Manon Lescaut (an opera review post)

Yeah, yeah, I have no image for you for this one, either. I'm just not excited about the cover of the opera book enough to want to go to the trouble of getting a picture of it. Visualize this: a strand of pearls on a glossy, black tabletop with a few scattered pearls lying around it.
There you go. If you can get that picture in your head, you have the cover of the program.

The opera is much better than the program cover but, then, it is Puccini.

Manon Lescaut is based on the French novel L'Histoire du chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut published in 1731. It's one of two operas based on this work, the other being Manon by Messenet, and both are still popular and rotation today. Without having seen the other one, I'm going to say that the Puccini one is better. Hey, it's Puccini!

Here's what I found amusing from this opera:
Part of the opera takes place in the wastelands of Louisiana. Wait, let me make that more clear: It takes place in the desert wastelands of Louisiana. Of course, having grown up in Louisiana, when I heard this, it made me laugh and wonder what the heck Puccini was thinking. I mean, he wrote Lescaut in 1890; everyone knew there were no deserts in Louisiana in 1890. It was kind of like, what the heck?

Then, I realized that it was based on a novel from the early 1700s, and Louisiana was a huge territory in the 1700s. Something like 1/3 of the total area of what is now the United States. When the novel was written, there were wastelands in Louisiana, and the opera is set during the same time period as the novel, so the it all suddenly made sense. Still, it was funny, and that's going to be the thing that most sticks with me about this opera.

The next thing is that Manon was much abused. She was an incredible beauty that her parents were sending off to a nunnery, which means the character is probably somewhere in the 14-16 year old range. The opera opens with a rich old white guy attempting to kidnap her to take her away to be his sex slave. It ends, as with all Puccini operas, in tragedy. In tragedy in the wastelands of Louisiana.

This production was good. It's not the best Puccini I've seen, but it might be the one with the most complexities and nuance, including a scene of prostitute branding which was quite horrific.

Brian Jagde, whom I have mentioned many times before, played des Grieux and was as good as always. Lianna Haroutounian was Manon and was a good match. The only real issue with the production was the death scene at the end, which I'm not going to try to explain, but I'm sure was a directing problem. Beyond that, though, it was a great production with great performances.

Tosca (an opera review post)

In my last opera review, I talked about the bel canto opera style. Well, I'm not the only one who doesn't, or didn't, like it. Verismo, which means "true" or "real," was, at least in part, a reaction to the bel canto style which dominated opera through a large part of the 1800s. Puccini is probably the most well known verismo composer. So, where last time we had Donizetti playing fast and loose with history and facts in the name of some "emotional truth" that he completely made up, this time we have Puccini paying close attention to facts and details and presenting a fictional story set against exact historical veracity.

When I say he wanted to get it all correct, I'm not exaggerating. The story is set against a particular day in Rome when they got news early in the day that Napoleon had been defeated. In fact, the news was false and Napoleon was actually victorious, so the celebrations that had started over Napoleon's "defeat" came to a sudden halt when the actual news finally reached them that Napoleon had won the battle. Puccini set his story at three specific places in Rome, actual places that are still there today, and reproduced them exactly. In fact, he wanted to include the ringing of the bells in  the church that part of the opera is set in, so he went to Rome so that he could listen to them and accurately incorporate their music into his score. There was no loosey-goosey "emotional truth" and re-writing history for Puccini!

Of course, none of that has anything to do with this production; it's just to contrast Tosca against Roberto Devereux.

As for this production, it was great. At least we (my wife and I) thought it was. Evidently, the local opera critics didn't think much of it, overall, because they felt it was not original enough... What...? These are the same people who complain when SFO stages a classic opera in some new way, as with the opera set in the museum last year (or the year before; I forget).  So you can't do it the way it's always been done, and you can't do something too original, either. What line is it they want walked, here? Oh, wait, the invisible one.

So my wife and I thought Tosca was great. The sets were stunning. Of course. And the singing...

Well, Briane Jagde was in it as the male romantic lead, and he was great. I know I've talked about Jagde before -- this is at least the fourth opera I've seen him in, maybe fifth -- and he's always quite good. Okay, very good. I enjoy him a lot. He's not one of those "stand and sing" fellows, and I really appreciate that. In fact, in this one... wait, hold that thought.

Tosca was played by Carmen Giannattasio. This was her debut to the role and to SFO, and she was also great. Giannnattasio and Jagde had great chemistry together, and they both had scenes where they had to sing while lying on the floor! Excuse me, they both had scenes where they had to sing while lying on the fucking floor! And if you'd had your eyes closed, you wouldn't have been able to tell they were on their stomachs on the floor. Do you know how hard it is to sing while lying on your stomach? Why don't you try it. And they had no loss of volume while doing it!

Yeah, I was pretty impressed with that.

All of that to say that we really enjoyed the opera. And, if you go into it without knowing the plot, it might just throw you off a bit. At least once. However, it is Puccini, so expect everyone to die in the end. Okay, well, it's not Hamlet, but Puccini may be the best at deaths other than Shakespeare.

Turandot (an opera review post)

The 2017 opera season is underway. This is a short season, only five operas which will all be presented this year, but that's because the San Francisco Opera is presenting Wagner's Ring Cycle next summer! I can't wait. This is such a big deal that we had to purchase the tickets for it LAST YEAR. I have almost an equivalent anticipation for this as I did for The Phantom Menace or Raimi's Spider-Man. But none of that has to do with this opera, so let's get to that.

Turnadot was Puccini's last opera; in fact, he died before it was finished. That he died is just part of what makes this particular opera problematic and, often, controversial. The ending most often performed is by Franco Alfano and was written from Puccini's notes; however, that did not keep it from feeling inauthentic to me, not least of which was because the ending is happy. I'm not saying the ending wasn't good, and Puccini may have intended a happy ending for this one, but it didn't feel quite right to me. It's not really what he's known for.

That said, the opera was amazing. Turandot contains one of the most famous arias in all of opera: "Nessun dorma" or "None Shall Sleep." In the role of Calaf, Brian Jagde (seemingly becoming the SF Opera's tenor De Niro) performed it admirably.

The other big issue with this opera -- skipping over the issue of the name and the disagreement about how it should be pronounced -- is the... Well, I don't know if it's accurate to call it racism, but it certainly caricaturizes the Chinese. In fact, the opera was banned in China for a while because of it. But, then, the opera is kind of a cultural muddle, for which there are reasons of a sort, but you can look up the origins of the story on your own if you want to know about them.

At any rate, seeing that we are much more culturally sensitive these days than people were in the 1920s, and rightfully so, the San Francisco Opera staged it as a fairy tale. Of sorts. Which has a basis in the original story, so it all works out.

With that in mind, the sets were amazing! I mean, they were seriously amazing. I've commented previously about how great some of the sets have been at the SF Opera, but I think Turandot has had the best set design of any opera I've seen. By far. It was almost like watching a dream. Especially the scene during which "Nessun dorma" is performed. It was like a fairy forest with a bridge... Well, it was really great.

And the costumes were also really good, especially Turandot's. Actually, a couple of her gowns rivaled the sets.

The only possible negative I have about this presentation is that there was actually a lot of that whole standing and singing thing. However, possibly due somewhat to the richness of the sets and that, often, there were background chorus people milling around, it didn't often feel that way, and, when it did, it felt more natural.

This production of Turandot is definitely one of the best operas I've seen so far.