So what’s the opera like in Albania?
OperaAn exclusive report from Jonathan Sutherland:
The Opera House, built during the Hoxha dictatorship, has a Communist-bunker feel about it. The acoustics were thin, dry and totally devoid of resonance. Public areas are non-existent and the only bar is located in the Opera Cafe next door.
The orchestra consisted of fewer than 50 players in the pit, including 6 first violins and only 2 contrabasses. The singing diction was poor. It took me 15 minutes into Act 1 to realise they were actually singing Sannt-Saens Samson et Dalila in the original French.
There were surtitles in Albanian for those who didn’t speak French and surtitles in French for French speakers who couldn’t understand a word. The staging was minimal – to put it kindly. Six wobbly Stonehenge-ish monoliths comprised the entire three act mis-en-scène with small additions of a future fornicating bed for Dalila in Act 2 and some steps in Act 3.
The director decided to minimalize textual fidelity. Rather than slaying Abimélech with his own sword, the indominatable Israelite merely renders the smarmy Satrap inanimate with a fatal nudge on the shoulder. There were no nefarious Philistines lurking behind Dalila’s bedroom to give the horny hero a buzzcut and blinding. Samson simply walked out of Dalilas bedroom and came back in Act 3 with a coupe
balkanique and raccoon eyes. Instead of a small boy leading Samson to the pillars as specified in the libretto, two Philistine soldiers tie him to two sides of the temple, enabling the one-man wrecking ball to wreak havoc. The Spring-loving priestesses of Dagon seemed as miserable as the enslaved Hebrews. The orgiastic Bacchanal had the eroticism of a Sunday afternoon barn dance in an old folks home. There were no programmes so the names of the singers remain a mystery.
The extremely tall Samson had an interesting timbre strongly reminiscent of Luciano Pavarotti but with serious technical shortcomings. Anything softer than mezzo-forte became ugly and swallowed but the top B-flats were clarion. One hopes a work in progress. At the conclusion, the audience rose (almost) as one in a standing ovation. One wonders how they would react to a semi-decent performance.
I don’t think you should look down your nose at this as it is probably the best they can do given the governments shortcomings and a poor performance is beter than nothing at all. Isn’t it?
My feeling entirely. Any opera performance is better than no opera performance.
Point taken Elizabeth.
My criticism was more against the failings of the director which has nothing to do with limited funding.
Surely it is not too difficult to follow the extremely clear directions in the libretto?
Hang on a minute! Why criticise well meaning Albanians? Virtually all of western opera productions that I read about ditch the composers instructions replacing them with the producers’ ideas. I think it was Walter Legge who described their efforts as graffiti.
My criticism was not directed so much against Albanians as the director Paul-Émile Fourny who is Belgian.
Walter Legge’s comment was against the American director Peter Sellars.
The full quote was that his productions are ‘like throwing shit over the Mona Lisa’.
Besides, from what is described, the staging looks no worse than the excesses of Regieoper that are de rigueur.
And lets’ not forget that, even in these conditions, Albania gave a few world class singers: Ermonela Jaho, Saimir Pirgu, and Enkelejda Shkosa.
I also think the reporter is being unnecessarily snarky. Albania only has a population of 2.8 million and has nevertheless provided international opera stages with at least three singers that I can think of.
As I replied to Elizabeth, my criticism was principally directed against the director Paul-Émile Fourny.
I am a great admirer of Jaho and Saimir Pirgu whom I have heard many times.
I take your point Jonathan. Nothing worse than an inept director or one trying to make a name for himself.
The opera singer in the movie “The 5th element” was a top class opera singer from Albania -look it up!
Interesting results if you search for Jonathan Sutherland. I hope it’s not the same person (although that would explain a lot)
Hahahha critics at it again..
Obviously a country with a rich history in classical music and world renowned for its arts funding is expected to put on a great opera right? I wonder if the guy walked a bit through the city, read even a couple of pages of its history, its people and the religion. The fact that there is an opera house and that there are people going is already great! One does best with what he has. Im sure it improved a lot in the last decades and will only improve. Dont like putting labels like this but this is obviously a work of an old white westerner thinking they know best:)
This comment is big on unfounded assumptions and very short on fact.
Have you ever been to the opera in Tirana to attest “it improved a lot in the last decades?”
As for the ageist, reverse racist sneer, would you prefer to read a review by an adolescent Asian who never saw an opera before?
Having attended literally hundreds of opera peformnces for more than 50 years in 5 continents, I beg to claim the advantage of experience.
To paraphrase George Orwell, “all opinions are equal, but some are more equal than others”.
Most opera orchestra pits are depressingly small. The statistics you mentioned are not rare at all around Europe.
One could point out that tickets to the Tirana Opera cost about 10 Euros ….
I’ll bet they don’t stage “Cosi” very often.
BUT at least opera is being performed! And, when the money is there, standards will rise…. It’s easy to sneer!
I saw Fidelio in Tirana at least 15 years ago. The production in the same building as pictured above with an orchestra was sponsored by the German Embassy. I really enjoyed it because I wasn’t expected to see any concert at all!
Dear mr.Sutherland,
Yes i would prefer an asian (wonderful how after criticising me for racism you pull a trick out of your pocket) that does not want to show that he knows what a great opera is and doesnt need to show some useless knowledge in a post about an albanian opera. You dont mention yourself that you went before and that the standard has not improved, which i am 100% sure it has, as in any country that didnt have a classical music tradition and also had no conservatory until relatively recently as well as little audience.
I find it great also how you sneer on the audience for standing up(showing their love and appreciation for the artists) yet you seem to decline the elitist label i gave you.
To paraphrase pretty much any composer and most musicians ‘who gives a f*ck what critics think’ 🙂
Oh really?
Perhaps you can explain to me why agents, promoters, concert halls and opera houses feature favourable reviews so prominently.
I suggest you read some of the critiques by Andrew Porter, Rodney Milnes or Joahcim Kaiser.
You might learn something.
*Joachim.
There’s a tremendous amount of confusion going on in these comments. First of all, the reviewer is entitled to express his opinions of the performance that he saw. A review should be primarily objective, less so subjective, though there will always be subjectivity in the assessment of any human endeavor and particularly in the arts. But the people who take the viewpoint that, ‘these poor Albanians don’t know any better and this is the best they can do,’ seem to me to be the ones who are actually the elitists. We live in an age when all things are to be considered of equal merit, standards are anathema and nothing should be considered better than anything else. Hogwash. Good performances are just that, likewise mediocre and terrible ones. And the assertion that a poor performance is better than no performance could only be made by people who don’t actually know the difference between a good one and a bad one. Truly skilled and dedicated musicians will know that you should present that which you can do at least reasonably well. Maybe Samson isn’t the right vehicle for you, but likely there are vehicles which would allow you to present something which might actually be quite fine or in any case more credible. But if in fact the Emporer is under dressed, let’s have the courage – and the charity – to acknowledge that.