(Always a pleasure to attend the opera with my long-time opera friend and former ABT soloist, Craig Salstein)
Tuesday October 5, 2021 – Attending my first live performance at The Met since March 2020, I met my friend Craig Salstein in our balcony box to watch the Met’s BORIS GODUNOV. It’s an opera I have seen only once previously: in the classic Ming Cho Lee settings, with Samuel Ramey as the tsar, during the Met’s 1997-1998 season. Currently, The Met is performing BORIS in its original 1869 version, without intermission, lasting about 2 hours and 20 minutes.
BORIS has always been a problematic opera for me. I remember hearing it for the first time on the 1963 Met broadcast – in English – and finding it incomprehensible. Even after attending the Ramey performance, I felt bemused. Scenes showing events that will lead in the end to Boris’s downfall did not seem to make for a cohesive story – we don’t even see the tsar for a long time following his coronation – so tonight I tried a new approach: listening to the opera as a symphonic work, with vocal soloists and chorus. It worked, for the music is truly marvelous.
And it was marvelously played tonight by The Met Orchestra, under the expert baton of Sebastian Weigle. Solo passages, in particular for the clarinet, were savourable. As always, I truly enjoyed watching the Met musicians from our perch above the pit. Onstage, the Met Chorus were in fine fettle, splendidly voicing all the magnificent music Mussorgsky has given them, and entering into the drama with gusto.
The Met’s current production can’t touch the grandeur of the Ming Cho Lee version, but it’s effective in its own way. Scene flows into scene, and we are spared the tedium of a Gelb intermission. When I booked the tickets, the thought of a 140-minute sit seemed daunting, but in fact the evening flew by, thanks to the excellence of the musical forces.
René Pape, now 57 years old, gave a deeply committed and moving portrayal of the tsar. As with his Gurnemanz here in 2018, the basso measures out the voice more cautiously now than of yore. After years of singing some of the most demanding roles in the bass repertory – and singing them unsparingly – it’s inevitable that the voice would be somewhat altered. But it’s a beautiful sound all the same, so touching in its eloquent lyricism. Pape’s haunted, abstracted portrayal was fascinating to experience.
Estonian basso Ain Anger as Pimen and British tenor David Butt Philip as Grigory had made their Met debuts in these roles a few days earlier. In this production, Pimen has the look of a member of the order of wizards of Middle Earth; I briefly scanned the monastery set, looking for his palantir. No such globe was to be seen, but there was a huge book from which the old monk read to Grigory the tale of the murdered Dmitry.
Mr. Anger has a riveting presence, and his singing was expressive, though the sound of the voice sometimes lacked richness. I will look forward to hearing him as Prince Gremin later in the season. Mr. Butt Philip (is he related to Dame Clara?) was fine, but without the Polish scene, the role’s vocal opportunities are greatly diminished.
Two superb portrayals were the outstanding elements of the evening: Ryan Speedo Green was simply grand as the drunken Varlaam. The basso has a big voice and a big presence, and he made his ballad the vocal hit of the evening, winning applause. Mr. Green could surely take on the role of Pimen one day, and – who knows? – maybe even that of the tsar himself. Tenor Myles Mykkanen gave an astonishing physical portrayal as the Holy Fool. In this staging, the character appears right from the opera’s start: constantly in motion, his body twisting tormentedly in a hapless dance of one possessed. Later, when the Fool approaches the tsar and begins to sing, Mr. Mykkanen’s feel for neurotic lyricism was uncanny.
Maxim Paster was the wily Shuisky, making the most of his passage describing the glowing corpse of the murdered Dmitry; it’s Shuisky who assumes power following the death of Boris, as the production’s final tableau shows. Baritone Aleksey Bogdanov as Schelkalov has a fine voice indeed; we can hope to hear him in other roles at The Met.
Without an appearance by the Polish Princess Marina Mniszek, the performance was dominated by male voices; the characterful singing of two distinctive mezzo-sopranos – Tichina Vaughn as the Innkeeper and Eve Gigliotti as the Nurse – was thus doubly welcome. The nurse’s discovery of the tsar’s dead body in the final momenst of the opera was a very effective touch.
Any Met performance that kicks off with Richard Bernstein onstage is headed – from that moment on – for success. Other fine portrayals tonight came from Kevin Burdette, Bradley Garvin, Brenton Ryan, and Mark Schowalter. As Boris’s children, Erika Baikoff (Xenia) and Megan Marino (Fyodor) did well, though it’s always preferable to have a boy as the heir, if at all possible.
Metropolitan Opera House
October 5th, 2021
BORIS GODUNOV
Modest Mussorgsky
Boris Godunov...........René Pape
Prince Shuisky..........Maxim Paster
Pimen...................Ain Anger
Grigory.................David Butt Philip
Varlaam.................Ryan Speedo Green
Simpleton*..............Miles Mykkanen
Nikitich................Richard Bernstein
Mitiukha................Bradley Garvin
Shchelkalov.............Aleksey Bogdanov
Innkeeper...............Tichina Vaughn
Missail................ Brenton Ryan
Officer.................Kevin Burdette
Xenia...................Erika Baikoff
Feodor..................Megan Marino
Nurse...................Eve Gigliotti
Boyar in Attendance.....Mark Schowalter
Conductor...............Sebastian Weigle
~ Oberon
Oberon's Glade 
