A performance of „The Turn of the Screw“, in the Konzerthaus showed that opera can also work concertante.

Psychoanalysis, pedagogy and paedophilia: The plot of Benjamin Britten’s chamber opera based on Henry James’ novel of the same name is disturbing. A governess arrives at an English country estate to teach two children. The ghosts of her predecessor and the footman Quint soon appear.  While alive, Quint was “too close” to the children and he still seeks a connection to them from the other side, which the teacher tries to prevent.  The struggle for the children costs one of them their life.  It is left open whether the ghosts were real or merely figments of the imagination of the governess.

The content is ambiguous but the opera is musically more transparent: its 16 scenes are divided into variations of the twelve-tone “Screw Theme”, which preview the mood of the next section. Britten describes the spooky scenery with atmospherically dense sounds.  The Vienna Chamber Orchestra, under Rory MacDonald, was impressive. The solo strings were convincing with chamber musical harmony and were not overtaxed by the highly virtuosic demands of the opera.  Together with the winds, who played well in tune, they managed, in spite of the 13-piece instrumentation, to fill the Main Hall with sound.

23.03.2014 | 18:08 | (Die Presse)

Strong New Generation of Britten Singers

The singers were also pleasing: Soprano Miah Persson as the near-mad governess demonstrated how facial expression and gestures can also be appropriate in concertante performances. In the beginning, her voice seemed thin next to mezzo-soprano Anne-Marie Owens, who filled in adequately for Angelika Kirchschlager (who had cancelled because of exhaustion) and portrayed the housekeeper Mrs. Grose with much volume. Mark Padmore was fascinating as the spooky Quint and narrator with a sensitively phrased vibrato. The 13-year-old boy soprano William Gardner took over the part of the ailing Sebastian Davies and, together with the 20-year-old Erin Hughes, demonstrated that there is no need in England to worry about the next generation of singers.

Naturally, a concertante performance is not able to transmit all the impressions of an opera. The evening, however, presented a convincing argument for this resource-saving performance practice.(stp)

(“Die Presse”, print version, 24.03.2014)