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Rating: Triumph for Iphigenie auf Tauris Closing the 35th Festival della Valle d'Itria
Gluck Strauss's Iphigenie auf Tauris triumphantly concluded the 35th Festival della Valle d'Itria last night in absolute beauty: after the inauguration entrusted to a controversial and debatable Orfeo, an extremely interesting Re Lear on a musicological level, less so on the empathic-emotional one, with the last opera we witnessed a true masterpiece: credit to the Artistic Director for having recovered from the "drawer" yet another unusual title which combined a truly first-rate expressive and musical power.
The foundation is Gluck's opera "Iphigenie en Tauris" staged in Paris in 1778, shortly followed by Pugliese Piccinni's version, "revised" by Strauss at the beginning of the 20th century (these operations were absolutely common - think of Wagner's rewrites for "Iphigenie en Aulide" - which today would make musicologists' and music philologists' hairs stand on end). Returning to the staging of this superb Iphigenie (performed for the first time in Italy), we can only speak well, indeed very well,
With a perfect interpretative harmony, favored by a sober direction that highlighted the proven acting skills of the individual interpreters, the duo of Orestes and Pylades confronted, representing the archetype of friendship par excellence (a similar case in myth is the Achilles-Patroclus pair) in confrontation with the "imposed" solitude of Iphigenia, and through the dramatic articulation of the "tragic mechanism" one witnessed the final resolution (the "untying" of the knot, the "recognition," the anagnorisis Aristotle spoke of).
The musical direction of Ramon Tebar was dry and precise, always attentive to the sound of the Orchestra in relation to what was happening on stage. Similarly, the direction of Oliver Kloeter, a worthy student of Karsen, together with the sober and functional scenes and the "minimalist" costumes by Darko Petrovic (both protagonists of the Mozart-Strauss Idomeneo staged at the Festival three years ago), favored the narrative and musical discourse, simplifying the situations to make them clear and immediately intelligible.
Indeed, the opera in Strauss's 20th-century version, performed for the first time in Italy, is in German: particular appreciation goes to all the interpreters for convincingly tackling such an arduous task: memorizing and interpreting long and complex parts in German. It was unfortunate that the program did not include an Italian translation of the libretto. Standing out among all was the trio of ‘Greeks': Orestes (the Chinese bass Liu Song-Hu), Pylades (the Italian tenor Marcello Nardis, already appreciated on the Valle d'Itria stage), and Iphigenia (the Russian Olga Ktlyarova). The arias filtered directly from the Gluckian model were wonderful: the wandering and hypnotic aria of Orestes, nobly sung by the baritone Song-Hu, with a noble and generous timbre (a welcome return to the Festival della Valle d'Itria) that revisits his memory and tragic guilt, the passionate and participative arias of Iphigenia sung by Russian soprano Olga Ktlyarova (including the beautiful closing aria of the first act "O du, die mich in Aulis Schuetzte"... Reminiscent of Callas...) and those of Pylades interpreted with touching emotion and absolute stylistic perfection by the young tenor Marcello Nardis.
Applause and repeated curtain calls for all the performers.
Bravo.
Truly bravo.
V. Raguso
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