Livermore Valley Opera's Così fan tutte

Samuel Kidd (Guglielmo), Courtney Miller (Despina), Megan Potter (Dorabella), Meryl Dominguez (Fiordiligi), Eugene Brancoveanu (Don Alfonso, on floor), Sid Chand (Ferrando)

Photo: Barbara Mallon, courtesy of Livermore Valley Opera

A mixed-bag of a Così fan tutte at Livermore Valley Opera, with lots of laughs but somehow missing on the more serious and heartbreaking emotions in the work.

• Lisa Hirsch, Parterre Box
• Charlise Tiee, Opera Tattler

Previously, the Opera San José Così:

• Lisa Hirsch, SFCV

Family Matters

Rigoletto

Act 1, Scene 1

San Francisco Opera

Photo: Cory Weaver

I spent a lot of time over the last week with Giuseppe Verdi, in the form of two of his middle period masterpieces, Rigoletto and La traviata. What these operas have in common is the intense parent-child relationships, a major theme in the composer's Simon Boccanegra and Don Carlo(s) as well.

San Francisco Opera just ended a top-notch run of Rigoletto, seen once more in the great Michael Yeargan production, the design of which is based on the works of Giorgio de Chirico. I've seen several of the bring-ups and it never fails to impress me. It is both shadowy and beautiful, its colors a little artificial, its architecture askew. Its lurid colors embody the decadence of the Duke of Mantua's court and the haunted spirit of the opera, where an assassin has the closest thing to a clearly-defined moral code. José Maria Condemi directed and did a terrific job with it.

My recollection is that the production has gotten a bit less decadent over the years; I have vague memories of women in breast-baring body suits and sexual behavior in the first half of Act 1 that ah went way beyond flirtation. I can understand why the Opera might have wanted to tone it down, but the atmosphere at court does justify that degree of decadence. Regardless, I love this production and as far as I'm concerned SFO can use it until I'm dead and gone.

In any event, this was a bring-up for the ages. I don't think of Rigoletto as being a conductor's opera, because the work is so great that it will be effective with a merely competent conductor, yet Eun Sun Kim made it a conductor's opera. I could hardly believe the range of colors she got out of the orchestra, the perfect rubato, the drama, the way the silences rang with tension. To me, her conducting sounded deeply informed by her Wagner conducting, which has been awesome in the last two seasons. This was just spectacular Verdi.

On to the singing. The originally-scheduled Duke, Giovanni Sala, dropped out in early August for the usual "personal reasons." I was not very impressed with Yongzhau Yu, who stepped in. He went sharp a lot; his voice is on the tight, thin, side; he didn't project the kind of allure that the Duke should have for both Gilda and Maddalena to become so attached to him.  I realize that with Sala dropping out so close to the start of rehearsals, it would have been difficult to find a first-class replacement because all the best tenors are booked solid at the start of a season.

I liked Amartuvshin Enkhbat's Rigoletto well enough. He has a tremendous voice of the right type, both powerful and beautiful. He is a little emotionally stiff and not a great physical actor, but his singing was first class.

Adela Zaharia, last heard as Donna Anna in the last SFO Don Giovanni, was the vocal star of the show, singing a really spectacular Gilda and presenting her as a more stubborn and self-assured character than you usually get. I will say that I do not expect to hear the role more beautifully sung than Ruth Ann Swenson back in the late 1990s –– Swenson had possibly the most beautiful lyric soprano voice I've ever heard –– but Zaharia has a much better dramatic sense and made a lot out of Gilda.

In the smaller roles, Peixin Chen was a fantastic, threatening Sparafucile, and Adler Fellow Olivier Zerouali made a huge impression on me as Marullo.

And then there was J'Nai Bridges as a sexy Maddalena, with tons more character than the usual Maddalena in that role, largely because, face it, she is a big star who has sung Carmen and a major role in Girls of the Golden West with SFO. You're not alone in wondering what she was doing in Rigoletto, so let's just chalk it up to luxury casting.

All in all, it was a very satisfying Rigoletto.

