Stupendous playing by the Berlin Philharmonic, with
remarkable orchestral detail, sharp attacks, and quick tempos
make listening to this newly recorded Carmen an exhilarating
experience. The “Spanish” numbers—the Habanera, the second-act
Gypsy Song—fairly explode. And there’s not an unbeautiful,
jarring moment. Simon Rattle is to be congratulated for bringing
such freshness to the score, even if it does leave one wondering
what the scandals the opera used to cause were all about, and
often, wondering what the opera is all about.
Lady
Rattle, the gorgeous-voiced mezzo Magdalena Kozena in the title
role, is either a problem or the problem: We are used to
bigger-voiced Carmens, with more Mediterranean glamour; she
seems a bit dainty and chilly for the part. There have been
totally miscast Carmens—Jessye Norman’s recording remains quite
funny overall—and Victoria de los Angeles’ recording possessed a
critic at the time to refer to her Carmen as being “fresh from a
convent.” That really wasn’t fair; Angeles refused to indulge in
any vulgarity, but her tone was both alluring and seductive, and
neither adjective can apply to Kozena. It is beautifully sung,
as was Anne Sofie von Otter’s, but both are simply wrong for the
part. Both sing handsomely and neither has the charisma the role
requires. And size does not matter—Teresa Berganza’s Carmen,
filigreed and elegant, was filled with the Southern sun.
The cast’s star is Jonas Kaufmann as Don José, by turns
vicious, tortured, loving, and deranged. It is by now a known
quantity (there are at least two DVDs of him in the role—both of
them even better vocally than this performance); he sings with
taste, intelligence and attention to text and dynamics. And the
huge explosions of sound he lets rip in the opera’s final scene
are dazzling. Kostas Smoriginas is a weak-at-the-bottom
and coarse Escamillo; Genia Kühmeier (a singer previously
unknown to me) is the loveliest of Micaelas. The rest of the
cast is marvelous, and the second-act quintet is spotless and
fun. It’s remarkable how well the German chorus copes with the
French language at Rattle’s clip.
Rattle uses the Oeser
edition, with spoken dialog, and everyone’s French enunciation
is commendable. I listened to this set three times, attracted by
its sheer gleam, but despite the fine “music-making” of the
orchestra it’s simply too slim, too refined, and too “northern”
to convince. The best-recorded Carmen, hard to believe, remains
a live performance (also Oeser) from Covent Garden in 1973 under
Solti (on Opera d’Oro)—Verrett, Domingo, José van Dam,
Kanawa—all white hot and in their primes. The sound isn’t ideal
and the chorus can be wayward, but boy, what a Carmen! And then
there’s Callas….
