Glorious Gershwin

Michael Tanner

Wednesday, 4th November 2009

Porgy and Bess
Royal Festival Hall

Artaxerxes
Linbury Studio

Cape Town Opera has been on tour in the last ten days, taking its production of Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess to Cardiff, the Southbank Centre and Edinburgh. I went to the first of the two London performances, staged but without scenery. The action took place behind some of the orchestral players, with the rest either side. That is not an ideal situation, but nevertheless Gershwin’s finest score came across with enormous impact — in fact, I was freshly astonished at how much finer this work is than anything else he wrote. Whereas, I gather, the production is set in Soweto, at the Festival Hall it wasn’t set anywhere at all. It is therefore about black people, but not about any particular set of them, so that part of James Baldwin’s critique of the opera — specifically the movie — is sidelined. Baldwin wrote:

and so on, for several penetrating pages — does anyone remember and read this great writer? The combination of lack of props and an edition of the opera, as the conductor David Charles Abell explains in the programme, which tightens the central drama and eliminates unnecessary detail, goes quite a way in countering the view that Porgy is a sentimental and hammy work, though elements of that are bound to remain.

But what came across most clearly at the Festival Hall was the energy of the piece, the stupendous melodic fecundity, and the effectiveness of many of its key scenes. What also came across, more excitingly still, was the magnificence of the soloists, though I have no complaints about the chorus and orchestra. As soon as Clara, played by Pretty Yende, launched into ‘Summertime’, I realised how thirsty I’ve been for a long time to hear such a rich, luscious voice in the flesh. And superb as Yende is, when the Bess of Lisa Daltirus began to sing I saw that there is no exaggeration in the programme’s claim that ‘with a radiant voice of beauty, power, nuance and musicality, as well as a strong stage presence, Lisa Daltirus is poised for a major career worldwide’. On the strength of this performance I envisage her appearing at the leading opera houses in important roles within months. None of the others was less than adequate, and the Porgy of Xolela Sixaba was much more than that, but it is natural, though unfair, when you hear an indubitably great new voice, that you should take it out of the context and celebrate. Anyway, I found it a great evening all round, and am highly impressed by Cape Town Opera’s potential and achievement.

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