Search - Gounod, Nore, Rico :: Faust

A good modern Faust, with impressive singing

Santa Fe Listener | Santa Fe, NM USA | 02/19/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"If you look over the reviews for the various Faust sets, too many people call their personal favorite "the best ever." By any objective standard we haven't had a thoroughly excellent Faust on disc, with only three serious competitors over many decades. Those are the pre-LP historic Beecham performance, the 1958 Cluytens on EMI with de los Angeles, Gedda, and Christoff (a stereo remake of the same cast and conductor in mono from 1953), and the 1987 Colin Davis version on Philips that is excellent in every way except for a tepid Te Kanawa as Marguerite and a somewhat unstylish Faust in Araiza. Those are the basic facts one must work with, unpalatable as they may be.



This set under Michel Plasson and his Toulouse Opera forces is a decent contender, thoroughly French in style--even if none of the lead roles are taken by French singers (Van Dam is Belgian)--and dramatically convincing. But it's far from ideal. To begin with, Faust is a very long, very uneven work, and only the best conducting, or a good deal of cutting, enables a listener to hold interest over the long haul. Beecham prfers the cuts, Davis tries for extended drama. Plasson is merely good, rating higher than his Teldec rival, Carlo Rizzi, but not as high as Cluytens, much less Davis. Also, it's fairly obvious that his orchestra and chorus aren't first-rate. The final, fatal flaw is Plasson's preference for slow, loving tempos, the last thing this wandering opera needs.



As for the singers, they make the show. Cheryl Studer was a miraculous artist in her brief heyday, a soprano capable of singing Wagner, Strauss, Mozart, and Gounod. It's amazing to think that a voice suited to Pamina, Elsa, Salome, and Marguerite could exist in the same person. She makes a musical, touching, and often vocally thrilling heroine, the best in modern times since de los Angeles. Her Faust, Richard Leach, makes up in style and ardor what he lacks in voice (his attractive lyric tenor is innately small), and dramatic fervor carries him a long way. Jose van Dam would have been a perfect Mephisto ten years before this rrecording was made (1994, I believe), and he's still a great stylist, but the voice itself had thickened and blurred. Even so, he is preferable to almost any other modern Devil, excepting the ultra-hammy but terrifying Boris Christoff for Cluytens. I must admit to being disappointed by Thomas Hampson's one-size-fits-all Valentin, who doesn't sound remotely like a loving brother or a soldier, either.



I've tried to offer a realistic appraisal of this enjoyable Faust, which makes a good standby while we wait for the ideal performance. I'd place it well below the Davis and just below the Cluytens.

"

One of the two best Fausts available...

Simon | Auckland, NZ | 02/22/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"...conducted by probably the greatest conductor of French romantic music of his time, Sir Thomas Beecham. Despite being an Englishman, he had a unique command of the type of swoony French elegance that is needed in this music. Really only Monteux and Ansermet are comparable in the French repertoire. But in Faust in particular, Beecham remains supreme. His cast is led by Roger Rico as Mephistopheles, though perhaps not a dark enough voice for the part, is still better than Christoff for Cluytens or Ghiaurov for Bonynge. Both of them make the part more devilish, sure, but both indulge in a vulgar howling manner which is alien to the French style. Georges Nore is a paragon of elegance in the title-role, rising to a splendid climax in his big aria "Salut, demeure chaste et pure". Geori Boue as Marguerite is easily the best exponent of her role on record, sparkling in the Jewel Song, and sweet and adorable throughout (You might also want to check out her Giulietta in the Cluytens Tales of Hoffmann). Roger Bourdin is a fine Valentin and one regrets the omission of his aria. The mono sound is rather dry, but Naxos' transfers come over well. All in all, a very nice opera set with a nice price, equalled in terms of performance only by the even older 1930 set conducted by Henri Busser with a well-nigh perfect Mephistopheles in Marcel Journet."

A Faust of a different color

L. E. Cantrell | Vancouver, British Columbia Canada | 08/31/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This is a great conductor's perfectly plausible performance which just happens to sound wrong. Wrong, that is, in comparison with every subsequent recording and just about every subsequent performance. It seems too cool, too bland. It strives for too much . . . elegance.



What it most singularly lacks is a howling, roaring, spitting Mephistopheles--that very Russian snarler of the Chaliapin-type who industriously and entertainingly tears every passion to tatters. While that sort of roaring demon is wholly appropriate for Boito's Italianate take on the story, I am inclined to think it is not what the very French Gounod had in mind. Gounod's "Faust" (or "Marguerite" as the Germans huffily prefer to think of it) is not Goethe's philosophical redemption story but a seduction story--not that of Marguerite by Faust, indeed, but of Faust by Mephistopheles. If you look at the words and the musical lines and forget the familiar performances, Mephistopheles is a suave, even lyrical seducer. I believe that Gounod, on hearing this recording, might well have said, "Yes, that is what I intended."



The performing edition used by Beecham is generally a satisfactory one to my ears. After all, who really wants to hear that endless, bloodless Brocken scene ever again? However, the omission of Valentine's big song (written for the London premiere to give a bonbon to an English baritone) is a real loss.



This is a studio recording in mono sound appropriate to its age, not bad overall.



I give this one four stars for the conductor and what I take to be its authenticity. I recommend this as a second or later "Faust" to serve as an antidote to current performance tradition.



"