Nancy

The operatic tradition of the City of Dukes de Lorraine has been well established for years and many natives of Nancy remember - and have carefully preserve the programs - the fabulous lyric seasons of the [19]50s, when a new spectacle would be presented every week!  It was not rare to attend, to list only two titles, Postillon de Longjumeau by Adolphe Adams or La Poupée by Edmond Audran.  Over the years the city has not been able to preserve such recurrences of opera magic but has continued to treat the public with high quality entertainment presented by artists of national and international fame.

Indeed, it was a frequent occurrence to hear those to whom we added, after their names, “from the opera” to indicate they were glorious residents of the Paris Opera--Mado Robin, Jacqueline Brumaire, Régine Crespin, Guy Chauvet, Henri Legay, Michel Dens, Gabriel Baquier, Alain Vanzo.   The Opera of Nancy also welcomed great international stars and we regularly found Piero Cappuccilli, Rolando Panerai, Nicola Rossi Lemeni, Sesto Bruscantini, Paolo Montarsolo, Ruggero Raimondi, and Fedora Barbieri alongside other artists from Europe and even from Asia. Sometimes the biggest of the big pass through Nancy, such as Lucia Valentini Terrani and, before unrolling the red carpet for José Cura, a great singer of today, his illustrious predecessor-tenors: Giacomo Lauri Volpi, Luis Mariano and Carlo Bergonzi.

It was a time when the people supported this opera and in the late 60s the first association promoting lectures and brochures to represent the works on the opera’s season, as well as hosting open receptions with the artists, was born. Today, the city has four (!) [of these associations] and one of them, Nancy Opéra Passion, had a surprise for the public that reflected the splendours of the not-so-distant past. …..We can see what creates the ‘passion’ in the title of the association:  bring an artist of the calibre of José Cura, who returns to France after an absence of six years, and allow us, a fabulous once-in-a-lifetime chance, to “draw near this immense artist,” according to the President [of the association, Jacques Delfosse].

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Now it is time to exclaim, much as Tonio from Pagliacci comes in front of the curtain to explain in Leoncavallo's brilliant conceived Prologue: "Andiam, incominciate!” (Let us go, begin!).

It is precisely the Prelude from Pagliacci that the orchestra attacks, spread out widely and in an impressive way for the public most familiar with it jammed into its “Golfo mistico,” to use once more the attractive Italian expression for the orchestra pit.  Curiously, it is not José Cura who directs…we know, however, of the double talent of this artist, the one who becomes a conductor to be more still, if one can say so, to listen to the singers.

We notice the energy and heat with which Mario De Rose (José Cura’s assistant) attacks and drives the tormented music of Leoncavallo, but what are they going to do as the prelude breaks off so that the baritone can appear in front of the curtain? We get the answer and a surprise:  it is no less than José Cura, the great tenor, who sings the part of the baritone!  In doing so he takes up the practice of outstanding tenors such as the incomparable Mario Del Monaco, tenors whose span of vocal registers allows them this performance.

We discover just like that the measure of this Artist:  the exceptional cream and quality of the timbre, combined with perfect control of vocal emission and a warmly Latin vibration and an interpreter who obviously ‘lives’ what he sings.  One does not need more to conquer this curious public, even if he is already known, and it did not end the evening's surprises. . . . .

With surprising ease, José Cura addresses the public, jokes with them and then introduces the first artist, Stéphanie Vernerin, from France, who sings with attractive fruity tones Musetta’s waltz from La Bohéme (G. Puccini).   One hardly recovers from the quality of the timbre and the singing of this young soprano, who began in 2004, when José Cura underlines the peculiarity of the bass which he introduces.  Jan St’ Ava come from the Czech Republic and is only nineteen years old but nevertheless has a voice with a cavernous low register enhanced by a brilliant middle and with the capability of bringing to life "Vecchia zimarra", the famous, if brief, intense aria of the philosopher Colline from La Bohéme.

