Opera
Unpredictable
Rodney Milnes
Cosi fan Witte (Glyndebourne) The Knot Garden and La Calisto (Opera Factory London Sinfonictta, Royal Court)
How unpredictable revivals are. Peter Hall's Glyndebourne Figaro has de- veloped steadily since 1973, attaining a state of gleaming grace this year. His Cosi, last seen at the 1978 and 1979 festivals and inordinately admired by those who like their Mozart straight, now looks less like a revival than a completely new production. It is, of course, a work that depends much more on the physical, temperamental and vocal balance of the six soloists, whereas in Figaro a directorial overview can temper individual contributions. While Claudio Desderi's exuberant Figaro threatened to burst out of the confines of the Hall production but was cunningly contained, his Don Alfonso has changed the Hall Cosi almost beyond recognition.
So has a minute adjustment to the girls' costumes. Originally John Bury's Kate Greenaway frocks ended just above the ankles, which somehow made the charac- ters both simple and vulnerable; now they are full-length, fail to define character, and with the mob-caps worn further forward than before suggest something approach- ing dowdiness. Maybe the casting caused the change: Carol Vaness (Fiordiligi) and Delores Ziegler (Dorabella) are both tall and healthy of figure and thus might have looked odd in three-quarter-length little- girl outfits. And I hope it is not just memories of Miss Vaness's magnificent Donna Anna and Elettra that made me feel that this hugely capable Fiordiligi, who is many things but not vulnerable, would have seen through the whole plot, banged everyone's heads together and sent Alfon- so off to the nearest shrink half way through the first act. It was clever, then, to cast Jane Barbie as Despina; no longer impeccable vocally, she suggested untold depths of worldly experience and very nearly suspended my lurking disbelief. If these capable ladies listened to anyone, it would be to this mature, pop-eyed little bundle of Mediterranean naughtiness with the most infectious of cackles.
Desderi's Alfonso — his enunciation, incidentally, of his native tongue remains one of the lasting pleasures of the last four festivals — is a bitter, sarcastic, emotionally crippled freak. If a smile escapes him, it is through the thinnest of tight lips. He jumps on the idea of the wager with beetle- browed eagerness, and takes sadistic plea- sure in sending the officers to find the 'Albanians' in the finale. 'lo crepo se non rido,' he sings in the Farewell Quintet, with a look of such nausea that you feel he needs to throw up rather than laugh if he is not to burst.
This is a wholly riveting performance, but is it Mozart's and Da Ponte's Alfonso? The lesson to be learnt at this School for Lovers is that romantic love, for want of a better adjective, lasts a short time — three years, or at best the traditional seven — before being replaced by something more interesting based on different qualities if marriages are to last longer than the one year suggested by our legislators. Mozart's music hints that the necessary lesson is taught out of kindness and affection, not with the anger and cynicism that Desderi brings to his impersonation. One spent too much of the performance wondering what on earth had happened to the man to turn him into such a monster: it was he who needed sorting out, not the lovers.
While this casting emphasises the cruelty of the action rather than its sympathy in the broadest sense, and thus makes the Hall production a great deal less upsetting than it was (cruelty we can 'easily cope with, sympathy less so), the skill of the staging remains as provocative and fresh as ever. Hall's handling of 'Come scoglio' remains an object lesson in opera direction (just watch and analyse it); all traditional gags are studiously ignored ('Morti non son' without a pause); the emotional weather gets blacker and blacker. Which raises my only doubt: is not the first act meant to be funny? The music, again, says so, and if it isn't, then is there anywhere for the opera to go to after the interval? There is a slight lack of light and shade. Details: the new and wholly expendable commedia character must go; Mozart rightly replaced `Rivolgete' with 'Non slate ritrosi' and Glyndebourne should follow suit; and I trust that the revolting and impractical new house curtain is for the anniversary season only and will swiftly be returned to Surbi- ton where it belongs.
On the musical side, Gustav Kuhn takes an overtly romantic view of the score yet keeps his expressive shading within decent classical bounds — very distinguished. Indi- vidually, Miss Vaness and Miss Zeigler (debutante) sing ravishingly, but together the chemistry of their voices brings slight problems of tuning. Ryland Davies, not in his freshest voice last week, and J. Patrick Raftery, an excellent American baritone also en debut, are the brother officers. As always in Cosi, it is the ensemble that counts: the first-act finale, dazzlingly play- ed by the LPO and perfectly sung, brought the sort of intense musical pleasure that only Glyndebourne can provide in Mozart.
If one can disregard their management's promotional pronouncements, which bet- ray attitudes to opera in performance as jejune and out of date as Peter Brook's, there is much to enjoy in the Opera Factory's work. Their musical standards are impeccable: Meirion Bowen's clever chamber reduction of the Tippett is bril- liantly played by the Sinfonietta, and Paul
Daniels's realisation of the CavaIli, equalli, well played, sounds as practical as- it " authentic. Since The Knot Garden is about group therapy, it suits the Factory wen; Calisto,. up-dated and faultlessly is a farcical romp at the level, alas, of 8,11 end-of-term play at a not very good school. The piece itself is much, much m1sophisticated. As always, I came awaY of admiration for a first-rate ensemble 13:, singing-actors — among them Lesi,e,' Stephenson, Christine Botes, Janis ge"Yt and Tom McDonnell — and wishing tha their talents could be put to more growir
up use. executed,
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