Glyndebourne festival Poliuto – review

A war between old gods and new, the destruction of idols, a faith so potent it drives its disciples to willing martyrdom or wilful suicide. These are the essential elements of Donizetti’s tragedy Poliuto, the opening event of the Glyndebourne festival 2015 and the first professional UK staging. The work could hardly be more timely. The events described take place in third-century Armenia during the Roman empire. Around this time the monumental arch, the iconic news image used to depict the threatened ancient Syrian city of Palmyra, was built. The point need not be laboured.

Glyndebourne, that most bucolic of opera festivals where sheep safely graze and singers have time and space to rehearse properly, might reasonably have thought they were broadening the canon, acknowledging the growing enthusiasm for Donizetti’s lesser-known works and giving a platform for two of the most challenging vocal roles in the repertoire, made famous in a 1960 live recording by two megastars of the past, Maria Callas and Franco Corelli, but not widely known today.

Indeed they were. Yet the work’s uncanny relevance – operatically enriched with an inter-faith love triangle and a bigoted father willing to betray his daughter — struck a sober note on an otherwise spirited opening night. The sun shone. The thoroughly revamped gardens were in full bloom. The septuagenarian German artist Georg Baselitz was present for the opening of a small exhibition of his work in the elegant temporary pavilion, part of a new three-year collaboration between Glyndebourne and White Cube.

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One year after the death of its long-time chairman and guiding spirit, George Christie, Glyndebourne is embracing the future in style. Nor does it shy from adventure. The other new productions this season – Mozart’s Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Handel’s oratorio Saul and, moving to the main stage from the tour, Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia – are far from obvious choices. Even bolstered by revivals of Carmen and the delicious Laurent Pelly Ravel double bill, the box office may struggle, if not suffer.

It’s impossible to ignore some of the background to Poliuto, dating from roughly halfway through Donizetti’s career. He wrote some 70 operas and maintained impressive standards. Little wonder “new” ones continue to appear each year. (English Touring Opera has two rarities on the road right now.) Poliuto was based on Corneille’s 1642 tragedy, Polyeucte. The Christian martyr of the title is thrown to the lions to the delight of baying crowds. The religious element caused disquiet in Naples: the opera was banned before its 1838 premiere. Donizetti fled to Paris and expanded the piece into his first French grand opera, Les Martyrs, a brilliant recording of which was released earlier this month by Opera Rara, conducted by Mark Elder. So the story of poor St Polyeuctus, having been all but eclipsed for centuries, is suddenly common knowledge.

Musical standards, under the baton of Enrique Mazzola, were outstanding with tip-top playing from the London Philharmonic Orchestra (including a particularly lovely clarinet solo) and a trio of world-class young singers to the fore. The American tenor Michael Fabiano, in the title role, has a thrilling, vibrant tone, fearless in top notes, powerful in the middle and subtly expressive even when, as often with Donizetti, the emotional colours tend towards the downright obvious. Fabiano won overnight fame as a late stand-in at the New York Met’s Bohème last year. Catch him in Eugene Onegin at the Royal Opera House in December.

The Puerto Rican soprano Ana María Martínez, contradicts her all too prim appearance in Jackie Kennedy-ish frock with matching white handbag, shoes and cardigan, as the troubled, impassioned Paolina. The hero’s dutiful wife is still in love with Severo, whom she thinks dead but who turns out not to be. Big trouble scenario. Paolina was Callas’s role. The Greek diva and the Latin Martínez share some qualities including a dark, dusky chest voice and pinging coloratura, as well as a passing physical resemblance. The radiant-toned Russian baritone Igor Golovatenko excelled as Severo, every word clear. The ever impressive British bass Matthew Rose as Callistene, high priest of Jupiter, led the assured supporting cast. In a score that slips between showpiece aria and grand, Verdi-like ensemble, the chorus deserves special praise.

There was a low point. The production, by Mariame Clément, with designs by Julia Hansen, is weak to the point of boredom. Whether in catacomb, home or wood, all is overwhelmed by big grey blocks that move back and forth without discernible logic. In the programme book, Clément refers to a work by the leading video artist Anri Sala, in which people dash across the street in Sarajevo during the siege.

This is replicated during the prelude and boded well, but that initial energy soon petered out. Looking at unvaried grey and a near empty stage for some two hours (the opera is short) does nothing to help Donizetti’s music, which needs the oxygen and particularity of a strong production to release it from formulaic bel canto tendencies. Literal reference to current events can be equally clumsy and misplaced but here was a work crying out for at least a hint of a concept to match vivid libretto and score. Urban dreary, with a touch of cliched Italian fascism for the Roman oppressors, doesn’t do it. Go for the irresistible singing. Together with all Glyndebourne’s other charms, it’s well worth the detour and a chance to go if you’ve never been: there are still tickets. As for lions? Lost in abstraction.