Handel, Giulio Cesare: Soloists, Concert  d'Astrée / Emanuelle Haïm, Opéra de Lille, 18.5.2007 (SL)

 

Size does matter! One of the most successful recent productions of Handel’s “Giulio Cesare”, that of David McVicar’s, moved recently from the compact Glyndebourne stage to the faux-baroque splendour and space of  L’Opéra de Lille in northern France.  The production in Sussex had been (and remains) a dazzling endorsement of McVicar’s skills at re-presenting Handel for a modern audience but for various reasons its transplanting to the French house was problematical.

Lille Opera has an extremely deep stage – viewed from the front of the first balcony it seems to recede somewhere into the middle distances of the town behind – and this of course precludes anything like reasonable sight lines for up to thirty percent of the audience who sit on the sides of the traditional horseshoe shaped auditorium.  The sets and design for this Cesare worked well on the shallower Glyndebourne stage: McVicar’s evocative “rolling” waves on the Alexandrine shores, not to mention the passing galleons and later warships under either a glaring desert sun or limpid moonlight, were a constant reminder of place and mood.  Here in Lille, only the privileged few could even see them.  Not only that, but much of the detailed, amusing, or downright cheeky aspects of theatrical “business” was now, of necessity, rather spread outwards and backwards into this cavernous space – and so lost much of its impact and appeal.  The wonderful set-piece of stylised dance that accompanies Cesare’s famous hunting aria “Va tacito”, where the Roman emperor and boy-king Tolomeo square up to each other and the former throws down his ambiguous challenge to the latter, was sabotaged by a lack of claustrophobic tension, the large space seeming to dilute the effect.

Perhaps, too, some of the singers themselves were less able than their predecessors (Connolly/Daniels/Zazzo) to carry off successfully such complex and taxing scenes. The recently recruited Sonia Prina in the title role (the original Cesare,  Bejun Mehta, having cancelled all performances due to illness) struggled somewhat with both the vocal and physical demands of a characterisation for which she is not perhaps best suited.  Although she made a brave attempt, there was always a sense of forcing rather than of natural ease in both her acting and vocalism.  Tolomeo was sung by the young French countertenor Christophe Dumaux who although not new to the role, was again not well suited in voice or physique, being a sweet-timbre’d countertenor of particularly tall and willowy frame.  Whenever he squared up to the diminutive Cesare, it was difficult not to smile at the mis-match. Another brave attempt was that of Anna Christy as Cleopatra.  This young American soprano has excellent technique and a crystalline confident top, and may one day also cope with the emotional demands required of the role.  However, whereas Danielle de Niese glittered and hoofed her way through the opera at Glyndebourne (some would say blinding us to some doubtful vocalism on the way) in scintillating sexy style, Christy came across more as a tomboy Queen of Egypt with her fresh-faced looks and jolly gestures.  The hockey pitch seemed a more likely venue for her seductions than any perfumed boudoir.

But all was not lost.  Underpinning this performance with sheer opulence of tone and deep truthfulness of expression was the rich mezzo-soprano of Charlotte Hellekant as the widow Cornelia, well-matched both vocally and dramatically by Tuva Semmingsen as Sesto.  Both singers have much experience in these roles, and it showed.  They also sounded completely at home with the sound world of Emmanuelle Haïm’s excellent Concert d’Astrée, effortlessly spinning long lines of music, delicately ornamented, as if it were the easiest of accomplishments.  Hellekant in particular was spectacular in her moving arias of anguished grief, her voice darkly expressive and reflecting the nobility of spirit within this character. If there is a criticism of the mainly excellently idiomatic orchestral interpretation, it is one of volume:  sometimes Haïm allowed the thirty two players to drown out the singers and this was unfortunate and unnecessary. As we have seen so many times before, Handel opera in any size of house does not need decibels to convince; it just needs to balance in harmony with the voices.   As indeed did the inherent quality of McVicar’s production here in Lille, which went some way to balance the uneven casting and unhelpful stage dimensions.  It will be interesting to see how future reprises fare in other large houses around the world.

 

Sue Loder

Pictures © Frédéric  Iovino