This recording presents
a famous moment in the annals of recent
British opera history, for it was during
the 1981 season that Dame Janet Baker
felt that she had reached the summit
of what she could achieve in opera and
that this season would be her last.
So this live relay was her farewell
to the house. Alceste was one of her
favourite roles and she performs it
with regal authority, passion and impressive
stamina – it’s a role which requires
her to sing almost uninterruptedly throughout
the evening.
Even without this aspect,
the performance represents British opera
of the day at its best. For a start
we have Mackerras who finds the true
Gluckian tone; dignified and statuesque
but urgent and dramatic at the same
time – it’s so easy to veer too much
towards one or the other. And then Robert
Tear and (particularly) John Shirley-Quirk
are in fine form and indeed, of the
whole cast I had reservations only about
Jonathan Summers’ unpleasantly stentorian
Hercules.
Admirers of Gluck should
note that this is the French version,
otherwise available from Otter/Gardiner
and Norman/Baudo. Ponto provide a presentation
of the performance but no libretto or
even synopsis. All I managed to find
on Internet was a libretto of the Italian
version, and tried following that, which
is as good a way as any of seeing how
different they are. In fact, after about
two-thirds of the way through the first
act they virtually become different
operas; the French version is more formal
and succinct (the opposite of the situation
with "Orfeo", then), with
several characters eliminated and the
first act, for example, discarding a
lengthy confrontation between Alceste
and the infernal deities and simply
closing with the opera’s most famous
aria, "Divinités du Styx".
I must say I find "Alceste",
at least in its French version, a more
formally satisfying and stylistically
coherent opera than "Orfeo ed Euridice"
(in either version), while admitting
that it contains nothing as sheerly
beautiful as certain portions of the
earlier work.
This is, I take it,
an off-the-air recording, and at first
it seemed pretty good, except that the
stereo channels are reversed, unless
Mackerras had his violins (and also
flutes) on the right for some reason,
and the cellos and most of the brass
on the left. I found this a bit disconcerting,
but even more so is a degree of distortion
affecting the upper frequencies and
so affecting Dame Janet’s top notes
which are made to seem tremulous and
strained. Future generations will get
the idea that she was less secure technically
than we know her to have been. For much
of the second disc the recording seems
to be a more congested mono one. Though
there’s not much space around the sound,
oddly enough Dame Janet’s top notes
sound all right here. Thereafter the
stereo image wanders a bit – it almost
seems like a mono recording wandering
between the speakers, until it opens
up and finishes as it began (with the
channels reversed). Problems with the
original broadcast? With the home-taper’s
equipment? Have Ponto had to piece it
together from at least two incomplete
sources?
While this is nothing
like as problematic as Ponto’s "Vestale"
excerpts from Rome which I recently
commented on, and while we would obviously
give a fortune to hear, say, Guild’s
series of Met relays from the 1930s
and 1940s in sound remotely approaching
this, all the same, a 1981 BBC relay
should sound better. If by any miracle
the BBC still hold the original tapes,
the performance should be issued on
BBC Legends without delay. As it is,
it is an important issue for opera buffs
and I am glad to have it, but it doesn’t
quite compete with the best "official"
versions.
Christopher Howell
Orchestra and Chorus of the Royal Opera House,
Covent Garden/Sir Charles Mackerras 
