Jean Stilwell glitters as Carmen. She is sexy, hard, exotic.
Her voice
ranges from glorious soaring to mocking, harsh tones, changing character
suddenly and unexpectedly. She is at her best in the early scenes.
As her foil,
Micaela, Liping Zhang is superb. Where Carmen is vivacious,
she is
reserved, where Carmen is volatile, she is steady. And where Carmen
flashes with
danger and threats, Micaela offers a safe haven and forgiveness for
Don José.
And her singing quite takes the breath away. Unfortunately Don José
is no
match for these women.
NicholasLoren struggles to portray Don José’s passage from honest
soldier
to murderer, so well described by Bizet. Having failed to convince
us of Don
Josés hasic decency at the beginning, his protestations of undying
love
become merely tedious and his ultimate tragedy unmoving. Eduardo
del
Campo as Don Emilio has presence and sings well, but lacks the
extra
touch which should bring excitement and danger (again) to his part.
Jonathan Liebich and Michel Corbeil as the smugglers and
Monica Huisman and Julie Nesrallah as their girls put
in solid
performances. The second act quintet was engaging and lively. The chorus
sang clearly and strongly and the children’s voices were charming and
just
mocking enough. There were some very nice bits of stage business.
The opening langour of a day in Seville is well supported by Edmonton
Opera’s
set by John Conklin. Barrack walls stretched down one side of
the street
to the water in the distance. Lillas Pastia’s tavern is suitably exotic.
The setting
for the smuggler’s camp however is cluttered with large blocks of masonry
from
what appears to be a ruined church. Symbolic no doubt but not helpful
to
the performers or audience. The costumes by Catherine Zuber
and
David Burbick are traditional, attractive and apt. I had looked
forward to Rosario Ancer’s choreography and indeed the professional
dancer’s flamenco is excellent and by not being flamboyant the dancers
remained part of the townsfolk. The dancing for Carmen however was
repetitive, at times coarse and unimaginative, especially in the
seductive scene with Don José at the tavern. This was disappointing.
The orchestra under Maestro Matthias Kuntzsch played well, if slightly
unexcitingly.