Bizet: Carmen.(Video Recording Review)

BIZET: Carmen

Obraztsova, Buchanan; Domingo, Mazurok, Rydl; Vienna State Ogera, Vienna Boys Choir; C. Kleiber. Production: Zeffirelli. TDK DVD DVUS CLOPCAR (Naxos, dist.), 152 mins., subtitled

Not much happens in the first twenty minutes of Carmen, and most performances seem to be trying to prove it. But Carlos Kleiber disagrees in this live 1978 performance. His prelude is dashing but not frantic, and it leads like a giant upbeat directly into a solid, flat-footed arrival of the opening chorus. This in turn connects kaleidoscopically into the bugle calls, builds still more into an unusually pointed chorus of cigarette girls, which in turn becomes ever rowdier until just before Carmen's entrance. The second verse of her Habanera is not a mere repeat but is so furious and heavy that it must tumble into something new, her tossing of the flower. And so it goes, in a reading that pours out until it is overwhelming. Kleiber elicits a unique combination of impeccable legato and biting attack from the superb Vienna players. He shows how the quintet, rather than being an opportunity to set an Olympic speed record, actually sounds livelier at two beats to the bar rather than one. He has found a gentle throbbing chain of accents in the string accompaniment of the Act II prelude that nobody ever notices, and he demonstrates--as the singers do not--how playful Frasquita and Mercedes can be.

Elena Obraztsova is not so cloudy of timbre and unruly as some remember her; there is even a little spin on the tone. She also has that essential quality that so many Carmens lack, at least onstage: a self-deprecating sense of humor. She makes a real siren song of "La-bas, la-has ...