It was again Puccini whom we hear next and Marie Karall (France), having only begun studying last year, astonishes us with a big voice, full in all the registers and giving again grace and passion to "O Mio babbino caro" from Gianni Schicchi.  For the public who did not attend the master class the day before, no one could have suspected the miracle wrought by the “Maestro.” This soprano had arrived with a narrow, badly placed and poorly controlled voice.  José Cura, in trying to remedy this disaster, eventually said to her:  “Imagine you sing Tosca!”  And the artist, finally breaking free of herself and releasing her voice, succeeded in reaching the magnificent notes.

The tenor Avi Klemberg (France) has been working for four years but it is not only he who sings.  It is José Cura, who not only conducts the orchestra with love but also assumes the part of the baritone (!) at the beginning of the aria.  It is the brief but warm “Addio fiorito asil,” from the always charming Puccini (Madama Butterfly), which Klemberg sings in a beautiful lyric tenor with delicate high notes,  reliably and with confidence.

Maria Bisso, though Spanish, is a fellow countryman of José Cura since she was born in Buenos Aires.  She took a training course at that city’s famous “Teatro Colón,” a real bastion of Italian opera in Latin America, and won the 2001 International Competition Maria de São Paulo in Brazil. She sang nothing less than "Regnava nel silenzio,” the opening soprano aria in Lucia di Lammermoor by Donizetti. 

The means of expression explains more than anything the particular difficulty in this aria, taken straight from the Italian romantic spirit: a dreamy and delicate song but at the same time passionate, a prisoner of the era, so to speak, of vocal exercises and very shrill sections in musical expression.  Thus we are astonished that this substantial, firm, almost hard, voice was capable of such well-driven vocalism and assured high notes and ‘density.’ The contrast is most striking when compared with the next artist, a French mezzo-soprano of Italian origin, Alexia Ercolani, who began study in 2003.  The aria “Mon cœur s’ouvre à ta voix” from Samson et Dalila (C. Saint-Saëns) places emphasis on the lower register and she is endowed with an impressive vibrato which blurs in the well-projected higher notes…and what a Samson responds to her!  The conductor, José Cura, who in jest, replaces the lover’s final response “Dalila!  I love you!” with an ecstatic but well good balance:  “Alexia!  I love you!”

From South Korea comes baritone Changhan Lim who has worked in France since 2003 with such artists as Elisabeth Vidal, André Cognet and Michèle Command and who has already sung on stage in La Bohéme, Carmen, Cavalleria rusticana and in the title role in Don Giovanni. A beautiful lower register and a luxurious middle as well as [vocal] suppleness, all the attributes of a valued baritone, are here put into service in the aria “Vision fugitive” from Hérodiade by Massenet, and leads us to predict a beautiful career.

A duet rarely performed in concert finishes the first half.  Drawn from Pagliacci, the duet between Nedda and Silvio allows us to hear again soprano Maria Bisso, impeccable in the old-fashioned coloratura of Nedda, and to discover a young, local baritone, since Benjamin Colin was born in Nancy.  Also a student of Michèle Command, he began in both opera and operetta; one feels in his performance brave work, effort and concentration in spite of his difficulties in pronouncing Italian, a curious yet perceptible defect, considering the mother tongues are “cousins,” noticeable in French singers. He is now part—just consecrated—of the Chœurs de l’Opéra national de Nancy and Lorraine.

After the break a beautiful surprised awaited the public when José Cura announced a favorite opening of opera concerts:  I Vespri Siciliani (or rather Les Vêpres siciliennes, because the original French version is being given more and more often) of Giuseppe Verdi.

We had been, up to now, able to appreciate the art of conducting by José Cura, who does not enslave the singers as we could accuse some conductors of doing but rather serves the singers as the composer [would]. With this masterly opening, we now had the measure of this chef-d’orchestre in opera, renewing an ever more distant tradition, as well as the fashion of today, to conduct quickly, believing that speed ‘equals’ dramatic. One result is that we often end up with a dry interpretation, empty of poetry and burnt wings of Musique.  José Cura, however, let the orchestra breathe (and God knows how much Verdi needs to breathe:  we speak of the sight of panting Verdiens).  Of course, the poignant motive for the father-son duet played here by cellos is already opera par excellence, but it is still necessary to know how to let them sing. As for the martial crescendo, more usually solid or booming, we heard it amazingly produced, in the style of Franco Capuana, supple and warm like Gianandrea Gavazzeni.  In brief, much like Fernando Previtali, José Cura made the entire overture vibrate with a theatrical sense…

