I wouldn't for the life of me have headed back to the Metropolitan Opera for another dose of Des McAnuff's production of "Faust" were it not for the presence of Joseph Calleja. Much like the first time around, it's a limp production, but all praise to the Met for assembling not one but two impressive casts.
Calleja and Jonas Kaufmann are about as different sounding as tenors come. Calleja's tone is bright and voluminous, his top swells to produce some of the most easy and bell like notes imaginable. "Salut demeure" came off gorgeously. The price you pay for this is a very distinctive vocal character that won't be to all tastes, a squillo punch that can occasionally come across as uncomfortably heavy vibrato. Unique singing however you hear him and acted with conviction, though emotively it was all a bit general, it was a total performance of some class.
If Calleja proved Kaufmann's equal, Ferruccio Furlanetto did not live up to the absurd charisma of Rene Pape as Mephistopheles. Furlanetto has just the right devilish smile but much of his acting was too blunt and his Bass forced. He powered out the notes losing all sense of beauty, reduced to barking out the high lying passages. Marina Poplavskaya was the only remaining principal from the first cast and she continued to deliver an extremely refined but slightly soulless Marguerite. She seemed to tire a little towards the end of the evening, and struggled with both the highest and lowest of material, but it was a pretty solid effort overall.
The smaller roles were superbly taken. George Petean is something of a stand and deliver singer but the sound he produces is lovely; Kate Lindsey, always a house favourite, charmed as Siebel. Alain Altinoglu kept the evening zipping along in the pit, the orchestra have had plenty of practice at this music and it came across flawlessly.
McAnuff's staging remains a thing of little interest (I described it at length in my first review). Aside from the odd irritatingly irrelevant directorial addition it's more vacant than actively intrusive. It's a concept production that doesn't believe in its concept, more or less ditching it for Acts II through IV, but at least it gets the narrative from A to B without too many undue complications.
A good vocal cast do not a great evening make and the Met's "Faust" hasn't yet found its groove (this was the last performance this season). Hardly the greatest of praise then, but not total damnation either.
(Review of Performance on Thursday, January 19th, 2012 at the Metropolitan Opera)
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