According to Enrico Caruso, all Il trovatore needs to succeed is to hire the four best singers in the world – an impossible achievement anywhere, let alone Christchurch.
Vocally, the casting of principals was stronger than one had dared hope, with only minor reservations.
The remarkable voice and striking stage presence of Elena Bocharova (Azucena) dominated, as it should. (Verdi loved oddball characters, as Rigoletto showed.) Azucena’s role demands a huge compass, from guttural chest register to upper mezzosphere. Although both extremes were admirably exploited, Bocharova’s rich, strong voice occasionally sounded disconcertingly like two job-sharing singers.
Carlo Scibelli was a credible Manrico, with the right combination of testosterone and tenderness, though with a tendency to sing under the note at times. Careful scrutiny of the libretto reveals that Manrico can only be in his late teens – another impossible demand, although through half-closed eyes Scibelli could just about do the trick.
Less could be said for Patricia Wright as his sweetheart, Leonora. Wright is an operatic veteran whose vocal technique could, and at times did, run rings around the rest, but her casting in this production suggested that Manrico preferred older women.
On the other hand, Seung-Wook Seong’s Count di Luna presented a perfectly comfortable match, with beautiful singing and impressive gravitas – a truly Verdian baritone.
Director Elric Hooper, one assumes, has deliberately reverted to the “stand and deliver” method of opera – not least with the chorus, who exist to provide an audience for whatever narrative is going on. The “Anvil Chorus” was oddly static, another frozen tableau, despite four well-oiled bodybuilders arhythmically beating the living daylights out of some unseen object. Nevertheless, it was a coup de theatre to have the men’s chorus hanging from the metal lattice-work of John Parker’s austere set for their stirring opening to Act 3.
Both set and lighting strove to evoke the atmosphere of civil war or fill gaps in the narrative, with cycloramic projections of swirling skies, roaring flames and images of Azucena emphasising her centrality to this gothic horror story.
A capacity audience enthusiastically affirmed that it likes what it knows.
IL TROVATORE, Southern Opera, Isaac Theatre Royal, Christchurch, September 30.