Arts
On the record
Rodney Milnes
All these opera sets are first recordings, even the ones that aren't. In the latter category is Kato Kabanova (Decca D51D 2, £8.50), which almost counts as a first performance. In his informative notes, Charles Mackerras describes the problems caused by Janacek's illegible MSS and his hardly more legible corrections to bewildered copyists' decipherings. Even when a sort of score had been arrived at, the opera was habitually performed in a touched-up version since Janacek's orchestration was, of course, impossibly 'amateur'. Such was the case with the old and rather good Sup' raphon recording. Having spent seven years establishing an authentic score, Mackerras Still found it necessary to make adjustments in the opera house, in the interests of balance and emotional weight, but in the recording studio it has been possible to perform the work absolutely as written, right down to the usually inaudible viola d'amore and the correction of one or two misreadings that had passed everyone by for over fifty years. Whether or not you think all this important, the recording that has resulted is a stunning achievement.
There are many reasons. First, Mackerras, who must be as much inside this opera as any conductor today. Whereas his very involvement can carry him away in the opera house, in the studio he sounds relaxed and expansive: the music is never hustled but allowed to unfold and expand without losing an iota of dramatic power. Using the luscious Vienna Philharmonic for this most overtly lyrical of Janacek's operas was another masterstroke; again, there is no lack of snarling brass when needed, but the Playing of the strings passes belief, whether in the yearn ingportamenti in the love music, the near-obscene glissandi in the scene betwe.en Kabanicha and Dikoy, or the hairraising ostinato figure that accompanies K.abanicha's formal bows over Katya's corpse.
Then there is the casting of the title-role. Czech sopranos tend to be of either the spun steel or pliant wobbly variety, but Elisabeth SoderstrOm's vibrant, soft-grained soprano is ideally suited to convey Katyas vulnerability yet strong enough to ride the .orchestral storm. Her familiar dramatic involvement comes over even on record, and according to Mackerras her Czech is faultless. The other roles are taken by native singers. Nadezhda Kniplova is a Properly repellent Kabanicha, and Dalibor Jedlicka a bear-like Dikoy. The young Slovak tenor Petr Dvorsky is the Boris, clear, musical, bright-toned and impasmoiled, but without the range of colour of Benno Blachut on the old version. But I fear there will never be another Blachut. In private the Decca management have been exerting a nice bit of blackmail: if this Kenya sells they will plough ahead with the rest of the Janacek canon with similar forces; if not — well, you now know where your duty lies.
Steep claims are made by the conductor, Jesus Lopez-Cobos, for the other first /umpteenth recording, Lucia di Lammermoor (Philips 6703 080, £9.25). This too goes straight back to the autograph, and I for one am glad to be spared the insane skitterings with flute that Donizetti never wrote and are an embarrassment even when emerging from the throat of a Callas. There were also downward transpositions so that coloratura nightingales could insert high E-flats and Ds all over the place, and over a hundred details (details?) of tempo, dynamic, scoring etc. to be corrected. To be fair, much df this was done on the second Sutherland recording for Decca, and Lopez-Cobos also rejects the glass harmonica obbligato for the Mad Scene, preferring Donizetti's alternative flute.
This is nevertheless an interesting restoration, even if the lack of decoration in second verses is taking severity a little too far. But the opera does gain in weight with a real lirico spin to in the title-role, less a circus act, more a serious psychological study. Montserrat Caballe is to my mind magnificent, but then she always is. The expression comes from her matchlessly limpid tone and the way she joins the notes together, not from the verbal and tonal colouring of a Callas. This is bel canto in its purest form. Perhaps now Callas is dead there will be the obligatory reaction away from her approach to this repertory; did it get in the way of the vocal line? There is still no one to touch Jose Carreras in ottocento opera: his Edgardo is ardeni, long-breathed and unfailingly musical. Perhaps he is a little unsparing with his forte singing, but I will forgive him a lot for the amazing top E-flat that the conductor makes him sing. Vicente Sardinero is a cold, implacable Enrico. The text, it goes without saying, is complete. The conducting is very straight and very tough. And, I think, very -Donizetti.
The Nose (EMI SLS 5088, £7.50) is a genuine first recording, one in which the soloists, chorus and orchestra of the Mos cow Music Theatre, under Gennadi Rozhdestvensky, make full amends for the ghastly treatment visited upon Shostakovich after the premiere in 1930, and indeed throughout the following decade — treatment that showed how well the satire had found its mark. The composer's prodigious talent matches Gogol's at every turn, whether farcical or nightmarish. I cannot agree with those who believe the piece makes no sense outside the theatre: I found myself laughing out loud (and shuddering silently) at the music. There is neither a dull nor a superfluous bar. Although the singers are placed well forward and are in danger of catching the mikes, the performance is superb, especially orchestrally, and matches the exuberant invention of a young composer throwing several kitchen sinks into his score and hitting a target with each one of them.
The Italian Straw Hat (more properly 11 Cappello di Paglia di Firenze, on RCA RL 31153, £6.98) is a rogue opera by Nino Rota, composer of, amongst other things, film scores for Fellini, Visconti, and Coppola (yes, The Godfather). Since this setting of Labiche's masterly farce could have been written at virtually any time in the past century (apart from one or two 'wrong-note' passages) it would doubtless be frowned upon by serious critics, but if it is good enough for Giorgio Strehler to direct at the Piccola Scala, then it is good enough for me. Call it a through-composed operetta, and the problem recedes somewhat. Farce is not easy to set, and Rota's pacing is skilfully contrived. He can write a good tune, and he can write for the voice. Perhaps parody is too strong a word for his affectionate pastiches of stock operatic episodes — the obligatory storm, ensemble of confusion. jealousy monologue etc. — but affectionate they certainly are. I enjoyed it, and if this recording by the Piccola Scala forces conducted by the composer gives impetus for a production over here so much the better.
L'Oracolo (Decca D34D2, £8.50) is a piece of limp verismo by one Franco Leoni dating from 1905. A vehicle (secondhand, I imagine) for Antonio Scotti, it is set in San Francisco's Chinatown. Wicked opium-den proprietor named Cim-Fen desires Ah-Joe, buries his chopper in her boy friend's neck, stuffs her dear little child cousin down a sewer (bravo), and is strangled with his own pigtail by boy friend's father while Ah-Joe goes ineffectually mad off-stage in competition with a fog-horn. The music — a mixture of Chu-Chin-Chow chinoiserie' and imitation Mascagni — is absolute piffle and has nothing to do with the words. The Scotti role must have had some visual appeal, as there is nothing that even Tito Gobbi can do with it on record. Joan Sutherland is unlikely casting for the Chinese ingenue, and the piece is conducted by Richard Bonynge, What Decca is doing pushing this pseudo-Chineise junk I cannot imagine, unless it is the ptice they have to pay to keep the Sutherlantl/Bonynge team happy. In which case it is pretty steep.
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