It's unclear why the title of the novel is hyphenated but the actual whale's name isn't. However, I'm glad to see that this opera version kept the hyphen intact. However, unfortunately, it got rid of the alternate title, so while if you say "hey, I just saw that opera, Moby-Dick," other people will say "cool, how was it?" if you say "hey, I just saw that opera, The Whale," these same people will say "what the heck are you talking about, you weirdo?" They'll think you sounded like a fool! It's a real shame.
Heggie is also the composer of Dead Man Walking, which is going to have its Met debut live in HD next season. That is, if anything ever happens again in this country. I just don't know anymore. The libretto to Dead Man Walking was written by the playwright Terrence McNally, who also suggested the idea for this opera and who also died of coronavirus last week. Ain't that a kick in the teeth.
Well, life goes on, for now, for some of us, so watching operas to relieve the tension is a good idea. This version of Moby-Dick is streamlined from the novel; obviously, there are no whale-biology sections, eg. It starts in media res, with the Pequod already at sea. It features most of the characters you'd expect: Ahab, Starbuck, Stubb, Flask, Queequeg, Pip the cabin-boy (a trouser role) and Ishmael--although for whatever reason, the latter is referred to only as "greenhorn" until the very end when he's talking to the (off-screen) captain of the Rachel who asks him his name and he says...well, you can guess. So that's a bit naff, but for the most part, the libretto does quite a good job of capturing that Melvillean spirit, although I was disappointed that it doesn't include Fedallah, the ominous Indian mystic, who, it seems, could've made for some good dramatic moments.
People are inevitably going to compare this to Billy Budd. It may not be entirely fair, but there's just no escaping it. There's certainly at least some Britten here. And, no, if we must compare, I suppose it doesn't quite live up to that one. It is awfully good, though! There are a lot of great dramatic arias; Ahab and Starbuck in particular seem to be great roles: indeed, the highlight here is probably a really beautiful duet between the two of them rhapsodizing about their wives and children back in Nantucket; Ahab is almost persuaded to turn the ship around, but then the whale appears and everyone goes to hell. Dramatically. This San Francisco Opera production has a lot of great ocean effects that I'm not entirely sure how they pulled off. Also, Ahab really appears to be missing a leg; I suppose it's his lower leg is just bent all the way back and tied behind him--that must be annoying--but whatever it is, it works very well.
Ahab here is played by Jay Hunter Morris, the smalltown Texas boy who sounds like the sweetest guy ever in interviews, eternally unable to believe his luck that he gets to be an opera singer. He played Siegfried in the Met's Live in HD ring performances. It's kind of amazing: Siegfried was recorded in November of 2011, Götterdämmerung in February of 2012, and then this in I think October 2012: so less than a year between playing a seventeen-year-old kid and a fifty-eight-year-old sea captain. He was in his late forties at the time, and it works at least in large part just because of how his hair was dyed in the former role: sure, he didn't quite look like a teenager, willing suspension of disbelief and all, but closer than you might think. And then, here, he's really fantastic as Ahab, nailing both the madness and the introspective moments. Morgan Smith--not exactly a household name--is also a highlight as Starbuck.
It's really hard, obviously, to say what new operas will have enduring popularity and which ones will just fade away. Let's face it, even if I like them, most of the ones you see on Operavision are probably in the latter category, but this seems likely to stick around. I mean, as long as the performing arts stick around, period, which length is never quite clear. But let's try to be optimistic, for god's sake.
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