Subject: Xerxes, ENO 6Feb98 Xerxes Sarah Connolly Arsamemes Artur Stefanowicz Amastris Jean Rigby Ariodates Mark Richardson Romilda Janis Kelly Atalanta Susan Gritton Elviro Christopher Booth-Jones Conductor Noel Davies Original director Nicholas Hynter Revival director Emma Jenkins Designer David Fielding This is a revival of the production for Handel's tercentary in 1985 which must have been one of the first to give a Handel opera the full theatrical treatment. I bought the video because I was sure the production had gone for good. It was strange finally to watch this after getting to know a single recorded performance very well, but it still works, and is thoroughly enjoyable. Xerxes is similar to a restoration comedy, with misread letters, lies and disguises, but without the wit. As a programme note by Sir Charles Mackerras points out, it is also similar to a ballad opera -- musical numbers are varied in form, but not particularly demanding, and there are few conventional da capo arias. (Though the ones that there are are almost all showstoppers.) The result is potentially very fragmented dramatically, like Alcina, but without the musical coherence to hold it together. This is particularly obvious in the character of Amastris, Xerxes' betrothed, who (like Bradamante) shows up disguised as a soldier to claim her beloved. She gets some passionate arias, but they have almost no context at all -- she's just rattling about most of the time. Nicholas Hynter, the original director, dealt with the potential fragmentation of the work though style and decor. Xerxes is more or less the king at the time Handel wrote the opera, and the whole thing is set in Vauxhall gardens. The exhibits on display provide the "Persian" decor, including a model of the ruins of Persepolis. The bridge over the Hellespont becomes yet another exhibit, confused with the real thing by a drunken Elviro. The acting and stage business generally aim to keep the performance entertaining, in Hanoverian style as defined at the RSC. (There's also a statue of Handel, titled Timotheus, as part of the decor. This is a bit cryptic -- the programme mentions Timotheus as the poet who celebrated Alexander the great's capture of Persepolis before he burned it. But it's also the name of two different Spartan military poets with a satirical bent.) The production still works fine, but what really kept this performance together was Neal Davies and the orchestra, which made the music sound as purely enjoyable as I've ever heard. The singers were all good or better. Jean Rigby and Christopher Booth-Jones repeating their roles from the original production both sounded ten years older. Rigby is still totally delightful as Amastris, though she's lost some of her rich middle range. I was amused to see that Booth-Jones does Elviro with more hair than ten years ago. Sarah Connolly was mean enough as Xerxes, and quite funny, and Janis Kelly and Susan Gritton were pretty much right as Romilda and Atalanta. Atalanta is a thankless role, as she's got as little to do as Amastris in terms of the drama -- her main purpose is to misdeliver letters and confuse things, which she doesn't need much music to do -- and she's totally unsympathetic as well. Susan Gritton did a sort of ugly-sister comic turn which worked quite well. The standout (for me), and a very pleasant surprise, was the young Polish counter-tenor Artur Stefanowicz as Arsamenes. He seems to have some of the mezzoid range and richness that Jean Rigby has lost, with a lot of vibrato. He's got a large voice as well. And (mirabile dictu) he's a first rate actor and handled the theatricalicality of the production in style, as well as singing expressively. This was his first appearance in the UK (he did Baba the Turk in Amsterdam -- I think somebody commented on his acting there as well). He's down to sing Unulfo in the Glyndebourne Rodelinda this summer. What's so good is that I don't think Stefanowicz is a unique talent like David Daniels -- he's an absolutely first-rate performer who happens to be a counter-tenor and who seems to have found a career quite easily. I suppose you could worry that he's doing too much too young, but he seemed to make himself heard in the Coliseum quite easily (like Daniels), and I'd guess that there isn't much risk of purely vocal damage. Another useful production for the ENO.