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- Konstantinos 'Dino' Yannopoulos
- Baroque opera
- Teatro Apollo
- Leipziger Kammerorchester
- Jean-Patrice Brosse
- Elisa Sutherland
A Sure Feel for Dramatic Pacing
MIKE WHEELER reviews Opera North's Mascagni/Rachmaninov double bill
The last time Opera North took Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana on tour, it was paired with its usual stable-mate, Leoncavallo's Pagliacci, but on the current run it plays in tandem with Rachmaninov's little-known one-acter, Aleko - more about that later.
Director Karolina Sofulak sets Cavalleria Rusticana in communist-era Poland, where an intense Catholicism holds the community together - there's a photo of Pope John Paul II, himself Polish, on the wall. During the tenderly-played Prelude a dumb-show on stage with Lola, her husband Alfio and her lover Turiddù - Helen Évora, Robert Hayward and Andrés Presno - played out the love-triangle that drives the action.
Giselle Allen returns to the role of Santuzza, Turiddù's unhinged ex-lover, chewing the scenery, and with frantically melodramatic gestures, which, after all, is about all you can do with a role that doesn't exactly call for subtle characterisation.
Giselle Allen as Santuzza with the Chorus of Opera North in Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana at Leeds Grand Theatre on 15 February 2024.
Photo © 2024 Tristram Kenton
In the Easter Hymn, she drifts off into a fantasy in which she plays Mary Magdalene to Turiddù's Jesus, the huge cross from the back of the stage advancing towards her menacingly.
Andrés Presno has the vocal resources for the role of Turiddù, but this turns him into such a repellent figure you wonder what anyone could see in him. Perhaps he is a natural product of a repressive society. Someone once described Bizet's Don José as a 'mother-fixated psychopath'. This Turiddù seems to be another.
Andrés Presno as Turiddù (left) and Robert Hayward as Alfio in Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana at Leeds Grand Theatre on 15 February 2024.
Photo © 2024 Tristram Kenton
Robert Hayward's Alfio veers between wariness and furious jealousy, inhabiting every inch of the role with commanding authority. Helen Évora is a striking contrast to Giselle Allen's Santuzza - more knowing and more in control of what she wants.
Robert Hayward as Alfio and Helen Évora as Lola with members of the Chorus of Opera North in Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana at Leeds Grand Theatre on 15 February 2024. Photo © 2024 Tristram Kenton
Anne-Marie Owens' Mamma Lucia is convincingly weary, having to contend with her wayward son on top of trying to run her shop in spite of food shortages.
Members of the Chorus of Opera North with Anne-Marie Owens as Lucia (far right) in Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana at Leeds Grand Theatre on 15 February 2024. Photo © 2024 Tristram Kenton
No, I can happily live without verismo opera. There were times here when I needed to not merely suspend my disbelief, but to drop it from a great height. Let's just say that the Intermezzo came as a welcome relief.
Rachmaninov's Aleko comes as a postscript to last year's 150th anniversary celebrations. He composed it aged nineteen, as part of his graduation exercise from the Moscow Conservatory. It was highly acclaimed at its premiere - Tchaikovsky, among others, was impressed - and Rachmaninov was on a roll, until his Symphony No 1 crash-landed at its first performance four years later.
Based on a poem by Pushkin, the opera centres on the title-character, who joins a gypsy community out of an idealistic attraction to their free-spirited way of life. He falls in love with a young gypsy girl, Zemfira, but when her father describes how her mother abandoned him and Zemfira for another man, Aleko is shocked that he didn't take revenge. This begins to gnaw at him, driving a wedge between him and Zemfira, who turns to a younger man for consolation. When the jealous Aleko murders them both, her father tells him that the community does not believe in revenge, but Aleko is driven away, not to return.
The two operas are linked, in Karolina Sofulak's production, by Robert Hayward returning as Aleko. Indeed, when the curtain goes up, he is holding the same pose as when it came down at the end of Cavalleria, with the gun with which he shot Turiddù still in his hand. He convinces as a man gradually finding himself out of his depth.
Robert Hayward as Aleko with members of the Chorus of Opera North in Rachmaninov's Aleko at Leeds Grand Theatre on 15 February 2024.
Photo © 2024 Tristram Kenton
Elin Pritchard's Carmen-like Zemfira is feisty and full of life, while Andrés Presno returns as her gypsy lover, a less prominent and more sympathetic role than Turiddù.
Elin Pritchard as Zemfira and Andrés Presno as her lover in Rachmaninov's Aleko at Leeds Grand Theatre on 15 February 2024. Photo © 2024 Tristram Kenton
As her father, Matthew Stiff has a kind of relaxed gravitas.
Matthew Stiff as Zemfira's father (far left), Elin Pritchard as Zemfira and Robert Hayward as Aleko with the Chorus of Opera North in Rachmaninov's Aleko at Leeds Grand Theatre on 15 February 2024. Photo © 2024 Tristram Kenton
The gypsy camp here is a hippy commune, the members' colourful costumes (designed by Gabrielle Dalton) a striking contrast to the drab outfits of Cavalleria. In the gypsy dance, Lola and Santuzza re-appear briefly, and Anne-Marie Owens' nameless character makes a fatalistic comment on the unspooling tragedy at the end. Though skilfully put together and paced, the score is barely recognisable as Rachmaninov's work, with its occasional echoes of Borodin and Tchaikovsky, but the choral writing has hints of the Orthodox chant that Rachmaninov would take to new heights in his All-Night Vigil, and his assured mastery of orchestration is already in place.
As always, in both works, the Opera North Chorus and Orchestra sing and play their hearts out, and Anthony Hermus conducts with a sure feel for dramatic pacing.
Copyright © 15 March 2024
Mike Wheeler,
Derby UK
