Stravinsky's "Rake" Renewed at CCM
It was “Rake” redux Thursday night at the University of
Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music’s Corbett Auditorium.
In a most unusual concurrence of events, there have been two chances to experience Stravinsky’s “The Rake’s Progress” in Cincinnati this spring. The first, a concert performance by the Vocal Arts Ensemble and the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra, took place in March at the School for Creative and Performing Arts. (See review on this site at http://www.musicincincinnati.com/site/reviews/CCO_VAE_Rake.html). As with concert opera in general, it was highly (necessarily) inventive, relying on imagination and the power of the music to conjure the opera fully in the listener’s mind. And very well done, too.
The new production by the CCM opera department is all-out, with visuals bordering on sensory overload. A Conservatory-wide collaboration by the divisions of E-Media and Performance and the departments of Opera and Technical Design and Production, it is both eye-popping and musically arresting, with a sterling student cast and the Philharmonia Orchestra led with an expert hand by conductor Mark Gibson. Director Robin Guarino, opera department chair, has poured a smelter full of ideas and inspiration into its realization onstage.
Thanks to Watchout, a digital media production and delivery system newly acquired by CCM, students in the E-Media division, under the guidance of Peter DePietro, were able to create visuals and integrate them with the set. Thus, in act I, soprano Jacqueline Echols as Anne Trulove and tenor Daniel Ross as her ne’er do well suitor Tom Rakewell sang before a “backdrop” of foliage waving in the breeze at Anne’s home in the country. When Tom, having learned from Nick Shadow, i.e. the Devil, that he has just inherited a fortune, sets off for the big city to complete the transfer, a dizzying ride through a tunnel took place. The images were projected onto a huge white screen or frame, that reversed as each new scene was played out. The screen had windows and doors carved into it for comings and goings by the cast. The set was designed by CCM professor emeritus Paul Shortt, with lighting design by Weston G, Wetzel, a graduate student in TD and P. Cast members could approach the audience more closely than usual. The stage was extended over the pit, allowing singers to walk in front of Gibson and the orchestra, who could still be seen through an opening in the stage.
Guarino has updated “Rake’s Progress,” to the 21st century. Originally set in 18th-century London and inspired by William Hogarth’s famous paintings of the same name, it utilizes a splendid libretto by W.H. Auden and Chester Kallman. Unfortunately, the surtitles (projected above the stage) do not do justice to the text. They were confusing, lacking punctuation between sentences and phrases, and the meaning was often hard to deduce, especially with all the visual activity below.
The projections evoked Times Square in New York, though it could have been Amsterdam when coupled with live action of prostitutes displaying their wares in the windows cut into the frame (as in Amsterdam’s red light district.) The production is “X-rated,” by the way, with a warning, displayed at the box office and in pre-performance advertising, “for mature audiences.” The advisory is well earned, with simulated sexual activity of all kinds portrayed in freeze motion behind the windows.
The tale of Tom and his undoing is the sad, but true one expressed in the moral pronounced at the end, “For idle hands and hearts and minds, the Devil finds a work to do”: Tom, conveniently enriched by Nick Shadow, goes to the city where he is: seduced by Mother Goose at her brothel, persuaded by Nick to alleviate his boredom by marrying Baba the Turk (a bearded lady in the circus), decides to devote his fortune to speculation on behalf of the poor and needy, loses everything in the process, and is asked to forfeit his soul to the Devil (Nick). Thoughts of his true love, Anne, guide him to the correct answers in a sportsmanlike game of cards with Nick, who, infuriated that Tom has escaped him, strikes him insane. Tom dies in Bedlam after a final visit and a farewell lullaby by the faithful Anne.
The opening night cast was uniformly outstanding. Ross conveyed the many aspects of Tom with great skill and conviction: naive and innocent in act I, overwhelmed in act II, disillusioned and destroyed in act III. Echols’ Anne was moving and beautifully sung, her courage convincingly displayed on the road to London (“I go to him”). As Nick, Charles Owen was as arch as one could wish, right down to his slick white hair and mellow baritone. (E-media students followed him with cameras and microphones to emphasize his celebrity.) Mezzo Brandi Samuel was a larger-than-life Baba. Her rage at Tom’s inattention in act II was a scream (enacted partly on a tabletop in precarious high heels); likewise, her departure in a hail of glitter following the auction scene seemed perfectly fitting. Mezzo Leah de Gruyl was a steamy Mother Goose, with bass Thomas Richards a strong, caring Father Truelove. Tenor Shawn Mlynek had a star turn as the sleazy, pink-suited auctioneer Sellem.
The Chorus, as the Roaring Boys and Whores, was equally impressive. “Lanterloo” they reveled as Mother Goose led Tom into the brothel for the night. The Whores, striking in their black cat/bunny getups, crawled (endlessly it seemed) out of Tom’s bed in act II. Gibson and the Philharmonia (a chamber-sized 43) performed Stravinsky’s music with precision, crispness and lyricism, with Junghyun Cho on fortepiano.
The E-Media element, a first for CCM Opera, stole the show, with the eye actively involved at all points. The static-like background of the scene in Tom’s bedroom in act II quite accurately reflected his confused state of mind, and piles of bills ($100s of course) and stock quotations appeared when he (Nick) conceived the notion of saving the world with Tom’s money. The scene where Nick asks to be paid for his services took place against a dismal, snowy background. Dark clouds rushed across the sky as Shadow angrily pronounced Tom insane. He then disappeared through a door as the projection shrank away to the sound of rushing wind, to be replaced by a tunnel with white light pouring in, symbolizing Tom’s redemption. All that remained at the end -- in stark grey Bedlam as Tom died, believing himself to be Adonis having been visited by Venus (Anne) -- was a bare, fading light bulb.
The opera (highly recommended) repeats at 8 p.m. tonight, 2 p.m. Sunday in Corbett Auditorium at CCM. Tickets, $27-$29, $17-$19 for students and seniors, are available at (513) 556-4183 and online at www.ccm.uc.edu. Student rush tickets, Sunday matinee only, are $11 at the door.