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SCRUTINY | Renée Fleming Bids Farewell To The Marschallin In New Met Der Rosenkavalier

By Joseph So on May 7, 2017

Strauss: Der Rosenkavalier, MET Opera, 2017 (Photo: Ken Howard)
Strauss: Der Rosenkavalier, MET Opera, 2017 (Photo: Ken Howard)
Joseph So

Strauss: Der Rosenkavalier. Elina Garanca, Renée Fleming, Erin Morley, Gunther Groissböck. Sebastian Weigle, conductor. Robert Carsen, stage director. Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and Chorus. May 5, 2017.

NEW YORK CITY — One of the biggest splashes of the current Met season is a new production of Der Rosenkavalier. It replaces the beloved, long-serving one by Nathaniel Merrill and Robert O’Hearn that dates to the early days of the New Met — you are talking about nearly fifty years, folks. While still handsome, it had started to look rather dowdy and frayed in recent revivals. When it was announced that it would be retired, the traditionalists cried foul. But even the Marschallin is wise enough to realize that sometimes you just have to let go.

This new version is directed by Canadian Robert Carsen. It’s not truly new but reworked, the original having premiered in Salzburg in 2004 starring Canadian soprano Adrianne Pieczonka. Preserved on a commercial DVD, it had fine singing but the production, then as now, drew polarized opinions.  It was adapted for Covent Garden last December, before arriving at the Met this spring with a largely different cast except for Renée Fleming.

Fleming had earlier indicated that this show would mark her farewell to opera. Never mind that she’s now protesting that she said no such thing. A prima donna’s prerogative perhaps?  In any case, her operatic performances have dwindled. I went to the Semperoper Dresden in 2014 to hear her Arabella and the Countess Madeleine. She sang Madeleine and cancelled Arabella. As far as we know, there’s nothing operatic in the standard repertoire scheduled beyond this Marschallin.

It is a wise farewell choice.  Der Rosenkavalier is Strauss’s supreme meditation on love, aging and the passage of time. One of the most finely drawn female character in all opera, the Marschallin is an ideal farewell vehicle for prima donnas of a certain age. I was fortunate to witness both Elisabeth Söderström and Evelyn Lear sing this role in their respective Met farewells. Fleming, the authentic American prima donna of our time, certainly has the star power to make it memorable.

If attendance at the 4000-seat Met is down these days, you’d never have guessed, as it was sold out in the performance I saw. What a striking contrast to the old-fashioned Nathaniel Merrill-Robert O’Hearn production! Carsen has time-shifted it from mid-18th–century to 1911 Vienna, quite a master stroke. It has created a completely different “feel” to the piece, with WWI looming in the not-too-distant future. The Hapsburgs’ long gone and the Austro-Hungarian Empire in its last legs. It casts a spell of darkness to the proceedings.

Act One is still essentially conventional, but Act Two opens with two cannons on stage, in what would be the house of Faninal!  Carsen’s vision of the nouveau riche Faninal (fabulously played and sung by Markus Brück) is someone who has made a killing — pun intended – as an arms merchant. Craving status, he wants his daughter Sophie to marry into title. This re-imagining works surprisingly well. That said, the heavy artilleries, the enormous militaristic Grecian frieze, and the huge number of soldiers on stage run counter to the Romanticism of the Presentation of the Rose. Carsen’s rather awkward solution is to have waltzing couples in the background. Using many silent extras appears to be a Carsen trademark, something he used effectively in his Munich Ariadne auf Naxos some ten years ago.

Clearly, the most radical departure from tradition is Act Three. Instead of the nondescript inn, it takes place in a brothel, complete with a drag band (!), and a drag Innkeeper, valiantly played by Met stalwart Tony Stevenson.  Octavian, in disguise as Mariandel, turns the table on Ochs with some outrageous roughhousing, eliciting plenty of snickers from the audience. This teenage boy with the raging hormones looks a tad too comfortable pretending to be a woman!  After the Final Trio, Octavian and Sophie make out on the bed, a replica of the Marschallin’s. If you had caught the opening night broadcast, you would have noticed the lusty boos for Carsen and his team. But on May 5, I only heard cheers.

Whatever one’s feelings for the production, musically it was exquisite. Fleming might have lost a decibel or two, and the occasional chest tone at the start could be a bit raw, but she remains a formidable Marschallin, a role that fits her like kit gloves. Lovely mezza voce, and the treacherous opening line of the Final Trio was perfectly delivered. She received thunderous ovations, totally deserved. The Latvian mezzo Elina Garanca, at the height of her game, was a boyish and impetuous Octavian, her gorgeous, well-modulated mezzo never sounded better. She also has the requisite volume for the climaxes, sounding considerably bigger than Fleming in their scenes together. Garanca’s irrepressible Mariandel in Act Three, looking for all like Marlene Dietrich in The Blue Angel, was beyond hilarious.

Instead of the archetypal superannuated, fat slob of a nobleman, Austrian baritone Gunther Groissböck’s Baron Ochs is youthful and handsome, undeniably against type. Sophie might well have fallen for him if only he weren’t such a boor! Possessing fine acting chops, Groissböck’s Ochs is among the best I’ve seen.  He sang beautifully too, although his lowest notes weren’t as firm as I had expected. Another standout was the Italian Singer of tenor Matthew Polenzani. In terrific voice, his “Di rigori armato” was sensational. His impersonation of Caruso was spot-on. Giving an autographed 78 rpm record to the Marschallin before his aria — what an inspired stroke!  On the other hand, having Ochs lounging on Marschallin’s bed was a bit over the top.

Soprano Erin Morley was a lovely Sophie, a role she has sung beautifully at the Met in 2013. Her smooth, well-focused, crystalline light soprano was a real pleasure, all the way up to a high C sharp. All the supporting roles were expertly taken — to have distinguished veterans like Alan Oke and Helene Schneiderman (in her Met debut) as the Intriguers was luxury casting. Dramatic soprano Susan Neves, a noted Abigaille and Odabella, took on the small role of Marianne, showing that her high C’s are still formidable if a tad strident. Sebastian Weigle, a fine Wagner-Strauss conductor, led the wonderful Met Orchestra in a sublime reading of the score.  All in all, a truly memorable evening. Two more shows, on May 9 and 13. Everything is now sold out, but you can catch the May 13 performance in selected Cineplex cinemas.  If you are a Fleming fan, you wouldn’t want to miss her last Marschallin.

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#LUDWIGVAN

Joseph So

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