R2 Review
0 THE GLOBE AND MAIL• SATURDAY, APRIL 7, 2001
Diva Fleming's big voice a divine pleasure CLASSICAL MUSIC Renee Fleming, soprano with Jean-Yves Thlbaudet, piano At the Chan Centre for the Performing Arts in Vancouver, on Thursday REVIEWED BY BEN D'ANDREA
A
soprano of Renee Fleming's pre-eminence can give a re cital without a single one of
opera's hit arias and still mesmer ize her audience with vocal thrills. None of the 18 songs the American singer chose for her Vancouver debut on Thursday night so much as hinted at grandiose operatic out pourings. Instead, Fleming offered a program of art songs - imbued with quicksilver passions and moonlight - wonderfully suited to displaying the evocative breadth of her voice. Fleming began with six songs by Gabriel Faure, and her opening cpoice was perfect: the capering
Mandoline, so like an invitation to the refined pleasures of the moonlit dance it describes. Considered by many as foremost among French composers of melo dies, Faure is almost required in a program of art songs. But there was nothing merely dutiful about Flem ing's renditions. She brought fresh ness and elegance to Mandoline and maintained a beautifully flexi ble vocal line throughout all of Faure's freewheeling melodies. The obvious choice for the Ger man-language portion of a pro-
gram centred around the songs of the late 19th- and early 20th-centuries would be the Aus trian Hugo Wolf. But, as Fleming's past recitals of both contemporary and neglected songs have shown, she isn't always satisfied with the obvious selections. She chose four songs by a lesser-known compa triot of Wolfs., Joseph Marx. She sang these miniatures as if they were rare gems, capturing their longing as well as playfulness with her glowing tone. In the second half, Fleming re-
turned to French with Debussy's three Chansons de Bilitis, which the composer himself described as being both "tender and cruel in the fact of being impassioned." In other words, these songs require con trasting vocal colours. Fleming sang them with precisely chosen dra matic subtleties - by turns raptur ous, mournful and haunting. The journey through art song that began with the elegant reti cence of Faure ended with some openly romantic songs of Rachma ninoff, for which Fleming set free the full resonant power of her voice. There were also moments when she floated hushed phrases as softly as butterflies in her luminous high range. The effect was ravish ing. Only for the last in this set of songs did the dramatic tension weaken a little as Fleming con sulted the printed lyrics while she sang. Fleming's accompanist was the excellent French pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet, his graceful playing sel dom too weighty for the vocal line. Thibaudet also played solo pieces by Chopin and Debussy in
between the sets of songs, which af forded opportunities for the kind of virtuosic display not usually per mitted to the accompanist. The pieces Thibaudet chose suited the predominantly nocturnal colouring of Fleming's songs, and his exqui site interpretations provided more than mere interludes to the singing. He easily met the technical de mands of the Chopin etude and beautifully shaped the phrases for the Chopin nocturnes and the two pieces by Debussy, including the famous Clair de lune. Fleming looked glamorous in a black gown that, after the intermis sion, acquired black and tangerine prima-donna frills around one arm and along the hemline. But there was nothing of the imperious diva in her manner. She proved herself a relaxed performer, sometimes lean ing against the piano during ex passages, tended keyboard seemingly lost in the music. She was enjoying herself. She obviously wanted everyone to have a good time. After the audi ence clamoured to hear more of her big, gorgeous voice, Fleming gave four encores - by Dvorak, Strauss and, as a lively send-off, Dulce El lington's It Don't Mean a Thing If It Ain'r Got that Swing. Special to The Globe and Mail