At the end of the burst of amply deserved applause, it was touching to hear José Cura, as if speaking to himself, as a dreamer still under the spell (nevertheless obtained by him!), murmur, ‘What an orchestra, my God!”,  and then still pensive and in a hushed voice, to the first rows, “This belongs to you!  It must be preserved!”

But why does he not turn around completely to receive the applause?  It is because an even more beautiful picture awaits us: Cura eventually steps down from the podium, joins the first instrumentalists and then faces the public, one with the orchestra.

The second part of the concert opened with more Verdi, the great baritone aria from Don Rodrigo di Posa in Don Carlo. Although the piece is usually called “Mort de Posa” because the character is shot during this scene in the drama, we could enjoy José Cura’s joke in which he introduces it as follows: “The death of Rodrigo, but without the death!” Such perhaps was his intention, but it could also mean that the baritone was going to sing only the first of two arias, which make up what we would call a double ‘aria.’  Andrej Benes, who come from the Czech Republic, had the luck to meet in 2004 (the year of his debut) one of the greatest baritones of the 20^th century, Giuseppe Taddei.  We were struck to discover the ‘purified’ tone of D. Fischer Dieskau, with the German singer's characteristic clarity of emission, and at the same time,with an astonishingly assured high notes.  As for the counterpart envisioned by Verdi for Don Carlo, also present at this moment in the opera, we heard them coming from another mouth and, once we recovered from the surprising effect which they produced when seeming to come our of nowhere, we said to ourselves:  “But of course!  José Cura does Don Carlo—and what a Don Carlo!”

The captivating Verdi was always honored for the following piece, the dazzling Finale to the first Act of La Traviata.  Aude Priya Engel (France), who left the Academy of Toulouse in 2002, has already sung this work, as well as in La Bohéme and Mozart’s Don Giovanni.  Her blazing timbre “leaves” in the high notes in a surprising way but the astonishing mastery she has is also there. She also surmounted the difficulties of the final cabaletta “Sempre libera,” of which it is absolutely necessary for us to underline the quietly mischievous tempo (of another era!) which José Cura imprints with his orchestra.  We know that in this piece Alfred intervenes, off-stage under Violetta’s window, a detail that often makes us smile in fascination according to how near or far the theater relegates the poor tenor, sometimes almost in the cellar, as someone once commented in humor. Well, this time it starts straightforwardly and especially since Alfredo is present on stage, a brilliant Alfredo, high notes blazing, José Cura putting into practice as well the words which he sings:  “Amore è palpito…” while by his side, his Violetta, all the more stimulated, one must say, vocally ignites.

Next is the first part of Alfredo’s aria “De’ miei bollenti spiriti” sung by tenor Thomas Blondelle from Belgium.  A young graduate of the Conservatory of Bruges, he has received numerous prizes since 2006.  His tone is clear and he is endowed with such confidence that we were amazed at the strength in which he ‘lives’ his singing and, though this is not always the case with this aria, vibrates literally with the words he sings:  “De’miei bollenti spiriti / Il giovanil ardore : De mon esprit bouillant, / La juvénile ardeur.”

Very deserving, a young soprano moves onstage gracefully but without affectation and José Cura explains that Gabrijela Ubavic, from Serbia, is ill but, in the absence of being able to really perform, she is still anxious to take part.  She will sing only half of the aria “Addio del passato” (La Traviata), which means she had the praiseworthy intention to interpret the da capo which is very often cut.  José Cura consequently requested the indulgence of the audience for her.  Gabrijela Ubavic began in 2002 at the National Opera of Belgrade and has performed in Europe since then.  We are stuck at once by the consistency of her tone, luxuriously copper-colored, so to speak, rich and full but very docile, effortless.  We learn with astonishment from the program that she also sings roles requiring great vocal agility, like Gilda (Rigoletto) and Norina (Don Pasquale). Faced with such a quality of tone and song, we think with shivers of what must be the level of performance from this opera singer when she is in top form.

