Customer Reviews

Bizet: Carmen

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

When I first heard this performance of Carmen I enjoyed it but, nevertheless, was somewhat disconcerted by it. Both the singing and orchestral playing are beautiful, but the performance sounded different somehow from any other performance of Carmen I had heard. Now that I've lived with this performance for several months -- and compared it to other performances -- I've concluded that the difference is that this is the most lyrical performance of Carmen I've ever heard, and I attribute much of this to Sinopoli's conducting. Somehow he manages to present Carmen as an an incredibly melodic, lyric opera -- with all the requisite drama where appropriate -- but without the usual overlay of bombast that makes Carmen so often seem like an old warhorse. Frankly, I think that some listeners who like Carmen performed as a bombastic old warhorse will be disappoited with this performance. But if you are willing to listen to it with "fresh ears" you will discover that the old warhorse has been replaced by a fresh opera that is both lyrical and dramatic by turns and unfailingly beautiful throughout.

Upon first encountering this recording, I wasn't sure what to expect. I love Jennifer Larmore in the Bel Canto and Baroque repertory, but I was a little wary of her Carmen. Suffice it to say, she's a gem at whatever she does. She easily has more versatility than the more famous (why?) Ms. Bartoli. This recording has gotten some critical drubbing, but I find it thoroughly enjoyable, musically and dramatically, and the sound quality is exceptional. It is good to hear Thomas Moser's beautifully sung Jose, and Angela Gheorgiu is now one of my favorite Micaelas. Sinopoli's conducting, while not for traditionalists, is invigorating and intense.

This is perhaps the most ornately and beautifully-sung, uber-French/Gaelic version of Carmen as you will ever find. Lost is the Italian-influenced verisimo sex and blood drama that is often associated with this opera. The honey-voiced and sexy mezzo soprano Jennifer Larmore sings Carmen, tenor Thomas Moser is Don Jose, soprano Angela Gheorghiu steps down her diva pedestal to sing the more minor role of Micaela and baritone superstar Samuel Ramey sings Escamillo. With a cast like this one, and with Maestro Giuseppe Sinopoli conducting you can't go wrong. This should be among one of your top Carmens, even if you already own a dozen other Carmens.

Jennifer Larmore is primarily a French mezzo soprano, singing ina kind of technique that is very rare and uncommon. While her voice is suited for recital and concerts, her dramatic operatic roles are just as impressive. Being a mezzo-soprano, she was bound to add Carmen to her resume. Her Carmen is one of pure sex appeal, with a voice that is as dramatic as it is sensual. She may not step up the drama as some "high" mezzos have done before (examples include Grace Bumbry, Shirley Verrett, Julia Migenes Johnson) and she certainly lacks what soprano-Carmens like Maria Callas brings to the role, but she is absolutely amazing, holding her own as well as any more famous Carmen. Listen to her version of the Habanera- it is musically the most French sounding instead of Moorish/Spanish sounding. The Seguidilla, Gypsy Song and the "Song and Dance for Don Jose" (Je Vrais Danser En Votre Honoeur) are all examples of French concert songs and Larmore is able to bring out true beauty out of them, without forgotting plot and sounding compelling. Her reading of the Death Card Scene is dark and rich, like dark chocolate. Her Final Confrotation with Don Jose may not be explosive but it is fatal and appropriately dramatic. Jennifer Larmore is the most well-intepreted Carmen in most recent times.

Larmore is supported by Thomas Moser as Don Jose. I really don't have much to say about Thomas Moser. He is doing a decent job, but he is only serviceable and lacks some of the more colorful and dramatic portrayals sung by such tenors as Don Jose and Jon Vickers who fit the role like a glove. Moser does not sound enough like Don Jose for me, though in his French diction and French persona of the character he is unsurpassed. Soprano Angela Gheorghiu, who hails from Eastern Europe, is a true diva and one of today's most popular dramatic sopranos. In each performance whether it is Tosca, Mimi, Manon, Werther or Nedda, she resembles Maria Callas with better voice! As Micaela, she is fully lyrical, gorgeous and splendid and her mastership of French opera is exceptional. She truly benefited from her marriage to tenor Roberto Alagna who is actually a French citizen. She does not overdo Micaela as Mirella Freni does, and does not try to outshine Larmore. This is after all "Carmen" and not "Micaela" and its refreshing and interesting to hear Angela Gheorghiu not act the diva for once. However, with a voice like hers, one wonders why Don Jose would ignore her and go for Carmen!

