There was no room for the elephants

Enrique Sacau

viernes, 25 de noviembre de 2016

San Francisco, sábado, 5 de noviembre de 2016.

San Francisco Opera. Aida. Libretto by Antonio Ghislanzoni and music by Giuseppe Verdi. Francesca Zambello, Director. E. Loren Meeker, Associate director. RETNA, Artistic designer. Michael Yeargan, Set designer. Anita Yavich, Costume designer. Mark McCullough, Lighting designer. Jessica Lang, Choreographer. Clifton Brown, Associate choreographer. Brian Jagde (Radames), Raymon Aceto (Ramfis), Ekaterina Semenchuk (Amneris), Leah Crocetto (Aida), Anthony Reed (King of Egypt), Pene Pati (A messenger), Toni Marie Palmertree (A priestess), Rachel Little and Jekyns Peláez (Solo dancers), George Gagnidze (Amonasro). Orchestra & Chorus of the San Francisco Opera. Ian Robertson, Chorus director. Nicola Luisotti, Conductor. San Francisco Opera co-production with Washington National Opera, Seattle Opera and Minnesota Opera.

Giuseppe Verdi's Aida is fiendishly difficult to stage. Directors face many tough choices: to make room (or not) for its Egyptian context in its various architectural and zoomorphic manifestations; to stick (or not) with setting the action in the past (either real or mythological); to focus (or not) on the political dimension of the drama and, if so, how to manage to leave space for the three main characters. It's not any easier to figure out what to do with several musical passages: to dance or not to dance, that is the question.

Complex though it is, directors are expected to take a view and stick with it. Nowadays, their function is to help us understand the opera. This task doesn't entail the search for some hidden "truth" known to the composer and the librettist - in fact, they're increasingly given plenty of leeway to invent and…

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