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OPERA REVIEW
Martha
February 4, 2007
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Pippin's Pocket Hits the Big Three-Oh By Janos Gereben
Even on Super Bowl Sunday, with the Queen Mary 2 slipping under the Golden Gate
Bridge right next door to the Legion of Honor, Pocket Opera faithful showed up in
good numbers in the Legion's Florence Gould Theater. The event was auspicious: the opening of the
30th season of the tiny company, created and nursed alone all these years, since
his days as a pianist at the Spaghetti Factory, by the remarkable Donald Pippin.
Even as part of the tradition of opera administrations not being democratic institutions,
various Herr Generaldirektors holding sway over their domain (as Kurt Herbert Adler
did, famously, over the San Francisco Opera, for 43 years),
Pippin's three decades of one-man leadership and responsibility for Pocket's
survival constitute a unique entry in the history of the genre.
There he was on Sunday, as always, with the jaunty beret; his own inimitable translation of the libretto, the shy, hesitating, endearing, wickedly funny delivery; playing the piano, conducting the Pocket Philharmonic (of 11, with a crackerjack first violinist, Kristina Anderson, and fine woodwind players), and informing, illuminating, entertaining the audience. This being Friedrich von Flotow's 1847 Martha — a one-time warhorse, now a rarity — Pippin took care to explain the historic setting and significance of the story, a German composer's French opera about early 18th-century England. At the time of Queen Anne, even more than in other periods, Pippin said, "it was an extremely good idea to be born rich ... the alternatives too terrible to contemplate." A couple of hours later, Pippin acknowledged that complications remained unceasing, but he exclaimed: "Good Lord, it's the fourth act, and the matter will have to be settled soon!"
Tenor Brian Thorsett (Lionel) Of course it was settled, happily, and there is no reason to go deeply into the paper-thin story, but the music is pretty good (not more than that), and then there are the two "big numbers" — "The Last Rose of Summer," and the tenor aria, "Ach so fromm ..." Another hallmark of Pippin's long reign is the cultivation of young talent, and this Martha was clear proof of that. The tenor, for example, was Brian Thorsett (Lionel), who delivered a consistent, unflashy, impressive performance. Even when others jacked up the volume (see below), Thorsett sang quietly and beautifully, as a good lyric tenor should.
The title role (Martha, also known as Lady Harriet) went to Marcelle Dronkers, an excellent singer blessed with a big voice, but not enough performance smarts to adjust it to tiny Florence Gould Theater. One of the disadvantages of Pippin doing "everything" is that, seated at the piano, his back is to the singers, so he had no chance to rescue Dronkers from oversinging. She did, going shrill at times, and blowing her very last note just because she was aiming for the solar plexus, rather than the ears, the heart. In this same small venue, not long ago, Dronkers sang a near-perfect Lady Macbeth. Was Martha too easy for her? Of the two comprimario roles, bass Clifton Romig (Plunkett) got carried away with his big voice, singing louder than necessary and appropriate. But mezzo Julia Ulehla (Nancy) got it exactly right, creating a memorable secondary role. Stage director Dianna Shuster moved the "semistaged" production along. Considering Pippin's ever-so-clever text ("Dukes and barons fawn and flatter / Princes worship and adore / I repeat, they little matter / For I find them all a bore), it's a shame not to have supertitles. Except for Thorsett and Ulehla, diction left much to be desired, going counter to yet another Pippin trademark.
(Janos Gereben is a regular contributor to San Francisco Classical Voice. His e-mail address is janosg@gmail.com.)
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