Customer Reviews

Puccini - Turandot / Gergiev, Schnaut, Tear, Vienna State Opera

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

This DVD brings us a very important development in the life of the opera Turandot: the Berio ending. A couple of years ago the contemporary Italian composer Luciano Berio composed an alternative ending to the opera, to replace that supplied by Franco Alfano. (Puccini died before he could complete the last act of Turandot -- what he would have done had he lived a couple of more years is one of history's great tantalizing mysteries.)

If for nothing more, this DVD is of great interest to Puccini and Turandot fans for that ending. And it is a very interesting ending. Where Alfano is simplistic and loud, Berio is subtle and varied. The new ending is vastly more interesting than that of Alfano -- it actually addresses, in some satisfactory manner, the great problem of how Turandot can transform from ice princess to human being in a mere fifteen minutes of singing.

Some viewers will not like the staging, which casts everyone in a phantasmagoric Peking of half-human, half-machine beings. This is a matter of taste. There can be no "realistic" staging of Turandot -- to paraphrase Dorothy Parker, there is simply no "real" there. Turandot is a fantasy, pure and simple, and how one visualizes the fantasy is subjective in all cases. I found David Pountny's approach to be as good as any I have seen.

The casting features mature, accomplished singers in all the roles. One cannot fault the singing in any major way. The staging does call for them to be rather static in their acting, but this is not their fault. Unfortunately, there are a few occasions in the recording in which the singers are overwhelmed by the orchestra -- probably an issue of microphone placement or mixing.

This may not be the ideal first Turandot for someone not already familiar with the opera, but, fortunately, there are other choices. DVDs of productions from the Met and San Francisco are both available, and both are more traditional. But for a Turandot aficionado, this DVD is an absolute must-have.

I have first to admit that my opinion might not be that of every one; but let me put the facts before you and judge for yourself before throwing away the price of this disc.

This is one of these Eurotrash "concept" operas in which the populace of Peking are parts of a large machine that consciously echo Fritz Lang's "Metropolis" from the silent era and possibly Woody Allen's "Sleepers" of a more recent time. With a very large chorus all made up to look like robots and machine parts, we have Ping, Pang and Pong, one with a saw for a hand, one with a wrench, and one looking like Peter Lorre in "Mad Love."

I am on tender ground here, but the Liu is most unattractive I have seen in any sympathetic role while the tenor makes Pavarotti at his widest look thin. Through most of Act I, the director has him seated, even when demanding "Let me pass." I braved Act I and tried to watch Act II, but one singer in the opening trio was in a spot where the mike did not pick up his voice and what we had was a duet. It was at the point, I gave up.

Now there might be some of you out there who like this sort of thing. But to me, opera is about PEOPLE--yes, even "Cunning Little Vixen" where the animals are thinly disguised human types.

Dehumanizing the people of Peking makes their fear of Turadot's retribution utter nonsense, as it does their pity for the Prince of Persia and for Liu. Machine parts do not particularly care about things like that. Given all this, there is no point in discussing the muscial aspects at all.

So let the buyer beware. You are warned.

