United States Meyerbeer, Le prophète: Soloists, ‘Marche du Sacre’ Banda, Bard Festival Chorus, Dancers, Enfants, American Symphony Orchestra / Leon Botstein (conductor). Bard SummerScape, Fisher Center at Bard, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY, 4.8.2024. (RP)
Production:
Director – Christian Räth
Sets – Christian Räth and Daniel Unger
Costumes – Mattie Ullrich
Choreography – Catherine Galasso
Lighting – Rick Fisher
Projection – Elaine McCarthy
Chorus master – James Bagwell
Cast:
Jean de Leyde – Robert Watson
Fidès – Jennifer Feinstein
Berthe – Amina Edris
Jonas – Brian Vu
Mathisen – Wei Wu
Zacharie – Harold Wilson
Oberthal – Zachary Altman
Tenor Soloist – Rashard Deleston
Bass Soloist – Aaron Theno
If it were not for Leon Botstein and Bard Summerscape, just where would New Yorkers get their annual fix of opera rarities? Arguably, New York City Opera would once have claimed some of that turf. And, of course, Eve Queler, now in her nineties and present in the audience for this performance, made such neglected gems her domain with the Opera Orchestra of New York. But in 2024, there is only Botstein and Bard SummerScape in the game.
Meyerbeer’s Le prophète is this year’s offering. The Metropolitan Opera last staged it in 1977 with James McCracken, Marilyn Horne and Renata Scotto. Star tenors gravitate to the opera, and the Met also produced it for Enrico Caruso in 1918. The place to go to experience Le prophète in recent years has been Europe, but Botstein changed that trajectory with this gripping production.
The French libretto by Eugène Scribe and Émile Deschamps is loosely based on the life of the sixteenth-century Dutch Anabaptist leader, John of Leiden, or Jean de Leyde in French. His resemblance to a picture of King David in the cathedral is a sign that he has been chosen to establish a ‘Kingdom of God’ in Münster, Germany. Jean de Leyde becomes a prophet to his followers and an anathema to his foes.
The historical Jean de Leyde abandoned the pacifist tendencies of the Anabaptists and promoted a social agenda that would be considered progressive today. The sect’s embrace of polygamy went beyond the pale. After their downfall, these excesses made it open season on all Anabaptists for Catholics and Protestants alike.
Scribe and Deschamps’s libretto doesn’t dwell on such matters, but centers on Jean de Leyde’s messianic complex and his relationship with Berthe. That young woman was unfortunate to have caught the eye of Count Oberthal, who is eager to destroy Jean de Leyde and his Münster stronghold. The other central figure is Jean de Leyde’s mother, Fidès. To save her son, Fidès endures ignominy and betrayal, ultimately dying beside him as the walls of his palace crash down upon them. The role is said to have inspired Verdi in crafting the role of Azucena in Il trovatore.
Intrigue is key to the plot. One is never quite certain whether Jean is answering a divine calling or is a charlatan. The three Anabaptists, Jonas, Mathiesen and Zacharie, are scheming opportunists, willing to jettison Jean to save their skins. Fidès and Bertha both despise the Prophet, not knowing who he actually is. Once aware of his identity, a mother’s instinct was to forgive, while the zealotry of the young woman opts for destruction.
Director Christian Räth’s concept is simple and straightforward but powerful. The translation of the Bible into the vernacular during the Reformation opened the door for varying and sometimes radical interpretations of Holy Writ. The set drives this theme home.
Three enormous and richly bound French-language Bibles dominated the stage. Reconfigured and with imaginative lighting, they became a multiple of locales, including cathedrals, palaces and prisons. Single pages from the Bible, appropriately French translations of the ‘Apocalypse of Saint John’ or the ‘Book of Revelation’, also served as backdrops to the action.
Time was fluid in Räth’s staging. The men’s costumes tended towards stylized Medieval garb as seen in any number of blockbuster film series. Fidès and Bertha wore contemporary clothes. In the pivotal scene where Fidès recognizes the man who is about to be crowned king as her son, she is a lowly street person pushing a battered baby carriage and cradling a bundle of bloody rags. When reunited with Jean and Fidès, Berte is dressed as a commando with a bright red bomb in her kit.
Räth had a message or two to impart. The dangers of demagoguery are illustrated through historical footage of marching Fascist soldiers. Concerns over a dystopian future are expressed by the women of the chorus dressed as Handmaids, the fertile women turned into breeding stock in Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale. The opera itself speaks to religious fanatics.
Botstein assembled a fine cast for the production. Tenor Robert Watson had the vocal allure, including the uniquely French sound in his upper range, stamina and charisma required for Jean de Leyde. Watson’s voice had little spin or luster in the long-sustained notes that Meyerbeer demands of the tenor, but they are a test of endurance more than ability.
In the opening scene, Amina Edris sang Berthe’s enchanting aria, ‘Mon coeur s’élance et palpite’, with simplicity and charm. Reunited with Jennifer Feinstein’s Fidès, Edris’s Berthe was a woman intent on revenge with a blazing voice full of her color, depth and strength. Sparks flew whenever Edris and Feinstein joined their voices in the searing duet.
Fidès is not much of a presence in the opening scenes of the opera, but that changes once she recognizes her son as the detested Prophet. Meyerbeer gave her remarkable music to sing, and Feinstein was tremendous, demonstrating her vocal agility, impressive range and emotional honesty in Fidès’s two great arias, ‘Ah! mon fils, sois béni’ and ‘O toi qui m’abandonne’. She all but stopped the show with both.
The three Anabaptists were performed by tenor Brian Vu and basses Wei Wu and Harold Wilson. The latter was particularly impressive dramatically and vocally as Zacharie. Bass-baritone Zachary Altman was rich-voiced and appropriately despicable as Oberthal, Jean de Leyde’s rival in love and power.
Meyerbeer’s score is a wealth of gorgeous melodies and stirring musical and instrumental solos. His incorporation of Latin hymn tunes of his own creation, particularly ‘Ad nos ad salutarem’, adds authenticity as well as a sinister sense of the macabre to the drama. The trumpet solos in the Coronation March, like the role of Fidès, also caught Verdi’s attention, as is readily apparent from the Triumphal March in Aida. Members of the Princeton Brass Band, styled as the ‘Marche du Sacre’ Banda, added to the tonal impact of the march.
Botstein led orchestra, bands, chorus and soloists in a performance that bristled with energy and resonated with emotion. The opera is on the long side. Even though the ballet music was performed during intermissions in the lobby, the performance clocked in at well over four hours. Nonetheless, time stood still for those who love French grand opera with all its excesses and rewards.
Rick Perdian