• Steven Winn, SFCV and SF Chronicle
• Joshua Kosman, On a Pacific Aisle
• Charlise Tiee, Opera Tattler
• Patrick Vaz, The Reverberate Hills. Patrick's analysis of the role of honor in the opera is important to understanding how everyone behaves here, and I love his description of the sets. However, I've been privately arm-wrestling with him about Gilda for roughly as long as we've known each other. I think it's a misnomer to say that she "has sex with the Duke;" given her overprotected upbringing, what do we think she even knows about sex? Does she understand it well enough to give consent? She is extremely upset, and I don't think it's just shame, when she comes out of the room where she was locked up with the Duke. It's also worth keeping in mind that while she talks about going up to Heaven while she's dying, that's partly in relation to her dead mother, who she thinks is watching over her and whom she will join in Heaven. Being perverse and self-defeating is one thing; letting yourself be killed (SPOILER SORRY) in place of the awful man you're in love with is quite another.

Avery Boettcher (Violetta) and Brad Bickhardt (Alfred)

La traviata, Livermore Valley Opera

Act 2, last scene

Photo: Barbara Mallon

Then there was La traviata at Livermore Valley Opera where, once again, you get those very intense and overwhelming family relationships. In this case, Giorgio Germont shows up in Act 2 to do whatever he can to separate his son Alfredo from the woman he loves, because she is a former courtesan and Alfredo's involvement with her, which is very public, is about to wreck Alfredo's sister's engagement and the family's reputation. The Germonts are bourgeoisie, as far as I can tell; after all, if they were noble, Alfredo would get a little talking-to about being less public, but nobody would try to separate him from his lover. (See Baron Duophol, Violetta's once and future patron, for example.)

We've got more singing about life in Heaven here, when Violetta asks Germont to remember her to Alfredo's sister ("Dite alla giovine"), because Violetta, who is dying of tuberculosis, will watch over the sister from Heaven.

The big star of La traviata was, beyond a doubt, the spectacular Avery Boettcher, who gave a fabulous, three-dimensional, beautifully sung performance as Violetta. The character is on stage for about 90% of the opera, the exception being the scene in Act 2 where Germont tells Alfredo why he's better off without Violetta, so it's possible for the Violetta to pretty much carry the whole opera. That is more or less what happens here. I'd say that Boettcher is worth the price of admission for her tour-de-force performance, and you know, it's great to see opera at the Bankhead Theater, because it is tiny and small details of a performance register strongly.

What I got from seeing these two operas in close proximity was a renewed respect for and love of middle-period Verdi. Yes, these operas are done too often; yes, the casts are not always first class; yes, yes, yes, but they are as popular as they are because of how brilliantly put together they are, how well Verdi creates drama, how well he sets the text, how vivid his characterizations are, the emotions they bring up for the audience. 

• Lisa Hirsch, SFCV
• Joshua Kosman, On a Pacific Aisle. "Most mesmerizing was her commanding traversal of Act 3, from a wrenching “Addio del passato” through Violetta’s quavering death throes." 

 

Don Giovanni at Livermore Valley Opera

Titus Muzi III as Don Giovanni and Meryl Dominguez as Donna Anna

Photo: Barbara Mallon

I reviewed Livermore Valley Opera / LVOpera's production of Don Giovanni over the weekend, and liked it a lot. 

This was my fourth Don Giovanni since the SF Opera production in 2022. I might give the opera a break for a while, but it certainly has been interesting. I avoided Don Giovanni for a number of years because it is too easy to present it as a parade of great arias, without enough drama. The SFO production in June, 2017 was like that; an awful set and terrible direction left the cast adrift, and that production was a "reboot" of an earlier production that I gather was even worse.

• Lisa Hirsch, SFCV
• Joshua Kosman, On a Pacific Aisle
• Charlise Tiee, Opera Tattler

Joshua Kosman takes note of the boldness of David Walton's Don Ottavio. That he had only "Il mio tesoro" surely had something to do with this. The opera is tighter when Ottavio has just one; in last year's excellent Merola Opera production, the tenor sang "Dalla sua pace," also to excellent effect. (I will note that both of these singers were better than the tenor I saw last year in Santa Fe!)

Two performances remain, March 8 and 9, both at 2 p.m.

