{"id":46381,"date":"2017-07-18T08:02:45","date_gmt":"2017-07-18T12:02:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/?p=46381"},"modified":"2017-07-19T09:46:51","modified_gmt":"2017-07-19T13:46:51","slug":"scrutiny-letters-from-munich-don-giovanni","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/2017\/07\/18\/scrutiny-letters-from-munich-don-giovanni\/","title":{"rendered":"SCRUTINY |\u00a0Letters From Munich: Don Giovanni"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Maria
Maria Celeng (Zerlina) and Mathias Hausmann (Don Giovanni) (Photo: Thomas Dashuber)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Mathias Hausmann (Don Giovanni), Jennifer O\u2019Loughlin (Donna Anna), Nadja Stefanoff (Donna Elvira), Levente P\u00e1ll (Leporello), Szabolcs Brickner (Don Ottavio), Maria Celeng (Zerlina), Christoph Filler (Masetto), Christoph Seidl (Commendatore). Herbert F\u00f6ttinger, Regie. Marco Comin, Musikalische Leitung. Orchester des Staatstheaters am G\u00e4rtnerplatz. Cuvilliestheater, Munich. July 8, 2017.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Munich has been one of my opera destinations for over thirty years. My focus had always been the Bavarian State Opera during their annual Opernfestspiele, with a sprinkling of symphonic concerts and Liederabend<\/em> whenever possible. This summer I finally managed to catch a performance of Munich\u2019s other<\/em> opera company, the Staatstheater am G\u00e4rtnerplatz, in a new production of Don Giovanni<\/em>. Part of the attraction was the venue\u2014the exquisite Rococo opera house known as the Cuvilliestheater was pressed into service, due to G\u00e4rtnerplatztheater\u2019s own house being closed for renovations. I had only seen a show in Cuvilliestheater once before, and it was of all things, Bernstein\u2019s Trouble in Tahiti<\/em>. With Don Giovanni<\/em> being a much more stylistically appropriate piece for that space, I couldn\u2019t pass it up.<\/p>\n

For those used to cavernous theatres that pass for opera houses, the Cuvilliestheater is a real treat. Its\u00a0ambience gives a taste of what opera must have been like back in Mozart\u2019s time. It seats only 550, with comfortable, velvet upholstered chairs, albeit with no armrests. I was fortunate to have an aisle seat in the second row, a good vantage point to see everything up close. The pit is relatively small but enough for a chamber-sized orchestra of up to maybe 50 musicians. I should point out that the Staatstheater Orchester is not a Baroque band, since they play a huge variety of repertoire, from Semele<\/em> to My Fair Lady<\/em>. The pit isn\u2019t as sunken as most modern houses, but the acoustics for the voices are really wonderful.<\/p>\n

This new production premiered just two weeks ago, on June 24. The simple unit set consists of three handsome-looking panels with doors, sitting on a turntable to facilitate scene changes. Directed by Herbert F\u00f6ttinger, it has been time-shifted to the present. When Leporello sings his \u201cCatalogue Aria\u201d to Donna Elvira, he uses an iPad, not exactly ground breaking, as these electronic gadgets have become de rigueur<\/em> in opera. All characters are in modern dress\u2014that is, when they\u2019re not taking them off! In the party scene, a few in the chorus are topless. Everyone wearing skirts, men and women. I couldn\u2019t help but notice that in the five operas I saw on this trip, three featured topless women, and male disguised as female\u2014is it a trend? Why? Does it enhance the story? A major departure from the original\u2014at the end Don Giovanni points a gun to his mouth and pulls the trigger. Why? I have no idea.<\/p>\n

\"Don
Don Giovanni at Staatstheater am G\u00e4rtnerplatz, Munich (Photo: Thomas Dashuber)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Musically it was a fine performance. I was pleasantly surprised at the quality of the singing, but in retrospect, I needn\u2019t be surprised. All the principals have fresh, attractive instruments, most are already well-established with respectable international careers; the rest are on the way up\u2014this is a company of young artists. Impressive was the well-sung and darkly menacing Don Giovanni of Austrian baritone Mathias Hausmann. A check of his bio shows he has already appeared at La Scala and Wiener Staatsoper. Equally fine was American soprano Jennifer O\u2019Loughlin (Donna Anna) who tossed off extra appoggiaturas here and there, not to mention a brilliant \u201cOr sai\u201d and a lovely \u201cNon mi dir.\u201d<\/p>\n

I also liked Hungarian tenor Szabolcs Brickner (Don Ottavio), who sang with attractive, rather robust tone; perhaps just a little short on head voice in \u201cDalla sua pace.\u201d Incidentally, like O\u2019Loughlin, he also used extra ornamentation. Sadly, his \u201cIl mio Tesoro\u201d was cut. Fellow Hungarian bass-baritone Levente P\u00e1ll was a sturdy-toned, playful and thoroughly convincing Leporello. I\u2019d be remiss for not mentioning the beautifully sung and dramatically vivid Donna Elvira of Nadja Stefanoff. Her \u201cMi tradi\u201d was outstanding. The Staatstheater Music Director Marco Comin led the chamber orchestra of about 40 musicians\u2014I only did a rough count as unobtrusively as I could\u2014in a well-oiled, idiomatic performance. I watched him closely from where I was sitting. He cued with care and knew the score like the back of his hand, to be expected since Don Giovanni<\/em>\u00a0is a bread and butter opera in German houses, and every musician is expect to know it really well. All in all, a very enjoyable first experience for me at the second opera company in Munich, and it won\u2019t be my last.<\/p>\n

For more REVIEWS, click\u00a0HERE<\/u><\/a><\/span>.<\/h3>\n

#LUDWIGVAN<\/i><\/b><\/h3>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fresh voices and youthful energy make G\u00e4rtnerplatztheater\u2019s Don Giovanni a winner. A look into Munich’s second opera company. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":46383,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[6439,43,52],"tags":[1067,6254,9688],"yst_prominent_words":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2017\/07\/DonGio1.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9bakr-c45","amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46381"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46381"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46381\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46387,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46381\/revisions\/46387"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46383"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46381"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46381"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46381"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=46381"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}