ARIADNE AUF NAXOS
I went to see Ariadne
auf Naxos by Richard Strauss at Alexander Theatre last Saturday (first night).
I was really looking forward to the performance, since the opera is a bit
unusual and consists of two parts: the prologue and the opera. Parts are
different, but intertwined. You could perhaps say that the prologue is a bit
opera buffa and the opera is ubertragic.
Changing the story of
the opera from Vienna to Russia seemed a bit unnecessary, but fortunately it did
not disturb that much during the opera. I have seen far worse modernizations of
operas before. As a whole the opera was nice. Set and costumes worked
(Zerbietta’s wigs were awful, but perhaps they had some message, too) despite
the challenges posed by the small size of the stage. It was quite smart to use
also the loges next to the stage in the opera. That gave a little extra spice
to the performance.
Unfortunately the
primadonna Emriikka Salonen had a flu and she only sung a few notes in the
prologue. Fortunately the ladies singing her role from the wings (Hedvig Paulig
and Minna-Liisa Värelä) did a great job. Personally I especially liked Värelä’s
performance: sooooo beautiful! And even though Salonen did not sing, her looks
suited the role of ubertragic Ariadne. The second voice that caressed my ears
was Mika Nisula as Bacchus. Such a warm tenor voice. I also like Ann-Marie
Heino’s debuting composer. I am not quite sure how believable her crush on the
silly Zerbinetta was, but who says that opera plots would be realistic. I don’t
think anyone goes and sees operas because of the realistic stories.
Then I simply must
mention the extremely beautiful dancer Oskari Nyyssölä. I have no idea what
kind of gold paint he was covered with but it definitely worked!
I really recommend
this opera to others, too.
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