Opera: Gluck's Orfeo

There is something intractably odd about the Orpheus and Eurydice story. At one level, it is nasty a piece of business as anything in Grimm's fairy tales--bewildered guy gets his dearest wish, conditioned on some dopey rule that makes no sense to him or anybody else; he mucks it up and loses dearest dream forever.

At another, it has an almost universal appeal. Is there any person alive who has not wakened from a dream to feel some ecstatic vision vanishing irretrievably behind him?

And it's all about music, the universality and pervasive power thereof. No wonder that opera composers (so they say) liked to tell it and dtell it. Monteverdi was in there at the get-go with L'Orfeo, favola in musica. One hundred and fifty-four years later, Gluck weighed in with Orfeo ed Euridice aka Orphée et Eurydice, an item that must be one of the most intensely compelling items in the entire operatic canon.

On the Met's latest rendition of the Gluck masterpiece (last week's HD), Mr. and Mrs. Buce deliver a divided verdict: I thought it was one of the most engaging items I'd ever heard and could cheerfuly have rewound the tape and watched a second time on the spot. Mrs. B thought it kitschy and overdone. She's right, it was kitschy and overdone, but I'd cheerfully settle back and watch it a second time on the spot.

The deal-closer is the music itself--not so much a fullscale opera as an extended conversation between Orfeo and orchestra, with incidental support from the chorus, a bunch of dancers and, oh yes, the beloved Eurydice herself. As Orfeo, Stephanie Blythe is a force of nature--in company with, if not quite as extraordinary as, the great Joan Sutherland herself. Blythe did the whole 91 minutes without ever seeming to break a sweat: no trouble at all believing that she also does Wagner. Whether it was she who brought out the best in James Levine's orchestra--or whether it was the other way around--either way, the two turned the performance into a sustained musical conversation.

The kitsch started with the chorus--100 different people, dressed in 100 different costumes, as if to represent all of history in the shade. When I first heard of it, I thought it was a lousy idea: I figured on some kind of cosmic runway show. In the event, it was more restrained that that; it was rather more like watching the crowds at the Dorothy Chandler Center on Oscar night: ooh, look, isn't that Frederick Douglass? And here comes Genghis Khan--yo Gen, love the hat! In any event, I thought (though Mrs.B did not) that they treated it all with commendable restraint.

And the chorus: it's Mark Morris. He had them dressed as if they were study hall at the High School of Music and Art. They took rather a bit of time and threw themselves around the stage in a most un-18th-Century manner. It was wildly anachronistic, but who cares? No, strike that, I know who cares. I guess in the end it all comes down to a question of what sort of item you conceive Orfeo to be: is it a genteel and elegant garden entertainment? Or a twilight farewell to the gaudy excesses of 1o7th Century Venice? If you tend to the former view, than there was plenty to give offfense (except the music, do remember the music!). If you tend to the latter view, there was nothing here to bother you a bit.
Running time 1 hour 31 minutes / no intermission

Mark Morris’s acclaimed production returns. This complete vision for Gluck, with choreography by Morris and costumes by Isaac Mizrahi, features the artistry of Stephanie Blythe in the male title role. The alluring Danielle de Niese is Orfeo’s adored wife, Euridice, who inspires the hero to face the underworld for her sake. Music Director James Levine conducts.

Conductor: James Levine; Production: Mark Morris; Stephanie Blythe, Danielle de Niese