August 4th
The Indian Queen Received a Standing Ovation at the Salzburg Festival
Teodor Currentzis, Peter Sellars, the international cast of soloists, and the Utopia Orchestra and Choir presented Purcell’s semi-opera as a concert performance at the Felsenreitschule, one of the Salzburg Festival’s principal stages. The premiere has already got wide coverage in European media. Here’re some excerpts from recently published reviews:
— Conductor Teodor Currentzis is leading his Utopia Orchestra, which is playing mainly standing, and the singers of the wonderful Utopia Choir arranged in groups of voices, with extraordinary precision and differentiation, emphasizing all the contrasts of the work.
— The dynamic range is breathtaking, with the musicians and choristers sometimes pushing the boundaries of audibility in their explorations of the piano. With a historically informed approach to music-making, Utopia’s performance of Henry Purcell’s music is energetic yet transparent.
— Far tauter, more delicate and more potent was Currentzis’s conducting of Peter Sellars’s wrenching, decade-old completion of Purcell’s “The Indian Queen.” Utopia (…) performed with exquisite sensitivity. In a superb cast, the soprano Jeanine De Bique stood out with a voice and presence of unaffected directness.
— Quite likely the strongest scenic presence on stage was Teodor Currentzis’ conducting. While fussing every single note, Currentzis elicits extremely well-marked phrases with his Utopia Orchestra. (…) The spectacle was all very enjoyable, the music was great, and Sellars has wonderful political and visual sensibilities.
ORF:
— All the musicians in the orchestra and choir really manage to bewitch and absolutely enchant us; with Purcell’s help, Currentzis simply plunges into euphony, and in various forms either further enhances or reduces it.
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung:
— The choir sounded full, expansive in forte and reaching the limits of sounding breath in pianissimo, rather than the delicate chirping of an English boys’ choir. Nothing in the orchestra’s playing recalled the historically informed vegan sound; to be admired was a full, even lush, but never baroquely plush sound, achieved through precise entries and concise articulation.
— Currentzis is phenomenal. He is the only major conductor who works so enthusiastically, tirelessly, and makes Purcell, Rameau, Mozart, Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Stravinsky, and Berio sound magnificent — and this always turns into a flying movement, and, perhaps, even becomes a prayer. After all, the spiritual is very close to this conductor, he himself sometimes appears as a clergyperson in music.
— A wonderful ensemble of voices is composed primarily of the bright, sonorous, shining timbre of the soprano Dennis Orellana and of course Jeanine De Bique, perfectly conveying all the shades of sadness in the role of Teculihuatzin, doomed to suffering.
— It is obvious that at the origins of such energy — it could also be called an aura — there lies exceptionally scrupulous rehearsal work that does not miss a single detail.
APA:
— At the end of this intense journey of the senses, the audience did not remain on their seats for long before giving a standing ovation and cheering for several minutes, not only for the visibly moved Peter Sellars.