Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
WHAT IS THIS LIKE?, 4 Jul 2006
Weber does not really have as clear a 'profile' or identity for the musical public as composers of similar stature, say Schumann or Chopin or Berlioz, have. Knowledge of his work (my own included) is usually patchy. As far as his operas go, even those of us well familiar with Freischuetz and Euryanthe rarely know Oberon, and this is not surprising since, as Gardiner says, it was thought all but unstageable throughout the 20th century.
During the first half of the 20th century Handel's operas were viewed in much the same way. We are learning better now, and it's time to think again about Oberon as well. There is a really excellent liner booklet accompanying this set containing thoughtful and informative essays both by Gardiner and by Richard Wigmore. Wigmore quotes some of the more unflattering comments on Planche's libretto, including Tovey's dictum that it is 'the merest twaddle'. I will venture to take a different view and say that in my opinion it is really quite good. I read it as a pantomime book, and read like this it is certainly a lot more coherent and sequential than the libretto of The Magic Flute. I think I find a good deal of tongue-in-cheek whimsy in the vagaries of the plot, and if I'm right Planche has really had the last laugh on Tovey and the others. For this performance, sung in English, Gardiner has had the excellent idea of connecting the musical numbers with a spoken narrative, read by Roger Allam. Gardiner has written this narrative himself, and he needs to be complimented on the way he has caught the Christmas-pantomime idiom.
As for the music, it doesn't recall The Magic Flute to me nor indeed anything by Mozart, to whom Weber was related by marriage. The fairy music stands comparison with Mendelssohn's, but you would never mistake it for Mendelssohn's. This is the familiar Weber of Freischuetz and Euryanthe, and that ought to be commendation enough. Weber was a melodist to rival Berlioz and even Verdi himself. Searching for comparisons, I thought momentarily of Verdi's Il Corsaro with its parallel theme of the rescue of a captive princess from a wicked Caliph, but that comparison goes nowhere, or only as far as that both composers were born theatrical dramatists. The comparison with Schumann's Manfred probably has more going for it, even though Schumann had no theatrical sense whatsoever. What the two works have in common is the treatment of the supernatural in early romantic English literature and the way German composers of the period handled it. Looking forward rather than back, I can't say I find much foreshadowing of Wagner. What I do find is strong suggestions of one of Brahms's least-known and finest masterpieces his dramatic cantata Rinaldo, the very work in which I first heard and admired the tenor Steve Davislim who sings the part of Huon here.
Weber can stand on his own feet. I love his heavenly lightness of step and lightness of touch. His orchestral writing was praised by no less a virtuoso of that art than Berlioz, and his melodies sing for themselves. Both the performance and the recording here strike me as first class. You will need a fairly high volume-setting, and the singers are not brought artificially close to the microphone. Davislim has the biggest part and that suits me very well, but at this early stage I have not noticed any weaknesses at all among the soloists, who might all be native speakers of English as far as elocution goes. The chorus is, very properly, a small one, with corresponding benefit to their clarity of diction too. The orchestral players perform with both fire and refinement, and Gardiner's love of the beautiful score is as apparent from his direction as it is from his commentary.
The composer died aged 40 shortly after the first performance of Oberon, a victim of consumption as Chopin would be some years later. There is not the smallest shadow of death over his last score, and indeed his music seems to me to be a celebration of life as very little other music can be said to be to the same extent. I for one am more than glad of this opportunity to visit one of his neglected monuments, which I expect to do frequently. The year 2006 is now half-way advanced, and I have no way of knowing what my greatest musical discovery may be by the time it has run its course, but this one is going to be hard to surpass.
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7 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
This is Jonas Kaufmann's show!, 20 Aug 2006
Forgive me if I correct the review by David Bryson, by pointing out that the main tenor role of Huon is taking by that excellent German tenor Jonas Kaufmann, whom I heard in Puccini's "Rondine" last year and found very impressive, with a baritonal quality that does not impede the projection of a ringing top. Steve Davislim sings Oberon - very well, but his is a smaller, lighter, neater voice, As in his otherwise very informative and intelligent review, Mr Bryson does not consider the singers, I would add that while he is right that the English even from non-native speakers is excellent (both Kaufmann's and Martinpelto's being virtually impeccable), the exception is the attractively voiced Marina Comparato as Fatima - but her accent matters little as she is playing an "exotic" role: an Arabian maid. Orchestral playing, sound, production, the narrator's delivery of Gardiner's link narrative: everything works to make this work not a hodge-podge but a coherent, entertaining whole, show-casing some delightful music - albeit bewilderingly disparate in its synthesis of different styles. The only slight disappointment comes in Martinpelto's rendering of the showpiece aria "Ocean, thou mighty monster"; she simply hasn't the heft of voice to do it full justice but it is nonetheless an attractive performance.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Nothing to do with Shakespeare - but very good!, 13 May 2009
A few years back now I heard all three of Weber's large scale operas at the Edinburgh Festival, two of them for the first time! Of 'Oberon' all I had heard was the old war horse 'Ocean, thou mighty monster'. What a revelation those performances were and what a pity that Weber only left us with three works but they are all excellent and fascinatingly different in style.
'Oberon' has little to do with Shakespeare and indeed the title character doesn't get very much to sing though Steve Davislim makes a good job of what there is. The main characters are Huon, one of Charlemagne's heroic knights and Reiza whom he falls in love with in a vision and rescues from a harem. They undergo a number of trials, courtesy of Oberon, in order to prove their undying love. Luckily they pass all of these and in doing so release Oberon from a 'fatal vow' made to his estranged wife Titania (who never appears) allowing them to also reunite.
The libretto (much mocked at the time) is actually very entertaining and generally light hearted and a lovely example of English musical theatre at the time. In this recording, John Eliot Gardiner conducts with a wonderful lightness of touch. The main roles are taken by Jonas Kaufman as Huon and Hillevi Martinpelto as Reiza. Kaufman is really excellent, particularly so in the vigorous 'From boyhood trained'. I think the role of Reiza must be incredibly difficult to sing ranging as it does from Rossinian coloratura at the end of Act 1 to the Brunnhilde-like 'Ocean, thou mightly monster' in Act 2; Martinpelto does a good job though I agree that a little more weight in 'Ocean' would have been good - hear what Karita Mattila does with it in her German arias recital disc! The secondary lovers are well taken also (Marina Comparato as Fatima gets quite a lot to sing and her lilting English accent is actually rather attractive).
Overall this is a fine achievement and highly recommendable.
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