Finally, Julija Samsonova from Lithuania comes to sing us the last piece from the participants in the master class.  Leaving the Academy Rossini de Pesaro, she began in 2005 with the role of Corinna in Il Viaggio a Reims by Rossini at the prestigious Rossini Opera Festival, which the city has dedicated to this composer.  Here she sang Desdemona’s aria from Verdi’s Otello, the curious “Air du Saule.” Samsonova displays a velvet timbre in brilliant complexions, a beautiful sound with melodious low register, superb piani and control of tone.  An exemplary legato makes the ‘passages’ unperceivable and leaves the listener breathless. It must also be said that the orchestra formed a single body in its exceptional interpretation, José Cura chiseling marvelous subtleties from the “old man’ Verdi, like the violins in their highest notes concluding “Ave Maria.” 

José Cura, so invested and so touched by what he heard that tears come to his eyes, wonders how he is going to sing now that it is his turn, at the conclusion of the concert!

He concentrates and forgets the fatigue and heat while Maestro Rose makes his entrance.  The piece is nothing less than the finale of Otello, in which the hero contemplates his Desdemona, whom he has just straggled in unjustified jealousy before killing himself.  José Cura’s Otello roars at first, with a warm strength that is always phenomenally harmonious, filling the entire auditorium of the Opera, which is held silent and continues to hold its breath…Almost as much as the great tenor, whose astonishing emission in mezza-voce captivates the audience.  He continues the aria, always balanced between beautiful delicacy and painful intensity lived every inch…Then when Verdi greets his public—in the last dramatic flight of the orchestra, typical of its style, Otello-José Cura still cries out again:  “Un bacio… un bacio ancora… ah !… un altro bacio…” and then his voice dies out gently, and the orchestra with it.

Under his spell, the audience of the Opera of Nancy waits while the impalpable magic of the opera hangs over it before bursting into applause and then into an ovation during which José Cura invites all the artist to rejoin him joyfully on the stage.  Shortly after, the ‘Maestro’ stops the ovation with a raised arm and the public expects the announcement of an encore…perhaps the famous Brindisi from La Traviata, often selected at the end of a concert, or at least some words of greeting, of wishes, but no, José Cura declares simply with the ‘little bit direct’ carelessness which characterizes him:  “Now, we will all eat!” Then they really step off the stage, leaving the once more public astonished (this time having too little to celebrate to suit its taste) but profoundly moved.  [Yonel BULDRINI]

 

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José Cura Show at the Opera

 L'Est Republicain

The teacher and his students gave a concert late yesterday afternoon. Discovering new voices.

 

José Cura in the role of singing professor, conductor, and ‘Monsieur Loyal’ late yesterday afternoon on the stage of the l'Opéra de Nancy at the invitation of the ‘Nancy Opéra Passion’ Association: The great Argentine tenor, who had not performed in France in several years, initiated his return to the country with a master-class for thirteen young singers. Yesterday’s concert was the result of the previous day’s work sessions.

 

Chatting with the audience, the tenor called out to a small child to ask him for his name, then asked his students to refuse to reveal their identity, address, and phone number, undoubtedly to put them at ease.  Remembered from the first half, begun about thirty minutes late due to the rush at the ticket counters: The Prologue from Pagliacci with the maestro, the performance of the young 19-year-old Czech who offered an aria from La Bohéme in a powerful, clear, and well positioned bass voice, also the aria of Hérode from Massenet’s Hérodiade, sung by Korean baritone Changham Lim with great presence and excellent diction—a lesson for the Frenchwoman who preceded him on stage and from whom we had difficulty understanding the words in the duet from  Samson et Dalila by Saint-Saëns. With a booming "Hello, colleague", the maestro then welcomed the French tenor Avi Klemberg, who bravely managed the Pinkerton aria from Puccini’s Madam Butterfly.  It is regrettable that Argentine Maria Biso chose to perform Lucia di Lammermoor since the timbre of her voice did not correspond well at all with the hallucinatory nature of the character.  The baritone from Nancy, Benjamin Colin, a former student of Arcadi Volodos at the Conservatory of Nancy, sang a duet from Pagliacci with little power but with a well-placed voice.

