Uneven Performances in Beethoven’s Heroic ‘Fidelio’

Despite The Metropolitan Opera’s stirring cast and chorus, several elements failed in March 12th performance.

Save

Uneven Performances in Beethoven’s Heroic ‘Fidelio’ — The cast of Beethoven's "Fidelio," with Lise Davidsen (C) as Leonora. The Metropolitan Opera

3/13/2025Updated: 3/13/2025

NEW YORK—Time is our greatest critic. Out of the thousands of operas written from the Renaissance to the present day, only a hundred or so have survived and make up the standard repertoire we hear in the major theaters. Of this number, most were commissioned and only a few were written purely out of inspiration.

Beethoven’s “Fidelio” is the greatest among them, as the composer was deeply moved by the true story of a political prisoner saved by a faithful young wife who disguised herself as a boy, worked in that prison, and managed his escape. The Metropolitan Opera went to great trouble and expense to hire the world’s most celebrated artists and tried its best to deliver the superlative performance the piece deserves.

The Conductor and Orchestra

Despite a brilliant cast of singers there were many difficulties in this production. Conductor Susanna Malkki presided over an orchestra that did not give her its best. From the outset both brass and strings had intonation problems and made ragged entrances, and, throughout, the entire orchestra rarely played as a unified ensemble.

Singers were constrained by rigid tempos: moderate and slow movements were sometimes too slow, and often a fast sequence of notes were too fast for an artist to negotiate with sufficient articulation. Malkki did not accommodate her colleagues, and sometimes they fought back, resulting in a push and pull between orchestra and soloist. The underlying and central issue however, lay in the lack of a decisive rhythmic thrust and a stylistic approach suitable perhaps to Mozart or Haydn, but certainly not to the dramatically aggressive Beethoven.

The Singers and Choral Director

The hero of the evening proved to be the chorus, due in part to its radiant tone, but due primarily to the superlative leadership of its director, Tilman Michael and his musical preparation. In both the prisoner’s chorus, and the second act finale, the ensemble’s personality eclipsed that of the conductor, and the entire production burst into radiant life.

The cast was close to ideal. Lise Davidsen is the best Leonora we have, and although she doesn’t possess the golden trumpet sound of Birgit Nilsson or Kirsten Flagstad, she delivers a solid performance with especially dazzling top notes; Ying Fang was a sweet-voiced and convincing Marzelline; sweet-voiced and convincing as well was tenor Magnus Dietrich in the role of her suitor, Jaquino.

David Butt Philip, the evening’s Florestan, was a perfect match for Davidsen’s Leonore. Philip’s dramatic power, like hers lies in brilliance of vocal quality, rather than quantity of sound. René Pape, who was in this production’s first run 25 years ago sang with slightly diminished resources, but with beauty of tone and a convincing generosity of spirit. Bass-baritone Tomasz Konieczny’s dark voice and dramatic temperament could easily have made a cliché of the villainous Don Pizarro but Konieczny is a fine actor as well, and never wandered over the borders of overstatement.

Despite these fine performances, the music of “Fidelio” has an organic connection with the time in which the drama takes place. Seventeenth-century Spain, its architecture, its objects, the lines and contours of its clothing, has an expressed kinship with Beethoven’s score. What we saw this evening, however, was the world of today: The watch towers of the prison were watch towers of present times; Rocco and Pizarro, in their three-piece suits could have just as well walked on stage from row L, seat 12 and 13 in the theater.