Divas Haunted by Ghosts?

[Ralph]

From The New York Times:

May 17, 2006
Critic's Notebook
Deborah Voigt and Renée Fleming vs. the Ghosts of Met Divas Past
By ANTHONY TOMMASINI

It was just the first intermission at the season-opening performance of Puccini's "Tosca" at the Metropolitan Opera on April 22, and already some hard-to-please buffs in the lobby could be overhead complaining about Deborah Voigt's performance. This was Ms. Voigt's first appearance as Tosca at the Met, a daring departure from the Strauss and Wagner roles with which she had established her reputation.

From the comments I heard, some patrons had decided that Ms. Voigt lacked the classic Puccini soprano warmth and the dramatic temperament for this touchstone role. I thought she sounded splendid and made an affectingly vulnerable Tosca. Though her sound was a little bright, a little Nordic for Puccini, she brought vocal charisma and shimmering power to her portrayal, which grew stronger as the performance continued.

For the record, the audience that night gave Ms. Voigt an ardent ovation. Still, in the following days complaints kept coming from several critics and, not surprisingly, opera bloggers. Die-hard opera fans can be a tough crowd.

Why shouldn't an artist of Ms. Voigt's stature be encouraged to sing whatever she wants? She had just completed a run as Tosca at the Vienna State Opera before taking on the role at the Met, amid the ghosts of great Toscas past. In no interview did she claim to be an ideal Tosca. All she wanted, it seemed, was to bring her own insights and artistry to the role.

The reaction among some audience members and critics recalls the response to Renée Fleming when she sang her first Met performances of Violetta in Verdi's "Traviata" during the 2003-4 season. Ms. Fleming has avoided benchmark roles like this one, because, as she has said, she is uncomfortable with the passion of opera buffs for comparing today's singers with legendary artists of the past.

At the time, Ms. Fleming tried to lower expectations about her Violetta so that she could bring her own approach to a role she loved. I found her performance vocally luminous and deeply personal. Ms. Fleming has said that she tends to hide behind unfamiliar repertory, like the title role of Handel's "Rodelinda," which she sings on Friday at the Met. As grateful as I am for her remarkable Rodelinda, I wish she felt encouraged to take on more roles like Violetta.

The instrumental world has always been looser about letting artists stretch themselves. The pianist Peter Serkin, for example, recently gave a Carnegie Hall recital in which he played on a modern concert grand some Renaissance works by Dowland and Bull intended for the virginal, an early keyboard instrument. By juxtaposing these pieces with a new work by Elliott Carter, he invited his willing audience to hear the hints of strangeness and modernism in the old music and echoes of history in Mr. Carter's score.

I have heard the French pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard give astounding performances of Ligeti, Messiaen, Boulez, Berg, Ravel, Debussy, even Liszt. His account of Schumann's "Carnaval" last October at Carnegie Hall took adjusting to. His playing was incisive and colorful, if lacking in rhapsodic freedom. This was not my idea of Schumann style, but it was riveting, and if Mr. Aimard gave a Schumann recital, I'd be there.

Singers, naturally, must be more cautious in their choices. Voices take time to settle. Young pianists can stretch their techniques by working on a formidable Prokofiev sonata, but an aspiring lyric soprano could actually damage her voice by trying to sing a weighty role like Strauss's Salome.

It is true that Ms. Voigt has been adjusting her voice and technique to her slimmer, post-surgical body. How her voice has weathered the striking change in her physique after gastric bypass in 2004 is a legitimate question for debate. The reservations about her Tosca have come over matters of style and temperament.

I heard Ms. Voigt sing the role again on May 5, and she was more confident in her portrayal, both vocally and dramatically. Her conception of Tosca had me thinking of the much more fleshed-out character we encounter in the play by Sardou from which Puccini's opera is adapted.

In the play we learn that Tosca was a wild orphaned girl tending goats in the field when a group of Benedictine nuns found her and took her to their convent near Verona to rear her. As the girl grew, her singing in church proved so extraordinary that the pope himself sanctioned her pursuit of a musical career.

Tosca's past is only hinted at in the opera. When we meet her, she is a wealthy and celebrated diva. But might not her tumultuous childhood have taken its toll? The way the great Maria Callas played her, Tosca covers any remnants of childhood insecurity with tenacious possessiveness and blazing jealousy over her lover Cavaradossi.

Though I may be reading too much into Ms. Voigt's portrayal, she lets more of Tosca's insecurity come through. Tosca's life is rich with art and with love. Yet her chaotic childhood has left this Tosca fearful that the whole works could easily come tumbling down, as indeed it does. When the conniving Baron Scarpia, the police chief, leads Tosca into thinking that Cavaradossi is deceiving her with the beautiful Marchese Attavanti, Ms. Voigt's poignant Tosca, though furious, seems utterly humiliated.

Her portrayal is a work in progress. I'd ask this of those who question Ms. Voigt for her daring: Who are the great Toscas of the last 20 years that she is challenging? No one has dominated the role the way Callas and Renata Tebaldi did in the late 1950's and early 60's. When the Met's current production by Franco Zeffirelli was introduced in 1985, the Tosca was the soprano Hildegard Behrens. Though a compelling actress, Ms. Behrens was, if anything, far less suited to the role vocally than Ms. Voigt.

During the 2009-10 season, the Met will present a new production with Karita Mattila singing Tosca for the first time at the house. Though the role would seem a stylistic stretch for this dazzling Finnish soprano as well, she could be amazing in it. And if Ms. Mattila triumphs, I bet Ms. Voigt will be as excited as the rest of us. She doesn't want to own the role; she just wants to perform it. More power to her.