Messiah (review)

Conductor Jean-Christophe Spinosi weaves a dramatic musical tale of grief, joy, irony, betrayal, and confrontation with this untraditional performance of Messiah. This surprising, and perhaps shocking, interpretation takes the listener into a Baroque world tinged with romanticism. In a Hande lian move, solos are reassigned to different voice types. Soprano Susan Gritton gracefully sings "Thou Art Gone Up On High," normally a bass aria. Warm and expressive countertenor Bejun Mehta takes many of the alto arias. Boy soprano Martin Pollmann enjoys singing the announcement of the birth of Christ. Florian Boesch gives a new meaning to the "raging bass" aria. Richard Croft, tenor, and Cornelia Horak, soprano, both sing arias convincingly well. Paul Lorenger, who plays the central character, does not make a sound, but instead dances. Perhaps the purest character is the sign language performer, played by Nadia Kichler. The Arnold Schoenberg Chor, under the Chorus Master of Erwin Ortner, performs with a great intentionality and responsiveness to the music and the staging.

The story that unfolds onstage in the Theater an der Wien is not a familiar Messiahstory. This performance, divided into four parts instead of the normal three, centers around Lorenger's character, a man who commits suicide. While the suicide is not shown on stage, viewer discretion is advised due to the mature and intense nature of the scene. His wife, played by Horak, is having an affair with his brother or close companion, played by Mehta. Boesch, playing either another brother or close companion, struggles with his own darkness. Croft, who is a spiritual leader, deals with his failure to help Lorenger. Gritton attempts to console Horak, but also makes the decision to leave her husband, the brother and unfaithful lover played by Mehta. Kichler is often there performing in sign language. The audience never fully understands some of the roles of the characters and how, if at all, they add to the story.

Those seeking a traditional performance experience would prefer a different resource. A healthy liberty is taken with many of the Adagio and Grave sections. There are also tempo changes in this performance that are not marked in the original score. Spinosi does this for dramatic effect, for example to emphasize the darkness of the text even if in context it is not meant to be dark. "Glory to God" starts off a form of Allegro, but the words "And peace on earth" lose the rhythmic vitality that the rest of the chorus carries throughout. Along with interpretation of tempo, there is also looseness with intention in some of the selections. "How Beautiful Are the Feet of Them" becomes a song about admiring a lover's body. "But Thanks Be To God" does not carry a particularly joyful feeling, coming across rather ironic as the ensemble piles the funeral chairs in the back of the room.

This performance is not intended to be a traditional performance of Messiah, and in that it is successful. In Spinosi's performance of Messiah, the oratorio is almost taken to the point of opera with its dramatic intensification and imposed story line that blurs the message of the original text. The staging and music are interesting and unsettling, in both musical interpretation and story overlay. While not everyone would enjoy this performance, the music and the story are well done, even if it is difficult to connect the two.