Here’s a rarity that will appeal to curiosity-seekers, but alas, to few others. In his mid-20s Bizet sought success with a Meyerbeerian grand opera set in an exotic locale. The story is about Ivan the Terrible, his requited love for a Circassian maiden, and court intrigue that ensnares her father and brother in an assassination plot. Ivan appears at the end to save the siblings and replace them on the gallows with the evil courtier, Yorloff. Bizet began the opera in 1862, set it aside for The Pearl Fishers, then, after its completion, couldn’t get it performed. Demonstrating his critical prowess, he destroyed the manuscipt, recycling some of the better parts in other works. This Radio France live concert performance uses British conductor Howard Williams’ completion of an unfinished copy of the score. Unfortunately for Bizet, he missed the boat–the Parisian rage for grand Romantic operas was fading, and the work’s utter predictability and endless clichés, both narrative and musical, likely would have doomed it anyway.
It has redeeming features, of course, most of them on a fondly recalled old Pathé LP of highlights with such stylish performers as Janine Micheau and Henri Legay. But the earnest young singers on this recording lack the voices and idiomatic singing of their elders. And when such highlights as Marie’s first-scene duet and her big arias, “Ah! Par ces larmes” and “Il me semble”, are buried in a clichéd context, the positives become muted. Complete, Ivan IV also is a bit too derivative for comfort: Bizet’s models are dominated both by Meyerbeer-type ensembles (that often lose impetus due to clumsy handling of melody and orchestration) and in Verdian touches such as the young Bulgarian’s Serenade (reminiscent of Eboli’s Song of the Veil from Don Carlo) and the ominous bass figures lifted from Sparafucile’s music in Rigoletto.
Conductor Michael Schønwandt keeps things moving, and the somewhat dimly recorded orchestra is adequate, though some passages call for more weight, especially in the trombones. The best of the singers are the lower voiced men. Ludovic Tézier is a fine Ivan, his resonant baritone and deft characterization enlivening a stock figure, and bass Alexandre Vassiliev as the baddie, Yorloff, is a worthy antagonist. But the Circassian family at the heart of the opera strikes few sparks. Marie, sung by Inva Mula, has music that’s by turns pathetic, resolute, defiant, yearning, loving, and pleading.
If the music were more memorable and the singing more elevated, it would go a long way toward making this the lost masterpiece we want to find. But the music rarely rises to its ambitions and Mula’s smallish, shrill soprano wants the size and bloom necessary to make the most of it. Her brother Igor is tenor Julian Gavin, and while he has the cutting brightness the part needs, the voice, like Mula’s, lacks color and has its quavery moments along with an unappealing throaty production. Paul Gay, as their father, Temrouk, shares their deficiencies. It would be nice to be more positive about an ambitious work by a talented young composer who went on to bigger and better things. But Carmen it’s not.
