La Donna Del Lago (The Lady of the Lake) is not among my favorite operas. From Rossini, I prefer La Cenerentola and Il Barbiere di Siviglia. They have a bit more charm to them. The best thing about this production is definetely Joyce di Donato as Elena(Ellen). She is no stranger to Rossini (performing Rosina and Angelina). Her singing and acting are lovely and she commands the stage. Daniela Barcelona gets her footing as Malcolm and did a great job. Juan Diego Flores was great as the kind. The week link of the production is Oren Gradus as Douglas, Ellen's father. The production made him a bit of a brute, so that didn't help him either. Sets and costumes are traditional, but sorta bare. Overall, worth watching for Joyce di Donato and some other performers. 6/10.
The Metropolitan Opera HD Live (TV Series)
Rossini: La donna del lago (2015)
User Reviews
Review this title2 Reviews
Some disappointing elements, though musically it's almost perfect
TheLittleSongbird22 March 2015
On the most part the 9th season has been a very good one, if as with all the previous seasons not consistent. After a strong start with Macbeth, the season got even better with the best of the series Le Nozze Di Figaro, other standouts were Die Meistersinger Von Nurnberg and Iolanta/Duke Bluebeard's Castle. While not terrible by all means, this production of Rossini's La Donna Del Lago was disappointing and of the season only The Merry Widow was weaker.
La Donna Del Lago is not one of my favourites from Rossini like Il Barbiere Di Siviglia, La Cenerentola and William Tell are. Most of the music as ever with Rossini is lovely if only with a few show-stoppers with Tanti Affetti, O Fiamma Soave and some choral passages, but some of it is on the banal side and the story is rather static. With this production the slightly above average rating is for the musical values, which are almost perfection. The only disappointment for my tastes was Oren Gradus as Duglas, his singing is solid and with resonance and without being wobbly but a little underpowered at times. But it's the acting where Gradus disappoints, a large part of the problem is how ill-served he is by the staging, which characterises him as a callous brute and Gradus brings very little dimension to it.
The orchestral playing is marvellous, the tone is gleaming in beauty, the attention to balance is evident, the musicality and phrasing is expressive and there's plenty of elegant style. The chorus are beautifully balanced and don't sound too heavy for the music, though they are not given an awful lot of stage direction, a shame because the chorus have come a long way over-time and their personalities have become more individual but this is not as apparent here. Michele Mariotti's conducting is much more attentive and is crisper and livelier than in the Met's recent production of Il Barbiere Di Siviglia, where it was mostly good but inconsistent in places. Although Gradus disappointed the rest of the performances certainly do not.
Joyce Di Donato is the best thing about the production, a magnificent performance and one of the best performances I've seen from her. Her voice is rich and beautiful, as well as even from top to bottom with the plush low notes to the long-way-from-shrill high register, the florid passages always sounded like they come easy to her(and Rossini's music and passage-work is actually very difficult) and she's by far the best dramatically on stage(Di Donato always has been a great, communicative actress), acting with charm, nuance and joyous personality. Tanti Affetti was fantastic, and from personal opinion the only truly outstanding rendition of the night. Juan Diego Florez is a great match, he tries a little too hard on occasions but he is dashing, heroic and involved at least and his voice is as captivating as ever with its effortless high notes, honeyed tone and fearless-sounding passage-work. Daniela Barcellona becomes more at ease as the production progresses but still impresses with her warm powerful voice, she's convincingly masculine and expressive and she really shines in Ah! Si Pera, which was very moving while subdued. John Osborn shows himself to be a charismatic actor and sings very admirably, his vocal duel with Florez has to be heard to be believed.
For all the good things that the production had, it did have some disappointing things that let it down badly. The sets are very unappealingly barren with some rather primitive backdrops and the screen projections while striking don't serve much of a purpose and may go over some people's heads. Only the one in O Fiamma Soave worked somewhat. The lighting did at times give the production a rather gloomy look(with a notable exception being the final scene), which on occasions didn't make it easy to discern who was who. The costumes did fare better though, they were quite effective and the video directing is as good as ever. The staging also didn't really compel, apart from Tanti Affetti and O Fiamma Soave, the storytelling seemed even more static than the story already is, interactions are often aimless and stolid and some parts seemed confused and clumsy, really undermining the energy that was heard in the musical values.
Overall, is musically near-perfect with a magnificent performance from Di Donato but the unappealing visuals and uncompelling staging make the production a disappointing one and one of the weakest of the season. 6/10 Bethany Cox
La Donna Del Lago is not one of my favourites from Rossini like Il Barbiere Di Siviglia, La Cenerentola and William Tell are. Most of the music as ever with Rossini is lovely if only with a few show-stoppers with Tanti Affetti, O Fiamma Soave and some choral passages, but some of it is on the banal side and the story is rather static. With this production the slightly above average rating is for the musical values, which are almost perfection. The only disappointment for my tastes was Oren Gradus as Duglas, his singing is solid and with resonance and without being wobbly but a little underpowered at times. But it's the acting where Gradus disappoints, a large part of the problem is how ill-served he is by the staging, which characterises him as a callous brute and Gradus brings very little dimension to it.
The orchestral playing is marvellous, the tone is gleaming in beauty, the attention to balance is evident, the musicality and phrasing is expressive and there's plenty of elegant style. The chorus are beautifully balanced and don't sound too heavy for the music, though they are not given an awful lot of stage direction, a shame because the chorus have come a long way over-time and their personalities have become more individual but this is not as apparent here. Michele Mariotti's conducting is much more attentive and is crisper and livelier than in the Met's recent production of Il Barbiere Di Siviglia, where it was mostly good but inconsistent in places. Although Gradus disappointed the rest of the performances certainly do not.
Joyce Di Donato is the best thing about the production, a magnificent performance and one of the best performances I've seen from her. Her voice is rich and beautiful, as well as even from top to bottom with the plush low notes to the long-way-from-shrill high register, the florid passages always sounded like they come easy to her(and Rossini's music and passage-work is actually very difficult) and she's by far the best dramatically on stage(Di Donato always has been a great, communicative actress), acting with charm, nuance and joyous personality. Tanti Affetti was fantastic, and from personal opinion the only truly outstanding rendition of the night. Juan Diego Florez is a great match, he tries a little too hard on occasions but he is dashing, heroic and involved at least and his voice is as captivating as ever with its effortless high notes, honeyed tone and fearless-sounding passage-work. Daniela Barcellona becomes more at ease as the production progresses but still impresses with her warm powerful voice, she's convincingly masculine and expressive and she really shines in Ah! Si Pera, which was very moving while subdued. John Osborn shows himself to be a charismatic actor and sings very admirably, his vocal duel with Florez has to be heard to be believed.
For all the good things that the production had, it did have some disappointing things that let it down badly. The sets are very unappealingly barren with some rather primitive backdrops and the screen projections while striking don't serve much of a purpose and may go over some people's heads. Only the one in O Fiamma Soave worked somewhat. The lighting did at times give the production a rather gloomy look(with a notable exception being the final scene), which on occasions didn't make it easy to discern who was who. The costumes did fare better though, they were quite effective and the video directing is as good as ever. The staging also didn't really compel, apart from Tanti Affetti and O Fiamma Soave, the storytelling seemed even more static than the story already is, interactions are often aimless and stolid and some parts seemed confused and clumsy, really undermining the energy that was heard in the musical values.
Overall, is musically near-perfect with a magnificent performance from Di Donato but the unappealing visuals and uncompelling staging make the production a disappointing one and one of the weakest of the season. 6/10 Bethany Cox
See also
Awards | FAQ | User Ratings | External Reviews | Metacritic Reviews
