A Singer’s Life Pt4
Britten in France
I found myself in Rouen, cast as Peachum in Britten’s version of The Beggar’s Opera. Rouen is a lovely old city on the banks of the Seine, with a famous cathedral. It was the seat of the Exchequer of Normandy in the Middle Ages and was one of the largest and most prosperous cities in Mediaeval Europe. During the 100 Years War, it was the main Headquarters of the English Army, and, in 1431, was the location for the trial on charges of heresy and eventual execution by burning at the stake of Joan of Arc. The cathedral was often painted by Claude Monet, who lived at Giverny, some 45 miles upstream, and is one of the great French Gothic cathedrals.
The Opera de Rouen-Normandie had assembled a largely English-speaking cast, the usual collection of Brits, Americans and Scandinavians. The production was not too weird, but again, as in Nantes, the (different) French director had, as his assistant, his girlfriend, and she, like her compatriot in Brittany, was tasked with teaching the chorus how to sing in English. As in Peter Grimes, there is a lot of chorus, and the folly of trying to coach them in what is already archaic English was beyond this lady.
Premiered in 1728, and adapted in 1948 by Benjamin Britten with new harmonisations and arrangements of pre-existing tunes, the libretto was originally by John Gay, with additional dialogue by Tyrone Guthrie. Britten’s version, as usual, starred Peter Pears as Macheath. Brecht and Weill had 20 years earlier, for the 200th year anniversary, famously produced a German version, Die Dreigroschenoper (the Threepenny Opera) with the famous song, Mack the Knife, as its highlight.
Britten kept much more to the 18th century original, and that was what we performed in Rouen. I can’t really remember much about the rehearsals and performances, other than that I objected several times to what the director was doing, and fought a sort of phoney war with him throughout, to try to keep a semblance of clear English on stage. Sadly, the girlfriend had control over the chorus to the extent that their singing could have been in Swahili, and the nadir came with the line “but we are only interlopers here.” It came out as “buit, we err onnly anter-low-pers ere” with stress on “pers”.
The huge upside was the lovely town, the very jolly cast (my discovery over 40 years is that the more British and Scandinavian singers there are in a cast, the more fun is had on and off stage), and the fact that one can easily reach Giverny, Chateau Gaillard (a fabulous mediaeval castle overlooking the Seine) and the Normandy coast from Rouen.
Several years later I found myself at the Theatre de la Monnaie in Brussels, which had become something of a home base for me, in a production of Peter Grimes that I had heard about for years from my old friend Ian Caley, who regularly sang Bob Boles in it. It premiered at the Monnaie in 1994 and has travelled the world, including two revivals at Covent Garden. The director was the German Willy Decker, and although it was very different from the usual British production, it was brilliantly conceived and looked spectacular. This time I sang Carter Hobson, the bluff character who acts as a delivery man for the Borough. It is not a huge singing role, but he has to summon the town for a potential lynching of Peter Grimes in the second act, beating a drum in very clear rhythms, specified in the score by Britten. I was directly coached in drumming technique by the General Director of the theatre, a fine organist in his own right, and an opera administrator who is really knowledgable about music. The added excitement in this production is that the set was on a huge slope (rake) which turns on an axle during the summoning scene into a veritable precipice. Hobson has to lead the cast and chorus up and over this slope, drumming in rhythm the while, a manoeuvre I could achieve then but not now! I attach a photo of the beginning of the scene.
We had assembled a world class cast, conducted by a fine Japanese maestro. Unfortunately, his English was rudimentary, and his French only slightly better, so the rehearsals lasted a long time whilst translations took place, and we also felt that his understanding of the text was scanty. However, he was a very efficient conductor technically, and the performances were excellent. Towards the end of rehearsals, the singer engaged to sing Peter Grimes left the production for some reason, and Ian and I were delighted when our old friend from Scottish Opera days, Mike Myers, turned up to take over. Mike had sung the Duke in Rigoletto at Scottish when I had sung Monterone, and was both a fabulous singer and a great guy. Cue much merriment and wining and dining, especially as the show carried on to Bilbao in Spain. I had been in Bilbao in the mid-70s with my university choir and remembered a dreary coal mining town. By the time we got there for Grimes, it had been transformed by the building of the Guggenheim Museum and various pieces of urban renewal, into a splendid town in which to spend some time. We did it proud!
A Midsummer Night’s Dream in Aix and Beijing, and Peter Grimes in Monte Carlo will follow next week.
