Berg, Vivaldi and Menotti at the Santa Fe Opera

Summer Opera in the Burnt Sienna of Santa Fe

By: Susan Hall - Aug 13, 2011

A remarkable performance in the title role of Grisdela by Meredith Arwady.

The incomparable David Daniels in Griselda

The Last Savage had sets full of cotton candy pink and cerise green. Jamie Barton looked like a wind up doll in the image of Queen Victoria.

The Last Savage sung by Daniel Okulitch was Tarzan, King Kong and Romeo rolled up in one character.

Richard Paul Fink draws us in to Wozzeck with his wonderful baritone.

A red moon hanging in the New Mexico sky means blood in Wozzeck

Among other singers in Wozzeck, Eric Owens takes on a small role as The Doctor. He is brilliant in whatever he does.

 

Santa Fe Opera

Santa Fe, New Mexico

Charles MacKay, General Director

Performances through August 27, 2011

Santafeopera.org

Photos Ken Howard courtesy the Santa Fe Opera

When the Berkshires give up the harsh landscape of Ethan Frome and take on their lush green mantle, theater and dance and music abound, but opera, except for an occasional concert performance at Tanglewood, is absent.  West of the Mississippi, at Central City in Colorado and notably in Santa Fe, the opera house doors are flung wide for unusual and excellent productions from a wide-ranging repertoire.

Santa Fe has found a mix that works.  There are the warhorses, like La Boheme this year.  Although Wozzeck was put on by the Metropolitan Opera in the spring, the take on it by diretor Daniel Slater in Santa Fe was different and in certain ways more accessible. By choosing as the point of view Wozzeck's mind and heart, his disturbing collapse at the hands of the society around him draws us inexorably in.  Richard Paul Fink's performance as Wozzeck was as compelling as Santa Fe resident Patricia Racette's Butterfly, that complete attention to detail, revealed most touchingly by both artists as they walk, Racette in the tiny steps of the delicate Japanese call girl and Fink trying to hold onto his mind by scuffling inch by inch.  

Menotti's The Last Savage crashed on arrival at the Metropolitan Opera in 1964.  Nicolai Gedda, George London, Roberta Peters and Teresa Stratas all were on stage for the American premier.  Audiences enjoyed the production, but critics detonated it.  Except for small, local productions this opera was successfully buried.  Especially for lighter, summertime fare, the opera is a perfect confection.

Perhaps because the Santa Fe Opera is committed to ensemble work (the Metropolitan Opera succeeds in this only when they bring in Adams and Sellars) the entire production is of a piece: strikingly the sets in Wozzeck fall apart as Wozzeck the man does.  In The Last Savage, sets, direction and costumes all come together support performance in a style which both integrates music and drama, but also gives a seamless presentation to the audience.  If something disturbs it is meant too.  

Operas neglected for hundreds of years are also made part of the repertory.  Die Liebe der Danae, a Strauss opera ripe for revival, was presented in Santa Fe a decade ago. Antonio Vivaldi, the red priest, claims to have written 94 operas that we don't hear often.  Vivaldi’s operas are experiencing a broad revival in Europe and Peter Sellars elected to present Griselda in Santa Fe.  Based in the last story of Bocaccio's Decameron, Sellars finds currency as we watch the wife of a king be sent from his bed so he can marry a beautiful younger woman.

Summertime also gives opera a chance to listen to up and coming talent.  Isabel Leonard who won the Beverly Sills award this year performed in Griselda.  Roger Honeywell and Ryan Speedo Green came here early on.  The Berkshires are as attractive as the southwest as a summer vacation destination for artists, but with the exception of concerts, like Stephanie Blythe’s recent birthday celebration, you do not see much opera talent here.

Set on a glorious mountain top in Santa Fe, architectural firm Polshek has created an open opera house which puts Tanglewood's shed to shame.  Could a company be put together to present summertime opera in the Berkshires, either under the wing of the BSO or innovative artist like Diane Paulus at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge?  If you take a trip to Santa Fe, you will see up and running an argument for just such an enterprise.

Even though summer opera opportunities may not be at the top of the list of an orchestra on the hunt for a new music director, or any other struggling art institution, Santa Fe makes the case that they are worth consideration.

If you get tired to the green Berkshire foothills and want to feast your eyes on the oranges and browns of the magnificent mountains discovered a century ago by creative artists like Agnes de Mille, Georgia O'Keefe and D. H Lawrence, try Santa Fe.  It does not disappoint.  Every production we saw had something to recommend it.