Hall
Auditorium, Oberlin
March
14
Joshua Blue, center, as an unhappy King of the May. |
When
Benjamin Britten’s comic opera Albert Herring premiered at
Glyndebourne in 1947, the director of the festival reportedly warned
the audience, “This isn’t our kind of thing.” The undercurrent
of homosexuality in a man being chosen as Queen of the May was too
strong, especially with Britten’s partner, tenor Peter Pears,
singing the title role.
Fortunately
that’s passé now,
leaving a brilliant musical work ripe for straight (no pun intended)
comic treatment – with satirical swipes directed at the supporting
cast, not Albert. Director Jonathon Field ran with that premise in a
whipcrack production last week, turning in a professional-caliber
performance with Oberlin Conservatory students.
Field
approached the opera in the spirit of screwball comedy, the
rapid-fire, histrionic style of filmmaking that was popular in
Hollywood in the 1930s and ’40s. Characters marched, preened,
bantered and cajoled in clockwork precision, starting with the group
of British villagers that convene at the home of Lady Billows to
decide who will be Queen of the May. Stereotypically stiff and
proper, they moved like interlocking parts of a well-oiled machine,
establishing caricatures (priggish schoolmarm, huffy police
superintendent) with a few deft lines and gestures before flitting
into places around a dining table to make unctuous pitches for their
candidates.
Marvelous Monroe. |
That
set up an amusingly pompous entrance by Lady Billows, played on
Friday night by Amber Monroe, whose privileged mien and florid
indignation delivered in Wagnerian-sized vocals provided amusing
reaction shots throughout the entire evening. The snappy put-downs of
her maid, sung by Micaëla
Aldridge, to each of the proposed names set a brisk tempo and arch
tone of comic anticipation.
The
pace slowed with the title character’s appearance in the second
half of the first act, and Joshua Blue’s one-dimensional portrayal
of a depressed mama’s boy didn’t help. Daveed Buzaglo’s overly cloying Sid
was more distracting than amusing, but Hannah Hagerty as his
girlfriend Nancy brought back some sparkle, particularly in their
love duet. And when the committee flooded in for a rousing production
number announcing Albert as King of the May, the cascade of reactions
– Albert aghast, his mother thrilled, Lady Billows dangling the
prize purse – set an enticing mixture of farce, satire and
whimsy.
Britten’s
witty score comes to the fore in the second act, and Field took full
advantage of comic set pieces like Miss Wordsworth (Audrey
Ballaro-Hagadorn) rehearsing her mischievous choral trio. Even more
impressive was the way he had his singers play to the quirks in the
music – flashes of color in the woodwinds, sharp cracks of
percussion – that add dimension to the characters’ personalities.
The score is also notable for its many references, to which Field
added a few of his own onstage. Lady Billows had a Scarlett O’Hara
moment on the staircase of her home, and it took an invocation of da
Vinci’s “The Last Supper” to induce Albert to get up and speak
at the banquet celebrating his crowning.
Albert’s
disappearance in the third act gave Hagerty a chance to shine in
hand-wringing arias, and the full ensemble an opportunity to indulge
in some lusty, madcap recriminations after he reappeared. The singing
was uniformly strong, without a weak voice in the cast. After Albert
downed a spiked drink in the second act and his character opened up,
Blue blossomed into a rich, full tenor who dominated the stage by the
final curtain. Monroe never failed to get a reaction to her outsized
singing and acting, and the committee members crafted amusing
character studies.
Much
of the credit for the production’s success has to be shared with
conductor Christopher Larkin, whose credits include a stint as music
director of the New York City Opera touring company. Even for a small
orchestra (13 pieces), the sound was remarkably transparent, clear
and disciplined without losing the spontaneity that gives Albert
Herring its bright spirit and momentum. Violinist Yuri Popowycz
deserves special mention for a virtuoso invocation of whistling. And
the orchestra’s intermezzos merited an extra round of applause.
King
of the May? By the final curtain Friday night, it seemed exactly like
our kind of thing.
For
more on Jonathon Field:
http://new.oberlin.edu/conservatory/departments/opera-theater/faculty_detail.dot?id=20743
For
more on Oberlin Opera Theater:
http://new.oberlin.edu/conservatory/departments/opera-theater/
Photos by John Seyfried
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