Author: Jos Hermans
Opera, the prodigy and worry child of 400 years of cultural history and declared dead a thousand times over, is a tough art form. The current opera crisis is manifesting itself in very different ways in our country these days. In Brussels, there is no embarrassment in giving a stage to climate alarmism, the greatest hoax of all time. Has there ever been a more useless libretto produced for a new opera? In Antwerp, opera newcomer Milo Rau profiles himself in his familiar role as iconoclast, transforming La Clemenza di Tito into a master class of postmodern deconstructivism. If you want to know how to do everything wrong, travel to Antwerp. Liege takes a very different approach and invites former director Jean-Louis Grinda, known for many a conservative staging. It is therefore unfortunate to discover that Grinda's stagecraft still comes with little scenographic imagination (a responsibility he shares this time with Laurent Castaingt) and still lacks a compelling actor's direction.
Idomeneo is a hybrid form of Italian opera seria and French tragédie lyrique. It is fascinating to see how Mozart undermines the aesthetic foundations of opera seria, in which Idomeneo is nevertheless anchored for three-quarters of the time. To do so, one needs to wait until the finale of the second act. Until then, the convention of the opera seria reigns with recitatives (both secco and accampagnato) interspersed with arias. Very decent arias by the way like "Padre,germani, addio" (Ilia) and "Tutte nel cor vi sento" (Elettra) and the wonderful "Fuor del mar" (Idomeneo). Here and throughout the third act the creator of Da Ponte operas announces himself. When the 25-year-old court organist of Salzburg celebrates his first major opera success in Munich with Idomeneo, he is on the verge of his Viennese period. Salzburg he has only just left behind him along with the nagging of his father Leopold. The archbishop's kick in the butt has yet to follow. His emancipation from Leopold Mozart and from Salzburg simultaneously means his artistic emancipation. Not entirely coincidentally, Idomeneo also centers on a father/son relationship.
Idomeneo is about the relationship between human and divine governance. A certain willingness on the part of the spectator to suspend disbelief in the old gods for the time of three hours is quite essential. During the overture, under the watchful eye of La Voce, who will determine the outcome of Idomeneo's dilemma in the ultimate scene, we see Idomeneo go to war and bid farewell to his infant son, Idamante. It explains why, years later on that fateful beach, both do not recognize each other at first. For now, it is the gods who are watching the people.
Mythical creatures with hippocampal heads, spiritual henchmen of the sea god, cast the Cretan king ashore. Later we encounter a Minotaur as an accomplice of the priestly caste. A king-sized hand with outstretched index finger looks to have been severed from a Greek statue. Symbols from ancient Greece are handled in a lighthearted way. Diamond-shaped modules float in the air above the stage, rigorously arranged into an abstract art object. When the sea monster appears and the entropy in Crete visibly increases, the modules are seen bursting apart and disappearing into the stage tower to make room for the violated face of a statue of a god.
Often the ubiquitous sea can be seen on a panoramic background screen. Often this non-instrusive use of video offers an oasis of tranquility. It becomes more problematic when the kitschy-illustrative head of Neptune appears on the video wall in the finale of the second act. The chorus sounds underpowered , not making much of an impression. Idomeneo's scream, cloaked in electronic sounds comes across as forced.
When the Trojan princess Ilia takes the reins during the final measures, knocking the moribund Idomeneo off his throne and single-handedly pressing the king's crown on Idamante's head, the new couple is born and the gods are out of luck. The old generation has failed but will the new one be able to cope? "Let the gods of marriage grant their eternal peace of soul," the chorus sings but the glum-looking Idamante, surprised by his lover's sudden initiative, becomes an adult on the spot. As usual, the ensuing ballet is not performed.
Gladly I would have written here that the cast was to die for but unfortunately that was not the case. In part this was also due to the director. The soloists rarely draw you into the play as actors. During the duets they are often seen as walking museum dolls without connection, animated by the usual conventional gestures. All this makes Grinda's direction very old-fashioned.
Ian Koziara as Idomeneo gives his best in "Fuor del mar" and that is a lot but it is an uneven performance. The repeats of "non cessa minacciar" come off well and he is able to project them into the hall with great power, the rest is interpreted with too little mastery to be able to speak of tonal beauty.
All three sopranos suffer from the same flaw. Their chest register often sounds unnatural, sometimes unstable. Charging the arias with personality or singing from an inner need seldomly occurs. The latter, again, belongs to the director's job. The undeniable acting talent of Annalisa Stroppa as Idamante remains largely untapped as a result.
Nino Machaidze does not miss her spirited closing aria "D'Oreste, d'Aiace." As she hurls it into the hall with plenty of vocal power, she seems a foreshadowing of Wagner's dark fury Ortrud.
Maria Grazia Schiavo as Ilia manages to pull off an affecting messa di voce in "Zeffiretti lusinghieri." In the duet "S'io non moro a questi accenti," there are beautiful moments of harmonic singing but convincing manifestations of Mozartian happiness are scarce. The quartet "Andro romingo e solo" which Attila Csampai has called the germ cell, the birthplace of modern musical drama, does not make a great impression either. Riccardo della Scuccia is a rather pale Arbace.
Fabio Biondi leads the orchestra of the Opéra Royal de Wallonie through Mozart's score with sedate tempos, routine rather than exciting, hovering between nineteenth-century orchestral culture and the radical recreations that Harnoncourt and Co have accomplished to give the work its second life.