As of: March 24, 2024, 1:50 p.m
By: Markus Thiel
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She wants to, he doesn't - and in the end the matter ends fatally: La Gioconda (Anna Netrebko) meets Enzo (Jonas Kaufmann).
© Bernd Uhlig
“La Gioconda” has never been played under Mönchsberg.
Wrongfully so, as conductor Antonio Pappano in particular demonstrates.
While Anna Netrebko takes on the title role, Jonas Kaufmann sings with the handbrake on (action at the end of the review).
Her late opera sister in spirit takes a fatal leap: the last thing Tosca sees is the facade of Castel Sant'Angelo rushing past her.
La Gioconda, the woman without a name, also threatened by a horny older guy, whom she assassinates in time, takes poison.
Normally.
She survives in Salzburg, with a crazy look at the stalls, and you don't know what's better for this woman.
But what we do know is that it doesn't matter because hardly anyone buys a ticket for the Easter Festival because of any directorial subtleties.
Anna Netrebko, Jonas Kaufmann, possibly Antonio Pappano, these are arguments enough this year for a maximum of 490 euros per person.
And maybe, after enjoying the premiere, this piece too.
“La Gioconda” by Amilcare Ponchielli is rarely played north of the Alps.
It is an opera blockbuster with the perfect ingredients, even with a slight over-spice: there are two villains and two loving women around a tenor lover, melodies on the running score meter, effective choir and ballet scenes that created the “Dance of the Hours”. at least it's in the spa concert.
Antonio Pappano as one of the best opera craftsmen
Antonio Pappano demonstrates in an overwhelming way how to mix all of this, with taste and without succumbing to Ponchielli's offers without reflection.
He is booked for an Easter season on the Salzach with the Roman Accademia Nazionale Santa Cecilia.
Where others thunder the four-act act into early verismo, something different can be heard here: enormous energy, but also a lot of elegance.
A rich and colorful sound, noble and warmly timbred.
A sensorium for details without puzzles.
At the same time, enormous flexibility, changes in tempo and atmosphere in a very small space, which Pappano, one of the best opera craftsmen and singers, can create effortlessly.
Nobody gets run over here, not even Jonas Kaufmann.
He composed Enzo's aria “Cielo e mar” between teasing and expansive vocal gestures, including a swell on the final note.
Otherwise, the Salzburg resident doesn't dare to completely break cover.
All the tones are there, but sometimes dull to gray, an interpretation (like last year's Tannhäuser) with the handbrake on.
Anna Netrebko, on the other hand, sounds as if Ponchielli anticipated her with a custom-made piece.
The Gioconda requires a lot of middle range, hardly any top notes, and Netrebko's voice develops a rich resonance.
There is a fine flute register for occasional summit hikes.
And for the character of this opera figure between flaming Eros, murderous desire and generous renunciation, a strong to ruthless character study.
Director Oliver Meads shows La Gioconda's backstory
Director Oliver Meads, director of the co-producing Royal Opera House in London, has his own thoughts about the past life of La Gioconda.
A “street singer” is what Ponchielli and librettist Arrigo Boito say, who adapted a play by Victor Hugo to opera format.
A traumatized, abused person, that's what she is in Salzburg.
For foreplay, at her mother's behest, she has to please men, including her later adversary Barnaba.
That brings in money, especially for the fox fur-clad mom.
This history shines through again and again, even in the ballet scenes.
Once the poor woman has to go to a psycho doctor, who tortures her with electric shocks - the man (just a vision?) turns out to be Barnaba.
And at the showdown, when the mature woman spreads her legs for him, she stabs him with the knife.
It's a far cry from a psychological thriller; the Salzburg Evening simmers at the level of kitchen psychology.
Meads brings the piece to today's Venice, for which Philipp Fürhofer built him diffuse, historicizing backdrops.
While in the original everyone is afraid of the clutches of the Inquisition, here there are people in suits who play mafiosi and ask a colorful, sometimes short-hosted group of tourists to dinner at the lagoon.
If you want, you can throw yourself into her role like Netrebko.
Jonas Kaufmann's Enzo enters the scene wearing a sailor's cap as a Freddy Quinn revenant and otherwise moves with tried-and-tested gestures.
When he later threatens the chics with a pistol in the dark room, it has little effect.
But there is a lot to marvel at in the other vocal positions.
Luca Salsi is the magnificent, tireless baritone villain as Barnaba.
Eve-Maud Hubeaux is a large-format Laura, whose singing is mixed with bitterness and sourness, the perfect contrast to Netrebko.
In terms of bass systems, Tareq Nazmi could be an imperious and Belcantesque inquisitor Alvise, but it is precisely in his aria that he gets stuck singing.
As was the case with Kaufmann, there was muted applause for this.
Standing ovation, however, for Netrebko, especially for Pappano.
A year of transition will still pass until the Berlin Philharmonic returns in 2026 for a multi-year Easter residency.
After this “Gioconda” you find yourself thinking: the festival could have happily entered into a long-term affair with Pappano and his Romans.
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The plot:
Gioconda, a street singer, loves the nobleman Enzo, who is in love with Laura, wife of the inquisitor Alvise.
There is also spy Barnaba, who desires Gioconda.
She gets caught in the web of hatred and passion that Barnaba wraps around her.
After Enzo, who managed to escape with Laura after dangerous complications, escapes her, Gioconda kills himself - shortly before Barnaba believes he has achieved his wishes.