Karina Gauvin and Aaron Sheehan (centerstage) as Circé and Ulisse in the Boston Early Music Festival’s production of Henry Desmarest’s 1694 Circé. Kathy Wittman photograph
Circé
Boston
Boston Early Music Festival
6/4/23
Marrying the visual exoticism of Cirque de Soleil with the musical elegance of the Parisian Baroque, the Boston Early Music Festival staged its latest operatic extravaganza, Henry Desmarest’s 1694 Circé, in the Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre on June 4, to open its 2023 festival.
Postponed (save for a virtual approximation) since 2019, this BEMF finally presents its themed Celebration of Women. The North American premiere of Desmarest’s Circé continues a series of Grammy–attracting productions that have opened the biennial festival for almost three decades, including two works from Desmarest’s contemporary Lully (Thésée, in 2001, and Psyché in 2007). This festival continues with three more stagings of Circé, a trade show attracting international early-music enthusiasts and professionals, and weeklong performances from morning to late night.
Soprano Karina Gauvin sang the title role, authoritative and masterfully controlled. Statuesque tenor Aaron Sheehan (Ulisse) was joined by the richly textured lower voices of baritones Douglas Williams (Polite) and Jesse Blumberg (Elphénor). Gauvin was joined by sopranos Amanda Forsythe, alluringly precise as Éolie, and Teresa Wakim as Astérie.
At least a dozen choristers had substantial solos as well, exemplifying the depth of vocal expertise in this (as in every) BEMF production.
Even the corners of the stage held visual interest, with Gilbert Blin’s sets and Jérôme Kaplan’s costumes. Kathy Wittman photograph
Costumes, color, sets and effects maintained a continuously replenishing visual field, exciting and deftly coordinated. Luxurious robes (Jérôme Kaplan) regaled not only the soloists, but each dancer and chorus member.
Sets (Gilbert Blin) looked magnificent: mountainous displays of forests, intimidating temples and an unforgettable scene in Hell. Kelly Martin’s lighting—especially lightning effects—boldly added to the carefully planned color schemes, which matched costumes to scenery and to the characters’s frequently shifting affections. While the palette mostly splashed turquoise and burnished reds, it also offered stunning monochromatic moments, notably Éolie’s third-act entrance (with dancers and chorus) in ghastly, shimmering, off-white robes, wigs and masks.
Melinda Sullivan directed the dancers, which included choreographers Marie-Nathalie Lacoursière and Pierre-François Dollé. Dance and informed gesture were essential, not just during interludes but as an integrated part of the storytelling. Soloists, choristers and dancers all contributed to the stately pace and the stylized interactions. Every movement and glance had potency.
BEMF musical directors Paul O’Dette (theorbo) and Stephen Stubbs (guitar) led the perpetually active continuo section. Concertmaster Robert Mealy directed the string-heavy orchestra, two dozen instrumentalists, facing each other along a narrow desk. The instrumentalists were seated at audience level in the pit; their visual presence underscored the seamless relationship between dance, libretto and music.
Louise-Geneviève Gillot de Saintonge (1650–1718) wrote the libretto, notable not for its robust narrative but its emotional directness. All the arias were about love (or its steady companion, hate), and the subplots involving incendiary amorous entanglements became interchangeable. There is an over-arching plot involving Ulisse rescuing his sailors from the enchantress, but this Circé focuses on love rejected or embraced.
There were many striking solo and duet moments—Gauvin’s raging “S’il vous m’aimez, faut-il me taire,” as she transforms Ulisse’s men into swine; the infectious Forsythe singing “Désirs, transports, cruelle impatience”; Wakim and Williams’s extended duet that closes the second act. The instrumental score predominantly accompanied: robust, but not adventurous. There were no instrumental solos.
The strengths of Circé rested on its extravagances. Enhancing the directness of the music, the energy of the color palette—costumes, masks, wigs, scenery and lighting all coordinated expertly—provided seamlessly shifting appeal.—Keith Powers