Diana Damrau triumphs at Met Opera in first Lucia

October 04, 2008 by The Associated Press | Staff

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By MIKE SILVERMAN
Associated Press Writer

NEW YORK (AP) -- "Lucia" lovers are in luck at the Metropolitan Opera these days.

A year after French soprano Natalie Dessay opened the season to acclaim in a new production of Donizetti's "Lucia di Lammermoor," a very different kind of singer scored her own triumph as the Scottish maiden driven to madness and murder.

Astonishingly, Friday night's revival marked the first time Diana Damrau, a German lyric coloratura, had ever sung the role. Yet she immediately made it her own, with a combination of splendid vocalism and keen dramatic insight.

Where the diminutive Dessay's Lucia is a frail creature, seemingly unbalanced from the start, Damrau portrays a sturdier young woman happily in love with a neighboring squire, Edgardo, until she is tricked into thinking he has abandoned her.

Her singing is likewise robust at the beginning, with house-filling high notes and expert ornamentation. But it's no mere exercise of vocal fireworks; there's a wonderful expressiveness in the way she modulates her tone and shapes the melodic line to fit the emotional moment. Later, in opera's most famous mad scene, she falls apart before our eyes, exploding in anger one moment, then floating mournful phrases that seem to hang in the air.

Damrau could not have found a better partner for the occasion than the sweet-voiced Polish tenor Piotr Beczala as Edgardo, and the audience cheered them both rapturously. He matched her phrase for phrase in their Act 1 duet with ribbons of beautiful, unforced sound. In the final scene, he seemed to push his volume to the limit in the aria "Fra poco a me ricovero," ("Soon an uncared-for tomb shall give me refuge", but then pulled off the delicate "Tu che a Dio" ("You who have spread your wings to heaven") with no hint of strain.

Beczala actually made his Met debut two years ago but is coming into his own this season, with assignments after "Lucia" in Tchaikovsky's "Eugene Onegin" and Verdi's "Rigoletto." If he can avoid the trap of taking on heavier roles too early in his career, Beczala should be a welcome presence for years to come.

As Lucia's well-meaning tutor, Russian bass Ildar Abdrazakov brought rich sound and gravitas to a role that can seem perfunctory. Tenor Sean Panikkar sang brightly in his short stint as Arturo, Lucia's unloved bridegroom and eventual victim.

Making his Met debut as Lucia's conniving brother, Enrico, Bulgarian baritone Vladimir Stoyanov left a mixed impression. His warm, compact sound at times filled the hall effectively, but at other points he seemed to disappear into the ensembles.

The production by Mary Zimmerman, enhanced by Daniel Ostling's evocative sets, looks good on second appearance. Its more inventive touches are still on display - the ghost who wanders through the woods (and then reappears at the end as Lucia herself), and the photographer who arranges the principals for a group photo of posed happiness while they are singing in the Sextet of their anger and despair.

Marco Armiliato conducted with enthusiasm and feeling for the range of colors in Donizetti's score.

Damrau sings six more performances through Oct. 25, then "Lucia" returns four more times in January and February starring Anna Netrebko and Rolando Villazon.

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