UK Edition
Review
Superb performances do Janáček’s masterpiece proud - Jenůfa, Grange Park Opera, review
After a mediocre start with a meh-meh Tosca, Wasfi Kani’s new opera house moves into higher gear for a straightforward but engrossing version of Janáček’s grander and greater masterpiece Jenůfa, based on a 1998 production for Welsh National Opera, originally directed by Katie Mitchell before she changed her aesthetics and reacted against simple realism.
As revived by Robin Tebbutt, the staging shows us ordinary people going about going about their daily lives in a plausible fashion, without the theatrical tricks and “alienation” devices that have coloured Mitchell’s more recent work. Nothing much is gained but not much is lost by setting the action in the mid-20th rather than the late-19th century: the important thing is that the narrow moral values and limited experience of a rural community still provide the frame, and the emotional impact of the sad but uplifting tale of infanticide remains unimpaired. I regret only the retention of the gratuitous and baffling apotheosis, unjustified by anything in the libretto, showing what is presumably Jenůfa and Laca’s son cheerily at play in a garden.
Conducting the BBC Concert Orchestra in repertory that it must have found challengingly unfamiliar, William Lacey emphasised the score’s sweetness and warmth rather than the cut and thrust that Charles Mackerras famously exposed. Ensemble came adrift at times here, but there was no mistaking the great outpourings of love that make the opera’s final scene so overwhelming and the playing was full of gusto throughout.
What made the evening so satisfying, however, were four superb performances in the principal roles. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Jenůfa’s hapless suitors Laca and Steva as strongly or sharply defined as they are by Peter Hoary and Nicky Spence. Hoare’s Laca movingly portrays low self-esteem suddenly finding inner strength, while Spence is totally persuasive as Steva the drunken oaf and braggart whose most redeeming feature is his shamefaced embarrassment at his own foolery. Both these excellent tenors sing at the top of their game.
Equally good are Susan Bullock and Natalya Romaniw. At this late stage in her career, Bullock’s voice is raw and strident, but she is the most thoughtful of musicians and as the tightly coiled Kostelnicka she knows exactly how to turn this to her advantage. Even without the help of an imaginative director, she presented a powerful and sympathetic interpretation of this complex character.
Still under 30, Romaniw confirmed her reputation as our most promising dramatic soprano in a touchingly acted and beautifully sung incarnation of the title-role that never lapsed into sentimentality. Fingers crossed, this Swansea girl of Ukrainian descent must be destined for great things in the world’s major opera houses.
A note on the West Horsley Place acoustic: from my seat at the side of the mid stalls, the balance seemed significantly to favour the stage over the pit – a blessing in Janáček, whose orchestral music tends to drown even voices as good as these, but perhaps not ideal in other circumstances.
Until July 8, in repertory with Tosca and Die Walküre. Tickets: 01962 737373; grangeparkopera.co.uk