 

The Daughter of the Regiment, LVOpera

Eugene Brancoveanu (Sulpice), Lisa Chavez (Marquise of Berkenfield), and Véronique Filloux (Marie)

Photo: Barb Mallon, courtesy of LVOpera

I saw the last performance of LVOpera's The Daughter of the Regiment, which, as I and many have commented in the past, has one of the silliest plots in opera: Marie has been raised by a regiment of French soldiers. She has fallen in love with the young Tyrolian Tonio, who joins the regiment to be near her just as the Marquise of Berkenfeld shows up and drags her off to be married to a man she didn't choose and doesn't love. The regiment comes to her rescue, the Marquise's secret sort of comes out (Marie is her daughter), and love conquers all.

Yes, it's silly, but after the amount of time I spent with The Handmaid's Tale recently, literarily and operatically, I'll take an opera where her family rescues a young woman from a marriage she doesn't want. 

The plot may be silly, but the music is lovely; there are many great tunes and opportunities for vocal display for Tonio ("Ah mes amis...Pour mon ame", with its nine high Cs) and Marie (don't ask me the names of her arias, I don't know and I'm not looking them up right now :). There's also a great comic role in Sulpice and a good role for a mezzo, the Marquise.  Maybe, just maybe, it's time for me to consider getting over my Donizetti allergy, which I share with so many.

I really wish I had been able to get to an earlier performance to tell you all that you should see this production, which was a complete delight! It had wonderful singing from all of the leads. Chris Mosz, singing Tonio, had the high notes, including a D (!) in a tiny cadenza and was a charming country boy. Baritone Eugene Brancoveanu has been a mainstay of Bay Area opera for many years, and his bright baritone and exquisite comic timing were perfect for Sulpice. Lisa Chavez's dark mezzo and diva mannerisms made her Marquise quite the character.

And Véronique Filloux, singing Marie, was a real find: she has a lovely, sweet voice, she's a great comic actor, and her arias were stupendously sung. She has range, she has volume, she has a gorgeous legato, she has a terrific trill. How I would love to see her again!

The sets and costumes were good; the direction, by Marc Jacobs, was extremely funny. The sight gags worked; everyone had great timing; he managed the stage very well. Alexander Katsman conducted deftly and sympathetically. The small chorus, directed by Bruce Olstad, was excellent. Special kudos to Aura Veruni, best known to readers of this blog for her soprano roles at Ars Minerva and West Edge Opera, for her French language coaching: everyone's French was excellent: clear and understandable in the spoken dialog and when sung, the sounds of the language properly forward. This is a difficult feat to pull off and most opera companies miss by a mile.

P. S. If you're in a position to donate a few bucks to this company, a generous donor will match your gifts up to 50% of $50,000. That is, if LVOpera can raise $50,000 by the end of October, the donor will donate $25,000. That is a lot of money for a small company. You can donate at this link.

 

Daughter of the Regiment, LVO

 

Eugene Brancoveanu and Véronique Filloux

The Daughter of the Regiment

Photo by Barbara Mallon, courtesy of Livermore Valley Opera

I won't be seeing LVO's The Daughter of the Regiment until next weekend, but it opened yesterday and the photos look like it's a charming production. Their Otello a couple of years ago was terrific and I'm looking forward to seeing this one. Yes, it's one of the silliest plots in a genre that's full of them, but the music is late Donizetti and more sophisticated than you might anticipate.

Starring: Véronique Filloux, Marie; Chris Mosz, Tonio; Lisa Chavez, Marquise of Berkenfield; Eugene Brancoveanu, Sulpice; Deborah Lambert, Duchess of Krakenthorp; Gilead Wurman, Hortensius.

Remaining performances:

• October 5th, 2024 @ 2:00pm
• October 6th, 2024 @ 2:00pm

Livermore Valley Opera 2024-25

Livermore Valley Opera (LVOpera) has a two-opera season coming up for 2024-25. They're doing two classics: Donizetti's The Daughter of the Regiment, a comedy with an extremely silly plot redeemed by surprisingly lovely and complex music, and Mozart's Don Giovanni, which needs no introduction. 

I've only been out to LVOpera once, for an excellent production of Verdi's Otello. Yes, I regret missing their recent production of Carlisle Floyd's Of Mice and Men. LVOpera performs in a 500 seat theater, and I really like the intimacy of seeing opera in a theater of that size.

Here are some details about LVOpera's upcoming season. 

