Raymond Gubbay Presents Dumbed Down Arias etc for the masses.
Or something like that. Of course the purist wouldn't attend, but what the heck...!
All very second rate in an enjoyable sort of way. The London Concert Orchestra and Chorus under Robin Stapleton, who's been around for ever and isn't bad. I suspect the orchestra was thrown together from myriad freelancers. The chorus contained various slightly familiar faces from various other choirs. Desperately under-rehearsed. All notes correct and on pitch and with faces buried deep in the scores.
A set of soloists from the file marked 'not quite top drawer'. Linda Richardson, Clare Shearer, Gwyn Hughes Jones and Jonathan Summers. None of them will ever be 'stars' but are exactly the sort of singers that the companies like ENO and WNO rely on. And I can't say that I was overwhelmed by any of them, yet they all showed excellent musicianship, reasonable stage presence, and pleasant voices true to pitch and so on. Four professional performances. What more can one want, except for that je ne sais quoi that distinguishes stars from mere professionals.
Of the four I think Gwyn Hughes Jones was my favourite, a sweet lyrical voice. At times beautiful. Hampered by a seeming complete absence of personality - of course, he could be a really interesting guy and great company down the pub but he seemed disengaged albeit in a concert setting. Jonathan Summers was entirely inaudible above the orchestra, which wasn't very large, yet when the orchestra shut up, there was no lack of volume from him. I thought Linda Richardson sounded nice but I was struck by this overall sense of mousiness that meant she never projected anything but voice beyond the footlights. Clare Shearer had the most commanding presence.
Of course what I mean by these two previous paragraphs is that even while can you enjoy such a performance it in no way compares to what the big star names (or most of them, anyway...) can pull off, seemingly without trying. Yet while they fell short of the standards set by the international superstars of opera, they were light years ahead of the wannabe one-tone no-emotion grunts so beloved of ClassicFM. Sometimes, I despair.
It was a populist-all-the-way programme, straight from a Classic FM Disc "Of all the nice bits in opera without worrying about the nasty plot lines." (Listed below the fold) but I have to say all of these pieces sound better with those ugly and sometimes brutal plot-lines round them. Well, apart from the Barber of Seville. I would happily take these two numbers, add in Una voce poca fa and call it quits on the Barber.
It strikes me as very unbalanced programme, and with such a light-weight middle-England selection, I would have expected a more light-weight audience. But actually, it was a very well behaved audience. No clapping arias in recognition "Ooh, it's that one off the telly" Perhaps Maestro had forestalled that by informing us that it was that one off the telly. No clapping before the final instrumental notes died away. No applauding the scenery. The bloke in front did decide to have a conversation during the Va pensiero. I vowed if he did it again, I would lean forward and enquire whether he required medical assistance to be summoned. But he didn't.
But, a pretty predictable programme, with the nearest to a surprise (IMO) being Stride la vampa and Softly Awakes My Heart. If I was programming such a concert, I would throw in a bit more Mozart, Wagner and Donizetti, and would cut the Puccini.
Rossini Overture and Largo al Factotum (The Barber of Seville)
Verdi Caro nome, La donna e mobile, Quartet (Rigoletto)
Verdi Anvil Chorus, Stride la vampa (Il trovatore)
Verdi Di Provenza, Brindisi (La traviata)
Verdi Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves (Nabucco)
Saint-Saëns Softly awakes my heart from (Samson and Dalilah)
Delibes Lakmé Flower Duet
Bizet The Pearlfishers Duet,
Bizet Entrance & Song of the Toreador, Seguidilla, The Flower Song, Habanera (Carmen)
Borodin Polovtsian Dances (Prince Igor)
Catalani Ebben nandro lontano (La Wally)
Mascagni Intermezzo, Easter Hymn (Cavalleria Rusticana)
Puccini Ah Mimi (La Boheme)
Puccini Un bel di (Madam Butterfly)
Puccini Nessun Dorma (Turandot)
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