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The Guardian, 22 April 2013 |
Martin Kettle |
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Konzert, Royal Festival Hall, London, 21. April 2013 |
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Jonas Kaufmann – review
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Royal Festival Hall, London |
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Jonas Kaufmann is everybody's darling in opera's dramatic tenor stakes. But
this recital of Verdi and Wagner, a splendid evening in many ways, was also
a reminder of the limitations of the operatic concert form, and of the fact
that the German singer is still an exciting work in progress, both in terms
of repertoire and vocal development.
Concerts of operatic extracts
labour under two constraints. The singer's need to pace his or her evening
requires orchestral fillers, which break the tension, and were played none
too alluringly on this occasion by the Philharmonia Orchestra under Jochen
Rieder. Meanwhile, the constant hopping from one opera to another means
characterisation and dramatic context take a back seat to purely vocal arts.
But what vocal arts they are. Kaufmann began with Verdi, plunging
straight into Rodolfo's dramatic recitative and aria from act two of Luisa
Miller. It was a bold start, showcasing not just the Italianate lyric ring
he commands so naturally, but more particularly his unmatched darker lower
registers and the distinctive half-voice that few can rival. Arias from
Simon Boccanegra and act one of the Don Carlo (in which Kaufmann is about to
appear at Covent Garden) were less arrestingly done, but there was a
powerful return to dramatic form in Alvaro's third-act scene from La Forza
del Destino, another new role which Kaufmann will undertake this year in
Munich.
Then came Wagner, a mixed bag of what used to be called
bleeding chunks, with Kaufmann giving a stirring, well projected Siegmund
from Die Walküre and a tantalising glimpse of his Walther from Die
Meistersinger. Parsifal's great outburst of remorse and understanding after
Kundry's kiss was unquestionably the highlight, grippingly articulated and
ideal for his voice's current stage of development. Generous encores
included two of Wagner's Wesendonck songs, rarely sung by tenors these days,
but a reminder of how well Kaufmann can scale down as well as up.
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