Two Pelleas et Melisande s (review)

Two Pelléas et Mélisandes. Claude Debussy
Pelléas: Jacques Jansen	Doctor: Armand Narçon
Mélisande: Irène Joachim	Opéra-Comique Orchestra
Geneviève: Germaine Cernay	Yvonne Gouverné Chorus
Golaud: Henri-Bertrand Etcheverry	Roger Désormière, conductor
Arkel: Paul Cabanel	(Recorded in Paris, June 1941)
Yniold: Leïla Ben Sedira	Opera d'Oro (distributed by Allegro)
Shepherd: Emile Rousseau	opd 9012 (2 CDs)

Pelléas: Wolfgang Holzmair	Shepherd/doctor: Jérôme Varnier
Mélisande: Anne Sofie von Otter	Orchestra and Chorus of Radio France
Geneviève: Hanna Schaer	Bernard Haitink, conductor
Golaud: Laurent Naouri	(Recorded in Paris, March 2000)
Arkel: Alain Vernhès	Naïve (distributed by Harmonia Mundi)
Yniold: Florence Couderc	v 4923 (3 CDs)

The year 2002 marks the centennial of the premiere of Pelléas et Mélisande at the Opéra-Comique, and the two complete recordings under consideration here are both related to anniversaries of Claude Debussy's only completed opera. The performance conducted by Roger Désormière features three members of the cast that participated in the fiftieth birthday performance of Pelléas (on 30 April 1952): Irène Joachim (Mélisande), Jacques Jansen (Pelléas), and Henri-Bertrand Etcheverry (Golaud). The set conducted by Bernard Haitink in live concert inaugurates a new series of recordings on the Naïve label coproduced by Radio France and the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées and comes just in time to commemorate the work's one-hundredth birthday. In this context, it would be appropriate to remind record collectors of some existing souvenirs of the original 1902 cast. In 1904 Mary Garden, accompanied by Debussy himself, recorded Mélisande's brief song, "Mes longs cheveux," that opens act 3. And an abridged version of the score on the Columbia label from 1928 gives convincing evidence of Hector Dufranne's still potent Golaud.

Obviously the sonics of the 1941 version (originally monaural) cannot compare with the amplitude possible in a recording made just two years ago. The spatial perspectives in the older set are difficult to grasp, as in the brief passage for the offstage chorus of sailors in act 1, scene 3. Some of the tempi are slightly faster in the Désormière account, which fits onto two CDs, whereas Haitink's reading requires three discs, the third containing only act 5, lasting not quite twenty-seven minutes. (In compensation, Naïve is promoting the set at a special reduced price.)

The whole scale of the 1941 performance seems designed for a smaller theater, one the size of the Salle Favart. This approach requires closer attention than the more italicized reading Haitink lavishes on the score. To my ears, at least, Désormière's approach fits snugly into the introverted, anti-rhetorical aura of the music. And Désormière's singers, all French, project the text with a precision not quite equaled by the estimable polyglot cast at Haitink's disposal.

Neither Joachim nor Jansen (whose name is consistently misspelled "Jensen" on the Allegro reissue) has a particularly memorable voice per se, but their performances are so atmospherically redolent that to me they prove devastatingly convincing. When Joachim utters "Je ne suis pas heureuse," one doubts neither her sincerity nor her inward confusion. The evanescence of her death scene is unforgettable. Jansen sounds more like a tenor than a baryton-Martin (as was Jean Périer, the creator of Pelléas), but the low tessitura of many passages gives him no problems. In the role's two most expansive moments, the Tower and Fountain scenes, his voice catches the requisite note of awestruck ardor. It helps to recall in this regard that the older French critics used to employ the verb dire rather than chanter when discussing vocal interpretation. Indeed, in a score that avoids overt rhetoric and vocal display as an end in itself, the diction of Désormière's entire cast is exemplary.

As Golaud, Henri-Bertrand Etcheverry...