Scottish Opera / RCS, 03/12/2017
Prokofiev : The Fiery Angel
The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland Chorus
The Orchestra of Scottish Opera
and students from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland
Mikhail Agrest
Looking at the subjects of Prokofiev's early operas, it's hard not to come to the conclusion that he liked to indulge in a distinct streak of psychological sado-masochism. Maybe it was the zeitgeist, but his first four operas - even the apparently good-humoured Love for Three Oranges - all display some decidedly twisted behaviours on the part of the protagonists, and few of the characters can be said to be endearing. The Fiery Angel's plot synopsis reads like something cooked up on mind-altering substances - occasionally it sounds like it too - and I think that it must be a director's nightmare to actually try and make sense of it. The beauty of a concert performance (even a semi-staged one, as today's) is that there's no need, and no attempt to try to draw some cohesive message from the plot, you just take it as it comes, and it comes on like a fully-loaded, high-speed freight train!
This was a collaborative effort between Scottish Opera and the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, who have a strong track record of such events, notably in Russian repertoire, behind them already. The principals were all Eastern European (mostly Russian), the secondary roles students or recent graduates of the RCS, and with instrumental students augmenting the forces of the Scottish Opera Orchestra, while the chorus came entirely from the Conservatoire. It was a hugely impressive performance, driven, passionate, extremely high-octane and wholly absorbing, with, at its heart, a pair who now have considerable experience in their roles, Evez Abdulla as the hapless Ruprecht, impenetrably enmeshed in the hypnotic, obsessive world of Svetlana Sozdateleva's Renata.
Renata is a crushing role, requiring a lyric-dramatic soprano not unlike that needed for Tosca, but considerably more demanding in terms of the amount of time spent singing, and the amount of energy needed for the part, because the character lives on a knife-edge of hysteria from start to finish. She has the occasional calmer moments (fortunately for the singer), but they are few and far between, and it is Renata's violent mood swings that largely propel the opera from scene to scene. Sozdateleva was outstanding, sounding clear and sure, and delivering the role with an unswerving intensity, so that whatever Renata was doing at any given moment - no matter how contradictory or irrational - was clearly the only thing she could be doing. Abdulla, a dark-grained baritone, virile and confident, was an admirable foil,
Like most of Prokofiev's principal operas, there is a plethora of smaller parts. Dmitry Golovin's Agrippa was taxed by the volume of the orchestra, as was Alexei Tanovitski's Inquisitor in the final scene (and it does get very loud at the end), but Maria Maksakova's smooth, dark mezzo was heard to good effect as both the Hostess in Act 1, and the Mother Superior in Act 5. Luke Sinclair also produced a nice, crisply sardonic turn as Mephistopheles, able to suggest the menace beneath the conjuring tricks of what looks, ostensibly, like a purely comic role.
The chorus is only really required in the last act, but then has to deliver a multi-layered scene of pure chaos which, of course, has to be anything but chaotic, and this, the RCS Chorus (mostly the ladies thereof) managed splendidly. Throughout the concert, the orchestra was playing at a white heat, acidly colourful, atmospheric and electrifying, with Mikhail Agrest almost dancing on the podium in his involvement in the music. A formidable performance on all counts.
[Next : 8th December]
The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland Chorus
The Orchestra of Scottish Opera
and students from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland
Mikhail Agrest
Looking at the subjects of Prokofiev's early operas, it's hard not to come to the conclusion that he liked to indulge in a distinct streak of psychological sado-masochism. Maybe it was the zeitgeist, but his first four operas - even the apparently good-humoured Love for Three Oranges - all display some decidedly twisted behaviours on the part of the protagonists, and few of the characters can be said to be endearing. The Fiery Angel's plot synopsis reads like something cooked up on mind-altering substances - occasionally it sounds like it too - and I think that it must be a director's nightmare to actually try and make sense of it. The beauty of a concert performance (even a semi-staged one, as today's) is that there's no need, and no attempt to try to draw some cohesive message from the plot, you just take it as it comes, and it comes on like a fully-loaded, high-speed freight train!
This was a collaborative effort between Scottish Opera and the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, who have a strong track record of such events, notably in Russian repertoire, behind them already. The principals were all Eastern European (mostly Russian), the secondary roles students or recent graduates of the RCS, and with instrumental students augmenting the forces of the Scottish Opera Orchestra, while the chorus came entirely from the Conservatoire. It was a hugely impressive performance, driven, passionate, extremely high-octane and wholly absorbing, with, at its heart, a pair who now have considerable experience in their roles, Evez Abdulla as the hapless Ruprecht, impenetrably enmeshed in the hypnotic, obsessive world of Svetlana Sozdateleva's Renata.
Renata is a crushing role, requiring a lyric-dramatic soprano not unlike that needed for Tosca, but considerably more demanding in terms of the amount of time spent singing, and the amount of energy needed for the part, because the character lives on a knife-edge of hysteria from start to finish. She has the occasional calmer moments (fortunately for the singer), but they are few and far between, and it is Renata's violent mood swings that largely propel the opera from scene to scene. Sozdateleva was outstanding, sounding clear and sure, and delivering the role with an unswerving intensity, so that whatever Renata was doing at any given moment - no matter how contradictory or irrational - was clearly the only thing she could be doing. Abdulla, a dark-grained baritone, virile and confident, was an admirable foil,
Like most of Prokofiev's principal operas, there is a plethora of smaller parts. Dmitry Golovin's Agrippa was taxed by the volume of the orchestra, as was Alexei Tanovitski's Inquisitor in the final scene (and it does get very loud at the end), but Maria Maksakova's smooth, dark mezzo was heard to good effect as both the Hostess in Act 1, and the Mother Superior in Act 5. Luke Sinclair also produced a nice, crisply sardonic turn as Mephistopheles, able to suggest the menace beneath the conjuring tricks of what looks, ostensibly, like a purely comic role.
The chorus is only really required in the last act, but then has to deliver a multi-layered scene of pure chaos which, of course, has to be anything but chaotic, and this, the RCS Chorus (mostly the ladies thereof) managed splendidly. Throughout the concert, the orchestra was playing at a white heat, acidly colourful, atmospheric and electrifying, with Mikhail Agrest almost dancing on the podium in his involvement in the music. A formidable performance on all counts.
[Next : 8th December]