When Opera Australia last performed Il Trovatore, nearly 10 years ago, it was in Elke Neidhardt’s Spanish Civil War-set production from 1999. It was time for a fresh look at Verdi’s astonishing middle-period drama of revenge.
Davide Livermore, for whom this is a fourth OA production in as many years after Aida (2018), Anna Bolena (2019) and Attila (2020), also sets the action during the Spanish Civil War although there the similarity ends. Neidhardt sought a real-world context for the traumatic events of the opera; Livermore dives into a metaphorical netherworld of fears, secrets, allegiances, superstitions and psychological scars. Above all there are memories and the need to be remembered. All these pulsate under the surface of the action – such as it is.
Elena Gabouri as Azucena with the OA Chorus, dancers and actors in Il Trovatore, Opera Australia, 2022. Photo © Keith Saunders
Il Trovatore is a hallucinatory work that concertinas time as it rushes headlong towards disaster with little regard for connecting tissue. The lack of an overture makes that clear from the start. There’s a brief musical introduction and then Ferrando, Count di Luna’s main man,...
Very penetrating and insightful review, thank you. Certainly reflected my experience of the production. I did find the tenor a little weak, a bit uneven in his delivery, and to me, he also sounded as if he had a bit of a throat issue. And overmuch emoting for my taste. But he was clearly a favourite with the rest of the audience, so I may have just been a bit picky, and unfamiliar with his style. And overall i thought the production was terrific.
Saw it last night. Whatever throat issues the tenor had were resolved and he was the BIG voice amongst big voices – ‘Di quella pira’ was complete & the high C full on and extended. The male chorus were superb and the other principals very good with one exception – pity about the soprano! A rather silly ending with Azucena slitting Di Luna’s throat – thus denying him a life time of guilt for having killed of ‘mio fratello’!