Credit: Music Academy of the West
By Hillary Hauser
The Music Academy of the West stages operas every summer as one of the highlights of its season and with Marilyn Horne at the helm of the Academy’s stellar voice and vocal piano faculty, the productions get more spectacular each year – so much so that Academy productions are being listed alongside international opera companies.
Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro, presented August 3rd and August 5th at Santa Barbara's Granada Theatre is no light undertaking. Lasting three and a half hours, the singing, playing and energy output
require Wagnerian strength and stamina, of which this cast and ensemble never let down. James Conlon, renowned conductor who is Music Director of the Los Angeles Opera and Principal Conductor of Italy’s RAI National Symphony, made his Music Academy debut, leading the Academy Festival Orchestra in an interpretation that soared and sizzled.
Under James Darrah’s direction, the stage setting was sparse, modern and scattered with chairs, desks and a mattress to hide behind or under. There was even a window to jump out of and a clothes box to hide in, during some of the opera’s more comical moments.
The plot is very convoluted; however we can thank Maestro Conlon for providing the audience with his own printed notes about how the churning wheel was set into motion by the “practice, use and abuse of the feudal droit du seigneur – or right of the lord of the manor to sleep with any women in his domain on the night of her wedding or to demand a monetary or material recompense to waive his prerogative.”
Simply put: advantaged men took advantage of “unprivileged women” and as Conlon observes, Mozart loved women and the rights of women – long before the #MeToo movement began. This opera shows Mozart at his best and most comical, of which he mixes into a big musical salad bowl brilliant solo arias, duets, trios, quartets, septets and chorales that are spun into a framework of Lozenzo da Ponte’s storyline of love intrigues, scheming women in disguise, confused men, mistaken identities and tricks aplenty. In the end, a peaceful resolution and powerful statement about class equality and the rights of women are achieved.
The Academy’s Fellows put on a stunning display of singing. We should keep an eye on soprano Rebecca Farley, who as Countess Almaviva, sang in the third act Dove sono (Where are the beautiful moments) – one of Mozart’s greatest arias in which she poignantly recalls her past happiness and love with the Count. Farley received sustained applause for this performance, which was so well deserved that other venues might have demanded an on-stage encore.
Bass-baritone Lawson Anderson was a commanding Figaro, who in the first act sets up the romantic mish-mash in the aria Se vuol ballare (If he wants to dance) – his reaction to being told by his bride to be and ultimate love Susanna that Count Almaviva plans to revive the ancient right of priority which masters had over bridegrooms on their wedding night. Figaro (Anderson) then assesses the situation and powerfully delivers with a sense of masterful scheming the aria that initiates the plot’s unraveling.
Baritone Benjamin Dickerson, winner of the Music Academy’s 2015 Marilyn Horne Song Competition, gave an account of Count Almaviva that was cushioned in deep and dark richness. He skillfully brought out the torment and corruption of an incorrigible philanderer in the aria Vedro, mentri’io sospiro - a vow that states his servant Figaro can’t be happy if he is not.
Weaving throughout this comedy of errors is Susanna, sung by Adelaide Boedecker with an immense sense of feeling, tenderness, mockery, irony, gaiety, anger and pathos. Nearing the final scene, her clear and joyous rendition of Deh viene, non tardar (Oh come, do not delay) is intended for Figaro, while the scurrilous Count thinks it’s for him.
It’s a dandy scene whose meaning confounds even music historians who often miss the fact that the love and ardor of this piece may start out for one person but eventually lands on the true lover. All of which proves that Mozart’s comedy of errors lives on.
Hillary Hauser is the founder and Executive Director of Heal the Ocean in Santa Barbara. She has written numerous books and articles about underwater adventures for publications such as National Geographic, Reader’s Digest, Skin Diver Magazine and the Los Angeles Times. She served as classical music critic for the Santa Barbara News-Press and in 2000, co-created the Tavros Records label.