Home Home Current Tours SF Opera Reviews Tour Catalogue   Click on titles for additional pages Review Archive Review Archive                 Festival d'Aix, Chorégies d'Orange, Festival de Montpellier,   Schedules of opera performances, listed by festival   Michael Milenski writes a monthly column about opera in the South of France for the Var Village Voice, an English language monthly magazine. Here are the recent columns that may be of interest to those planning travel in France.     Click here to contact Festival Tour.         September 2008, Looking Forward   Some years are better than other years. This coming year (the 2008-2009 opera season) is an "other" year, with little to get excited about. But looking closely there are a few evenings to look forward to.   Production (mise en scène in French) -- sets, costumes, lights, stage action -- is surely the most apparent element of opera. That is unless you sit there with your eyes closed in which case you might say that the voice is more important. All said and done though opera starts in the pit when the chef d'orchestra raises his baton to command the several hours of what we will see and hear. And for the sake of argument let us say that we hear what we see and we see what we hear -- compliquée this art form.   So it is notable when there are fine Verdi conductors, like Giuliano Carella for Toulon Opera's season opener Rigoletto (October) and like Marco Guidarini for Nice Opera's season opener Macbeth (November). In both cases the excitement will be in the pit, so get seats where you can see the real show (the pit), as opera in Nice and Toulon is not about the stage.   One of life's great pleasures is comparing opera productions. If you were lucky enough to have caught Pique Dame in Lyon last season (the mise en scène by Peter Stein was far weightier than the conducting), you can compare it to the staging by Guy Joosten of this beautiful Tchaikowsky opera in Monte Carlo this coming April. Not only is the Monte Carlo opera house one of France's architectural jewels, its opera company sometimes hosts superb productions, proven in Janacek's Jenufa of last season. This masterpiece comes finally to Marseille (first time ever) also in April, in a staging by the fancy French directorial team, Patrice Caurier and Moshe Leiser.   Renée Auphan, the general director of the Marseille Opera, is a former singer who has a real talent for spotting fine voices -- some of the best singers of Europe and America find themselves in Marseille from time to time. Even so you may not want to see yet another Aida though it surely will be well sung in Marseille (November) and in Montpellier (October). Or take your chances and try it in Nice (June).   There are three French operas in the top eleven of the standard international repertory -- The Tales of Hoffman (Nice in January), Faust (Montpellier in March), and Carmen (this past summer at Orange) -- so it is not big news when one of them is offered. It is news when Gounod's Mireille comes around, this season in Marseille (May) though in a homely if serviceable production that has already made the rounds of our local houses. A truly scary thought is Delius' tepid Lakme (famous only for its stratospheric bell song) that arrives in Nice (April) in a production of zero (generously considered) interest. Much more enticing is a staging of Berlioz' oratorio L'Enfance du Christ in Toulon's beautiful, old opera house (February).   There really does seem to be what one local opera pundit has called a mafia of opera directors in the South of France and we see too much of their at-best routine work. A recent addition to its ranks is René Koering, the estimable general director of France's most interesting opera company, that of Montpellier. Not content with his role as intendant, Mr. Koering presented last season an opera he composed and this season he acts as stage director for two of its productions, La Vedova Scaltra (November) and Faust (March). Montpellier does have a talented stage director on its roster, Jean Paul Scarpitta, who is staging Bartok's Bluebeard's Castle (April).   The Lyon Opera offers a season for connoisseurs so take note of it if you are one. Of general interest from Lyon will be Donizetti's Anna Bolena (November). Make it a part of a bel canto trilogy -- add Bellini's Norma (March in Monte Carlo) and his very first opera Il Pirata (February in Marseille). Rarely do we have such an opportunity to hear so much "beautiful singing."   The operas mentioned are of course just the tip of the iceberg -- there are many, many more. It is impossible to know which will be the hits or the flops until you have seen them, so try them any or all and be prepared for surprises! A day-by-day calendar of the opera houses of Southern France, plus links to their websites as well as critical responses to some of their productions may be found at www.CapSurOpera.com.   