{TABLE} La traviata ................ Verdi {/TABLE} THE Traviata seen at the National Concert Hall last night was Lyric Opera Productions' first full length opera at this venue. The members of the Cantabile Chorus were on raised seats at the back of the stage, in front of them sat the Orchestra of St Cecilia. Between the conductor, Albert Rosen, and the audience was the small acting space, with some furniture, as required.
It's not the best of layouts for getting just balances or precise co ordination between singers and orchestra. There's a touch of the faintly ridiculous in seeing a conductor going through the motions of turning to his left for a visual cue from a singer on the opposite side of the stage. And, if the shocking array of intonational problems to be heard last night is anything to judge by, the arrangement doesn't provide sufficient across the stage audibility for security of pitching.
Disagreement about pitch was one of the evening's major problems and lack of rhythmic co ordination was another. Whatever the reason, it was too often the case that orchestra and singers were not quite together, nor did it seem that the singers were always entirely comfortable with the speeds being set by the conductor.
If you could ignore the problems already outlined, there was an eye catching and vocally resourceful Violetta from the Australian soprano Cheryl Barker, and a similarly non Italianate, more self consciously musicianly Rodolfo from the Mexican tenor Raphael Rojas. Peter McBrien's Germont, however, seemed world weary, almost to the point of being beyond worrying about his actual notes. The smaller roles were generally poorly taken, the exceptions, being the Baron Douphol of Eugene Armstrong and the Doctor Grenvil of Nyle P. Wolfe.
The Cantabile Chorus sang with more enthusiasm than finesse and the stage direction by Vivian Coates was rudimentary. Such, however, appears to be the thirst for Traviata that the evening was given a rousing reception, leaving this listener feeling at the end as much an outsider as a teetotaller at the final stages of a long and beery party.
