Vancouver Opera review: Traditional La Traviata delves into characters
Credit to Author: Tracey Tufnail| Date: Fri, 18 Oct 2019 23:03:13 +0000
When: Oct. 19, Oct. 24, 7:30 p.m.; Oct 26. 2 p.m.
Where: Queen Elizabeth Theatre
Tickets and info:vancouveropera.ca
Verdi’s La Traviata is one of those surefire hits regularly programmed by the world’s opera companies. Vancouver Opera’s last La Traviata hit the boards of the Queen Elizabeth Theatre just eight years ago, in a rich, though emotionally rather cold, staging by the illustrious Jonathan Miller.
VO’s latest Traviata is directed by Alain Gauthier. Aside from an update to the 1920s (uh, just like last season’s La Bohème), the company presents a rather traditional vision of the story, with its flashy first act, its moral awakening midsection, and its great get out your handkerchiefs last act.
To call Gauthier’s version traditional is no criticism: even the bravest rethink of the piece can’t get around the social attitudes that drive the story, and Gauthier helps us understand what really matters about the characters as characters, not the antiquated mores of their time.
The production’s mise en scène is by Christina Poddubiuk, with sets built by Edmonton Opera and props and costumes created by Pacific Opera Victoria.
Soprano Emily Dorn as Violetta in Vancouver Opera’s La Traviata. (Photo credit: Tim Matheson.)
Two big crowd scenes were appropriately grand, but they (and the Paris in the Twenties conceit) never overwhelmed what is essentially an intimate examination of a doomed relationship.
Gauthier respected the three-act structure determined by Verdi — acknowledging that the master knew best how to pace a three-hour evening.
Conductor Yves Abel’s way with the score was efficient and effective (though I might have welcomed a bit more old-school Italian sentimentality). Both chorus and orchestra delivered a solid, respectable performance.
One of the dual stars of the production is tenor Andrew Haji, who brought a good sense of youthful impetuousness to the part of Alfredo.
Haji charmed everyone in his first VO performance last year in Donizetti’s bel canto masterwork The Elixir of Love. He continues to charm with his relaxed stage presence and seemingly effortless vocal style. He is definitely a young singer to watch.
I had a few small reservations about the production’s Violetta, soprano Emily Dorn, in act one, but by her extended duet with Alfredo’s pious, hypocritical father (sung by baritone Chenye Yuan) in act two, the shape and intensity of a great performance was revealed.
Her Violetta is a complicated, nuanced individual, a sophisticated denizen of the demimonde one moment, a fragile, terrified young woman the next.
With our interest in building new audiences for opera, this is a fine work to whet the developing appetites of neophytes; and the great work of
director Gauthier, Dorn and Haji offers much to please the more jaded
palettes of the opera cognoscenti.
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