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Stravinsky, The Rake’s Progress: Soloists, Oviedo Filarmonía. Coro de la Ópera de Oviedo, Conductor: Mikhail Agrest.  Teatro Campoamor de Oviedo. 27.11.2008. (JMI)

Production from Théatre des Champs Elysées.

Director. André Engel.
Sets: Nicky Rieti.
Costumes: Chantal de la Coste.
Lighting: André Diot.

Cast:

Tom Rakewell: Marlin Miller.
Anne Truelove: Elizabeth Futral.
Nick Shadow: Chester Patton.
Baba the Turk: Dagmar Peckova.
Mother Goose: Rebecca de Pont Davies.
Truelove: Darren Jeffery.
Sellem: Francisco Vas.

Little by little Oviedo is revising the repertoire in its opera season, introducing some rather rare titles to  Spain. In the current season they have presented already two operas composed during the second half of the last century, Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmelites and now The Rake’s Progress.  Both works are fundamentals in  the history of  opera, although remaining not be  particularly attractive to the general public.. This is the great dilemma that  any programmer has to face:  to find the balance between the traditional preferences of the  public in general  and the necessity to  open up  repertoire by offering important operas, even though they are not necessarily popular. Oviedo, like some other theatres in Spain, is struggling to find an equilibrium and basically they are succeeding.

The Rake’s Progress is probably Stravinsky’s best known opera and its  last performance in Spain took place two years ago at the Mozart Festival in Corunna. Prior to this we have to go back to Madrid’s Teatro de la Zarzuela in 1996. The work, as many will surely know, is inspired by the collection of eight pictures by the 18^th century English painter William Hogarth, a collection from which  the opera takes its title and which can still be seen today at the  Sir John Soane Museum in London. The opera is essentially a very classical work, Mozart’s  model to a great extent although not lacking music derived from  jazz and even with some fanfares at the work’s beginning very calling  Monteverdi’s Orfeo toi mind.  Also it include a final  scene about the spelling out a moral, a common practice in opera at the end of 18^th century and in the first half of 19^th.

The production by  the French director André Engel comes from the Theatre Des Champs Elysées, where it was premiered in 2001 and was revived again last year. Engel – with good sense - transfers the action from 18^th century England to the late 50s in America, which is in line with the composer’s own conception of it,  since he had the idea from an exhibition in a Chicago Museum and composed the opera in the US, for its  premiere in 1951. The sets are very appropriate, bright and colourful at certain moments and just trying to tell a story in others. Particularly well conceived are the scenes in the cabaret, the wedding with the Baba the Turk and the madhouse scene. There are bright costumes too and outstanding lighting in general. Engel does not follow today’s custom of having one single set for the whole opera, but changes sets for different scenes, making very good use of the front curtain and having some singing in front of it to allow the change of sets behind. Stage direction is good both with chorus and singers, with alternating humorous moments and others of deep sadness. As the program points out, Stravinsky wrote - that the stage director should remember that this opera is a moral fable and so should not over-emphasize the realism of Tom Rakewell’s history. Luckily André Engel has respected the composer’s view:  a huge surprise these days!  It is a curious coincidence that there is another Rake’s Progress, in Vienna just now by Martin Kunsej, in which  the “realism” has obliged the management prohibit entrance to young people under 18. 

Mikhail Agrest, a regular collaborator with Valery Gergiev at the Mariinsky Theater, was in charge of the  Musical Direction and gave a remarkable performance. His direction was very careful, and could have sparkled aarather more sometimes, but  the Orchestra played at a higher standard than usual The chorus  is a group of people able to sing well and act well having improved a great deal  in the last two years. In summary, this was a good choice of conductor.

The protagonist Tom Rakewell was  the American tenor Marlin Miller, who was very well suited  to the needs of the character. His voice is not exactly beautiful but he is a good singer who moves easily on stage.

Nick Shadow, a kind of  Mephistopheles, found a good interpreter in the American bass baritone  Chester Patton,  far better suited to this role than he was  to Enrico VIII in Anna Bolena last year in Bilbao. He offered a remarkable interpretation, with a physical presence exactly suited to the role. In vocal terms he was also excellent, except for some high notes of less than outstanding quality.

American soprano Elizabeth Futral made a wonderful Anne Truelove. She replaced the previously announced Mary Dunleavy and this is one of the few times where the replacement actually improved the performance. Ms. Futral is one of the most appreciated light lyric sopranos around these days:  she was also excellent and was always a believable interpreter of the role,  at her best in the best known aria from the opera “No word from Tom”. The most inventive character in the opera, Baba The Turk, was interpreted with not quite enough voice  by Dagmar Peckova, who was almost inaudible for too much of the time. Essentially,  . the problem was that the role requires a sonorous contralto and this Czech singer is not that.

In the secondary roles, the best interpretation came from  Francisco Vas as Sellem, the auctioneer, who was very good in all the senses. Rebecca De Pont  Davies was a decent  Mother Goose, the Madame of the brothel and   Darren Jeffery was a modest  Truelove.

There was a full theatre  as usual in Oviedo. The audience seemed pleased, although not excited and at  the final bows the biggest applauses went to  Elizabeth Futral and Charles Patton.

José M. Irurzun

Pictures © Carlos Pictures

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