Sound and vision | 28 April 2016

Janacek’s Jenufa, his first great opera, had a one-night stand at the Royal Festival Hall last Monday, courtesy of the wonderful Czech Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Jiri Belohlavek, the Czech Philharmonic Choir Brno, a large body that had all of five minutes’ singing, and a mainly excellent cast, with Karita Mattila making her transition from the title role, which she has so often performed to powerful effect, to that of the Kostelnicka, the terrifying figure of rectitude who drowns her daughter-in-law’s illegitimate baby rather than bring disgrace on the family.

The opera was performed strictly as a concert, with no interactions between the characters, and no appropriate facial expressions from any of the singers apart from Ales Briscein as the lovelorn Laca, and possessor of the loveliest voice on the stage, a true Czech tenor in the mould of Beno Blachut. It was surprising how much that lack of contact mattered, but it also struck me that some operas are much more suitable for concert performances than others, and that among those that aren’t Janacek’s occupy a leading place. His operas are intensely physical and atmospheric, but the music fails to provide the physicality or atmosphere. It is odd, because the music has its own very particular quality, which strikes one as physical — the sheer aural impact of those jagged lines and harsh harmonies. Yet they are not in synch with the stage action.

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Take the terrible moment in Act I when Laca, driven mad by his wastrel half-brother Steva, by whom Jenufa is pregnant, slashes her face with a knife. It makes a shocking impact on stage, but there is nothing in the music corresponding to that slash. Further — and this is a gripe I have often meant to air — while the surtitles translate almost everything anyone says, they never tell one what is going on, which is at least as important.