Just picked up Sir Simon Rattle's new performance of King Roger.
(EMI56823)
Summary from the busy non-executive: The sexually ambiguous tenor lures
the manly, but naive baritone home for drinks--this time, *before* the
opera's over!
Not exactly, but more on that later. Roger is a king who is asked by the
local archbishop to banish a wandering shepherd who has been leading people
"astray." The king ends up finding *himself * seduced by the shepherd, and
finds that his ever so reliable "calm voice of reason," (embodied in the
character of his adviser Edrisi), becomes threatened by new and unfamiliar
feelings of passion and sensuality, (embodied in the character of his wife
Roxana). Roxana is sung by Elzbieta Szmytka, and Edrisi by Philip
Langridge. Roger is sung by Thomas Hampson.
Well, you gotta hand it to Szymanowski for playing on Wagnerian and
Straussian turf while still managing to retain an original, yet equally
potent voice. The opera opens with a cathedral service of grand solemnity.
If you are a sucker for Post-Romantic treatments of arcane quasi-religious
ceremony, (think Puccini's "Te Deum" in Tosca), you won't be disappointed.
The re-entrance of the chorus after the incantations of the archbishop,
sung by Robert Gierlach (if *he* were the beckoning shepherd I'd be clawing
Roxana out of my way and telling that Edrisi to mind his own business!) are
truly hair-raising--with multiple choirs, gong, organ, and full orchestra
caught spectacularly by the EMI recording team.
The shepherd's aria delivers, and the voice of Ryszard Minkiewicz
is supported with some of the most beautiful and rarefied music of
the opera, including low, cool flute suspensions, forest murmurings,
and high, quietly-poignant Mahlerian-sounding unison string passages.
Critics have commented that Minkiewicz' voice is not exactly seductive.
Alas, this is true, though I find his performance to be more cautious
than unsatisfactory. The tenor is certainly accurate and musical, and he
chooses to sing with his chest voice, (as opposed to falsetto), even in the
highest and quietest of passages--very treacherous. There are certainly no
ugly moments in his performance.
Roxana's aria is everything one could want, and the most famous moment in
the opera. I worry that it sounds too stereotypically Szymanowskian--a
siren-song cliche kinda thing that will turn certain listeners off. But
there is so much more to Szymanowski's music than those augmented fourths.
King Roger is deftly woven together, and I believe the man possessed
exceptional compositional gifts. And the richness of the orchestration!
Even as an opera lover, there were times, (sorry!), where the
consonant-heavy Polish language seemed to detract from the heady, yet
sophisticated and sometimes delicate musical accompaniment.
The final act is inspiration from beginning to end. After the shepherd
reveals himself as Dionysus, the orgy scene builds in intensity, much like
the final march in Respighi's "Pines...", and one can hear the characters
emerge from the tangle at different points--Roxana, Dionysus, Roger, a
chorus of purple teletubbies....
Will King Roger go for it? You'll have to find out for yourselves!
A word about the cover design, since it's been such a hot topic lately.
I doubt that Szymanowski would have wanted anyone to consider his opera,
King Roger, a lurid creation; yet the colors EMI chose for the box--
shades of purple, sprinkled here and there with tiny mustard-yellow
tiles--couldn't be more lurid looking. And the male models! They're
dressed appropriately, (in togas), but they look as though they were
snatched from the local accounting office--how sexy is that? It would be
*so* much fun to say that the English shouldn't be allowed anywhere near
anything erotic, but Sir Simon and his Birmingham forces definitely know
how to ride Szymanowski's heady wave with aplomb.
Such a great release.
John Smyth
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