She
can trill and she can swing...
Recital time for Renée Fleming... America's
"beautiful voice"
 In
2002, soprano Renée Fleming shifted gears. America's "beautiful
voice" is definitely in recital/concert mode, and for the rest
of the 2001-02
season singing her way solo around the globe at an almost non-stop
pace. She started off the year with pianist Jean-Yves
Thibaudet, on a recital tour that took the duo on a northerly path
from Barcelona to London, charming audiences along the way with their
already recorded repertoire of songs celebrating the mysteries of night
("Night Songs" - Decca #467697).
Soon she was back in America delighting audiences from Puerto Rico to
San Diego, California with an array of songs that, rather than set a
singular mood, told her listeners who Renée Fleming is. Indeed,
if one wanted a snap shot of where America's premiere soprano of the
decade is coming from and where she's going, any venue on this recital
tour was a good place to be.
The California
Center for the Arts in Escondido, where we had a chance to hear
her in recital for the first time, was the last stop of her West Coast
tour. The venue was an ideal setting for a Renée Fleming evening
of song - an acoustically superior hall that can accomodate an audience
of 1500 and at the same time sustain an ambience of intimacy appropriate
for a recital performance. Ms. Fleming herself was evidently pleased
with the acoustic results when toward the end, between her encore numbers,
she exclaimed "I'd like to congratulate you on your fantastic hall!"
And without hesitation, Steven Blier, the eminent accompanist and Juilliard
faculty member, concurred from his perch at the piano: "I'd love
to take it back with me to New York, do you mind?" It was Ms. Fleming's
first visit to San Diego since she sang Dvorak's Rusalka with
the San Diego Opera in 1995, when her star was just beginning to rise.
A year earlier, she had also sung the role of Tatiana in Tchaikovsky's
Eugene Onegin with the company. She graciously acknowledged these
two performances to an appreciative audience as "two fantastic
formative experiences."
As soon as she opened her mouth to sing the first song, the audience
knew right away what to expect for the rest of the evening - an impressive
display of vocal colors and a purity and richness of tone. The program's
opening number was Di, cor mio from Handel's opera about the
enchantress Alcina, a role Ms. Fleming has sung to great acclaim
on the operatic stage. She sang the aria with trills that thrill, her
impeccable coloratura proving she can handle with graceful ease and
expressivity Handel's musical acrobatics, and indeed most everything
else - as one soon discovered as she shifted from one genre of song
to another: from Handel's baroque to Richard Strauss' plaintive lieder,
from Puccini's Un bel di (which she interestingly prefaced
with a jazzy song that distilled the essence of Madama Butterfly
- Golden's "Poor Butterfly") to Debussy's seductive Chansons
de Bilitis, and from Gershwin's fascinatin' rhythms to Rachmanimov's
melodious songs of night. The encore numbers were no less a showcase
of versatility and vocal prowess: from aria - "Song to the Moon"
from Dvorak's Rusalka, a role Renée Fleming owns today,
hands down, and "O mio babbino caro" from Puccini's Gianni
Schicchi, to jazz - Duke Ellington's "It don't mean a thing,
if it ain't got that swing!" (which harked back to her youthful
days with a jazz band) and back to aria (from Cilea's Adriana Lecouvre),
all without missing a beat!
Indeed, the recital was a joyous way for Renée Fleming to reconnect
with San Diego opera lovers who that evening reaffirmed with a warm
standing ovation what they have known for years - that she is indeed
America's "beautiful voice."
Photo credits: Decca/John Swannell, John Stoddart and
Andrew Eccles - courtesy M.L. Falcone
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