Arts
Bleak Boris
Geoffrey Wheatcroft
Boris Godunov (ENO) The textual history of Boris is complicated even by the standards of 19th century opera.iModest Mussorgsky (Constant Lambert said that the two of them had the most unapt Christian names of any musicians) wrote the first version in 1868-9. It has only seven scenes. This version was turned down by the committee of the Imperial Opera who also delayed the performance of Mussorgsky's longer second version. This was, however, eventually performed in 1874. After the composer's death in 1881 Boris fell out of favour. It had the seeming disadvantage of bleak, austere orchestration.
It was this that the well-intentioned Rimsky-Korsakov tried to put right (as he saw it) when he revised and re-scored the opera in two versions during the 1890s. The second Rimsky is the version which most opera-goers know. Partly through the preference for it of great basses from Chaliapin to Christoff, Mussorgsky's versions are not unknown to the lyric stage in England. The first, shortei version was given at Sadler's Wells in 1935, the second, longer one at Covent Garden in 1948, before the retrograde step was taken of using the second Rimsky version. Both these performances were sung in English.
It was right and proper that the successor of Sadler's Wells, the English National Opera, should present an authentic (though the word strikes a chill) Boris, and especially appropriate that it should be under the hand of David Lloyd-Jones, a distinguished scholar, editor of the definitive score of Boris Godunov. (It is published jointly by an unusual combination — the Oxford University Press and the Soviet state publishing house).
Mr Lloyd-Jones says in the informative (though horribly designed) programme that the opera should be performed as Mussorgsky wrote it, 'now that we not only tolerate but actually cherish the sparseness and what might be called the lack of 19th century diapason in such composers as Janacek, Webern, Tippett . . lie agrees also that his edition's main aim is 'to make available all the material that Mussorgsky wrote for Boris. It is a quarry from which performers can choose as much music as they wish'. With all this in mind I had high hopes of the ENO Boris, hopes which were marginally disappointed. Mr Lloyd-Jones is certainly -ight to restore Mussorgsky's score: 'Authenticity', as I say, strikes a chill when it has come to mean often rather unmusical performances, supposedly in the playing style and with the instruments of the composer's age. Giving the music as the composer wrote it is another matter. But one had the feeling that Mr Lloyd-Jones, not content with performing a correct and original score, chose to perform it in a way which emphasised all that is most jejeune in Mussorgsky's orchestration. Moreover, he has given us just about the lot, 'without doubt the fullest text ever staged in this country', four acts running from half past six to getting on for closing time. In short (if that is the phrase), this was a long evening and it felt like it. There were other problems. Richard Van Allan is a marvel lous singer, but someone who has made his name in the Mozart baritone roles is perverse casting for the part of Boris.
But as we have come to expect from the ENO, the whole ensemble was of high standard, the comprimario parts well taken: this company has strength in depth, as they say of football clubs. I would mention Stuart Kale's Innocent and Dennis Wick's Varlaann. If, as I shall suggest, the ENO were to give the original-originalBoris with just seven scenes, it must be admitted that it would mean losing much fine music in the Polish scenes, and here it would have meant doing without the strikingly beautiful performance of Elizabeth Connell as Marina.
The production by Colin Graham was unsatisfactory, though it is not easy to put one's finger on why. This company has a deserved reputation for the staging of large-scale operas and several such productions have been the work of Mr Graham — War and Peace, The Royal Hunt of the Sun.
Here something was, missing. David Collis's sets lacked magnificence, the crowd scenes were not grand. Perhaps this only means that Messrs Graham and Collis lack the art of adapting themselves to the straitened times, of getting round the financial stringencies which all opera houses, in this country at least, now safe). from. Of course, it is a greater test of ingenuity to do epic works on the cheap than t6 do small-scale ones.
Though whether Boris is really an epic opera is a nice question. It would be interesting to see an, as it were, chamber performance of it. We would certainly be allowed to see the 1869 version at the Coliseum. Now that the piece is in the ENO repertory there is no reason why it should not be used in either version. My preference would be for brevity. It is understandable that Mr Lloyd-Jones should have wanted to conduct a performance with his fullest text, hut an uncut Boris, like an uncut Don Carlos, is something to be kept for festival performances.
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