Total Karita in the Finnish National Opera, the 21st of May, 2022

When Karita Mattila performs in Finland you can be pretty sure that the tickets are sold out and the newspapers are full of admiring comments. This time the Finnish National Opera had trusted her reputation and charisma to fill the main stage for many nights and thus ”Total Karita” was born. The first part of the evening consisted of Francis Poulenc’s monologue opera ”The Human Voice” and after the intermission she sang schlagers and songs from musicals.  

I saw ”The Human Voice” the last time in Gothenburg opera in 2019 and it made a deep impression on me. The opera tells about a woman, who calls the man, who has left her and goes through the emotions she has about the break-up. I must say that I did not fall in love with this version by director Jussi Nikkilä. I was, first of all, a bit disturbed by the fact that Mattila sang to a mobile phone, when the story clearly has elements that stress the use of a normal phone. But perhaps even more I was disturbed that the director had made Mattila squirm and wriggle on the stage quite a lot. I assume it was supposed to express the sadness and despair she felt, but somehow I started thinking that if she had been really chagrined by the end of the relationship, she might have been rather frozen instead of wriggling. But, of course, people express their sorrow in different ways.   

Mattila’s pronunciation of French was superb and her voice was also in great shape. I believe she would have captured the attention of the audience even with more subtle movements, since the performance of the opera in Gothenburg was extremely captivating.   

After the intermission the concert gave an impression of Las Vegas or the Hollywood golden era of musicals. A big orchestra on the stage, dancers circling the singer and a change of dress after each song were reminders of big American shows. At her best in my opinion Mattila was in John Kander’s “Mein Herr” and in Friedrich Holländer’s “Ich bin von Kopf bis Fuss auf Liebe eingestellt”. Sure, the second part of ”Total Karita” was quite nice entertainment, but it did not make me swoon of admiration.