Germany Handel, Messiah: Soloists, Choral Soloists and Project Chorus of the Komische Oper, Orchestra of the Komische Oper / George Petrou (conductor). Hangar 4, Tempelhof Airport, Berlin, 21.9.2024. (MB)
Production:
Director – Damiano Michieletto
Set designs – Paolo Fantin
Costumes – Klaus Bruns
Choreography, Co-director – Thomas Wilhelm
Dramaturgy – Mattia Palma, Daniel Andrés Eberhard
Chorus director – David Cavelius
Cast:
Soprano – Julia Grüter
Mezzo-soprano – Rachael Wilson
Tenor – Julian Behr
Bass – Tijl Faveyts
Woman – Anouk Elias
Many of Handel’s dramatic oratorios seem to cry out for staging, although they present certain difficulties in doing so, above all regarding how to direct the chorus. Messiah is, of course, a different beast: contemplative rather than dramatic, without real characters, and so on. It also needs little ‘help’, so familiar is it both to audiences and performers, even in an age that has long since turned away from choral society performance for much Handel. It does receive stagings from time to time, though. ENO’s 2009 effort, unintentionally comical at times – film of people running up and down a Liverpool Street escalator for ‘All we, like sheep’ – did not augur well. That, however, need not damn other attempts, and given the success of the Komische Oper’s season-opening staging of Henze’s Raft of the Medusa (review here) last year at Tempelhof, I was keen to see what similarly augmented forces, including a community choir, might make of Messias, as it was billed, albeit sung in English.
Musically and from the standpoint of the occasion, there was indeed much to admire. The community chorus and extras all did very well; there was little, if anything, to hear that would have suggested these were not professional singers. It was moreover, a welcome and excellent thing, in these days of Messiah parsimony, to see and hear a performance that built on rather than childishly rejected the great oratorio tradition of the later-eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, without going to Crystal Palace extremes (fascinating though that would have doubtless have been to experience). The point is not, of course, that any one way is ‘correct’ and other ways ‘incorrect’; such categories have nothing to do with performance, let alone with humanity. But that there should be room for all, or at least for many, is a good thing to be celebrated, and the experience ‘on location’ at Tempelhof was a splendid one, which will likewise surely have attracted many more in the audience than would have attended an opera house performance. This first night appeared to be sold out; there is no reason to think that others will not be.
The soloists too were excellent, the presence of a variety of light accents (yet perfect English) only a reminder of the universality of the work and, of course, of Handel’s own ‘dual nationality’, as we now might call it. (That his English naturalisation required an Act of Parliament should offer a standing rebuke to all those who have put, and continue to put, barriers in the way of free movement of fellow human beings. Musicians and academics know this as well as many.) The quartet worked well together, vocally and on ‘stage’, whether singing alone or (occasionally) duetting. Julia Grüters finely spun soprano line and Rachael Wilson’s richly coloured mezzo-soprano offered character (in the non-dramatic sense) and contrast, as well as much textual illumination. So too did the effortlessly stylish tenor Julian Behr, imploring and resolute as required, and bass Tijl Faveyts, warmly compassionate yet precise. Joined by the astonishingly athletic actor Anouk Elias – more than one lap of the vast performing space accomplished with ease – cast and choral collaborators made for a fine team. In such a space, one simply has to tolerate the use of microphones; it is, as they say, what it is.
The Orchestra of the Komische Oper offered warm, stylish playing too. I could not help but feel that conductor George Petrou missed at least a couple of tricks in not using larger forces. The very small ensemble (even by contemporary standards) was vastly outnumbered by the singers: a practice with little, if any, historical warrant and which made little sense in an airport hangar. He might even have gone for ‘additional accompaniments’, be they Mozart, Prout, or (one can dream) Beecham. Moreover, some choral tempi went simply too fast for the assembled forces, causing noticeable, avoidable discrepancy. That said, despite an overture that suggested Petrou wished the performance to be over before it had begun, other tempo decisions were more sensible, permitting creditable variety, without becoming sluggish. There is no single text for the work; here, Petrou (I presume) offered a winning combination of familiar and (slightly) less familiar numbers. The great closing choruses to the second and third parts evinced proper Handelian grandeur and uplift, although not of the physical variety in the ‘Hallelujah’ chorus, which this Englishman abroad rather missed. And we were spared, thank goodness, the ‘B’ section of ‘The Trumpet shall sound’.
Damiano Michieletto’s production concept was doubtless well-intentioned. In a sense, that was the problem. I am not sure it ultimately worked any better than Deborah Warner’s hazy notion of ‘community’ for ENO, but Michieletto’s choice was one of those frustrating things that almost puts itself beyond criticism on account of sensitive content. Meshing Messiah with the story of Brittany Maynard, an American campaigner for assisted suicide, did not for me accomplish anything much either for her story – doubtless worthy of dramatic treatment in its own right – or for that of the Son of God. It made me aware of Maynard’s plight, but beyond that sentimental voiceovers, scenes of hospital scans, and perhaps worst, ‘Christian’ campaigners (no others, be it noted) against her cause seemed straightforwardly out of place.
Messiah may not be a dramatic oratorio, but it certainly has a narrative; paying at least some attention to that would not seem an unreasonable place to start in staging it. Moreover, the relative latitudinarianism of its theology stands miles away from the heartless fundamentalism of the American ‘religious right’, which in any case has little influence here in Europe. Adopting so hostile an attitude towards Christianity, as if it were not as multivalent as humanity itself, is not only all too easy a path in a secular, liberal society; it also sells Handel, Charles Jennens, and the extraordinarily rich performing history of their work miserably short. Quite why it began to rain at the end, the chorus having changed into plant-like green, I do not know, though the message of resurrection in general sat oddly with Michieletto’s concept. Such is the strength of Messiah, though, that many proper and possible messages could nonetheless be heard and felt.
Mark Berry