PIAZZOLLA María de Buenos Aires (Sprenger)
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Astor Piazzolla
Genre:
Opera
Label: Capriccio
Magazine Review Date: 06/2019
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 91
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: C5305
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
Mariá de Beunos Aires |
Astor Piazzolla, Composer
Astor Piazzolla, Composer Bonn Beethoven Orchestra Christopher Sprenger, Conductor Daniel Bonilla, El Duende, Bass-baritone Johannes Mertes, Cantor, Tenor Luciana Mancini, Maria, Mezzo soprano |
Author: Tim Ashley
In addition to a classy line-up of solo instrumentalists, he has Bonn’s plush-sounding Beethoven Orchester at his disposal; and where Villena casts a cantaora, Valentina Montoya Martinéz, in the title-role, Sprenger has the mezzo Luciana Mancini, whose roles include Monteverdi’s Nerone and Annio in La clemenza di Tito. The vocal polarities are to some extent reversed when it comes to the two Cantors in their multiple roles: both are superbly idiomatic, though Villena’s Nicholas Mulroy, well known as Bach’s Evangelists, sounds wonderfully elegant, while Sprenger’s Johannes Mertes, a natural Grimes, is darker-toned and earthy, more like a conventional folk singer in fact. Daniel Bonilla-Torres’s ironic Duende is warmer-voiced than Juanjo Lopez Vidal, his altogether more forthright, even aggressive counterpart for Delphian, though Bonilla-Torres is also faced with the difficult task of speaking the choric interjections, where Villena has an ensemble of actors.
The end result is notably reflective and at times short on the streetwise grit that Villena provides in spades. Like any major work, however, María de Buenos Aires admits of more than one approach, and in some ways the two interpretations should be seen as complementary rather than antithetical. Sprenger unearths a vein of sadness in the score that is easy to overlook amid its bravado, and his more classical approach pointedly reminds us both of Piazzolla’s debt to Bach and of the work’s antecedents in Weill’s Dreigroschenoper and Mahagonny. Having the bandoneón as an ensemble player, however, slightly understates its role as the instrument of seduction that lures María from the suburbs and sets her on her existentially defiant but dangerous course through the dark side of Buenos Aires’s nightlife.
This is no reflection on Lothar Hensel’s exemplary playing, though, and there is indeed some brilliant instrumental work here, with beguiling flute solos from Mariska van der Sande and a really sleazy barroom sound from pianist Thomas Wise. Choosing one cast over another isn’t easy. I prefer Mulroy’s grace to Mertes’s worldliness but would also argue that Mancini’s bravura way with ‘Yo soy María’, bristling with energy and courage, gives her the edge over Montoya Martínez, superb though she is. Villena’s actors perhaps work fractionally better than Bonilla-Torres’s one-man narration, though the latter is something of a tour de force in its own right. Sprenger’s approach might, I suspect, have a more immediate appeal for those unfamiliar with the work itself or with Piazzolla’s idiom, but if you love María de Buenos Aires, then ideally you need to have both. T
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