Metropolitan Opera Archives

The Metropolitan Opera now has a few productions that support themselves. Whether or not a critic "likes" the Franco Zeffirelli stagings of "La Boheme" and

"Tosca" - and I rather do, myself - they are true spectacles, certain to draw in the crowds that might otherwise spend their entertainment dollars at "Miss Saigon" or "Les Miserables." If the singing is good, as it usually is, so much the better but, in any event, Joe Public is certain to go home entertained.

To this select group, we must now add Sonja Frisell's 1988 production of Verdi's "Aida." How else to explain the capacity audience that filled the Metropolitan Opera House to hear a mediocre cast on one of the most unpleasant evenings of the year, when driving in from the suburbs was unthinkable folly and it took me all of 10 minutes to walk - or should I say skate? - across Broadway and Lincoln Center Plaza to pick up my tickets?

Inside, the horses pranced, the warriors blew their trumpets, the massive sets ascended and descended, a good percentage of the audience stuck it out for all four acts, and some stayed to cheer. There were some musical rewards along the way, the most consistent by far the playing of the Met orchestra (an idiomatic, detailed reading of the score, taut and lyrical by turn, led by John Fiore) and the dignified, empathic performance of Amonasro by Timothy Noble.

The leading roles were another matter. Michael Sylvester, the evening's Radames, started off with a "Celeste Aida" that might charitably be described as awful - insensitive, off-pitch and shockingly frayed in forte passages. He improved thereafter and brought a certain style and tenderness to the love scenes, although his voice continued to offer the occasional unpleasant surprise throughout the night.

Sharon Sweet, who sang the title role, is clearly being groomed for stardom and, in all good faith, I don't get it. There was not much that was actually wrong with her Aida - she has a large, healthy, reasonably lustrous voice that she uses with some skill - but nor could I find anything uniquely right about it. Sweet was solid, she was competent - OK, more than competent, most of the time, finding the notes with a reliable, if rather indistinct, artistic intelligence. But the question is inescapable: Is this really the best our leading opera house can offer for its first performance in more than two years of one of Verdi's supreme masterpieces?

Stefania Toczyska seemed to me miscast as Amneris; however, I admired the icy, arresting brilliance of her timbre and would welcome the opportunity to hear her in different material. Paul Plishka was his usual dependable self as Ramfis - how the Met relies on this worthy and versatile artist! Hao Jiang Tian, John Horton Murray and Camellia Johnson - and the production -filled out the evening.

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