Philharmonia/Klemperer: Beethoven’s Ninth (June 1970)
Otto Klemperer made his final public appearance at the Royal Festival Hall in London in 1971, but the previous year he had conducted a Beethoven symphony cycle there with the New Philharmonia (as it was then called), that concluded with two performances of the Ninth Symphony. It’s a BBC recording of one of those, on 30 June that year, with the New Philharmonia Chorus and Teresa Żylis-Gara, Janet Baker, George Shirley and Theo Adam as the soloists, which is now being streamed on the Philharmonia’s website. These days Klemperer’s performances, especially from the tail-end of his career, tend to be characterised as thick-textured and predominantly slow, but this account of the Ninth at least partly belies that. His approach is, of course, thoroughly traditional, with larger forces than we’re used to hearing in this work nowadays – Klemperer doubled up the woodwind parts, as Beethoven apparently specified for the work’s premiere. And by today’s standards too, the tempi are certainly on the slow side. But there isn’t a moment when the performance seems to drag, while the textures often seem miraculously light – the scherzo positively dances. If the first movement is relatively routine it’s a performance of gradually increasing power, and by the finale Klemperer’s seemingly minimal gestures to the orchestra have conjured up something truly remarkable. Andrew Clements
The Turn of the Screw (Opera North)
“Innocence, you have corrupted me,” the Governess sings at a climactic moment in Britten’s adaptation of Henry James’s insidious ghost story. In Alessandro Talevi’s Opera North staging, the boundaries between innocence and corruption constantly blur, throwing us continuously off balance, and few other productions have quite so consistently, or indeed so disturbingly, maintained the fundamental ambiguity as to whether the ghosts are genuine supernatural entities, or projections of the Governess’s disordered mind. There are some splendidly sinister moments, as shadows behave independently of bodies, and the children become increasingly like the ghosts that may or may not possess them. And the final moments of Act I are genuinely marrow-freezing. Tensely conducted by Leo McFall, it’s exceptionally well sung across the board. Sarah Tynan is outstanding as the tormented Governess, while Tim Gasiorek’s tragic, chilling Miles is probably the best you will ever see. Tim Ashley
Guillaume Tell (Rossini festival)
Rossini’s French grand opera Guillaume Tell (William Tell) pits the personal repeatedly against the political. Graham Vick’s production for the 2013 Rossini festival in Pesaro revels in further, sometimes gnomic juxtapositions. Thus the Act II love duet sees tenor and soprano confessing adoration not only across enemy lines but also, bafflingly, amid a herd of life-sized model horses. But don’t be put off: musically, this performance is superb, more than redeeming any frustrations with the staging. In the pit, rising star Michele Mariotti drives the excellent chorus and orchestra of the Teatro Comunale di Bologna with an unapologetically Italianate sense of momentum. Juan Diego Flórez is on top form as Swiss romantic hero Arnold, all earnest expressivity and clarion top notes, while Nicola Alaimo’s Tell is both physically and vocally imposing. As Tell’s son Jemmy, Amanda Forsythe is irresistible, her tone luminous. Leading the Habsburg occupiers (all dressed in pre-first world war Austro-Hungarian bling), Luca Tittoto’s Gesler is deliciously thuggish. But the standout performance is Marina Rebeka’s Mathilde: her voice rich with a steely edge and crystalline high notes, her stage presence intensely convincing even in closeup. Catch it free while you can. (Available until 7 July.) Flora Willson
Un Ballo in Maschera (Metropolitan Opera, New York)
Politics, affairs of the heart, betrayal: these are Verdi’s essentials in a plot based on the 1792 assassination of King Gustav III of Sweden. It was politicking, too, that dictated the opera being set in different locations in slightly differing versions (confusion alert). In his debut production for New York’s Metropolitan Opera, director David Alden opted for the Swedish setting, but with contemporary Scandi noir. Against the suitably stark and sleek design, references to paintings of the Fall of Icarus, Busby Berkeley films, fishermen in macs and sou’westers straight off a Peter Grimes set, not to mention the contents of soothsayer Ulrika’s shiny patent handbag, add notes of whimsy. The late lamented Dmitri Hvorostovsky is a main attraction, expressing both the violent urge of vengeance as well as the tenderness of regret, with the famous aria Eri Tu a great outpouring of emotion. Rian Evans
Ritratto (Dutch National Opera)
Opera Forward, Dutch National Opera’s annual festival of music theatre, should have launched last month with the world premiere of Ritratto by Willem Jeths, who was the Netherlands’s first “national composer” between 2014 and 2016. This year’s event was cancelled only days before the opening, but Ritratto’s dress rehearsal had been filmed and is now available online. The portrait of the title is that of Luisa Casati, an Italian heiress who was the muse and model for a number of artists in the early decades of the 20th century. Jeths’s opera depicts the efforts of Casati (sung by Verity Wingate) to become part of that artistic world, at a time when fascism was already beginning to take hold in Italy – Sergei Diaghilev, Man Ray, Jacob Epstein and Gabriele D’Annunzio all feature in the cast list. Jeths’s score is mainstream conservative, his vocal writing largely declamatory, but it’s a concise, dramatically taut piece, stylishly staged by Marcel Sijm. Andrew Clements
See also: Lockdown listening – our regularly updated list of online operas and concerts; critics’ daily picks week one, week two and week three.
