Opera Review: Days of future passed underlie Glass's "Galileo Galilei"

When Philip Glass and his librettists Mary Zimmerman and poet Arnold Weinstein premiered their opera “Galileo Galilei” at Chicago’s Goodman Theatre in 2002, the story of a scientist threatened with prison and death by a theocratic police state might have seemed comfortably distant. Now, with one of our two major parties under the control of religious fanatics openly advocating dictatorship, the past is starting to look like prologue. When James Robinson, director of the new production of “Galileo Galilei” at Opera Theatre through June 29th, writes in his program note that “it’s remarkable to consider just how resonant Galileo’s personal and professional struggles are today,” he is merely pointing out the obvious.

[Listen to the opera on Spotify.]

Paul Groves Photo: Eric Woolsey

That said, neither Glass and his team nor Robinson made this a work of Brechtian didacticism (just as well, since Brecht did that himself in 1938, 1947, and 1955). Even though the opera tells the story of the persecution and character assassination of Galileo Galilei in reverse order and employs a plethora of Brechtian, sod-the-fourth-wall devices, it is nevertheless an intensely personal work, with strongly drawn characters.

Both the opera and OTSL’s staging are designed to pull the audience in and create an emotional bond with the title character. In this, it largely succeeds, with the possible exception of a few scenes in the middle that concentrate on Galileo’s then-controversial ideas.

The opening scenes—in which a blind Galileo nearing the end of his life, recalls the kangaroo court that convicted him, his coerced recantation, and a letter from his daughter Sister Maria Celeste (who continued to support him despite being a cloistered nun)—are consistently moving. The trial and recantation scenes are also chilling in their depiction of the monstrous evil that results from the union of Church and State.

L-R: Jared Werlein, Elijah English Robert Mellon, Paul Groves Photo: Eric Woolsey

What really brought the opening night audience to its feet, I think, is the brilliantly written final scene. Here the elderly Galileo joins Galileo the adult and Galileo the child to watch a fictional opera by his father Vincenzo (who was mostly a lutenist and musical theorist rather than a composer) about the mythical hunter Orion. In this G-rated version of the story (there are a LOT of others), Orion is blinded by the treacherous king Oenopion for wooing his daughter Merope but has his sight restored by Eos, Goddess of the Dawn. Orion’s story becomes Galileo’s. Thus the final chorus refers to both of them:

Immortal now he lies among the stars
Immortal now in his home in the skies
Untouched by earthly fear

Robinson and his production team have done a stunning job of bringing all this to the OTSL stage. Lighting Designer Eric Southern and Video Projections Designer Greg Emetaz combine to turn Allen Moyer’s relatively simple set (essentially a false proscenium on a turntable) into everything from a Venetian canal to vision of Galileo’s heliocentric universe to, finally, a stage-filling view of the Milky Way. Marco Piemontese’s costumes add subtle touches, like putting the Pope and his cardinals in dark glasses—suggesting that they, not Galileo, are the ones who are blind.

The whole thing is just a feast for the eyes (see all the images at the OTSL web site preview gallery), to say nothing of the ears.

Vanessa Beccera Photo: Eric Woolsey

Philip Glass doesn’t have a reputation as a melody maker, but he can turn out his share of “ear worms” if he has a mind to do so. He clearly did here, for while the singers have (mostly) lines that approach recitative in their fidelity to speech patterns, the orchestra is spinning memorable themes out of Glass’s trademark repetition of melodic cells and relentless rhythmic energy. It's a score that demands to be heard more than once, which is why I have provided a link to the Baltimore Opera recording on Spotify.

Remarkably, he achieves all this with a small ensemble: three woodwinds (flute/piccolo, clarinet, bassoon), three brasses (horn, trumpet, trombone), three strings (violin, viola, cello), two percussionists, and two keyboard players—one of whom is on the synthesizer. In a kind of aural prestidigitation, the resulting sound is bigger than you’d expect. It sounds like a difficult score to play (conductor Dennis Russel Davies, with tounge firmly in cheek, once described it as "too easy for the amateur and too difficult for the professional") and a much harder one to sing.

“It’s fiendishly difficult for singers,” observed Cincinnati Conservatory professor Greg Eldridge, “and the big rule for them is to count.” That’s because the vocal line is often untethered to the orchestra. “Because it’s so hypnotic and trance-like,” said soprano Vanessa Beccera (who sings the role of Maria Celeste) in an interview for St. Louis Public Radio, “it’s easy to lose your spot and not know if you’re on the third beat or the first beat. You have to just ride the wave.”

Paul Groves and the ensemble Photo: Eric Woolsey

That she clearly did, both in Scene 3 (“Pears”)—a long aria based on the real Maria Celeste’s letters to her father—and Scene 10, in which she plays the sight-restoring Eos. Her voice floats like moonlight over the band.

As Older Galileo, blind and under house arrest, tenor Paul Groves gives us a moving portrayal of a man struggling with the conflict between his faith and what he knows to be true and wondering if his blindness isn’t some sort of divine punishment. The scenes of his confrontations with the Inquisition are harrowing.

As the two-faced Cardinal Barberini (later Pope Urban VIII), who supports Galileo until the latter becomes too hot to handle, bass-baritone Hunter Enoch shows the same vocal power and credible acting that highlighted his repellent Scarpia in “Tosca” last season. The scene in which Barberini casually describes having all the birds in his garden killed because they disturbed his sleep is the perfect distillation of the character’s casual cruelty.

L-R: Vanessa Beccera, Sean Michael Plumb Photo: Eric Woolsey

Baritone Sean Michael Plumb carries a substantial amount of the opera’s weight as Younger Galileo and does so with a youthful confidence that counterpoints Older Galileo’s despair. He’s also Salvati, Galileo’s mouthpiece in his book Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief Systems of the World, forcefully making the case for the heliocentric universe against the dogged incomprehension of Simplicio (Enoch, appropriately enough) while the moderator Sagredo (soprano Jennifer Kreider, cutting a strikingly elegant figure both vocally and visually) tries to keep peace.

Countertenor Elijah English, baritone Robert Mellon, and bass-baritone Jared Werlein are properly creepy as the three Cardinals presiding over Galileo’s recantation. The mix of two low voices and one high voice gives the trio a chilling sound.

There are many other fine performances in this cast—so many that I don’t have space to acknowledge them all. Every one of them deserves as much adulation as we can heap on them.

Cast and company in the final scene Photo: Eric Woolsey

The same is true for conductor Kwamé Ryan and his small but mighty band of St. Louis Symphony Orchestra musicians. The small size of the ensemble (Ryan calls it “a model of creative constraint”) puts every musician in the spotlight, especially during the quieter moments.

In an interview for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch,James Robinson noted that “while we may not have the all-powerful Catholic Church of the 16th and 17th centuries that he had to confront, we certainly have legislative bodies that are often tied to very strict religious dogma.” To me it seems that, like Glass’s Galileo, we are moving backwards in time. It would be good if audiences good see “Galileo Galilei” not just as historical fiction but also as a warning.

Performances of “Galileo Galilei” are sung in English with English supertitles and take place through June 29th at the Loretto-Hilton Center on the Webster University campus. Run time is around one hour and 40 minutes with no intermission. For more information, visit the Opera Theatre web site.