Ziggy de Voight: Nostradamus
Libretto: Jackson
B. Sutcliffe
(world premiere performance sung in English)
Timothy Du Fore (baritone) - Nostradamus
Kathryn McCusker (soprano) -
Marie
Andrew Foote (baritone) - Carlos Valorgue
David Hamilton (tenor) -
Thomas
Rosemary Barr (actor) - Madame Gautier
Andrew Moran (bass) -
Plumeaux
Robert van Mackelenberg (actor) - Narrator
West Australian Opera Chorus and Augmenting Chorus
West Australian
Symphony Orchestra
David Stanhope (conductor)
Saturday June 29 2002
Perth Concert Hall, Perth
Produced
by the West Australian Opera and the Eastman Group
Nostradamus is a brand new work, described by the producers
as a "musical drama" of an "operatic quality", which received its premiere and
only performance (to date) in concert on 29 June. Its authors came shrouded in a
certain level of mystery: composer Ziggy de Voight turned out to be Dawn
Eastman, the wife of producer Brian Eastman; the book is by Jackson B.
Sutcliffe, another nom de plume, this one for a certain Brian Dawson. It
is a sizeable work, running some two and a half hours and calling for a large
choir and equally large orchestra.
Little is known of the protagonist's actual life, and so, as the authors put it, "in the absence of biographical fact, we have written our own story." It is hard to assess what this actually means, since the tale told is quite simple. Nostradamus becomes a doctor, marries a Jewish woman, dabbles in prophecy, goes to Paris and predicts the death of the king, is taken up by the queen, has to contend with an enemy (Carlos Horlogue) who had been a suitor for his wife's hand and has some connection with the Inquisition, loses his wife to the plague, and rises above all this to become a Great Prophet.
This story is told through several "musical numbers," some bearing forward the narrative and others providing ambience and local color, such as a jolly Carnavale sung by "villagers," and "Let the wine flow" which probably speaks for itself; a bawdy court lady, Madame Gautier, is introduced (singing "Be my entrée") for comic relief. After a small hint of dissonance in the opening chords, the music is unfailingly melodic, and in terms of genre, probably leans more toward the "Broadway" side than the "opera" side of the blend of which the score is said to consist. The Director's Note in the program mentions Bernstein, Loesser, Sondheim and Les Miserables, and all these influences can be detected. There are also occasional hints of Berlioz, Puccini (one phrase in particular seemed to have been lifted from Tosca almost intact) and Prokofiev, as well as an almost straight crib, er, quotation from Ravel's Bolero. In terms of writing for individual voices and the chorus, the music is varied and suited to the various moods and events, and much of it is catchy and pleasing in itself.
The orchestration, made by David Stanhope from de Voight's piano score, would appear to reflect the conductor's particular interest and expertise in winds and brass. Almost every number, whether slow or fast, extrovert or introspective, for single voice or entire chorus, and whether or not it began piano, ended up fortissimo with swelling strings, the aforementioned winds and brass and three percussionists all contributing to a massive climax (if not several in one number). Furthermore, the whole thing was amplified — just why is another mystery, as the acoustics in the Perth Concert Hall are not at all bad, but it certainly made for a noisy night.
The lyrics left no cliché unturned, helped along by borrowings from, among others, Dickens ("it was the best of times") and Shakespeare ("the seeds of time"). There was watching like a hawk, descending like a flock or ravens, the "man they now knew as Nostradamus", "I can see tomorrow, he can see tomorrow", "something just died inside me", "someone will pay a price for this", "he had lost much but gained even more" and so on. At one point Marie, having been turned in to the Inquisition by Carlos, is locked up in a prison; in an adjoining cell, three crones sang something about being "locked up with buggers and shits," after which the lyrics turned vulgar. For all the notion that it was telling us something about prophets and prophecies, Nostradamus basically played as a melodrama.
With but two exceptions (both of whom are mainstream dramatic actors), the soloists are all regulars in operatic performance in Perth, and they were done no favors by the amplification. Kathryn McCusker in particular seems to be suffering from a widened vibrato of late, and the microphone elevated this to alarming proportions, also lending an unpleasant metallic tone to her upper notes. The men fared better, but all suffered from that directionless bland effect produced by amplifying operatic singers. Rosemary Barr (Madame Gautier) proved to be a fine Broadway belter, and charismatic actor Robert van Mackelenberg turned in a suave performance as the narrator (here Nostradamus' father-in-law) who helps us understand what's going on.
The capacity crowd seemed to love it: there was a standing ovation at the
end. Whether Nostradamus will reappear in a fully-staged performance
anywhere is anyone's guess, but it probably has the capacity to attract a crowd
looking for a nice night's entertainment, if not a particularly subtle
one.