Samuel Ramey's Escamillo is the sexiest and most gorgeously, soothing voice I've ever heard. Escamillo has been sung in very serviceable ways, lacking some character by such tenors as Kostas Paskalis and Sherill Milnes. But Ramey makes Escamillo appropriately macho and strong, while alsou ravishing US with his voice alone. His fight with Don Jose is as impressive as his duet with Carmen. Fans of Ramey will not want to be without this particular recording, since Ramey is not famous for Escamillo at all and instead gained popularity for the number of sinister villain roles of his operatic career - Scarpia, Mephistopheles, the villains in Tales of Hoffman among others. Conductor Giuseppe Sinopoli tends to conduct the tempi in any score in slower motion and in broad ways, but in this way we are able to hear the subtleties in the fatalistic drama that is inherent in Bizet's music as well as the more purely melodic French moments like the Preludes and exotic, explosive Fate Theme heard at the end of the Overture and at the end of the opera itself.

Existing so many wonderful and emblematic registries of this Masterful Obra, what can give of novel this version? As so many times it happens with Director Giuseppe Sinopoli, we found something new and that to enjoy much in this recording. Different from other visions, the intensity is growing throughout its dramatic and strongly cinematographic development, and moments that take advantage generally to bomb of early the eardrum of the listeners like the fight of Carmen and the entrance of the gypsys of tabaquería being denounced the soldiers; here they appear light rather and they surprise until one notices that it is a growth that makes final Act 3 more impressive and. Of all the registries that I have listened (Karajan I and II, Solti, Beecham, Kleiber, Abbado, Levine, among others), there is no is so pertinent from the celebration of the bullring (wonderful in its frenetic, alive, overwhelming, perfect rate) to the tremendous final scene. In this last scene, each musical phrase and the song of says us to the protagonists that they gamble the life, with desperation, anxiety, and gives the inevitable thing. Master of effects like accelerandis and ritardandis, Sinopoli maintains to us in vilo in each phrase. A detail: it is never as remarkable as here a ostinato first listened to in woods with the phrase of Escamillo to Don Jose when this one finds out that he is his rival (jealousy? , beginning of madness?) with Carmen, and that returns strongly in the final Act with the horns (final madness) when it begs desperate to Carmen that refuses to return with him.

The soloists are wonderful. Mezzo-soprano Larmore , although it does not have the intensity of the Balsa neither the Berganza's precious and refining singing, conquers with its voice and action doing merit its youth (real) and conviction. The Moser tenor surprises like Don Jose, very convincing and using all the refinement for his lyrical parts (the Aria of the Flower with the Master Sinopoli is simply overwhelming and stirring), and an enthusiasm for the worthy dramatic parts of Domingo. To its has affirmed that he is a light tenor in the style of Gedda (versions of De Los Angeles-Beecham and Callas-Pretre), nevertheless took it evolution to the Wagnerian song lately. Ramey-Escamillo that already we knew in the version video with Levine-Met, dispatches its part without problems, with some hardship in its scene "Torero" by the time selected by the Director. With Jose Van Dam, he is the best thing between the Bullfigthers. Angela Gheorghiu as Micaela moves, affects and wonder with its singing as it must be. It does not remain back in the firmness and passion of the aim of the first scene of Act 3, convincing to Don Jose to return. I do not know its version as Carmen, and it would be interesting to listen to it being been so precise for this sweet roll of the ingenuous and noble girl.

A "absolutely recommendable Carmen", very entertained and with more than a surprise, takes advantage of that it!

This Carmen is a miss on most cylinders. Sinopoli, who should have been as great in the pit as ever, conducts a listless, often dragging reading. Lamore is almost an alto, and her deep, chocolate tones sound neither young nor seductive. Moser is a workaday tenor with nothing to offer interpretatively--he just stood in because no one better was available, I suppose. All in all, a disappointment in eveyr department.