Michael Tanner

Iolanta/Duke Bluebeard’s Castle, Met Opera Live, review: enterprising take on two masterpieces

Iolanta / Duke Bluebeard’s Castle 
Met Opera Live

The Met’s antepenultimate relay of the season was an enterprising pairing of two operas, one of which we should see more often, and both of them done with intelligence and care. Tchaikovsky’s Iolanta, his last opera, inconveniently lasts about 100 minutes, so is especially hard to find a partner for. It is a strange, touching piece, though it has few of the characteristics we associate with him. There is hardly a memorable melody in it, and little that is overwrought, indeed the colours are pastel. Iolanta is a princess, blind from birth, but skilfully kept in ignorance of her condition, and surrounded in this production by bored maids who treat her sweetly and otherwise bitch. Suitors arrive, the more alluring of whom asks her to give him a red rose, and the bluff is called. All works out well – something else we don’t expect from this composer.

A scene from Tchaikovsky's Iolanta. Photo: Marty Sohl/Metropolitan Opera

A scene from Tchaikovsky’s Iolanta. Photo: Marty Sohl/Metropolitan Opera

The musical performance was admirable, though Gergiev took both works too slowly. But Anna Netrebko, surely now at the height of her powers, delivered a superb account of the title role, acting it as convincingly as she sang it. To achieve that and also her terrifying Lady Macbeth earlier in the season is something I can’t imagine from any other contemporary soprano. Piotr Beczala as the victorious suitor Vaudemont was equally persuasive – difficult, considering that Tchaikovsky wrote rather feebly for the male voice on the whole. Mild enjoyment is to be had from this piece, but I can’t help wondering why Tchaikovsky didn’t make a ballet out of it, for which the material would seem more suitable.

Nadja Michael as Judith and Mikhail Petrenko as Bluebeard in Bartók's Bluebeard's Castle. Photo: Marty Sohl/Metropolitan Opera

Nadja Michael as Judith and Mikhail Petrenko as Bluebeard in Bartók’s Bluebeard’s Castle. Photo: Marty Sohl/Metropolitan Opera

After the interval, where Joyce DiDonato was the sober compere, we moved to Bartok’s great Bluebeard’s Castle.

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