June 2008   Piano, piano, zitti, zitti, Almaviva and Rosina admonish one another as they prepare to escape Bartolo's house in the last act of Rossini's Barber of Seville. For non Italian speakers these words may be a bit confusing. Here piano is the adverb softly, not a musical instrument, that noun in Italian is pianoforte, and zitti is an adjective meaning quiet, not the one t'ed ziti that means both bridegroom and a nine inch tubular pasta stick, the original form of this pasta (the current, smaller form is now called mostaccioli).   In French the pianoforte is but a piano, and it does have some application to opera hereabouts. In fact Rossini's Almaviva and Rosina are soon married, only to encounter marital difficulties in Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro which the Les Azuriales Opera Festival will perform at the Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild at Cap Jean Ferrat on August 18, 22 and 27. This festival uses young artists who sing to piano accompaniment (we also say piano in English even though this instrument can be very loud, particularly when played by a conductor, here the dynamic Bryan Evans). This festival's complete programs is at www.azurialopera.com.   Most of the performances of the Les Azuriales Opera Festival include a buffet, dinatoire, or diner, and the gala evenings even require black tie. It is certain that the infamous dish ziti al forno (better known as baked ziti) will not be offered. The next operatic episode in the lives of Almaviva and Rosina unfolds in Milhaud's La Mere Coupable (The Guilty Mother) when a difficult love triangle tangles the life of the little soldier Cherubino into the unhappy marriage of Almaviva and Rosina who bears this now manly lieutenant's child. This sordid episode will probably not be done by Les Azuriales anytime soon.   Another love triangle with piano unfolded this past week in Montpellier when the Opéra de Montpellier experimented with the earliest version, for piano (1893-95) of Debussy's Pelleas et Melisande. The orchestral version (1902) is one of opera's greatest masterpieces, thus to explore its primal moments was an irresistible urge finally satisfied by France's most interesting opera company.   Previews of Pelleas et Melisande occurred in the poet Mallarme's salon, an intimate platform for exploring the depths of symbolist thought, and in which, apparently, the new art of photography was a big topic. There exists in fact a photo of Debussy at a small piano à droit (an upright) with whom one can imagine singers not accomplished enough to sing at Paris' various opera houses but musically accomplished enough to gather around the piano to satisfy the demands of the musical avant-garde.   These were not the resources at Montpellier Opéra Comédie where three extraordinary opera singers were the primary players in this salon tragedy, where a sizeable platform thrust itself deeply into the auditorium, where sophisticated lighting instruments were visible and an imposing Hamburg Steinway concert piano (à grande queue) was sitting at the side of the thrust stage. Intimate yes, by current operatic standards though hardly a salon, and most of all an exquisitely exciting theatrical space.   Pelleas et Melisande is from Debussy's first period, as is Clair de la lune as well. The great piano works come from his late period so perhaps this early Debussy score is not one of his pianistic monuments. But the pianist is most certainly the protagonist of this proto-Pelleas et Melisande, having the responsibility of creating Debussy's musical continuum which is the substance of his opera far more than the banalities of its verbal narrative. Alas, the careful, too piano piano playing of Anne Pagès-Boisset seldom rose above accompaniment to the narrative leaving us aching for real musical involvement and at least a few wrong notes.   One can only imagine such a project with a real collaborative pianist. Michel Béroff comes to mind, and a host of others. Béroff and many, many more great, good and even some not-so-good can be heard at one of Provence's grandest festivals, the Festival International de Piano at the Roque d'Antheron, July 19 through August 22. The scope of this festival is enormous, with pianists from around the world perusing the inexhaustable pianoforte repertory. Highlights (and there are many more than here listed) are an evening that features the complete piano works by Maurice Ravel, and a huge, three part evening where one pianist plays preludes by Bach, Chopin and Rachmaninoff in each of the 24 scales of western music. Pianist greats Aldo Ciccolini, Alfred Brendel and the Labéque sisters each give recitals, and three evenings are devoted to the sublime music of Messien (Visions of the Amen, Vingt Regards d'enfant Jesu, Quartet for the End of Time). Not to mention that there are five evenings of jazz, including one by the legendary Herbie Hancock. You will be astounded at the program, www.festival-piano.com.   