[Met Performance] CID:318160



Arabella
Metropolitan Opera House, Thu, October 13, 1994

Debut : Hans-Joachim Ketelsen, Charles Workman, Natalie Dessay, David Frye




Arabella (39)
Richard Strauss | Hugo von Hofmannsthal
Arabella
Kiri Te Kanawa

Mandryka
Hans-Joachim Ketelsen [Debut]

Zdenka
Marie McLaughlin

Matteo
David Kuebler

Adelaide
Helga Dernesch

Count Waldner
Donald McIntyre

Fortuneteller
Jane Shaulis

Count Elemer
Charles Workman [Debut]

Count Dominik
Kim Josephson

Count Lamoral
Julien Robbins

Fiakermilli
Natalie Dessay [Debut]

Welko
Roger Crouthamel

Djura
Barry Brandes

Jankel
David Asch

Waiter
Charles Anthony

Card Player
Glenn Bater

Card Player
Frank Coffey

Card Player
Frank

Card Player
David Frye [Debut]


Conductor
Christian Thielemann


Production
Otto Schenk

Set Designer
G?nther Schneider-Siemssen

Costume Designer
Milena Canonero

Lighting Designer
Gil Wechsler

Stage Director
Stephen Pickover





Arabella received eight performances this season.

Review 1:

Unsigned review in New York Magazine

People who love ?Arabella," the last collaboration between Richard Strauss and Hugo von Hofmannsthal, tend to love it a lot and take a protective attitude toward a piece that sometimes needs defending. Apparently the Metropolitan Opera feels the same way, since the company has given the work two lovingly prepared productions in my time: the first in 1955 with Eleanor Steber (later Lisa Della Casa) and George London, and the second in 1983, a handsome staging that has just returned to the repertory with its original Arabella, Kiri Te Kanawa, heading a new cast.

Can it be that "Arabella" has been accepted into the pantheon at last? Perhaps, but I suppose there will always be someone out there to tell us yet again that Strauss, pushing 70 when the opera was first performed in 1933, had written himself out and that he and Hofmannsthal could think of nothing better than to cook up a weak sequel to their big success of twenty years earlier, ?Der Rosenkavalier.? Not true. Both operas take place in Vienna and both contain waltzes, but there the resemblances end. The poet handed the composer a last intriguing variation on one of his favorite themes ? the eternal mystery of physical attraction ? and Strauss responded with a lovely score that ushers us into the serene style that flowered so miraculously in his old age. The often crude sexuality of "Rosenkavalier," the stylized ironies of ?Ariadne,? the elaborate symbolism of "Die Frau ohne Schatten," and the marriage-as-myth convolutions in ?Die Agyptische Helena? are all set aside. Arabella is a comedy of Viennese manners set in 1866 at carnival time, a simple love story told in music of exquisite conversational refinement and orchestral radiance.

Of course, these two craftsmen could never be just simple. The Arabella- Mandryka relationship seldom develops quite the way one expects, from the instant they catch sight of each other (always a magical moment for Hofmannsthal, who savors its mysterious significance as he delays the couple's first meeting until Act II) through painful misunderstandings that lead to the happy-ever-after marital resolution. This literate, wisely compassionate libretto is full of lovable characters, and Strauss brings them to life in musical dialogues of seamless melodic prosody supported by a glowing instrumental web of intricate thematic references. If the opera stumbles briefly midway through Act II, it recovers gloriously for that reconciliatory finale, one of the great boy-gets-girl scenes in all opera.

I first encountered Kiri Te Kanawa's Arabella in Houston more than fifteen years ago, and it was clear right away that nature had made her for the part: a willowy beauty with a provocative physical presence and a luscious, creamy-textured soprano, the ideal instrument to project Arabella's hot-and-cold moods. Unfortunately, nothing ever seemed to be going on inside that pretty head, and her interpretation a few years later at the Met was just as vacuous. This time, I'm glad to say, Te Kanawa has perked up considerably. If the voice has thinned out, she still looks terrific, and her performance now has touches of character: warm solicitation for her confused little sister, Zdenka; a charming insouciance as she bids three unwanted suitors adieu; and, most important, genuine feelings of love and respect for Mandryka. Te Kanawa still models the role more than inhabits it, but even that much progress deserves applause.

Otherwise, this revival has little to offer beyond the opera itself and some nice cameos. Natalie Dessay as the Fiakermilli, the flirt at the coachman's ball in Act II, is sensational ? spot-on coloratura and a delightfully saucy manner in a potentially irritating role ? and Donald McIntyre and Helga Dernesch make a few amusing points as Arabella's low-living parents. Hans Joachim Ketelsen's penny-plain baritone does little to romanticize Mandryka, Marie McLaughlin is a shrill Zdenka, and David Kuebler strains in vain to make Matteo interesting. The orchestra plays crisply for Christian Thielemann, but without much warmth or luminosity.

Review 2:

Tim Page in Newsday
A Middling ?Middle Work? by Strauss

In olden days music students were taught that Richard Strauss began his career as a blazing modernist genius, who then burned out around the time of "Ariadne auf Naxos" (1912) and retreated into a sort of aimless, reiterative nostalgia, More recently, late works such as "Daphne" (1938), "Capriccio" (1942) and the Four Last Songs (1948) have been hailed for their serenity and radiance. And now there is an informal campaign to bring the composer's ?middle works" ? pieces such as "Intermezzo" (1924), "Die Aegyptische Helena" (1928) and "Die Schwiegsame Frau" (1935) ? squarely into the canon.

"Arabella" (1933) has always been the most popular of these middle operas, and I'm not quite sure why this should be so. "Arabella," the last collaboration between Strauss and his great librettist Hugo von Hofmannsthal, returned to the Metropolitan Opera Thursday night after a 10-year absence, with a glittering cast and a wonderful young conductor, Christian Thielemann (whom you may remember as the man who stood up to Kathleen Battle ? and won ? during a fracas over tempos in "Der Rosenkavalier" two seasons back). It is a beautiful and surprisingly intimate production for such a large house; it is also, at times, a beautiful opera (that rapt, shivering, ecstatic duet between Mandryka and Arabella in the second act!), but, for me at least, "Arabella" doesn't really have "legs" and I don't think it ranks with the best of Strauss.

It has become something of a clich? to compare "Arabella" with "Der Rosenkavalier," but there is no character so touching as the Marschallin; the waltz tunes are nowhere near so catchy and effective and, if "Arabella" has fewer passages of extended note spinning (I've always thought "Rosenkavalier" might lose a half hour without much harm), it has nothing to compare to the Presentation of the Rose, or the final trio ? moments that sustain the spectator through even the dullest production of "Der Rosenkavalier."

Kiri Te Kanawa's Arabella will likely be found rather cool in some quarters; I prefer the word "patrician," and admired her graceful bearing and generally sweet singing in a difficult part. Marie McLaughlin was a fine, fluttering and emotive Zdenka. Hans-Joachim Ketelsen, in his house debut, made a somewhat woolly Mandryka; his is not a "pretty" voice and there were some slight vagaries of pitch, but his ardor was often compelling. Natalie Dessay, another debut, brought a pure, airy high soprano voice and a scampish charm to the Fiakermilli; I suspect we'll be hearing her sing Zerbinetta before long. Strong performances from Helga Dernesch (Countess Adelaide), David Kuebler (Matteo), Charles Workman (Elemer) and Donald McIntyre (Waldner) rounded out the cast. Conductor Thielemann proved once again that he both reveres and understands the paradoxical Strauss style; the tuttis were sweeping and grand while softer passages had the clarity of chamber music.



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