A fun frothy journey

Last night opened the annual visit of the Kirov Opera from the Mariinsky Theater of St. Petersburg, Russia, to the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. They chose a fairly unknown work by Gioacchino Rossini called Il Viaggio a Reims, or "The Journey to Rheims." This particular production is a joint project with the Théâtre du Châtelet in France. Later, the Kirov will be doing Verdi's Falstaff and a concert version of Shostakovich's Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk.

Viaggio is the story of a group of disparate wealthy people travelling to Rheims for the coronation of the French king, and Rossini and his librettist Luigi Balocchi created a sweet, comedic amuse oreille. The opera was popular in its day (it premiered in 1825 in Italy), but then was forgotten until being resurrected in 1984. The Kirov has chosen to "update" the opera, setting it on a luxury ocean liner in the 1950s.

Every time I've gone to an opera at the Kennedy Center, I've sat down in the lower orchestra section, as close to the stage as I can get—I like to watch the singers work! Last night, though, I did something different and got tickets in the First Tier. There's a big difference in ticket prices: $175 for orchestra seats, with first tier seats running from $145 to $80. Alas, though, this was not the time to be in the balconies! The Kirov staged a good deal of the opera from the house, with a runway from the stage to the aisle that transects the orchestra section horizontally, and they also had stairs from the side aisles onto the corners of the stage. That effectively blocked the view from everybody in the center boxes (including the presidential box!) and the all of the balconies—over half of the house! Next time, I'll be back in the orchestra seating: I've learned my lesson.

The Kirov was avant garde in the rest of its staging, as well. The entire stage was covered in white. As we entered the Opera House, an enormous blue, white, and red flag hung diagonally across the stage. The performance started ten minutes late; when they began, we had ten minutes of people coming on and off the stage from all over the house as well as the stage, most dressed up in 1930s period clothing and carrying white-covered suitcases, and also including some domestics who appeared to be trying to clean up and sweep the stage floor with brooms and a working vacuum cleaner. There wasn't any dialogue during this period. Finally, Maestro Valery Gergiev walked on to the stage from the center runway, dressed in all black clothing, then the flag was ripped away and pulled quickly backstage to reveal the entire Orchestra of the Mariinsky Theater dressed in all white tail coats and white tie not in the pit but arranged on stage.

Having the orchestra on stage was an interesting decision for this opera. It had the expected problems of alignment between the singers and the orchestra, which didn't happen too often, but it did happen. I looked and looked to see if they had television monitors or something so the singers could watch the stick, but I never could find any. Since we weren't in the top balcony, I couldn't see down into the pit to see if there was a prompter or associate conductor down there relaying the beat.

But, thus started the opera. They continued to stage from all over the theater and the house, with singers in the orchestra, singers in various parts of the house, and singers in the boxes. A few times, they interacted with audience members in their vicinities.

Now, I have to confess that I don't know this opera. What's more, the program notes are scant and read as though they were written by a Russian who speaks some English. So, I'm not really able to tell who exactly who the starring characters are and by whom they were sung. I'm going to take a stab at this, though, and guess that the two characters who impressed me most were Modestina and the Contessa de Folleville, sung by Olga Legkova and Larusa Yudina. Modestina entered in a tight, fitted, bright red suit-dress ensemble with a matching hat. Yudina's character—a big-time clothes horse—stole the show several times with her stunning coloratura and some stratispherically high notes somewhere in the range of about a high E (sorry, I left my perfect pitch at home), and her costumes were incredible. Her entrance had her in a bold hot pink and black dress with a fully flared skirt and we soon saw dozens of servants carting in an enormous crate with several boxes inside that included her matching pink and black hat. In another scene, she entered completely enclosed in a floor length cape covered in bunches of beige tuille and with a matching high beehive hat, but—get this—the cape was illuminated from underneath.

Amongst the male singers, only the character playing the British lord—I think "Sidney"—caught my attention, sung by Eduard Tsanga.

Rossini wrote a few truly magical moments, including one ensemble for thirteen singers (I know that eight singers is an octet and nine singers is a nonet, but what is thirteen singers?) and then yet another for fourteen!

The production designers also made another interesting decision for the musicians. On the far left side of the stage, they placed a harpsichord to provide the continuo for the recitatives, and the harpsichordist was attired in all white 18th century attire with white powdered wig. Later, when a harp was needed as a soloist, a similarly attired harpist was wheeled out by the men of the chorus on a little platform to play during those arias; when one of the male singers had, in esssence, a "duet" with a flute, a similarly clad flutist came out and actually had complicated staging to interact with the singer.

There was a bit of a lull in the second act—too many love-lorn solos and love bird duets, you know—but on the whole, it was a light, frothy, enjoyable evening. Unfortunately, there are just two performances of this opera, last night and this afternoon, so you won't be able to see the production. That's a shame, cause this was a fun show and a wild, visual circus on stage.

Oh, and just as an aside, I was a bit disappointed when I went to the martini bar in the Grand Foyer during the interval and there was no Russian vodka!!!