May 2008   Considerable stress may be associated with attending opera, stress created by fear of boredom, apprehension that the singing and conducting may be poor, or even dread that the production (mise en scène) will be thoughtless or, worse, stupidly thoughtful. Opera is not a light-hearted experience. Opera's most important muse is the tragic one, those brutal murders are strangely uplifting. Its most delicate muse is the comic one, as operatic humor is rarely amusing and in fact never is when it thinks it is.   So pour yourself a stiff drink and sit down with the summer festival brochures to decide carefully how you are going to spend a few thousand euros as wisely as possible over the next two months. Do not look to opera critics for help, because we are famously not prescient, our experience having proved that all opera is a crapshoot, you pay your money and you take your chances.   Opera festivals need audiences, so much thinking goes into creating attractive, safe programming. This summer the festivals have decreed that we like old operas, even very old operas. We may not recognize the names of the operas but certainly, and safely, we do recognize the names of the composers -- Handel and Hadyn in Aix, Purcell and Pergolese in Montpellier. That's Belshazzar and L'infedelta delusa in Aix and King Authur and Sakustia in Montpellier. The Purcell King Arthur is extra intriguing, as it is staged by "Shirley and Dino," the saviors of the decrepit Cabaret Paradis in the 2006 hit film of the same name.   The Aix Festival right from the beginning associated itself with Mozart, knowing that his operas assure audiences. Thus this summer Aix offers Zaide, an opera Mozart left unfinished which is now making the rounds to alleviate the hyper-saturation of Mozart's twenty finished operas. But it is of interest because its metteur en scène is the American wunderkind Peter Sellars (though by now, like most of us, well past that stage of life). If sometimes self indulgent, Mr. Sellars is brilliantly witty and always intelligent.   Of the usual Mozart repertory Aix is perpetrating yet another Cosi fan tutte. There remain lingering memories of a truly lame earlier one (1999) staged by Chinese cinematographer Chen Shi-Zheng (co-creator with Peter Sellars of Tan Dun's opera The Peony Pavilion). This new one is staged by Iranian cinematographer Abbas Kiarostami (b. 1940) in his opera debut. Mr. Kiarostami is known for films that take place in the backseats of cars. Not that Aix fared better in 2005 when Patrice Chereau, a truly venerable theater director, staged a famously static and utterly boring Cosi fan tutte.   Strangely Montpellier has associated itself over the years with little known composers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, opera composers you have never heard of, and probably will not ever again, who are absolutely meaningless at the box office. This summer it is Ildebrando Pizzetti's morbidly post-Romantic Fedra (1912), libretto by Fascist personality, poet Gabriele d'Annunzio, and the world premiere of Louise [!] Breton's 1836 opera La Esmeralda, libretto by none other than Victor Hugo, composed with the encouragement of Hector Berlioz, a piano reduction provided by Franz Liszt (though of course it is performed with orchestra in Montpellier).   The lure of famous names does indeed fill theaters, thus the Aix Festival has imported the Berlin Philharmonic and its wunderkind conductor Simon Rattle (though like most of us he too is well past that stage of life) for Wagner's Ring des Nibelungen. This year is the third installment, Siegfried, as staged by theater director Stéphane Braunschweig. The first two installments have not been well received and Seigfried is feared as the boring one of these four magnificent operas, thus there is good possibility that you can find a ticket (350 euros). The cast is blue ribbon indeed (Willard White, Ben Hepner, etc.). The moral of this story is that though you may buy prestiege you cannot buy success.   For me, everything mentioned above is not to be missed -- I will pay my money and take my chances. But there is so much more in Aix and Montpellier, and Orange too, not to mention nearby village opera festivals. Have another, stiffer drink and take a look.   April 2008   Live from the Met, in HD (that's high definition). American operatic imperialism on the rise.   