Location (all performances): Bankhead Theater 2400 First Street, Livermore, CA 94550

Cost: Adults $25-$110. Tickets can be purchased through the company's website at www.LVOpera.com. Special ticket pricing: $25, ages 20 and younger; $45, ages 21-40. Bankhead Ticket Box Office: 925-373-6800.

Alexander Katsman conducts all performances.

The Daughter of the Regiment 

Véronique Filloux, Marie; Chris Mosz, Tonio; Lisa Chavez, Marquise of Berkenfield; Eugene Brancoveanu, Sulpice; Deborah Lambert, Duchess of Krakenthorp; Gilead Wurman, Hortensius.

Performances:

• September 28th, 2024 @ 7:30pm
• September 29th, 2024 @ 2:00pm
• October 5th, 2024 @ 2:00pm
• October 6th, 2024 @ 2:00pm

Don Giovanni

Titus Muzio III, Don Giovanni; Murrella Parton, Donna Anna; Cara Gabrielson, Donna Elvira; David Walton, Don Ottavio; Samuel Weiser, Leporello; Kirk Eichelberger, Commendatore; Phoebe Chee, Zerlina; Joseph Calzada, Masetto

Performances:

• March 1st, 2025 @ 7:30pm
• March 2nd, 2025 @ 2:00pm
• March 8th, 2025 @ 2:00pm
• March 9th, 2025 @ 2:00pm

Otello at Livermore Valley Opera

My SFCV review of Livermore Valley Opera's Otello is now posted. Briefly, it is a rave. Joshua Kosman also raved, more eloquently than I did. Our vocabulary overlaps a bit; you'll find "electrifying" in both reviews. I didn't discuss one regular problem with productions of the opera, on the grounds that the production photos would speak to the issue.

This definitely falls under the rubric of "the little opera company that could." LVO has an annual budget of under $500,000, according to the 990 forms that I glanced at this weekend, and yet they've managed to stage a production of Verdi's Otello - a problem opera if ever there was one - that I found more dramatically cogent and just plain exciting than the last two bring-ups at San Francisco Opera, a company that spends roughly $1 million per performance.

I mean, those productions had issues. The 2002 production was announced with Ben Heppner singing the title role. He withdrew and was replaced by four tenors, each singing from one to four and a fraction performances. Yes, really: Jon Fredric West dropped out of the performance of October 26 after one act, with Antonio Barasorda singing acts 2, 3, and 4. I caught Vladimir Galouzine and remember him sounding vocally clumsy. Sergei Leiferkus, a wonderful singer in the right repertory, was badly miscast as Jago; he had the trill (YES THERE'S A TRILL THERE) but sounded nothing like an Italian baritone. Patricia Racette sang beautifully. I vaguely recall that Donald Runnicles wasn't at his best. I should check; I probably have notes someplace.

Okay, my comments about 2002:

 Galouzine was okay, which is much better than anyone has said West was;   it's the right kind of voice except that he sounds like a baritone. I don't just mean baritonal, I mean _baritone_, as in more of a baritone than Leiferkus. (I get impressions of nausea from everyone who has mentioned West.) Racette was terrific; Leiferkus sounds very dry and verging on wobble - at least he can trill and sound nasty at will. 

The performance didn't really gel very well. The orch. was surprisingly sloppy and Runnicles seemed to be beating time at various points. The scene with the Venetian ambassador lost all momentum, for example.

The most recent production, in November, 2009, had completely different problems. I heard the last performance, and Nicola Luisotti's conducting sounded so disengaged that I figured he was already mentally checked out and on his way to guest conduct elsewhere. Marco Vratogna shouted most of Jago. Zvetelina Vassileva was forgettable, and had so little chemistry with Johan Botha that she never looked at him during the love duet! Botha...what can one say? He sang like an angel; I know that I'll never hear a more beautiful sound in the love duet. But he could not act, was facially inexpressive, and not very mobile on stage. It was a really dispiriting performance.

So it's a real thrill to see an Otello production that's firing on more cylinders than you would think possible: terrific singing from the three principals, real drama, good direction, and fiery conducting.

There are two more performances, on Saturday, March 12 at 7:30 p.m. and on Sunday, March 13 at 2 p.m. Really, you should go!

• Joshua Kosman, SF Chron
  
• Lisa Hirsch, SFCV