Opera Les Indes Galantes Les Talens Lyriques, Barbican Hall, review

Regular readers of these reviews may be sick of hearing about my struggle to understand French composer Jean-Philippe Rameau’s genius. All I can say in my defence is that I keep trying, and that there were moments in this concert performance when I noticed my foot surreptitiously tapping and my face gently smiling. I still have a long way to go, but perhaps the ice has broken.

The cause of this relenting was Les Indes galantes, more properly described as an opéra-ballet, as it consists of a hortatory prologue and four discrete episodes intended to be danced as much as sung, each set in a different exotic culture (an Indian isle, Peru, Persia, North America), where some footling romantic intrigue is taking place.

The tone of these tales, each of which lasts about half an hour, varies from the frankly comic to the nobly tragic: I think I prefer the former. Although I will never love Rameau’s vocal lines (too much simpering, posturing and twittering) or warm to his porcelain characters, I was delighted on this occasion by his richly scored orchestral writing, which embraces the reedy French bagpipe or musette as well as a battery of drums and special effects illustrative of a tempest and volcanic eruption.

Thus coloured, the dances are charged with a wicked energy and panache which leads dainty politesse dangerously close to the cliff-edge of riotous orgy, and the show (for that is what it is) culminates in a thumping powwow, apparently based on a genuine Native American melody and milked in a finale worthy of Broadway razzmatazz.

At the Barbican, one had to imagine the spectacle: a fully staged production from Bordeaux, which had caused some upset on account of its flippant treatment of Islamic customs, had been left behind and only its musical elements imported.

Christophe Rousset has this music in his bones, and he conducted Les Talens Lyriques with just the right blend of precision, attack and elegance. Six young soloists, none outstanding but all gamely playing multiple roles, sang their meandering declamation and sinuous airs sweetly and correctly, but I was more impressed by Bordeaux’s in-house chorus, which sounded like a crack team of baroque specialists. Yes, I quite enjoyed myself. But why were there so many empty seats? Normally these early operas are an instant sell-out.

No further performances

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