Whether in the shadow of the cross or in the lawless freedom of a wandering community, the result is the same. Love turns sour, reason is shattered, emotions run wild. Pietro Mascagni is popular in each of the one-act plays in Opera North’s latest double bill Cavalleria Rusticana (1890) and that of Sergei Rachmaninov, rarely performed Aleko (1893) – crimes of passion are the result. This operatic combination offers no consolation, but its grip, thanks to an excellent cast, choir and orchestra led by Antony Hermus, is mischievous and bewildering.
The Mascagni is a revival from 2017, the Rachmaninov a new staging. Both are directed by Karolina Sofulak, who draws parallels between the works, written by young composers and premiered three years apart. Mascagni, 27, would never again have a success that could match his enduring masterpiece, which he was still conducting in his 70s. For Rachmaninov, his student work, which he wrote at a rapid pace at the age of 19, praised by Tchaikovsky but now almost forgotten, was only the beginning of a brilliant composition career.
Giselle Allen delivers fear on every note. Her transition from unjust lover to vengeful vixen is painful to watch
Without being too heavy-handed, Sofulak hints that the deceived Alfio is in Cavalleria Rusticana (“rustic chivalry” essentially means taking the law into your own hands) could be the older Aleko, awkwardly exiled in a hippie-esque beach community, rejected by his younger lover. For these independent works, such a link is not necessary – I would have preferred none – but it does give coherence to the evening, especially since the singer who plays both murderous roles, the British bass-baritone Robert Hayward, both as an actor and musician fascinates.
In Charles Edwards’ designs, the Mascagni is removed from the usual Sicilian village setting and given a desolate communist-era Polish makeover. A photo of Pope John Paul II and a Polski Fiat set the tone and the time. Church, a family store run by a desperate mother (Anne-Marie Owens) and a house of adultery all coexist on an open stage, creating a claustrophobic sense of foreboding. Belfast-born soprano Giselle Allen, who instills fear in every note, reminds us that Santuzza’s suffering comes from the pain of betrayal. Her transition, laced with complicated religiosity, from unjust lover to vengeful shrew is painful to watch.
The Uruguayan tenor Andrés Presno, a powerful and powerful Turiddù who sang Cavaradossi in Tosca for Opera North, adopts the self-righteous swagger of the guilty. The British-Cuban mezzo-soprano Helen Évora convinces as his sensitive married friend Lola. The orchestra, pushed to the limit by Hermus, brought out the saturated colors of the score, not least in the celebrated intermezzo.
Alekobased on the narrative poem by Alexander Pushkin The Gypsies (1827), is at once overwhelming in feeling and undeveloped in dramatic structure. Episodes feature two dances, cavatina and chorus, each magnetic in their own way but not clearly connected. The forces of Opera North united the stop-start form of the work with the coherence of their playing and singing, with Presno returning as the adulterous lover of Hayward’s deceived Aleko.
The object of their desire is Zemfira, callous in her rejection of her gray-haired old love, coquettish in the pursuit of her new young admirer: the Welsh soprano Elin Pritchard is enchanting in both voice and stage presence. Like her father, bass Matthew Stiff mustered a fine line in stoic gloom. The set (redesigned by Edwards), multi-colored and unbuttoned in contrast to the strict, bare wood look of Cavalleria Rusticana, neutralizes the original’s uncomfortable racial Roma stereotypes. Sofulak mentions the community of Freetown Christiania in Copenhagen as a touchstone.
Aleko concludes with a beautiful chorus, sung (excellently by Opera Noord) with the deep resonance of Russian Orthodox chants later used by Rachmaninoff in his The whole night Wake up. Here the lyrics are the opposite of religious: “We are wild, we have no laws,” these “gypsies” sing. In their humanity, they release the criminal Aleko to the arguably worse freedom of his own loneliness, and call for peace. This is a powerfully effective double bill and another feather in Opera North’s well-feathered cap.
The pure voices of Tenebrae, which opened Bath’s yearbook BachFest at Gesualdo Tenebrae Responsories for Holy Saturday (1611), took us back to the strict rituals of Lent. These sacred madrigals, written in nine sections for unaccompanied voices, traverse the extremes of dissonance and chromaticism, dwelling on the bleak language of the biblical texts: ‘They cast me into the lowest pit, into darkness and into the shadow of death’, as the penultimate response states. Ten singers, directed by Nigel Short, captured the volatile intensity of this music with vocals of finely tuned perfection. They were equally meticulous in three motets by JS Bach, including the exuberant Singet dem Herrn (Sing a new song to the Lord), BWV 225.
The next day, harpsichord superstar Mahan Esfahani played a program with Handel (Suite No. 2 in F major), Buxtehude (La Capricciosa) and JS Bach (English Suite No. 6 in D minor). The expressiveness of the Handel and the sheer virtuosity of the Buxtehude – a series of variations in which Esfahani seemingly turned a million black dots into a murmur – led, with deliberate logic, to the Bach: palindromes, enigmas and a ‘mirror’ fugue around your head painful (despite Esfahani’s clear explanation beforehand), but ultimately, and without a doubt, best heard as music.
There are currently two plays about Benjamin Britten and his environment: at the RSC’s Swan Theater in Stratford-upon-Avon, Ben and Imo by Mark Ravenhill (music by Conor Mitchell), and at the new King’s Head Theatre, London, Turn the screw by Kevin Kelly, deftly directed by Tim McArthur. So far I’ve only seen the latter. The cast, who can also sing, is led by Gary Tushaw (BRITs), Liam Watson (David Hemmings), Simon Willmont (Peter Pears) and Jo Wickham (Imogen Holst). This is a sensitive but unsensational treatment of well-documented issues in Britten’s life, not least his attraction to boys. Theater takes classical music seriously anyway.
Star ratings (out of five)
Cavalleria Rusticana/Aleko ★★★★
Bad BachFest ★★★★★
• Cavalleria Rusticana/Aleko is at the Grand Theatre, Leeds until February 24, then tours to Nottingham, Newcastle and Salford until March 22
• Turn the screw is at the King’s Head Theatre, London N1 until March 10