We left at the interval...

La Monnaie, Brussels, Sunday June 24 2018 Conductor: Alain Altinoglu. Production and Costumes: Christophe Coppens. Sets: Christophe Coppens and I.S.M.Architecten. Lighting: Peter Van Praet. Video: Jean-Baptiste Pacucci, Simon Van Rompay. Prologue: Gabor Vass. A Kékszakállú Herceg: Ante Jerkunica. Judit: Nora Gubisch. La Monnaie Orchestra and Chorus. A good-looking but somehow not, ultimately, very exciting Bartok double-bill in Brussels last Sunday. To me it came across more as a carefully-crafted "designer" production than a fully theatrical one. The last time I was at La Monnaie was at the end of April, so not so long ago, for Lohengrin . "Act three involved a kind of Celebrity Squares or noughts-and-crosses set-up: three floors of three square spaces, making nine boxes in all, with steel stairs between." I did wonder, this Sunday, if they'd recycled the same structure for the Bartok, to save money. It would have made sense - especially as La Monnaie...

ONP Garnier, Thursday December 10 2015 Conductor: Esa-Pekka Salonen. Production: Krzysztof Warlikowski. Sets and Costumes: Malgorzata Szczesniak. Lighting: Felice Ross. Video: Denis Guéguin. Duke Bluebeard: John Relyea. Judith: Ekaterina Gubanova. Elle: Barbara Hannigan. Lui: Claude Bardouil. Paris Opera Orchestra. Two preliminary thoughts: In the 80s, every opera house needed a flimsy silk curtain that could be whisked away in a flash as the music struck up, sometimes getting caught in the scenery and pulling it down. Later, they all had to stock a bombed-out concrete bunker, plenty of combat gear and a dozen black leather greatcoats. Last week (I've been away on business, which is why I'm writing this so late) it occurred to me that they can now probably chuck out their silk curtains and bunkers to make room for a set of large glass cases on wheels: every self-respecting new production uses some. There has been a great deal of heated hoo-ha over the past few weeks abo...

ONP Palais Garnier, Tuesday February 6 2007 Janacek – Diary of one who disappeared Orchestrated by Gustav Kuhn Bartok – Bluebeard’s Castle Conductor: Gustav Kuhn. Production: Alex Ollé and Carlos Padrissa, La Fura dels Baus. Man: Michael König. Woman: Hannah Esther Minutillo. Duke Bluebeard: Willard White. Judith: Béatrice Uria-Monzon. Orchestra of the Opéra national de Paris. Seven doors or seven veils? There’s a great deal to be said for sitting on the front row at Garnier. There’s nobody (apart from the orchestra) fidgeting in front of you. The orchestral sound envelops you without drowning the voices. You’re close enough to appreciate the acting, which in a production like this is worth seeing. And should any of the singers happen to be underpowered for the house, you’re in no position to tell. But with video projections taking up the full extent of the proscenium, I suspect we were unable to “read” the effects as well as people a dozen rows further back. And of course, if you un...

Théâtre du Châtelet, Paris , Monday November 14 2005 Dohnanyi anyone? Does anyone here have a firm opinion on the conducting of Christoph von Dohnanyi? I can’t pin him down. His conducting sounds somehow “plain,” which may not necessarily be a bad thing; what I mean is it’s hard to hit on or grasp anything you can describe or comment on. It’s like a “reading” rather than an “interpretation.” Is he letting the music speak for itself? Last night I heard him conducting Bartok’s Divertimento for strings and Bruckner’s 7th. He didn’t choose to bring out the potential warmth or “local colour” in the Bartok, which sounded quite like plain old English folk songs; nor did he choose to bring out any potential religious intensity or Viennese morbidezza in the Bruckner. Moderate tempi throughout: no reckless presto in the Bartok, no foot-dragging in the adagio of the 7th. Basically, it sounded like Bartok and Bruckner performed by a highly professional but no-nonsense north German radio orchestr...

Théâtre du Châtelet, Paris, November 19th 2003 Conductor: Bernard Haitink. Dresdner Staatskapelle. Bela Bartok, Concerto for Orchestra Piotr Ilich Tchaikovsky, Symphony N°6 in B minor, Pathétique, op. 74. When Bernard Haitink planned, as part of his 75th birthday celebrations, to bring the Dresdner Staatskapelle to Paris for a concert of Bartok and Tchaikovsky, he probably didn’t expect, at the end of part one, to be booed. It must have come as an unpleasant surprise. He certainly looked grim about it, as if he felt like booing back or spitting. The orchestra looked bemused. Admittedly, this was a lone booer, though – bad sign for Haitink - his booing wasn’t drowned, as is usually the case, by a surge of clapping and cheers. The polite, lukewarm applause continued. Bartok Now, booing, I know, is not much approved of on the fora I frequent. And of course, the lone booer wasn’t me. But I think I may have guessed how he felt. When he planned, coughing up a substantial sum – perhaps even a...