This release has lots to recommend it. The sets and costumes go for that retro-future look found in movies like "Metropolis", "Brazil", or "City of Lost Children". The inhabitants of these worlds share one more thing in common: they live under despotic rule. Their condition both physical and political, just like the character of Turandot, undergoes a radical change during the course of the opera. Act I looks the most like Jules Verne's vision of the future, a stunning act II boasts simply spectacular sets, while the last act is more subdued, more human. Whatever you think of the concept there can be no arguing the fact that everything looks like no expense was spared - too often radical productions of standard repertory look so cheap.
Of great significance is that this is the first Turandot released that has Luciano Berio's completion of the work Puccini left unfinished. I had to watch it a couple of times to get used to it. As Gabriele Schnaut states in an interview that is part of the DVD extras, this new finale is unabashedly Berio's, not pseudo-Puccini, and it works. With Alfano's ending there can be no doubt that you've just heard a fairy tale. Berio brings this fantasy world closer to our own, and rather than the "happily ever after" we get that uneasy, exciting sensation brought about by hope, love being its instigator. I'm not saying it's better or worse than Alfano's - it's there and now audiences have a choice.
I enjoyed the direction, in particular the movements by and around Turandot. The Turandot-Liu exchange I found the most revealing, with a nice touch added at the point Liu commits suicide (if that's what you call what happens here), when Turandot literally becomes Liu through the removal of her regal coat. The action around Liu's body (which remains on stage until almost the very end of the opera) might be the only aspect of the production that could be accused of being eurotrashy. Schnaut is the best in the acting department, with vivid and expressive facial expressions. Hers is a large, dependable voice, not perfect, not beautiful. Have we ever had an ideal Turandot? I found her no less convincing vocally or physically than the other most tolerable choice on video, Eva Marton. Botha's good acting moments seem to happen by accident, though he's competent enough and sings very well, occasionally overpowered by the orchestra. For those who care about these things: he does sing the optional high C towards the end of Act II, and it's good one. I was very sad with Cristina Gallardo-Domas' performance. She seems not to have shed Lius from other productions with stereotypical Victor Book of Opera "I'm Chinese" poses when in this whole affair no one is pretending to have any close affinity to the Far East other than what the text "inconveniently" makes them say. So maybe this is the director's fault, not so her singing: wobbly, unsteady and thin, no hint of that sweetness and beauty you could hear just a few years ago. I really hope she was just having a bad night. Paata Burchuladze, looking considerably slimmer than last time I saw him, does a great job with his small role. The three masks, wearing complicated costumes, are also more than adequate. This is not an opera where the conducting is going to unveil some deeply insightful revelations: it's a big show, and Gergiev conducts expertly with full, even, lush sounds from his orchestra, no controversial tempos or outbursts.
Every now and then there are moments when you wish you had a wider angle of vision because you know things are happening on stage you cannot see. Other than that the video direction is generally good, not the usual Brian Large smell-the-sweat, see-the-nose-hairs close-ups of most of his Met videos. The sound is excellent. Both the Italian and Spanish subtitles are screwed up and anything with an accent mark comes out as a different symbol.
Nothing wrong with liking the Zeffirelli circus from the Met (I do), Mehta's Beijing extravaganza, or San Francisco's airplane ladder (the other DVD choices). But if you want something a bit less traditional yet thoughtful and professionally executed, you will enjoy this performance. There's also the added bonus of a valiant modern attempt to complete what Puccini left unfinished.

This is a very unusual performance of "Turandot". As one who always prefers traditional stagings, I found myself actually liking this highly unorthodox production. Puccini died before he could complete the opera (right after the death of the slavegirl Liu), and Franco Alfano completed it, based on Puccini's own sketches, and this is how the opera has been heard ever since. But in 2001, Luciano Berio took at Puccini's sketches and composed HIS version of an ending, and this is what we hear in this performance. This new ending by Luciano Berio shortens the opera by about twenty minutes, and eliminates a lot of the music we are accustomed hearing sung by Turandot and Prince Calaf. What it enables us to see is the melting of Turandot and her reaction to the death of Liu. It is a little strange, but it somehow manages to engage interest. Then, quick as a flash, Turandot and Calaf are united, and the opera is over. The production itself? Well, considering what we see these days, this is at least interesting and somewhat colorful. The idea is that Turandot reigns over an automated and unfeeling society, where people are treated like machines. Where did THIS come from? Who knows? --- these stage directors take liberties that were unheard of years ago. Gabriele Schnaut is a big voiced dramatic soprano( Birgit Nilsson she's not!), and she creates an interesting portrait, but she's far from faultless in her vocalization. Johan Botha sings adequately as Calaf, but he's so incredibly fat that no costume can do him justice. Visually, he is a definite liability. The most appealing member of the cast is Christina Gallardo-Domas, whose Liu is geniuinely and deeply sung and felt. Valery Gergiev does an excellent job with the orchestra, and moves the opera along at at an urgent pace. This is a highly unusual "Turandot", one that many may dislike. But there's a lot of unique and interesting stuff here, and it should be viewed with an open mind. I happen to like it ---- far more than I thought I would.

A Turandot that will not please everyone (a friend of mine dismissively calls it the "Borg Opera"), but one that is striking in a fresh interpretation, offering a vision of the de-humanization of society. Even Turandot does not seem human, which may be a way of understanding her actions. The creative staging and costumes are stunningly evocative of SF visions of the future. A lot of thought went into this production, and every time I view it I perceive more ideas. The music from Act I is among Puccini's most arresting and dramatic. The added music and staging finishing what Puccini did not complete make sense, and deal with our ambivalence (even anger) with the anti-heroine. The resolution even humanizes the other citizens of this mechinistic, oppressive society.

