Post by CCADP on Mar 20, 2006 1:50:34 GMT -5
Music Review----'Dead Man' is accessible, unflinching----Baltimore Opera
Company is masterful in this story of redemption and execution
The death penalty, like war, is easier to support in the abstract, when
someone else is doing the actual dirty work, the switch-pulling, the
injection, the shooting - and in a place out of view, out of earshot, far
removed from our safe, comfortable world.
Perhaps the best thing about Jake Heggie's Dead Man Walking, which is
receiving an exceptionally strong production by the Baltimore Opera
Company, is how quickly and irrevocably it pulls audiences into an issue
and a reality that usually get no closer to us than a newspaper headline
or a snippet of film at 11.
Based on Sister Helen Prejean's influential book, the opera doesn't flinch
from the naked or the dead, the sacred or the profane, the horrid or the
mundane. It's a remarkably honest work, one reason it has been known to
confirm the convictions of both pro- and anti-death penalty factions since
its sensational premiere in San Francisco 6 years ago.
With Heggie's accessible, vivid score and a mostly fine-tuned libretto by
multi-Tony Award-winning playwright Terrence McNally, Dead Man Walking
takes us right into this nun's innermost thoughts, the progress from
gut-reaction to soul-searching.
We also get pretty close to the inner workings of a disgusting killer.
He's called Joseph De Rocher, but he could be almost anyone who ever
slaughtered a human being. The opera compels us to think of him as a human
being, too.
Baltimore Opera's presentation of Dead Man Walking finds the company
operating at peak strength. The uniformly impressive cast includes the
originator of De Rocher, John Packard; the work's original conductor,
Patrick Summers, is also on hand, exerting an obvious authority. The
staging, a co-production with six other American companies, provides a
good deal of atmosphere in economical fashion.
On Saturday night at the Lyric Opera House, Packard's sturdy baritone and
uncanny way of physically inhabiting the role made De Rocher a compelling
presence. The slow melt of the murderer's unrepentant facade was
masterfully achieved.
As Sister Helen, Theodora Hanslowe was equally impressive at creating a
three-dimensional figure, with acting as astute and incisive as her
vocalism. Her mellow, penetrating mezzo and superb diction (the whole cast
articulated admirably, but surtitles were used nonetheless) tapped deeply
into the opera's rich lyrical vein. Only her final solo, an a cappella
version of the opera's recurring hymn, disappointed. The pace was a little
too fast, the style a little too edgy to give this poetic coda its full
poignancy.
Diana Soviero, the wonderful soprano best known for her idiomatic
performances in the Italian repertoire, nearly stole the night with her
gripping portrayal of Mrs. De Rocher, who gets some of Heggie's most
inspired and moving music. Her almost Anna Magnani-like intensity laid
bare the pain of a mother who thinks she has failed her child. Even
allowing for some technical roughness in the voice, this was great singing
- and great theater.
As Sister Rose, Kishna Davis heated up the place with her gleaming soprano
and natural, animated phrasing. As the parents of the teenagers whose
murder launches the opera, Phyllis Burg, Suzanne S. Chadwick, John Weber
and, especially, Kelly Anderson offered dynamic voices and effective
characterizations. Other sturdy contributions came from Patrick Toomey as
the chaplain and David Langan as the warden.
Summers coaxed some of the most attentive and fully alive playing I've
heard from the Baltimore Opera orchestra, adding to the impact of a
performance attended by Heggie and the real Sister Helen Prejean (the 2
shared in the onstage bows before the sizable, enthusiastic audience.)
Director Christopher Thomas had the action progressing with cinematic
fluidity. It did look odd, though, for Sister Helen to stand during most
of her driving-to-the-penitentiary scene. And the tension of the
lethal-injection scene seemed oddly diluted; a nurse took too long
affixing the tubes, while the sight of cast members assembled close to the
gurney proved more distracting than symbolically meaningful.
A few mechanical glitches should be cleaned up for the remaining
performances. (The worst on Saturday was a sudden burst of amplification
during the execution scene.)
Other things about the opera cannot be changed. The passages in the score
that have all the obviousness and predictability of the soundtrack to a
murder mystery show on TV, for example. The way the music slips into a
kind of musical saccharine when Sister Helen tells De Rocher that "the
truth will set you free." The rather cheesy Elvis Presley stuff in the
scene when De Rocher and Sister Helen recall the King. Or the ordinariness
of Heggie's hymn tune, which is such a key element in the opera's musical
structure; I wish it had the emotional pull of a vintage spiritual.
That said, the best in this opera is very substantial, especially the
sextet, which works as effectively as any ensemble scene in grand operas
of the past. And the way Heggie has De Rocher enter for the 1st time
without a drop of melodramatic harmony or thundering percussion is just
right.
Above all, the composer's use of motives is skillful and telling, starting
with the twisty, portentous opening one that makes many a subtly altered
guise as it helps propel the characters on their individual journeys of
self-discovery and redemption.
Dead Man Walking Baltimore Opera Company. 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, 8:15 p.m.