 

The second half of the concert was far more interesting, with the overture from Verdi’s I Vêpres siciliennes, played superbly by the Orchestre de Nancy under the baton of José Cura:  atmosphere, changes in color, breathing—it was all there. Although unwell, the Serb Gabriela Ubavic managed a convincing Traviata, and the Belgian Thomas Blondelle a very respectable Alfredo.  Real emotion came, however, only with Lithuanian Julija Samsonova who splendidly carried off the role of Desdemona.

 

As for the maestro, he stirred every soul in the room with an Otello whose death he experienced with his entire being. As a singer but also as an actor. True art, indeed!

 

An evening that had begun like something out of "Dimanche Martin" thus came to an end with profoundness and dramatic intensity.

 

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José Cura, Instinctive and Ardent Argentine Tenor

 

A red-hot master class with José Cura yesterday at the Opéra de Nancy.  The Argentine tenor demands maximum emotional risks of young artists.  Today, the singer will offer a special recital.

 

After a six-year absence from France, the Argentine tenor José Cura chose the stage of the Opéra de Nancy to offer a recital of some of the most beautiful arias in the repertoire.  He will be accompanied by some of the most promising young talents of the international operatic stage.

 

Yesterday, a handful of privileged people attended the rehearsals/coaching sessions of the artist, thanks to the initiative of the Nancy Opéra Passion--a master class which takes your breath away and bowls you over all at the same time.

 

Jeans, a black T-shirt, small spectacles perched on the tip of his nose, Latin and even a bit macho: that’s José Cura conducting the orchestra as he concentrates on a frail 23-year-old.  Alexia Ercolani is a magnificent mezzo-soprano.  Her task is to sing Mon coeur, the sublime duet from Camille Saint-Saëns’ Samson et Dalila, with him.  It is not [vocal] technique that José Cura is interested in; it is the expression of an emotion.  He will never stop until he reaches his goals.  The singing lesson . . . passion!

 

First of all, he reassures the singer, relaxes her, whispering lines in her ear.  The orchestra of the Nancy opera is attentive.  José Cura makes them understand the music must be fluid, moving from one group of instruments to another like a warm feeling.  Then, suddenly, he looks at Alexia, urging her to look deep into his eyes.  This is a love duet. It must be ardent, it must be deeply moving.  Everything is in the breath.  The singer is still reserved. He stops; breaks the spell.

 

It’s just the carnality, only the ‘perversion’, that you lack

 

The next moment, he takes her by the shoulder.  He is massive, powerful; she is tiny.  Little by little she relaxes; her voice fills the auditorium.  One can feel that she’s gaining confidence, taking some pleasure while he hums and locks eyes with her.  “Put some heat into it, heat it up," he tells her bluntly, "Come on!”  Again, he stops.  “Listen, understand:  This is not a woman talking to a guy, no.  This here is not a woman, this is a female… you get the nuance?  It is not easy being Dalila.  I know. You have the voice, the look….”  He puts his hand on Alexia’s forehead.  “You lack only the ‘perversion’.”  The young woman has gotten it; she surrenders herself, lets herself go.  José Cura applauds.

 

A little later, biting with relish into a very juicy fig, he explains his approach.  “I do not have the time to go into the musical detail and teach an academic course.  I have only one day to awaken their curiosity, to activate that sixth sense which the performer has in him.” 

 

The sensuality of art

 

In search of passion, of emotion on the stage, he gives his all shamelessly.  Endowed with an animal magnetism that he does not attempt to curb, he even demands “the sensuality of art.  Art is nothing but that.  It is necessary to put technique at the service of the senses.  What happens too often is the opposite.  I am saying that the artist must strip, must bare his soul.”  

