Two summers ago, the honeyed light of a New Mexican sunset gave mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato a golden glow. Singing the role of Elena in “La Donna del Lago” at the Santa Fe Opera, she stood on a stage covered with fake rocks, moss, and heather. But the stage was open at the back where real mountains faded from sight. As she sang her love of nature and her Scottish homeland, twilight softened the desert behind her.
If that isn’t operatic magic, what is?
Santa Fe has co-produced the Rossini masterpiece with the Metropolitan Opera. It premiered in the Southwest in 2013. Now, it’s playing in New York.
Saturday, The MET, Live in HD, features DiDonato reprising her title role with a different King James (Giacomo, tenor Juan Diego Florez) and a different Malcolm (Malcolm, the mezzo-soprano Daniela Barcelona in this famous pants role), among others. Scottish director Paul Curran has continued his imaginative staging by celebrating nature’s beauty, battlefield horror, and royal splendor.
The back of the Met’s stage will likely have a painted or projected backdrop with enough rocks, moss and Scottish heather to suggest the Trossachs region, but that luminous Santa Fe light is something even film projections can’t replace.
All that aside, the new collaboration for Rossini’s 1819 opera is a first for the Met and SFO. The story may be melodramatic and predictable, but it brings together two dynamic works of art from the early 19th century.
Sir Walter Scott’s long narrative poem “The Lady of the Lake” was published in 1810 after Scott and his family vacationed on the shore of Lake Katrine. It was another of his popular historical works that brought him enormous fame – in Europe and the United States. To this day, you can book passage on the Sir Walter Scott Steamship and cruise the Scottish lochs, not to mention a side trip to the real Stirling Castle, the site of the opera’s final act.
Based on Scottish history, the story centers on the 16th-century political struggle between rebel clans and King James V. The opera opens when Elena meets a mysterious stranger whom we later learn is the king traveling in disguise. She turns out to be the daughter of his former tutor, now standing in opposition to the king. Two other men pursue the beautiful Lady of the Lake. She’s promised to one, loves the other, and the king, of course, is smitten. War erupts, and after battles, threats, complications and a mysterious ring granting safe passage, who else but Elena orchestrates a final peace?
In the middle of all the action, spellbinding bel canto singing expresses just about every emotion. Rossini mastered this elaborate form, and DiDonato is the reigning queen. She has sung the title role all over the world. Critics refer to her honeyed tone, effortless coloratura and fearless ornamentation. Her final aria is simply dazzling.
Curran’s mostly traditional production brims with realistic details and a few modern stage techniques, for example, a scaled down, after-battle scene full of smoke and spiked heads. The final court scene at Stirling Castle, however, glistens extravagantly in royal gold-and-white splendor.
Running time is a little over three hours. “La Donna del Lago” is sung in Italian with subtitles in English.
jreynolds@durangoherald.com
If you go
The MET: Live in HD presents Gioachino Rossini’s “La Donna del Lago,” at 10:55 a.m. Saturday in the Vallecito Room of the Fort Lewis College Student Union. Tickets: $23 general, $21 seniors, students and MET members, available online at www.durangoconcerts.com, by phone at 247-7657 or at the Welcome Center at Eighth Street and Main Avenue, or at the door. Note: Surcharges may apply. Running time: 3 hours, 5 minutes. Sung in Italian with English subtitles.