Friday, 3 p.m. Sunday. Lyric Opera House, 140 W. Mount Royal Ave. $40 to
$132. 410-727-6000
(source: Tim Smith, The Baltimore Sun)
Company is masterful in this story of redemption and execution
The death penalty, like war, is easier to support in the abstract, when
someone else is doing the actual dirty work, the switch-pulling, the
injection, the shooting - and in a place out of view, out of earshot, far
removed from our safe, comfortable world.
Perhaps the best thing about Jake Heggie's Dead Man Walking, which is
receiving an exceptionally strong production by the Baltimore Opera
Company, is how quickly and irrevocably it pulls audiences into an issue
and a reality that usually get no closer to us than a newspaper headline
or a snippet of film at 11.
Based on Sister Helen Prejean's influential book, the opera doesn't flinch
from the naked or the dead, the sacred or the profane, the horrid or the
mundane. It's a remarkably honest work, one reason it has been known to
confirm the convictions of both pro- and anti-death penalty factions since
its sensational premiere in San Francisco 6 years ago.
With Heggie's accessible, vivid score and a mostly fine-tuned libretto by
multi-Tony Award-winning playwright Terrence McNally, Dead Man Walking
takes us right into this nun's innermost thoughts, the progress from
gut-reaction to soul-searching.
We also get pretty close to the inner workings of a disgusting killer.
He's called Joseph De Rocher, but he could be almost anyone who ever
slaughtered a human being. The opera compels us to think of him as a human
being, too.
Baltimore Opera's presentation of Dead Man Walking finds the company
operating at peak strength. The uniformly impressive cast includes the
originator of De Rocher, John Packard; the work's original conductor,
Patrick Summers, is also on hand, exerting an obvious authority. The
staging, a co-production with six other American companies, provides a
good deal of atmosphere in economical fashion.
On Saturday night at the Lyric Opera House, Packard's sturdy baritone and
uncanny way of physically inhabiting the role made De Rocher a compelling
presence. The slow melt of the murderer's unrepentant facade was
masterfully achieved.
As Sister Helen, Theodora Hanslowe was equally impressive at creating a
three-dimensional figure, with acting as astute and incisive as her
vocalism. Her mellow, penetrating mezzo and superb diction (the whole cast
articulated admirably, but surtitles were used nonetheless) tapped deeply
into the opera's rich lyrical vein. Only her final solo, an a cappella
version of the opera's recurring hymn, disappointed. The pace was a little
too fast, the style a little too edgy to give this poetic coda its full
poignancy.
Diana Soviero, the wonderful soprano best known for her idiomatic
performances in the Italian repertoire, nearly stole the night with her
gripping portrayal of Mrs. De Rocher, who gets some of Heggie's most
inspired and moving music. Her almost Anna Magnani-like intensity laid
bare the pain of a mother who thinks she has failed her child. Even
allowing for some technical roughness in the voice, this was great singing
- and great theater.
As Sister Rose, Kishna Davis heated up the place with her gleaming soprano
and natural, animated phrasing. As the parents of the teenagers whose
murder launches the opera, Phyllis Burg, Suzanne S. Chadwick, John Weber
and, especially, Kelly Anderson offered dynamic voices and effective
characterizations. Other sturdy contributions came from Patrick Toomey as
the chaplain and David Langan as the warden.
Summers coaxed some of the most attentive and fully alive playing I've
heard from the Baltimore Opera orchestra, adding to the impact of a
performance attended by Heggie and the real Sister Helen Prejean (the 2
shared in the onstage bows before the sizable, enthusiastic audience.)
Director Christopher Thomas had the action progressing with cinematic
fluidity. It did look odd, though, for Sister Helen to stand during most
of her driving-to-the-penitentiary scene. And the tension of the
lethal-injection scene seemed oddly diluted; a nurse took too long
affixing the tubes, while the sight of cast members assembled close to the
gurney proved more distracting than symbolically meaningful.
A few mechanical glitches should be cleaned up for the remaining
performances. (The worst on Saturday was a sudden burst of amplification
during the execution scene.)
Other things about the opera cannot be changed. The passages in the score
that have all the obviousness and predictability of the soundtrack to a
murder mystery show on TV, for example. The way the music slips into a
kind of musical saccharine when Sister Helen tells De Rocher that "the
truth will set you free." The rather cheesy Elvis Presley stuff in the
scene when De Rocher and Sister Helen recall the King. Or the ordinariness
of Heggie's hymn tune, which is such a key element in the opera's musical
structure; I wish it had the emotional pull of a vintage spiritual.
That said, the best in this opera is very substantial, especially the
sextet, which works as effectively as any ensemble scene in grand operas
of the past. And the way Heggie has De Rocher enter for the 1st time
without a drop of melodramatic harmony or thundering percussion is just
right.
Above all, the composer's use of motives is skillful and telling, starting
with the twisty, portentous opening one that makes many a subtly altered
guise as it helps propel the characters on their individual journeys of
self-discovery and redemption.
Dead Man Walking Baltimore Opera Company. 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, 8:15 p.m.
Friday, 3 p.m. Sunday. Lyric Opera House, 140 W. Mount Royal Ave. $40 to
$132. 410-727-6000
(source: Tim Smith, The Baltimore Sun)