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Washington Opera TURANDOT Turandot was to feature three sopranos alternating in the title role. When Sharon Sweet bowed out for health reasons, that left Alessandra Marc and Xiu Wei Sun to portray the princess. Marc had a triumph opening night (Feb. 24), slicing through the orchestra with ease and also filing down her formidable soprano to a tender size to great effect, as when intoning the name of her abused ancestor, Princess Lou-ling. It was impossible to take eye or ear off Marc's thoroughly thought-out portrayal of an imposing yet clearly vulnerable woman. Aside from some tentative movement up and down the steep central staircase, the singer's ample physique was not really an issue; besides, she offered telling body, language to complement the potent vocalism. Ana Maria Martinez, as Liu, revealed an effortless upper register that generated exquisite, melting phrases in "Signore, ascolta"; she shaped her final scene with extraordinary lyrical and dramatic sensitivity. Alas, the Calaf of Ian DeNolfo spent most of the night barking out his music, often slightly under pitch. Rosendo Flores sang Timur in firm, warm tones. On March 27, Sun's Turandot was fascinating. Though svelte, she has a voice with remarkable powers of projection and a good deal of tone coloring. Even more subtlety of expression would have been welcome here and there, but the naturalness and innate intensity of the phrasing commanded respect. A fluent actress, Sun gave us a youthful yet fully imperious Turandot who meant business and was not easily melted. Certainly not by the lumbering, one-dimensional Calaf of Miguel Olano, who sang nearly everything with his arms outstretched in the exact same position, and who, at the big moment, could summon no more than an awkward peck on the cheek for Turandot. The rather virile quality to the tenor's sound was compromised by unsupported, quickly deserted top notes. Natalia Ushakova's Liu could have used more tonal sweetness and, at the end of "Signore, ascolta," breath control, but the confrontation with Turandot was effective musically and dramatically. Sun Yu's Timur had sufficient ripeness of tone, if not distinctive phrasing. In both performances, delectably vibrant, finely nuanced singing and nimble acting came from Daniel Mobbs (Ping), Matthew Lord (Pang) and Corley Evan Rotz (Pong); however, the chorus-line shtick in their Act 11 scene wore thin. Robert Baker, floating in a cloud, delivered the emperor's lines affectingly. James Shaffran was the consistently sturdy Mandarin. The chorus made a rich, almost always superbly, disciplined sound. The orchestra also excelled for the most part, responding warmly to Heinz Fricke's flexible, highly charged conducting. Zack Brown's costumes and sets (imaginatively, lit by Joan Sullivan-Genthe) provided sufficient dazzle without distracting from the music or wallowing in kitsch. Lotfi Mansouri provided fluid, sensible stage direction and usually succeeded at getting the characters to reveal something human behind the fairy-tale trappings. |