THE HANGOVER REPORT – Thomas Adès’s sensational THE EXTERMINATING ANGEL takes risks, and is breathtaking (and all the more unsettling) because of them

The company of "The Exterminating Angel" at the Metropolitan Opera.

The company of Thomas Ades’s “The Exterminating Angel” at the Metropolitan Opera.

Tonight, I caught the closing performance of Thomas Adès’s breathtaking The Exterminating Angel at the Metropolitan Opera. The opera, based on the Sartre-esque Luis Buñuel film of the same name, premiered at the Salzburg Festival last year to great acclaim. Happily, its American premiere does not disappoint. Adès and his librettist-cum-director Tom Cairns take risks in this new opera, and it sensationally pays off. Indeed, on the surface, the piece is decidedly not very viewer friendly; it’s musically harsh and thematically vague. However, look a little closer, and you’ll see a compositionally exciting and sophisticated work (I wish I caught it earlier in the run so as to re-assess the score) that’s  really an unrelenting, uncompromising, and altogether harrowing allegory of the times we live in.

Like the film it’s based on, the opera depicts a dinner party from which its diverse (professionally, not socio-economically) set of guests cannot escape. But why can’t they? Cairns seems to suggest that these guests are subconsciously holding themselves back through inaction and/or inertness (the opera should be mandatory viewing for members of Congress). Suffice to say, the scenario quickly devolves into a series of desperate situations, as the guests hang on to their very lives, let alone their human dignity. Although the opera objectively ends on a note of collective hope, Mr. Cairns production seems to suggest otherwise, which makes the opera all the more unsettling – and unforgettable.

Conducting his own score, Mr. Adès’s successfully makes the best case for it. Musically, The Exterminating Angel mature, inspired, and daring. It’s an eclectic, wondrous brew that consistently found ways to surprised me with its jarring, topsy-turvy yet familiar qualities, which feels right for this opera. Additionally, the cast is pretty excellent, particularly the soprano Audrey Luna (really, those ultra-high notes alone are worth the price of admission) and veteran British bass John Tomlinson, whose passionate reading of the character of Dr. Carlos Conde gave me goosebumps. But really, the opera is an ensemble piece and each of these fine singer-actors nailed their respective roles; I hope and look forward to them reprising these roles in a subsequent Met run of the opera. And as always, the Met orchestra sounded as gloriously incisive as ever.

HIGHY RECOMMENDED

 

THE EXTERMINATING ANGEL
Opera
The Metropolitan Opera
2 hours, 40 minutes
Closed

Categories: Music, Opera, Other Music

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