The Critics Speak Margherita D

The Critics Speak
Margherita D'Anjou in London, 2 Nov. 2002

Related pages on this site:

Photographs taken in London following performance

The Program

Reviews:

Electric Review by Allen Buchler

London Daily Mail by Robert Thicknesse

The Guardian by Tim Ashley

The Opera Critic by Peter Grahame Woolf (link -- opens in new window) (added November 12, 2002)

From ElectricReview.com

November 6, 2002

OPERA: Highland Fling
Margherita d’Anjou at the RFH, 2nd November 2002, produced by Opera Rara

By Allen Buchler

In order to preserve the integrity of ERO, let me commence with a retraction. Although I claimed in my introductory article on Meyerbeer that Margherita d’Anjou had never been performed in England, I have now discovered some evidence that it was presented in London in 1828. In my defence I will venture to assert that it must nonetheless still rank as a complete novelty for the vast majority of the readers of this distinguished organ.

A packed house at the Festival Hall awaited the event with eagerness — and indeed several hundred had attended the preliminary discussion in the concert-hall between Patric Schmid, the Artistic Director of Opera Rara, to whose intrepidity we owed the occasion, and Nicholas Payne, late General Manager of the ENO. How far the Meyerbeer revival may continue, no-one can say, but it is clear that we must begin to drop, when speaking of him, the sobriquet ‘forgotten’.

Margherita was written for La Scala in 1819 to a libretto by Felice Romani, who wrote also for Rossini and Donizetti and supplied virtually all the books for Bellini’s greatest hits. Adapted from a French melodrama of 1810, the story-line could be kindly described as quaint; it is one of those select few where reading the synopsis actually leads to one becoming more confused. Here goes, for what it is worth; Margaret (Annick Massis, soprano), widow of Henry VI, finds herself in Scotland disguised as a Highland peasant, fighting the revolt of Glochéster (the delightful Italian pronunciation of Gloucester) (Pauls Putnins, bass-baritone). Her commander and would-be lover Lavarenne (Bruce Ford, tenor) is meanwhile pursued by his jilted wife Isaura, en travesti as a young soldier (Patrica Bardon, mezzo-soprano), who has fallen in with the quack doctor Michele (Fabio Previati, baritone). Things are complicated by the traitor Carlo Belmonte (Alistair Miles, bass), and a gang of amiably disreputable Highland brigands willing to switch their loyalties at the drop of a sporran (the Geoffrey Mitchell Choir, who also doubled as assorted soldiers, country folk, and vivandières).

The absurdities of the plot, plus the advantage of being able to cut a large dollop of tedious recitative, provide good reasons for seeing such a work in concert rather than on-stage. Besides, in these days of surtitles, we should scarcely be able to suppress our giggling when confronted with translations such as those provided by Robert Arsanty in the concert programme, where the hawkers’ cry of ‘frutta e pasta a buon mercato!’ becomes ‘Fruit and inexpensive pastry!’ and Isaura’s plea to Michele of ‘Taci, taci, per pietà’ is represented as ‘Shut up, shut up, for pity’s sake!’ I understand Mr. Arsanty is translating the libretti of all of Meyerbeer’s operas with a view to publication — if his version of Margherita is anything to go by, this will indeed be a collector’s item, in its way.

Another argument in favour of concert versions is the opportunity of hearing the orchestra properly, particularly of interest in this work where Meyerbeer can be seen to begin to expand the range of orchestral colour beyond the Italian standard towards the more daring experiments of Robert le Diable. The London Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by David Parry, was set before us in all its splendour, including a generous percussion section and my first ever sighting in use of a cimbasso, a sort of vertical contra-bass trombone. It looked great, even if its sound was a bit lost in the crowd. The downside of all this was however that at climactic moments the voices of the soloists were also at risk of being overwhelmed by the forces ranged behind them.

The six operas which Meyerbeer wrote in Italy, when they are referred to at all, are generally mentioned only as Rossini-esque apprentice works. The experience of hearing Margherita is sufficient to convince that, although no masterpiece, it is far from an imitative essay. Indeed it is a tribute and monument to Meyerbeer’s dedication.

