Mozart: Mitridate – Emmanuelle Haim

   in Opera Now (Jul, 2017)
Mithridate was filmed at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées last year. Director Clément Herview-Léger goes for the stage-within-a-stage approach, which has the benefit of focusing on the characters and their interplay, but also results in scenic stasis and lack of variety. To concentrate on the positive, the singing is superb. Michael Spyres almost makes Mithridate’s avalanche of notes sound easy, and conductor Emmanuelle Haïm encourages vocal decoration by the bucket-load. Patricia Petibon’s Aspasia is superb, her voice pin-point, her acting affecting. Myrtò Papatanasiu and Sabine Devieilhe add to the soprano fireworks, and Christophe Dumaux’s contertenor is lithe and compact. Full marks for Personenregie and music, mitigated by dull visuals. …