Astute recipe for success
Tom Sutcliffe on three little-known but enjoyable operas in this year's Wexford Festival
You still get the Angelus at noon and at six in Ireland on RTE's Radio One. Last Friday, the morning after the Wexford Festival opened with Mercadante's II giuramento (The Vow), that made a fitting curtain-raiser to the lead news item — which was all about Dublin's Cardinal Desmond Connell facing 450 lawsuits concerning paedophile priests in his diocese. Some traditions do linger, though not the Wexford tradition of having the local RC bishop as a prominent guest. Bishops at the opera have been replaced by businessmen — this year's sponsors include Unilever, Merrill Lynch, Bank of Ireland, Growlife, Stena Line, as well as very old friends such as Guinness and the Irish Arts Council.
There's a lot of politics about in Wexford. There needs to be. Politics is money. Bertie Ahern has pride of place in the latest Friends Newsletter, having promised government backing for the festival's ambitious expansion and rebuilding plans. The tab to be picked up by the Taoiseach will total about euros 23 million (£14.75 million) — quite a tidy sum for an 18-day event in a theatre with a capacity of 500. Festival chairman Ted Howlin's brother Brendan is challenging for the Irish Labour Party's leadership — though party opinion-polls suggest the prize will go to another politician with the entertaining monicker of P. Rabbitt. And, notably, the Nice vote was reprised to general approval on Saturday.
From the politician's and businessman's points of view, backing Wexford is backing a success story. The festival is very professionally run by chief executive Jerome Hynes. With its Italian artistic director, Luigi Ferrari, its orchestra from Minsk, and its chorus from Prague, Wexford has totally dispelled the sense of Anglo-Irish amateurism and inferiority that used to be a significant element of its charm. It is a contender in the Euro-league of artistic events, a 'blind date' with the forgotten and neglected past that has proved an extraordinarily astute recipe. And that recipe makes brilliant economic sense backstage. Expensive established stars wouldn't touch the work anyway. Learning roles with no shelf life is something you only do when you're new on the block and need a shop window.
Wexford 2002 was a vintage year. The production of II giuramento by Joseph Rochlitz may have been absurdly wooden, with sets (and bald platforms) that bespoke a desperately low budget, but I shall long treasure the moment when Elaisa strode across a bed to seize a massive crucifix: the strange swivelling gestures of the chorus were like nothing I have experienced before. The tenor, Manrico Tedeschi as Viscardo, was said to be suffering from bronchitis — hut struggled on nobly. Luigi Ferrari told us he was being let off the difficult bits — which may account for the sense of mystery and dislocation. He was not a very interesting tenor, whatever his condition.
Baritone Davide Damiani as the wicked Manfredo was underwhelming, too. But all problems paled into insignificance when Italian soprano Serena Farnocchia as Elaisa started singing. Farnocchia is a thrillingly accomplished, serious new star with rock-solid technique and true vocal charisma. She was totally on top of the demands the role made, and I look forward to hearing her in an opera worthy of such a wonderfully reassuring, secure voice. And the Israeli mezzo Hadar Halevi as Bianca, the other female star in this (essentially) two-woman opera, was also gloriously velvety and robust. Singing like this, decently conducted by Paolo Arrivabeni, was enough to compensate for the weakness of Mercadante's short-winded melodies and routine structures.
One reason Wexford 2002 was such a pleasure was the contrast between the three operas. Last year Massenet's Sappho suffered from poor French. This year Auber's Manon Lescaut was very stylish indeed in that department, which it needed to be with all its spoken dialogue. Auber's gallic recycling of Rossini's comic style in the 1850s may be backward-looking and not profoundly original, and Scribe's version of Prevost scarcely prepares one for tragedy in the Louisiana desert. But the melodies bubble away delightfully, the various musical forms are structurally very inventive, and the characterisations of the older Marquis, the youthful passionate Des Grieux, and Manon's cousin Lescaut are all excellent. The producers were JeanPhilippe Clarac and Olivier Deloeuil. The tragic conclusion is touching and religious.
The heart of the work is the virtuoso title role, which really was a challenge and an opportunity for Marina Vyskvorkina who eventually turned out to be highly accomplished and charming. Alexandre Swan's Des Grieux had wonderful French and an interesting light technique. Matthieu Lecroart was an entertaining Lescaut and Luca Salsi thundered away with surprising flexibility as the Marquis. The young conductor Jean-Luc Tingaud managed to make the National Philharmonic Orchestra of Belarus play with real French delicatesse, an extraordinary achievement. Musically this was both the toughest assignment and the most promising.
Twentieth-century comic operas are not abundant. So the discovery that Martinu's Mirandolina really works in musical and dramatic terms is very welcome. The basic plot is about how a crusty misogynist is turned into putty in Mirandolina's hands. The staging by Paul Curran played up the obvious jokes a bit unsubtly. But Kevin Knight's excellent witty sets involved a crowd of stagehands (led by Colm Lowney) pretending to be builders and decorators giving Mirandolina's modest hotel a needed face-lift. Riccardo Frizza conducted with infectious energy, his baton flying into the net at one point. Daniela Bruera was lively and persusasive in the title role, with Enrico Marabelli strong and grumpy as her target Cavaliere. Simon Edwards and Simone Alberghini made a funny double act as the other suitors, and Massimiliano Tonsini's loyal Fabrizio obviously deserved to win Mirandolina's hand in the end. Martinu used just the right frothy romantic musical language.
Such a thoroughly good and balanced season suggests rebuilding Wexford's facilities is unlikely to bring much artistic benefit, though there's a strong case for restoring the tiered seating that existed in the auditorium before it was converted into a cinema in the 1940s. What Ireland really needs is a proper opera company in Dublin, which used to be (in the 18th and 19th centuries) an important musical centre. Bertie Ahern's millions could enable Ireland to develop a growing and intelligent operatic audience. Somebody should consider the true priorities.
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