Last Saturday, I saw Ligeti's Aventures and Nouvelles Aventures, part of the
Clocks and Clouds series at Queen Elizabeth Hall on the South Bank in London.
It's not strictly opera, but it's described as an opera buffa, and after
hearing and seeing it, I think that it's got a lot to do with opera, so
here's a brief review.

Ligeti: Aventures (1962), Nouvelles Aventures (1965)

Conductor: Esa-Pekka Salonen

Instrumentalists from the Philharmonia Orchestra: two keyboard players
(playing upright piano, harpsichord, doctored grand piano), flute, horn,
cello, bass and percussion (loosely speaking)

Phyllis Bryn-Julson -- soprano
Rose Taylor -- contralto
Omar Ebrahim -- baritone

Ligeti's own description of Aventures identifies five parallel streams of
events that combine and interact. The streams consists of episodes each of
which has an individual expressive character. Another way of putting it is
that Aventures presents musical drama without language, melody or anything
else organized like language. The performers use the texture and timing of
the sounds they make, and their physical context in some cases, to convey
feelings and interactions.

It sounds abstract, but in fact the audience in QEH found it highly
accessible and entertaining, and so did I. We got a bit of help from the
first part of the programme, a set of fourteenth century vocal works (billed
as Medieval Adventures), by Machaut and others, performed by Gothic Voices.
Christopher Page, the group's director, provided a brief introduction to each
piece emphasising its formal and dialogic qualities. The singers gave
absolutely precise and somewhat impersonal performances (shades of Dawn
Upshaw) that managed to show how radical the composition of these works is.

In a way, Aventures was comfortingly familiar after some of the medieval
oddities, like a comic strip after an overdose of Mondrian. The singers used
every imaginable vocal technique, at specified pitch and time, to produce
drama in its etymological sense of people doing significant things. They also
used facial expressions freely, and some broader movements. At one point,
Ebrahim broke away from the group (who were in a row at the left front of the
stage) and moved to the open grand piano to roar into it. What the singers,
and other performers, were doing was not exactly communicating, but
reflecting the feedback from their failing attempts to communicate.

I'd seen Ebrahim before (including as the eponymous vampire on television),
and wasn't surprised that he delivered the goods in performance, as he's
obviously a skilled actor. The other two singers both looked like versions of
Margaret Dumont, but were also superbly entertaining.

The total effect of Aventures is not that far from something like the cats'
duet, where operatic mannerisms depict a basic expressive situation. However,
the range of sounds and situations is much wider, closer to what you'd get in
a full-scale drama. And the audience's expectations are manipulated in the
same was as in a regular drama. For example (everyone's favorite bit), the
percussionist at one point threw a wine bottle in a dustbin, so that it
smashes noisily at a climactic moment. A second wine bottle and a tray full
of crockery were sitting on the table next to him...In fact, only the
crockery went in, but we were waiting for it. I wouldn't be surprised if
Ligeti hadn't scored in the audience's laughter as well.

I hadn't seen or heard anything by Ligeti before this, but I'm certainly
hoping to see more now (Le Grand Macabre looks like the thing). I'm not sure
whether I'd buy a recording, as the performance aspect is so important.

Also on the South Bank last weekend: Ann Murray singing Handel arias (Scherza
infida, O Lord whose mercies numberless, from Saul, Verdi prati, and Dopo
notte), with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, conducted by Nicholas
McGegan. Pig heaven.

And The life of David Lloyd George. Not an opera, but a great silent film
that a descendant of Lloyd George's found in his attic a couple of years ago.
The film ends with Lloyd George looking into his hearth fire and seeing
images of the war that has just ended. He says some things about what must
happen next time, then looks straight to camera and says "There must never be
a next time". I keep coming back to the thought that good opera acting is
very close to good silent movie acting, and a successful opera scenario will
make a good silent film and vice versa.