Jette Parker Young Artists
Royal Opera
Partenope
The Proms
The Royal Opera ended its season looking to the future, with its Young Artists Summer Concert on Sunday afternoon. Part I was most of Act I of Don Giovanni, and Part II two lengthy excerpts from Massenet’s Werther and Manon. I was only able to stay for the first half, having to get to the Prom performance of Handel’s Partenope, which began at 6 p.m. and went on for ever.
Rory Macdonald conducted, and seemed anxious to show his authentic credentials, with the orchestra of Welsh National Opera, by taking the opening of the overture as unportentously as possible: you’d never guess that this music was going to accompany the entry of the Stone Guest. The action was played on a bare stage, but there was costuming, some of it bizarre, vaguely reminiscent of silent movies, with seedy coat-tails and top hats. The singing, by the young artists who have taken small roles in major productions, was of a high standard, though several of these singers still lack the capacity to fill the house with their voice. Two exceptions are Pumeza Matshikiza, who is already a complete Donna Elvira, and Robert Anthony Gardiner, a full-toned Ottavio. I wish I could sound more enthusiastic, but to take us through Act I and stop before the finale does feel like extended foreplay without the play itself.
When Partenope was mounted by ENO last autumn, I was annoyed by the surrealist gimmicks of Christopher Alden, who made it a country-house comedy in or about the first world war. Having now seen it, not staged but acted with gusto by a quite marvellous cast from the Royal Danish Theatre, Copenhagen, I feel more indulgent of Alden, who did skilfully disguise the tedium of the first two acts, though nothing can really hide the fact that they constitute immense longueurs with occasional oases.
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