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by Giacomo Puccini, directed by James Robinson

Canadian Opera Company, Hummingbird Centre, Toronto

January 21-February 6, 2004

The winter season of the Canadian Opera Company featured the final operas of Verdi and Puccini in repertory.  Turandot (seen January 21, 2004) was presented in the James Robinson production that the COC co-owns with eight other North American companies.  Director Peter Rothstein, in recreating Robinson’s original direction, failed to infuse the action with the same sense of urgency and purpose that Robinson did when he directed it here in 1997.

As Calaf, Richard Margison produced a consistently refined tone, beautiful in itself, but as disconcertingly devoid of passion as his face was of expression.  Eva Urbanová made the risky attempt to communicate Turandot’s emotions, revealed later in Act 3, beneath the forbidding façade she projects in the riddle scene of Act 2.  On the minus side her stratospheric notes suggested fragility more than steel and her demeanor discomfort more than grandeur.  On the plus side she made Turandot’s conversion to love one of the most convincing this reviewer has seen.

The Liù, Serena Farnocchia, beautifully floated her high notes, and the Timur, Deyan Vatchkov, sang with a richly hued voice belying his young age.  As in 1997 the real star of the show was the COC chorus who sang magnificently throughout.                

        

Conductor Richard Bradshaw played up the score’s modernity through its links to the sound worlds of Debussy and Richard Strauss.  The COC was to have given the Canadian premiere of the new Berio ending but recurred to the Alfano since, according to Bradshaw’s program note, the Berio fails to provide “the cathartic exhilaration which redeems the death of Liù.”

©Christopher Hoile

Note: A version of this review appeared in Opera News 2004-07.

Photo: Serena Farnocchia, Deyan Vatchkov, Eva Urbanová and Richard Margison.

©2004 Michael Cooper.