Yes, and all at the same time, in spite of sounding contradictory. For mind you, this is no ordinary Turandot. From the musical point of view it has the important attractiveness of presenting Luciano Berio's ending, composed as an alternative to the well known by Alfano in use since the 1920's and that per se sets it apart. The cast in this 2002 Salzburg Festival production is typical of today's world in which italian operas are given without a single italian in the cast. Singing quality will be not to everyone's liking and not precisely because of the lack of italianità in the principals' voices as a consequence of the absence of italians, but rather because of the very condition of the voices in some of them. Gallardo-Domas's and Schnaut's are the most questionable; one thing is vibrato and quite another is wobble. I recall attending a Turandot performance in San Francisco some 12 years ago (available in dvd, by the way) in which Eva Marton's wobble was so obtrusive as to make sitting throughout the whole performance almost intolerable; Schnaut and Gallardo-Domas don't "sin" to that extreme in this set but are certainly questionable, especially if you laid out over 300 euros for the entrance ticket at the Grosses Festpielhaus. The german singer's problems seem to derive from plain voice wear (she's been around for close to 30 years now, and that certainly counts, with all due respect), the chilean's sound more like the effect of an ill-conceived effort of stressing a voice unsuitable to such a large venue as the Grosses Festpielhaus. Burchuladze's voice has also deteriorated importantly along the years but the range the Timur part moves into allows him to keep wobble under reasonable control and he still commands an engaging timbre. Botha acquits himself well, to me he is the better singer of the lot and I'd propose most of the problems others commented in this website are attributable more to microphone placing and his distance (or nearness) to them, this being a live performance. His is not a large voice, granted, but he's no tenorino either, perhaps the ORF engineers had to make allowances in microphone placing so the tuxedoed and pearled audience would not complain too much. And yes, the orchestra sometimes overpowers the singers but in so richly scored a piece this would be normal in the theatre. Tear still has a lot of voice left and projects a fine Emperor and Ping, Pang and Pong are quite good. The VPO play very well and with their usual refinement, their golden sound a definitive plus in this score; Gergiev seems to stress the 20th Century aspects of the score more than others who from that perspective appear to aim at pushing Puccini 30 years backwards: you end up hearing orchestral details that you'd seldom spot unless you were following the performance with a printed score, that do make you realise Puccini did study the music being composed by his contemporaries rather closely.

There are some very stunning ideas in Pountney's stage proposition, others that seem not to work as well. In no way I'd dismiss it outrightly as "eurotrashy" as other commentators in this website seem to imply. Acts 2 and 3 seem to work out better than the first one. The setting for the riddle solving scene is most impressive, with the Ice Princess atop a 9-metre high thing inside a gigantic human head (reproduced in the dvd's cover) that all of a sudden comes down to stage-level when Calaf divines the third riddle, as if implying Turandot's sudden crash into human-ness unless she can in turn solve the riddle posed her by the unknown prince. As the third act evolves, the ugly world of dehumanisation portrayed in the first two acts progressively becomes human, until for the closing pages all is resolved into, yes, human-ness. An intriguing concept that well escapes the traditional stagings and certainly worlds apart from Zhang Yimou's beautiful Peking venture that Mehta conducted and which makes use of the Alfano completion.

And what about Berio's ending? Well, definitely count me in among the ones who consider it as more suited to the work than Alfano's. In all likelihood both endings will coexist, but Berio, by his making far more use than Alfano of Puccini's sketches whilst avoiding the imitation of a language that is not his, is more "on target" than what Alfano's mimickry of Puccini's style and grandiose utterances achieved: it (Berio's) sounds so more sincere ...

In Peking the heralds announce that another suitor to the beautiful princess Turandot will be executed in the morning. The citizens of the city complain again for the fate that has condemmed the kingdom to live under the cruel decision of the princess. Among the crowd an old man falls and the girl who is with him ask for help. Suddenly a man appears. He is prince Calaf. He helps the old man and then we know that he is the old king Timur. Defeated and living like a beggar helped only by a poor slave: Liu. We know then that Liu is in love with the prince and he thanks her for being so good to his father. But then everything stops. The prince of Persia would be executed because he failed to guess the three riddles princess Turandot has proposed. Among the crowd in the execution Calaf see the beautiful princess and, of course he falls in love with her. His father wants him to forget the challenge, Liu wants him to forget the challenge, and even the three ministers Ping, Pang and Pong want that too, but Calaf has decided he will win the hand of the princess.

In the second act, we are at the imperial court. The emperor arrives complains about the terrible challenge his daughter has settled and tried to convince Calaf to leave. But he is stubborn and says he will win. Then appears Turandot. Magnificent and cold. Explaining why she has decided to play that cruel game. She presents the riddles and one by one Calaf says the right answers. Defeated Turandot ask her father for mercy but he says that she has set the rules and must admit that she has been defeated. Calaf then proposes a new game. If she next day can say his name he would leave her.

