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RECITAL REVIEW
June 8, 2005
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By Stephanie Friedman
Christóphoren Nomura, baritone, and Harolyn Blackwell, soprano, are a delightful and engaging couple onstage. That accounted in large part for the success of their duo-recital Wednesday evening at Herbst Theatre. It certainly wasn't due to superlative vocalism, or a perfect blending of voices (theirs didn't match at all), or even exceptional interpretation; none of these was much in evidence. But Blackwell's infectiousness and the captivating quality of Nomura's voice, as well as their charm as a couple, might easily make criticisms of faults, such as lack of attention to enunciation, or unevenly-sung vocal lines, seem mere quibbles. The fact that Blackwell scrunches up her face in a fetching manner, or that Nomura is the picture of the self-assured artist, however, must not be allowed to obscure the less artistic qualities in the two singers' performances.
To be sure, the program was well planned, well rehearsed and well executed. The salon songs of Gounod, Saint-Sa”ns, and Poulenc rested comfortably next to heavier fare of Schumann and Schubert (who were also represented in some lighter works) — with one glaring exception: One doesn't approach Schubert's tranquil, meditative Nacht und Träume (Night and Dreams) fresh from the giggly smirkiness of Die Männer sind méchant (Men are faithless) and the petulant Das gestörte Glück (Troubled Happiness); a wistful or mildly melancholic transitional song or two was needed to ease the listener into the song's deeper level. In her performance, Blackwell sang with musicality but with no sense of the ethereal indicated, for example, in the words, Wie dein Mondlicht durch die Räume, a line that she chopped into individual syllables, making it sound nothing like moonlight pouring through the night air. In addition, in this song as elsewhere, her voice waxed and waned, to no purpose.
So did Nomura's. For example, in his performance of Wanderers Nachtlied (Wanderer's Night Song), he repeatedly pulled his softer tones back into an almost inaudible range, causing a bewildering contrast with his more robust tones. His enunciation, too, for instance in Schumann's Dein Angesicht (Your Countenance), left a great deal to be desired. A beautiful voice is worth little if it doesn't apply itself to consonants whose clear enunciation supports the rhetoric of the song. Take, for example, the linking of the final sound of “und” and the initial sound of “schön.” These, when treated respectfully, pack an emotional punch, which Nomura missed. He also failed several times to phonate the weaker vowels in syllables such as Augen, so much so that, more than once, I wanted to shout, “Sing it, for pity's sake!” His singing of “balde” (soon) with its promise of surcease from suffering was, however, everything one could have wished for. Nomura has an enviable beauty of tone in his upper range — throughout his range, in fact. But it is no compensation — at least to my ears — for lazy enunciation.
Schubert's duet, Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt (Only one who knows longing), a beauty, was passionately, meaningfully sung, as was Schumann's Liebhabers Ständchen (Lovers' Serenade), a dialogue that the pair acted well. But, though equally well acted, the comic rendition of “Ein Jüngling liebt ein Mädchen,” from the song cycle Dichterliebe (Poet's Love), was a shock to both ear and eye. This song, in its proper setting, is one of Heine's typically ironic utterances of unrequited love. There is nothing humorous about it, though Schumann's setting makes it seem so — that is, until the final couplet, which ends, “Dem bricht das Herz entzwei” (His heart is broken in half). Never mind that Heine himself seems to be treating the pain lightly (it's his wont to do so) and that Schumann has been, up to this point, underlining the humorous aspects of the “love quadrangle.” The piano part at the end makes it quite clear this boy is deeply hurt. Blackwell's humorous cavorting about the stage while Nomura sang, and her (excellently achieved) miming completely changed the character of the song. As amusing as she was, I would gladly have raised a placard: “Unfair to Schumann. And Heine.” Four songs from Poulenc's Chansons gaillardes (Ribald songs), sung by Nomura, were delectable, though less energetic singing and more ironic self-awareness would have suited “Couplets bachique” (Bacchic verses) better. (What a naughty man Poulenc could be!) Blackwell sang “Violon” from Fiançailles pour rire (Light-hearted betrothal), poems by Louise de Vilmorin, and À sa guitare (To his guitar) to a text by Pierre Ronsard, with ample warm tone. Ted Taylor, the able pianist in the recital, brought out the guitar strummings and antique harmonies in the latter song. Finally, though, Blackwell's voice, though bright, is somewhat diffuse and has very little color. Poulenc doesn't need a beautiful voice, but he does need subtlety. The singers closed with a properly sentimental, romantic rendering of Poulenc's dreamy waltz, Les chemins de l'amour (The paths of love). But here again, there were anomalous swings between strange eruptions of tone and barely audible singing. The singers' superb control of a matched messa di voce at the end of the duet only raised the question: why this but not (at other times) a seamless vocal line, or full phonation of every syllable? San Francisco Performances is celebrating its 25th year in existence. To honor the occasion, and in special tribute to its founder, Ruth Felt, composer Fred Hersch set to music a poem — also written for the occasion — by Mary Jo Salter, entitled, I've Got Your Picture. Seated on two adjacent chairs but slightly facing away from each other, Blackwell and Nomura performed the piece smoothly and affectingly, at first at odds, but in the end bending sweetly in towards each other, a fitting demonstration, and final acknowledgment, of the ascendancy in this recital of the thespian over the lyric.
(Stephanie Friedman, mezzo-soprano, is retired from more than three decades of singing in opera and concert, here and abroad.)
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Harolyn Blackwell
Christópheren Nomura
