Massenet – Cendrillon (Bertrand de Billy, Joyce DiDonato, Alice Coote) [2012]

×

Massenet – Cendrillon (Bertrand de Billy, Joyce DiDonato, Alice Coote) [2012]

Close

Joyce DiDonato stars as Cinderella in the debut Covent Garden production of Massenet's Cendrillon. DiDonato captures all hearts in this enchanting, sophisticated retelling of the classic fairy tale. The charming production is by the famed French opera director Laurent Pelly. The Cinderella story seen through the eyes of the belle époque, Massenet’s Cendrillon was first performed at the Opéra-Comique in Paris in 1899 and its gorgeous score embraces pathos, pastiche, broad humor, subtle eroticism and sheer magic.
Neglected for much of the 20th century, this entrancing and often surprising opera has found a firmer place in the repertoire over the past 30 years. In Summer 2011 its debut at London’s Royal Opera House was built around mezzo soprano Joyce DiDonato, who first took on the title role at the Santa Fe festival in 2006; there, as at Covent Garden, the staging was by French director Laurent Pelly. The décor is inspired by a venerable volume of Charles Perrault’s fairy tales bound in red morocco leather, and the dominant colors are white, black and crimson, though mauve is chosen for the body-hugging gown worn by the voluptuous, capricious Fairy Godmother of Eglise Gutierrez as she scales spellbinding coloratura heights.
The only principal role sung by a man is Cendrillon’s good-hearted but ineffectual father, Pandolfe, portrayed here by bass-baritone Jean-Philippe Lafont, a mainstay of the opera scene in France, but here making his Covent Garden debut. His gentle character hardly stands a chance against his armour-plated wife, the formidable Madame de la Haltière, here embodied in flamboyant vocal and physical style by Polish contralto Ewa Podleś: her cavernous lower notes shake the Royal Opera’s foundations, while her opulently padded derrière sweeps all before (and behind) it.
With the conductor Bertrand de Billy, as the Bloomberg said, proving “what a nonpareil he is in French music,” the Guardian found that “the performance weaves quite some spell.”

×

Massenet – Cendrillon (Bertrand de Billy, Joyce DiDonato, Alice Coote) [2012]

Close