Jake Heggie – Moby-Dick
Morris; Costello; Smith; Lemalu; Trevigne; San Francisco Opera; Patrick Summers
EuroArts 2059658
The only lingering question about Moby-Dick as an opera is: why did it take so long to happen? The epic tale, characters and intensity of emotions — they all are perfectly operatic in scope. Deconstructing the linearity of the story was the right approach to the sprawling novel, suggested by Heggie’s collaborator Terrence McNally. (McNally, who was the librettist for Heggie’s Dead Man Walking began this project but had to back out and the libretto was completed by Gene Scheer). Paraphrasing the immortal first line of the novel as, “You may call me Ishmael ...” for the closing line was another stroke of genius. The rest relies on Heggie’s brilliant, neo-romantic score, with its delightfully unanticipated musical quotations from Poulenc and Debussy and all-male vocal score (save for the “in-trousers” role of Pip). In this production, the demonic Captain Ahab (Jay Hunter Morris) demonstrates considerable hubris early on — “I’d strike at the sun if it’d burned me.” His relentless pursuit of the whale, leading to a loss of humanity and almost complete annihilation, is set in stark relief by Starbuck (Morgan Smith), the moral centre of the opera. Stephen Costello as Greenhorn (Ishmael) imbues the music with a sense of foreboding and fear. The production values are truly spectacular — inventive use of digital projections (with a tip of the hat to our own Robert Lepage), beautiful sets and creative lighting make for an immensely watchable 140 minutes. Finally, the direction for video by Frank Zamacona is of a calibre rarely seen on operatic DVDs. All in all, Moby-Dick is a solid new entry in the standard repertoire and this production is a must-have for watching at home.
