'Rusalka' returns to Amsterdam: pimping, movies and Wagnerian ink

2023-06-05T10:44:38.544Z

Highlights: Joana Mallwitz's musical direction is the highlight in Dvořák's new production, premiered at the Dutch National Opera, with a good cast led by Johanni van Oostrum. The composer of the New World Symphony achieved in this 1900 opera a perfect symbiosis between the Wagnerian influence and the indigenous Czech elements. The South African soprano embodied the unfortunate water nymph with a clear and firm voice. The other winner of the night was the African-American mezzo-soprano Bryce-Davis who gave a powerful, intense personality to the sorceress.

Joana Mallwitz's musical direction is the highlight in Dvořák's new production, premiered at the Dutch National Opera, with a good cast led by Johanni van Oostrum

Antonín Dvořák's Rusalka is a rarity in opera houses, despite the undeniable quality of its music. At the Teatro Real in Madrid it was performed, in November 2020, after 96 years of absence. And the National Opera of the Netherlands did not arrive until 1976. He has now returned to the Dutch capital in a new production, premiered on Friday, June 2, which was canceled due to the pandemic in 2020. It maintains its original link with the Holland Festival, the performing arts event that fills Amsterdam every June with theater, dance, music and cinema. And also the presence in the pit of the luxurious Concertgebouw Orchestra, which collaborates with this festival and with the National Opera, for almost four decades, performing in a new production of the Het Muziektheater.

The composer of the New World Symphony achieved in this 1900 opera a perfect symbiosis between the Wagnerian influence and the indigenous Czech elements. In the hand program it is recalled, in Dutch and English, that Dvořák played the viola under the direction of Wagner, in February 1863, during a visit to Prague. It could be added that he almost became his shadow: "I was crazy about him, I remember following him as he walked through the streets to have the opportunity to see, from time to time, the face of the big little man," he acknowledged in The Sunday Times.

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Reality and Desire

For the musical direction of this new production of Rusalka, Jakub Hrůša, the main Czech baton of the moment, was announced in 2020. But in the end he conducted Joana Mallwitz, who debuted at the head of the Concertgebouw. The German is, at 37 years old, one of the best orchestra conductors of the moment. This is corroborated by his imminent ascent to the Konzerthausorchester Berlin from the Nuremberg State Opera. But also to have been the first woman to conduct the Vienna Philharmonic a new production of the Salzburg Festival, in its more than one hundred years of history. And to do it, in addition, with personality, brilliance and authority, as explained by my colleague Luis Gago.

Soprano Johanni van Oostrum sings the famous 'Song of the Moon' in the first act of 'Rusalka', on Friday in Amsterdam.Clärchen and Matthias Baus | National Opera of the Netherlands

The same epithets would now qualify his excellent Rusalka at the head of the Concertgebouw at the Dutch National Opera. His version highlighted the Wagnerian ink of Dvořák's score, above the native Czech that would have stood out with Hrůša. We see it, from the beginning of the prelude, in that transparency and plasticity with which he presented each leitmotiv. From the mysterious cell that opens the work in pianísimo, in the cellos, to the subsequent motif that represents the aquatic nymph that stars in the opera, both in the wood and in the string.

Mallwitz turned the orchestra into a powerful narrative instrument. He raised it especially, in the second act, to express the feelings of Rusalka, who has lost her speech when she becomes human. The moonrise and the ballet were two of the best orchestral moments. And the German conductor molded with astonishing precision every detail of the score before an orchestra that sounded refined even in the crudest moments.

The vocal cast was also different from that planned in 2020, with the exception of Pavel Černoch. The prince of the Czech tenor proved more interesting theatrically than vocally, although he compensated for his limitations in the high register with a brilliant final scene. Undoubtedly, the highest point of the evening was marked by Johanni van Oostrum, as Rusalka. The South African soprano embodied the unfortunate water nymph with a clear voice and firm high-pitched, and was moving in the most lyrical pages, such as the famous Song to the Moon of the first act.

Soprano Johanni van Oostrum (left) and mezzo Raehann Bryce-Davis, in the first act of 'Rusalka', on Friday at the Dutch National Opera.Clärchen and Matthias Baus | National Opera of the Netherlands

The other winner of the night was the African-American mezzo-soprano Raehann Bryce-Davis who gave a powerful, intense and racial personality to the sorceress Ježibaba. The German soprano Annette Dasch was a seductive and dedicated foreign princess and the Russian bass Maxim Kuzmin-Karavaev a good Vodník, although without capturing the multiple folds of the character. Good performance of the choir of the house and great level among the secondaries, with outstanding mention for the Dutch Karin Strobos and Erik Slik, mezzo and tenor, in the characters of the kitchen pinche and the ranger, although their scenic tasks were very different.

In fact, the most debatable aspect of this production was the scenic proposal. It is signed by both the versatile German film, opera, theatre and music video director Philipp Stölzl and the Austrian theatre director Philipp M. Krenn. Both situate that opposition between the fantastic and the human world of the Czech composer's opera in Hollywood, during the depressed thirties. They do so at the cost of turning all the allusions to stories like Hans Christian Andersen's The Little Mermaid into sweetened cinematographic references.

Rusalka is not an aquatic nymph, but a prostitute, and Vodník is not a goblin either, but a violent pimp. The natural environment is transformed into a sordid neighborhood, which has a cinema as a form of escape. And Ježibaba's spell becomes a cosmetic surgery operation, because Rusalka wants to be like the heroine who falls in love with her favorite heartthrob on the screen. Similarly, the foreign princess is a much more attractive actress than the nymph after going under the knife.

The soprano Johanni van Oostrum, lying on the floor, at the end of the opera 'Rusalka', last Friday at the function in Amsterdam.Clärchen and Matthias Baus | National Opera of the Netherlands

Everything falls into place thanks to Stölzl's sumptuous setting and Krenn's theatrical expertise. The first also deals with lighting and scenography (with Heike Vollmer). But there are too many extras that unnecessarily multiply the spotlight and limit the opportunities to delve into the psychology of the characters. The costumes of Anke Winckler help, as well as the cinematographic choreography of the Murcian Juanjo Arqués. However, the visual predominates in a show full of contrasts against the poetic evocation that Dvořák's music demands. They made it clear from the prelude, with the projection of a naughty movie about the little mermaid, whose filming is contemplated in the second act, and also in the disappointing end of the opera, with the protagonist cutting her veins in the middle of the street.

The function concluded with all the audience standing without exception, although the stage team reaped some booing. Anyone who wants to see it without traveling to Amsterdam can do so on the Operavision platform for four months from June 25.

Rusalka

Music by Antonín Dvořák. Libretto by Jaroslav Kvapil. Pavel Černoch (tenor), Annette Dasch (soprano), Johanni van Oostrum (soprano), Raehann Bryce-Davis (mezzo-soprano), Maxim Kuzmin-Karavaev (bass). Nationale Opera Choir. Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam. Musical direction: Joana Mallwitz. Stage direction: Philipp Stölzl & Philipp M. Krenn. Het Muziektheater, June 2. Through June 25.