BERLIOZ : BEATRICE ET BENEDICT

Radio New Zealand Concert network
Sunday 19th of July 2009 at 3 - 5.10 pm

INTRODUCTION
(Wikipedia, with links to the libretto)

BERLIOZ: Béatrice et Bénédict, an opera in two acts
Leonato........................ Christophe Fel
Don Pedro.................... Nicolas Cavallier
Hero............................. Nathalie Manfrino
Claudio......................... Jean-François Lapointe
Béatrice........................ Joyce DiDonato
Bénédict........................ Charles Workman
Somarone..................... Jean-Philippe Laffont
Ursula........................... Elodie Méchain
French National Chorus & Orch/Colin Davis
(recorded in Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, Paris)

With regard to opera, I don't have favourites (not even Richard Wagner and Anna Netrebko) but I will say that I have a soft spot for Hector Berlioz; I get excited about his music (example: Symphonie funèbre et triomphale, which impressed Wagner), and his wicked wit (I remember sitting in the Melbourne University library giggling and guffawing over his Nights in the Orchestra, in which his satirical essays are represented as discussions by orchestra players in the pit of a theatre, while an opera is being performed).

The four completed operas are: Benvenuto Cellini (1838), La Damnation de Faust (1846), Béatrice et Bénédict (1862), Les Troyens (1863). In our local opera group we have viewed Damned Faust, and Ruined Troy (The Trojans), but the other two are unlikely to appear in any opera house in New Zealand or Australia (but I don't mind at all if you can prove me wrong). Mention also Roméo et Juliette, and L'Enfance du Christ (the only Berlioz work I have sung in), which are only performed in concert halls, though they have a story-line.

Berlioz was crazy about Shakespeare, and he was married to an English Shakespearean actress (for a while). Beatrice and Benedict is a gutted version of Shakespeare's Much ado about nothing, with some dialogue borrowed directly from the Bard, and the rest written by the composer himself. Actually, even the "ado" is pruned out, the threat to the marriage of Claudio and Hero (the bride); they become an idealized couple, and Beatrice and Benedick come to the fore (Perfick!).

So, we miss out on this speech from Dogberry (replaced by Somarone) when the malefactors who have maligned Hero are brought to justice:"Marry, sir, they have committed false report; moreover, they have spoken untruths; secondarily, they are slanders [sic]; and lastly, they have belied a lady; thirdly they have verified unjust things: and, to conclude, they are lying knaves."

The two recordings I have are conducted by Colin Davis, and here he is again, in Paris. Beatrice is sung by Josephine Veasey in one and Janet Baker in the other; here it is Joyce DiDonato (the only name familiar to me in the cast-list; we hear her at the NYMetropera). Colin Davis has conducted all the Berlioz works which have an orchestra (name one that does not!).