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Les Arts Florissants by M-A Charpentier -- Performance by Opera LafayetteReview by John Wall"Historically-informed" performances of opera around the world can for the most part be lumped into two categories: (1) low budget productions, where the soloists sing with music or from memory with limited action and no costumes, and (2) large budget productions, typically heavily subsidized by European governments, with a powerful stage director and expensive scenery and costumes. Because, more often than not, the only aspect of large budget productions recognizable as baroque art is the music, low budget productions often turn out to be more appealing. Opera Lafayette, based in Washington, D.C., have pioneered an alternative approach to baroque opera performance by adding costumed baroque dancers to otherwise typical low budget productions. The results, as I have described in earlier reviews, have been breathtaking. Dance so dramatically transforms their performances that I have concluded that the first step in staging a baroque opera ought to be to engage an early dance choreographer and at least one experienced baroque dancer. Instead, the rest of the world has it backwards. Ballet usually is an afterthought. If performed at all, dances usually are left to the modern ballet dancers employed by opera houses. Consequently, few members of the baroque opera audience have experience with real baroque dance. Why hasn't the Opera Lafayette model been tried elsewhere? I'm not sure, but the main reason may be that baroque dancers are about as scarce as ventless baroque trumpeters. Another may be the same sort of gulf between modern and early dance enthusiasts as used to exist between modern and early instrument listeners. (I never was interested in ballet until I went to a baroque dance performance and consequently did not see it in conflict with something I already understood and cared about.) It also doesn't help that mainstream music reviewers are unable to tell a baroque dancer from a carnival acrobat, as demonstrated by the uncritical reviews of the DVDs of Lully's Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme and Cadmus et Hermione and Landi's Il Sant'Alessio. The latest production from Opera Lafayette, Charpentier's chamber opera Les Arts Florissants, featured three entrées superbly danced by Caroline Copeland and choreographed by Catherine Turocy of the New York Baroque Dance Company. In one short opera, the audience had an opportunity to see costumes and dances from both 17th and 18th Century France. In the first entrée, Ms. Copeland was dressed as a warrior princess in a blue hoop dress and a headdress with a single row of tufts. She wore a half mask and flat shoes and danced with the slightly higher kicks of the 18th Century. The second entrée was also in 18th Century style, with Ms. Copeland dressed as a furie (witch), again with a half mask and flat shoes. For the third entrée, Ms. Copeland appeared as Peace (the Sun) in an orange chiffon dress, a full mask, and high heels, typical of the 17th Century, and she danced in 17th Century style. The musical performances were also excellent. The program began with scenes from two Molière-Charpentier collaborations, Le Sicilien and Le Mariage forcé, followed by Les Arts Florissants. Monday, October 19, 2009 Terrace Theater, The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Washington, D.C. Opera Lafayette - 15th Anniversary Season Ryan Brown, Conductor and Artistic Director Music of Marc-Antoine Charpentier 1643(?) - 1704 Three musical scenes for comédies-ballets by Molière from Le Sicilien, ou I'amour peintre (1695 version) Ouverture from La Comtesse d'Escarbagnas and Le Mariage force (1672 version) Les Marys La, la, la, la, bonjour Pause Les Arts Florissants, An Idylle en Musique Ouverture pour les Symphonistes de la Suite de la Musique Scene 1er — La Musique, Chceur des Guerriers, Danse des Guerriers, La Poesie, La Peinture, L'Architecture Scene 2e - Bruit effroyable, Choeur des Arts et les Guerriers, La Discorde, Choeur des Furies, Entrée (Danse) de Furies Scene 3e - La Paix, La Discorde, Choeur des Furies Scene 4e - Menuet, La Paix Scene 5e - Chaconne, La Musique, Choeur des Arts et des Guerriers, La Poesie, La Peinture, L'Architecture, Un Guerrier, Sarabande en Rondeau, La Paix Nathalie Paulin, La Paix; Claire Jolivet and Elizabeth Field, violins; Translations and supertitles by Roger Brunyate, Huston Simmons, and Ryan Brown. * Member, Opera Lafayette Young Artists Program Website - operalayette.org |
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Copyright © 2002-2010 John Wall |