The third act opens with a city awaken trying to find out the name of the prince. A desperate Turandot orders that Timur and Liu were tortured to reveal the name of the stranger. Liu tells her that she knows the name but she will die before teeling it . And that is what she does. Killing herself before betray her prince. Everybody is shocked for her action, even Turandot. Calaf then reveals his name and kiss her. In the morning before the court Turandot announces she knows the name of the prince. His name is Love.

This is the last opera by Puccini. In fact he did not finish it. He was able to write till the death of Liu. The end was finished by Alfano , a fellow composer. But in this dvd we can listen the end written by Berio. Turandot it is for me one of the jewels in the opera. The music is wonderful. A modern opera in fact, that comes from the impressionist music of the end of the XIXth century to the new concepts of XXth one. It is an opera that, in my opinion needs three things: a good orchestra, two good sopranos and a good choir.

This production for the Salzburg festival has a good orchestra, well conducted by Valery Gergiev. The begining of the opera is wonderfully played. It has the perfect volume and tension. Something quite difficult sometimes. In fact the orchestra sounds wonderfully when is alone or with the choir. I am not sure when it is with singers. "In questa reggia" sometimes there is not sound but noise and sometimes we almost miss the beautiful melody hidden. But I htink that this is due to the second thing this opera needs. The sopranos. Ms Schnant has a great voice, a dramatic one, but honestly she does not play a good Turandot. Too much vibrato and a poor diction. Specially in the second act where she is leading the story. Sometimes is almost impossible to understand her. But Liu, played by Christina Gallardo-Domas is another thing. Her Liu is never tacky. It is beautiful, her countenance is charming and her "Tu che del gel sei cinta" is really moving. She and Burdinladze are, by far the best of the opera. About our Calaf, what can I say? Waiting for his "Nessun dorma" was a waste of time. He seems lost. He lacks of the passion of the prince. Good voice but not for this opera.

The production is interesting. A kind of Metropolis version. Where individuals are nothing but parts of this machine of destruction that Turandot has created. The second act is spectacular with a Turandot suspended over the court threatening the prince and expressing her anger. But it seems too cold for me. Maybe I am too classic but this production lacks of passion and this is what is about Turandot. Th eprincess is the only character who really makes an evolution from the quite and cold one in the first act, to the furious in the second one to end moved and heartbreaking after Liu's death. Her loneliness and fear are not shown here. Not by the singer or the production. And it is a pity because that is the main appeal of this opera. The choir is good and also the performance of Burdunladze, but I am afraid is not a memorable production, although interesting if you are a fan of Turandot.

Just watched this DVD- fortunately borrowed from my local library free-of-charge.
Love Turandot.
Hated this performance.
Only thing which would have made it worse: All black costumes upon a bare black stage with a total-black background.
And the singers are not that good either.
Dieter strikes again!!!!

What a spectacle this production is! Fortunately, I had read the previous reviews and was prepared for the shock of a part-man, part-machine cast and chorus. David Pountney must be a Star Trek (or Tim Burton) fan to have staged a Puccini opera with a Borg-like society. Strangely, this didn't bother me much. (But, don't EVER do this to Rossini!!!)

This really was a colorful spectacle! The curtain opens to three levels of choristers decked out in masks, machine parts, etc., who line the entire stage. Everyone moves like robots.

All this was quite distracting for the crucial performances of Ping, Pong and Pang, whose singing seemed secondary (and second rate) to the costumes and jerky choreography. The only humanoids are Liu, Timur and Calaf. Christina Gallardo-Domas who played Liu is the only singer I'd give more than three stars. She was probably the only character in this whole production that anyone could relate to. The role of the blind father, Timur, played by Paata Burchuladze impressed me only when he mourned Liu's death. That was the emotional high point for me. Calaf left me completely cold; even the singing of Nessum dorma was a dud. Gabriele Schnaut is no Eva Marton; her singing did not appeal to me at all. But, I've got to hand some acting stars to her for playing so well to the awful tenor!

At the end of this production, the choristers shed their machine parts and masks (but not the black and white mouth makeup) and appeared on stage in dreary grayish clothes, everyone paired in a closing embrace, along with Turnadot and Calaf. Love prevailed.

I think this is worth watching once just for the spectacle and the alternate ending. The production budget for this must have been enormous! But, if I watch Turnadot again, it will definitely be the one with Eva Marton and Placido Domingo.

Turandot is my favorite opera and I've seen five versions--this one is so ugly, it is painful to watch. I purchased this DVD for the Berio ending, but I won't keep it in my collection. The Devo-inspired sets and costumes are ludicrous and the cast abominable. A dreadful experience!