 

His –hot– Latin temperament, his vocal ease allow him to find maximum expressivity, something that turns a room upside down – and women in the audience in particular.  “Right now, Alexia, I wanted to get all this sensuality of hers gone; rather, I wanted to go into the sexuality of the character.  Sometimes people have difficulty doing this in public.  It is a question of upbringing. But when you are on stage, you are at the service of a character.  Totally, body and soul.  Otherwise, nothing will happen.”   

 

 

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Nancy Master Class

 

Terra Actualidad - EFE

22 August 2007

Soprano Maria Bisso will study with José Cura in Nancy

The Spanish-Argentine soprano is one of fourteen singers from different countries who will take part in the master class that Argentine tenor José Cura offers on 1 and 2 September in Nancy, in the east of France, according to reports from the event’s promoter.

The other thirteen who have been selected are Julija Samsonova from Lithuania, Gabrijela Ubavic from Serbia, Jan St'Ava and Andrej Benes from the Czech Republic, Thomas Blondelle from Belgium, Changahn Lim from South Korean, and Eva Gazinate, Benjamin Colin, Aude Priya Engel, Alexia Ercolani, Eva Gazinate, Marie Karall, Avi Klemberg and Stephanie Varnerin from France.

Together with José Cura, they will work on the interpretation and the construction of roles.

The master class will be open to the public and will conclude with a concert provided by the Maestro and his pupils at the Opera Nacional de Lorena, accompanied by Orchestra Sinfónica and Lírica de Nancy.

After an absence from the French stage of six years, this will be ‘an exceptional occasion,’ according to the organizers, to hear José Cura, who will present his interpretation of the ‘Prologue’ from I Pagliacci by Leoncavallo and  ‘Niun mi tema' from Verdi’s Otello.

The tenor will also sing more Verdi, but this time the duet 'Son Io mio Carlo...per me giunto’ from Don Carlo with Czech baritone Andrej Benes, and then sing ‘Mon coeur’ from Samson et Dalila by Saint-Saëns with French mezzo-soprano Alexia Ercolani.

Maria Bisso is expected to sing 'Regnava nel silenzio', a fragment from ‘Lucia di Lammermoor' by Donizetti.

 

Masterclass 

 

The Muscular Singing Class of José Cura

 Le Républicain Lorrain

Julien Beneteau.

05/09/2009

 

The tenor held public rehearsals yesterday morning, sometimes with caustic criticism of the young singers participating in his class.  A concert of arias will be held tomorrow at the opera in Nancy.

Florent Mbia completed Renato’s aria from Verdi’s Masked Ball.  A few people in the audience, swept away, applauded.  José Cura, willingly theatrical, interrupted with a grand movement of his hand.  “You are not there,” he said.  The audience persisted.  “If you continue, it will lead to a kind of competition between the singers.  Us, we work.  You watch.”

The tenor is like that, massive, direct.  When he gives instructions to Florent Mbia, the arch of his back makes him look like a bull ready to charge.  “When you are angry, it happens on the inside, not outside!”  He abuses the young man, an enthusiastic volunteer, as are his fifteen comrades, for this class by the ‘maestro.’

Marie-Adeline Henry calls him that also, with an “r” that rolls effortlessly.  “I cannot call him anything else, since I studied in Italy,” the young woman acknowledges.  “It is very nice to have an outside look,” says the soprano, who also was delighted to sing accompanied by an orchestra, a rarity for “students.”  She will attend all the passages of her friends.  Everyone learns from the different performances.

Jacque Delfosse, president of the Association Nancy Opéra and organizer of the course, said that 150 applications from around the world were received.  The selections were made by ear.  “It is rare to have a world class tenor and orchestra,” he was obviously pleased.  “After three years of organizing, this begins to take shape.”  José Cura will also direct a performance of Puccini’s La Rondine in 2011/2012.  The cast?  The young people who have made it through the class. 

Florent Mbia came down delighted with his stage experience.  “I discovered another way of singing, completely different today.”  On the stage, one hand on the orchestra, the other on the singer, José Cura continued his Latin number.  The audience applauded and he glared at them, irritated and delighted at the same time.