When he came to Italy in 1816 he was twenty-five and steeped in the German traditions which he had learnt from Zelter and Vogler, and which he shared with his friend Carlo Maria von Weber. He stayed there to learn about the voice, and it is clear from Margherita that his studies were deep and far transcended the affectations of a dilletante. Throughout the opera, from the opening bars of the overture, he shows a command of the forms, structure, and pacing of the Italian opera of his day, admittedly not approaching Rossini’s wit or lightness of touch. But to this he also allies a Germanic handling of the orchestra. The scene-setting of a Scottish valley owes much to Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony (and also anticipates some of the Alpine atmosphere of Rossini’s Guillaume Tell). The music (and the character) of Michele certainly owe something to Rossini’s Figaro, but also much to Mozart’s Leporello. Altogether the nascent combination of the German vertical harmonic and colouristic approaches with Italian horizontal melodic lines shows opera reaching tentatively towards the age of Verdi and — dare we say? — Wagner.

The performance we heard was appropriately full-blooded on the part of orchestra, chorus and soloists. Only Mr. Putnins disappointed slightly, not by the quality of his voice but by its absence of force and blackness, surely essential for the man who was to become Richard III. Admittedly his exit line here (‘My heart has lost its resolve in the face of such humiliation’) is not a patch on the one Shakespeare gives him. But Mr. Putnins is still young and will doubtless develop. Miss Massis’s purity of line was delightful and she will be an excellent Lucia in next year’s Met season. Mr. Ford’s performance was appropriately ringing and heroic, and Ms. Bardon’s rich and powerful. Mr. Previati, who had a gift of a role in Michele, made the most of it and displayed a most attractive operatic personality. The trio between Gloucester, Michele and the double-turncoat Carlo, as whom Mr. Miles conveyed an appropriately anguished performance, is undoubtedly one of the opera’s high spots musically and dramatically, and was rendered most convincingly. (A recording of this trio is available on the compilation of Meyerbeer’s Italian period issued by Opera Rara, and a complete recording of Margherita d’Anjou based on the evening’s performers will be available in September 2003).

At just over two-and-a half hours, the evening conveyed an ideal mixture of novelty, discovery, talent and entertainment. The resuscitation of Margherita by Opera Rara was wholly vindicated and the performance marks another stage in the painfully slow restoration of Meyerbeer’s reputation.

English opera reviews in the 1820s usually concluded with mention of persons of quality and fashion in the audience, and I am delighted to revive this tradition for ERO. Amongst those whom I met I was honoured to be introduced to the last living descendant of the composer, Ms. Elisabeth Beer, who was visiting London especially for the performance. She told me that Meyerbeer would have been delighted that his opera was being revived in London, a town which he greatly loved but which his predisposition to sea-sickness prevented him from visiting regularly. We were joined in conversation by the distinguished Meyerbeer scholar, and editor of his Diaries, Mr. Robert Letellier. I had a fascinating conversation with Mr. Nicholas Payne and Mr. Norman Rosenthal, whom I was able to set right on the question of the talents of Ignaz Moscheles. A significant contingent of the audience was represented by the Meyerbeer Fan Club, led by its maven Mr. Stephen Agus, who also made a lightning trip to London for the performance, having to return by Tuesday in order to vote in New York. Not least we were made welcome after the performance backstage by two of its heroes, Ms. Massis and Mr. Ford. In all, a thoroughly memorable evening.

From The Guardian, November 4, 2002

Margherita d'Anjou

Royal Festival Hall, London

Tim Ashley
Monday November 4, 2002
The Guardian

History, of which Giacomo Meyerbeer was fond, has yet to make up its mind about his music. In the mid-19th century Meyerbeer's epic operas were deemed the greatest ever written, and any composer who wanted to make good had to challenge him on his own terms. That Verdi and Wagner both succeeded in doing so was one factor in the decline of his reputation.

The other was nationalism. German-Jewish by birth, Meyerbeer trained in Italy before taking Paris by storm. Anti-semitism accompanied his every move in life and clouded his achievement in the years after his death.