Here in San Francisco (California) it has been a Saturday morning ritual for 78 years to tune into the weekly Metropolitan Opera matinée. For many years this is all the opera there was for many millions of Americans, the art form too big and too grand to be found anywhere except the U.S.'s greatest cities (until the 1960's New York, San Francisco and Chicago were the only cities with opera companies). Like the best of classic radio the Met broadcasts never fail to stimulate a strong, imaginative visual response, almost better than being there -- the magic of great radio.   In France these days we know these Saturday radio broadcasts as France Musique's En direct du Metropolitan Opera de New York, but the European time zone makes them a good reason to enjoy a quiet evening at home, the Saturday morning ritual still a visit to the village marché to buy food for supper.   Times change, though some things never change, like the Met's Saturday radio broadcasts, and for that matter the Met's repertory (pretty much the same as it was back in 1931, the first year of the radio broadcasts). Two years ago Peter Gelb, the new director of the Met announced that the Saturday matinée performances would henceforth be digitably directed to movie theaters around the U.S. No one except Peter Gelb perhaps would have dared imagine the extraordinary success of this crazy, artistically questionable idea.   As you know in the U.S. we have not much to export except our mortgages and our national debt. So it is pretty big news that now we export opera too! And here it is! La Boheme en direct du Met en HD on Saturday, April 5 at the Pathé Grand Ciel at the Grand Var in Toulon, at the Olympia in Cannes, at the Kinépolis in Nimes, at Le Royal in Montpellier and at the Pathé Masséna in Nice. In short La Boheme coming to a theater near you (and wherever you may be in Europe, Asia or Australia -- check the Met website).   Here in San Francisco on a Saturday morning you no longer roll over in bed to click on the radio, you roll out of bed and hop on the trolley to Bloomingdales and its adjacent movie palace. Last Saturday it was Benjamin Britten's Peter Grimes, so no one arrived much in advance. But the previous week it had been Romeo and Juliet with Roberto Alagna and Anna Netrebko, Placido Domingo in the pit (the Met is all about stars so one always says who they are) and it was mobbed. It will be a good idea for San Franciscans to get there really early for the 10:30 AM curtain on April 5.   So get there early too in Toulon, etc. (all with a big Printemps nearby) on April 5 where the curtain is 7:30 PM (1:30 PM U.S. Eastern time). Fit indeed for the big screen is the Met's 30 year-old La Boheme production (the Met calls it iconic rather than old) staged by the master of operatic giganticism Franco Zeffirelli -- the Café Momu scene boasts half of Paris on the stage. The sad, tuberculous stricken Mimi is (of course) Angela Gheorghiu (the ex of Roberto Alagna but quite intimate even so they say), the touching Rodolfo is Ramon Vargas.   The Met's new production of Peter Grimes was all about San Francisco. Imagine the hometown cheers for conductor Donald Runnicles, the music director of San Francisco Opera, and for the Ellen Oxford sung by soprano Patricia Racette who had spent years in San Francisco as an apprentice artist. The conducting was absolutely superlative, proving once again that this iconic British opera is among the very greatest masterpieces, and la Racette's school-teacher Ellen throbbed with compassionate lyricism. Alas the Grimes himself was green, raw and soft (a recent graduate of the Met's young artist program -- as all young artist programs the curse of good, adult opera).   Perhaps the only Frenchman as much dans le projecteur as Nicolas Sarkozy is diva Natalie Dessay who hosted the Met's Live in HD Peter Grimes in grandiose terms that, like opera, were at once grotesque, silly, touching (she often forgot what she was saying) and definitely always bigger than mere life. If Mme. Dessay is not a gifted big screen opera hostess she is one of the current greats of daring coloratura singing (high and fast). She will compete mightily for applause (and certainly win), with the thirteen consecutive high C's of tenor Juan Diego Florez on April 26 when Live in HD from the Met presents Donizetti's La Fille du Regiment coming to a theater near you!   Like the Met radio broadcasts, live from the Met in HD makes you ache to be at the real thing, and that is no small accomplishment. Not small at all. Notice the screen credits of the huge number of technicians needed to make these diffusions so successful. www.metoperafamily.org/metopera/broadcast/on_air.aspx.