italy. In fact, these singers were already pretty accomplished in bel canto and Cagli spent less time teaching them and more time educating the audience of about 200 – a full house in this intimate setting – in the “rules” of bel canto.

Cagli took his captivated audience through the history of singing, with particular emphasis on nineteenth century composers, including Rossini, Donizetti, Bellini and Tosti, and some of the most renowned singers from that period. There was also considerable talk about breathing and ‘proper’ voice production. Each of the singers contributed very good performances. One of them, tenor Antonio Poli, sounded like a major talent. All of them will be heard again during the festival in a concert with the Festival Orchestra on Monday night.

Domingo's Rising Stars Take the Stage
Later, I dropped by the Saint Édouard Chapel in Knowlton to hear a recital by winners of Placido Domingo’s Operalia competition.

This concert was announced in the programme as featuring “Winners Operalia 2008” (Québec City). Only Ukrainian soprano Oksana Kramaryeva (photo: above left), who took “The People’s Prize” there, fits that description. The other soloists are fairly recent Operalia winners in other countries. All were well worth hearing and have deservedly advanced beyond the promising ‘student stage’ to become busy professional artists.

If I had to choose a favourite, it would Kramaryeva. She is a genuine Verdi dramatic soprano with presence, richness of tone and considerable dramatic skills. Kramaryeva and her Operalia colleagues will all be featured again during the festival on Friday August 15. Kent Nagano will conduct excerpts from Tchaikovsky’s Eugen Onegin and Massimilliano Murrali will lead excerpts from Bellini’s I Capuleti e I Montecchi.

And From Ben Heppner - An Almost Perfect Set of Strauss Songs

The founders of the Knowlton Festival – Marco Genoni and Kent Nagano – based their new venture on the glories of the Italian bel canto tradition. While the content of the festival has shifted somewhat in the second season, singing in general and bel canto in particular remains a major component; it is, therefore, entirely within the concept of the festival that one of the world’s great heldentenors should be featured in orchestral songs by Richard Strauss.

Canada’s own Ben Heppner is in constant demand at all the top opera houses in the world and it was a coup for the festival to be able bring him here. He chose for his programme a group of six songs by Strauss, including the beloved Zueignung, along with some less popular pieces.

In the opening bars of Cäcilie we heard Heppner’s effortless purity of sound and beauty of phrasing. The darkly imaginative Ruhe meine Seele was also given a fine performance with Nagano taking care over every detail and the members of the OSM playing beautifully. We heard five Strauss songs presented as well as one is likely ever to hear them.

Then came Befreit. Suddenly, Heppner’s voice simply failed him. It was painful to hear and undoubtedly most painful for Heppner himself. One could only reflect on the vagaries of the human voice.

Texts, Translations, Projections?

As a festival grows, it learns from its mistakes and tries to improve things that need improvement. For any festival that makes vocal music the core of its mission, great care must be taken to provide the audience with texts for songs, operatic excerpts and complete operas being performed. This can be accomplished by means of texts and translations in the printed programmes or through the use of modern technology with projections on screens situated around the auditorium. Whatever the means used, it is not only important – some might add ‘respectful’ - to provide audience members a comfortable way into a full appreciation of the music they are hearing.

The Knowlton Festival continues on Sunday with the first of two performances of Bellini’s La Sonnambula starring Sumi Jo with Nagano conducting. More bel canto follows on Monday night, with an all-Handel programme by the period instrument orchestra Les Violin du Roy under Bernard Labadie on Tuesday night.

The concert on Tuesday will include, in addition to a group of opera arias featuring soprano Hélène Guilmette, Handel’s very popular Water Music.

Paul E. Robinson is the author of Herbert von Karajan: the Maestro as Superstar, and Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music, both available at Amazon.com.

Photos by Marita

Knowlton Festival 2009: Youth Orchestra of the Americas

by Paul E. Robinson

Last August, the charming village of Knowlton, Quebec, 70 km east of Montreal, welcomed the Orchestre symphonique de Montreal (OSM) and the birth of Bel Canto, a summer music festival that focussed on music written for the human voice - more specifically, music composed by Rossini, Bellini and Donizetti.

This summer the OSM is back in Knowlton, with a new name - Knowlton Festival - in a new venue, with a more varied slate of programs, and bel canto still at the heart of it all.

The Knowlton Festival's opening event this season was an orchestra concert that started and finished with infectious South American rhythms, and after several encores, had musicians and audience members dancing onstage and off - in a conga line! What a party! Who would have guessed? Well, if you've been paying attention to South American conductor Gustavo Dudamel and his tours with the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra (SBYO) you'll know what I'm talking about. The dancing and the party finish are typical Dudamel/SBYO. The Youth Orchestra of the Americas (YOA) – though less well-known than the SBYO, is definitely a relative, and it was this group that we had the pleasure of hearing in Knowlton this week.

The YOA, founded in 2001, is made up of young people from twenty-four countries and its artistic leadership includes the likes of Dudamel, Placido Domingo and the man who conducted the Knowlton concert, Carlos Miguel Prieto.

Selected via auditions throughout the Americas, 100 or so gifted musicians gather every summer as the SBYO in one of the member countries for intensive training, rehearsals and a tour. This summer Prieto is conducting most of the concerts, but Benjamin Zander and others are also lending a hand.

On the strength of the Knowlton concert, Prieto seems an ideal leader. He's young, personable, and has two professional orchestras of his own in Mexico City and New Orleans. He got the evening off to a rousing start with a virtuoso piece by Canadian composer John Estacio. Fast tempi and tricky rhythms held no terror for this band and Bootlegger’s Tarantella was a great success.

Next came pianist Gabriela Montero, featured earlier this year at the Obama inauguration with Itzhak Perlman and Yo-Yo Ma. She played with power and passion in Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No. 2. The orchestra played well too, especially the first horn. After the performance, Montero honoured a friend in the audience by not only playing Happy Birthday, but improvising an elaborate set of variations on the familiar tune. There was even a tango version!

After intermission, the YOA played Dvorak’s New World Symphony. In Prieto’s version, it was loud and fast, and a little rushed here and there. No matter. This was totally committed and joyous music-making. I couldn’t help but notice that four of the six bass players were female and that they played with both polish and pride. The principal player – also female – seemed to be in constant motion. Too theatrical? When she graduates to a full-time orchestra, she may have to rein in her terpsichorean tendencies. But many conductors and soloists love to literally strut their stuff. Why not orchestra players too?

After the Dvorak, the audience demanded an encore and Prieto and the YOA readily obliged. Not surprisingly, Prieto borrowed a Latin-American crowd-pleaser from the Dudamel playbook: Arturo Marquez’ Danzon No. 2. The YOA dug into the Latin rhythms with both authority and abandon.

Then came the topper. From out of the wings, wearing a dazzling white jacket, stepped trumpet virtuoso Mauro Maur, kicking off an exciting and infectious performance of Tico-Tico. Maur is principal trumpet of the Rome Opera Orchestra, a teacher at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia and a YOA coach. Some members of the orchestra broke into dancing at the edge of the stage and before long half the audience had joined them. Inevitably, a conga line materialized.

This concert was not the festival’s official opening night – that's coming up Friday with Nagano conducting the OSM in an all-Brahms program – rather, it was billed as a “Special Preview Concert.” Some preview! Some concert! This night's audience certainly went home happy with the new face of the festival.

More about the Knowlton Festival’s new facility this year – bigger and better – after Friday’s concert.


Paul E. Robinson is the author of Herbert von Karajan: the Maestro as Superstar, and Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music, both available at Amazon.com.