Margherita d'Anjou, revived by Opera Rara after a century of neglect, dates from his Italian period. Typically, it depicts real and fictional characters in a historical convulsion, in this instance the Wars of the Roses. Margherita is better known to us as the traumatised Margaret, wife of Henry VI in Shakespeare's history plays. Meyerbeer presents her as a voracious warrior queen, who took the Norman Duke Lavarenne as her lover the moment Henry was in his grave. Meanwhile, Gloucester - the future Richard III - is hunting them down.

There's a twist, however: the opera suddenly swerves towards Twelfth Night. Isaura, Lavarenne's wife, arrives disguised as an orderly, accompanied by Michele, a comically sad doctor. Lavarenne and Isaura develop a relationship similar to that between Orsino and Viola. Michele's world-weary humour, meanwhile, derives from Shakespeare's Feste.

Meyerbeer's Italian operas are often dismissed as imitations of Rossini, though the score set a precedent for much that followed. There is a slow accumulation of musical pressure that gradually draws you in. The vocal writing is extreme and the orchestration sombre, avoiding Italianate light throughout.

Opera Rara have done the piece proud. Annick Massis's Margherita and Bruce Ford's Lavarenne express desire and ambition in coloratura of lethal precision. Isaura is played by the wonderful Irish mezzo Patricia Bardon, heart-stopping in grief and bringing the house down with her ecstatic, difficult final aria in which sorrow gives way to elation. Fabio Previati is touchingly funny as Michele, while the young Latvian baritone Pauls Putnins is a sinister Gloucester. Only Alastair Miles disappoints, lacking dramatic fire as Margherita's disaffected general. David Parry's conducting is immaculate and the London Philharmonic is on blistering form. Gripping stuff - but whether it will put Meyerbeer back on the map remains to be seen.

London Daily Mail

November 3, 2002

Margherita d'Anjou
by Giacomo Meyerbeer
Concert Margherita d'Anjou Festival Hall

IF GIACOMO MEYERBEER is remembered at all these days it is generally to be disparaged, a handy stick for belabouring French taste. But before he took over the show at the Paris Opera and filled it, Baz Luhrmann-like, with hoofing nuns and rollerskating choruses, this German-born composer had done his time (1817-24) in Italy and been bewitched "like one in an enchanted garden". This opera, an undocumented episode in the life of poor Henry VI's widow, was one result. It is billed as a half serious melodrama, which about covers it, and is set, if that is the word, during the Northumbrian uprising of 1462 (when Henry was actually still alive). While the Wars of the Roses rage, Isaura, wife of the Duke of Lavarenne (one of Margaret's generals, in love with the Queen), turns up at the camp in male disguise to try and win her husband back: yes, it's one of those.

Opera Rara are dedicated to the notion that if these things are worth reviving you might as well wheel out the biggest guns you can, and with some sumptuous casting and the London Philharmonic on rip-roaring form this was really an irresistible concert. This particular muse of Meyerbeer's is deeply in hock to Rossini, and it is a tribute to the robustness of the idiom that armed with little more than boundless energy and rudimentary melodic gifts Meyerbeer could turn out such a compelling work, which never drags during nearly three hours (though David Parry was wise to cut a lot of recit.) This muscular, martial music, somewhere between William Tell and Trovatore, is cut with Isaura's pathos (sung in great fruity, soulful style by Patricia Bardon), the moodswings of Margaret, and an extraordinary buffo doctor (Fabio Previati) who bullocks into every tragic musing with another patter-song, one of which purports to explain his lack of a Scottish accent when he is about to be killed by villainous Gloucester. Bruce Ford, not on the smoothest form, sang Lavarenne.

Annick Massis deserves more than a paragraph as Margaret. This is the purest of light-toned sopranos, with an almost superhuman ability to sing coloratura, and her Act Il cavatina, accompanied by a swooping violin, was an extraordinary display of control and considered phrasing. It's the kind of thing that can seem purely an exercise in display (Meyerbeer, no great tunesmith, goes in a lot for arpeggiated melodies) but in Massis's hands this had real heart. And the same goes for Bardon's Cinderella-type singout, as, apparently maddened with joy at being reunited with her man, her Isaura crows through a breathtaking rondo: a rousing end to a supremely jolly evening.

Robert Thicknesse