Academy of Vocal Arts presents Verdi's 'La Traviata'

Artists to watch

Buchanan’s traditionalist approach — with handsome sets by Peter Harrison and period-specific costumes by Val Starr — allows the opera room to breathe. This feels appropriate for a student performance, where directorial concept shouldn’t be the evening’s primary focus. Without any extranarrative devices foisted on the work, audience attention is rightly drawn to the poignant and tragic love story at the opera’s center, and to the singing actors charged with putting it across.

Several AVA resident artists share leading roles across the production’s six-performance run. On opening night, Meryl Dominguez sang the opera’s heroine, Violetta Valéry, with musical intelligence and ample stage presence. A coloratura soprano with a shimmering sense of vocal line, Dominguez brought brighter-than-usual sound to the role. Although her pitch never wavered, the tone occasionally turned acidic. But rarely have I heard “Sempre libera” (“Always free”), Violetta’s Act I cri de cœur, performed with such thrilling agility.

Dominguez came into her own in Act II, when Violetta, secretly dying of consumption, faces the prospect of leaving her lover, Alfredo. She projected pride and strength during her long confrontation with Alfredo’s father, Giorgio, who tells her his daughter’s marital prospects are threatened by Alfredo and Violetta’s affair. Her singing ranged from delicately shaded pianissimo in “Dite alla giovine, sí bella e pura” (“Tell your daughter, so beautiful and pure”), when Violetta agrees to renounce her love, to full-throttle cries of anguish at her final parting with Alfredo.

Oliver Sewell matched Dominguez’s intensity as Alfredo, if not always her vocal polish. A first-year resident artist, his ringing tenor soared easily above Christofer Macatsoris’s occasionally bombastic orchestra, and he dispatched Alfredo’s Act II aria “De miei bollenti spiriti” (“My passionate spirit”) with appropriate ardency. Some of his highest notes turned squally, and at times his technique seemed less than secure. But in his first principal role with AVA, he distinguished himself as an artist to watch.

Timothy Renner’s rich baritone and dignified bearing suited Giorgio perfectly. He played the role as a pragmatist with a caring heart, which allowed him to move from initial gruffness toward Violetta to palpable sympathy. He similarly showed Alfredo compassion in the face of heartbreak, without shirking the sense of obligation that caused him to plead for an end to the affair. With performances of Count di Luna in Il Trovatore and the title role of Rigoletto already under his belt at AVA, Renner seems primed for success as a Verdi baritone.

Tuning trouble

Small roles were cast from strength across the board. Mezzo-soprano Gabriela Flores made a particularly touching impression as Annina, Violetta’s devoted servant. With relatively few lines, Pascale Spinney’s Flora suggested a voice I would like to hear again in a larger part.

AVA’s orchestra had a less felicitous evening under Macatsoris’s baton. Tuning problems persisted throughout Act I, compounded by occasionally rushed tempos and sloppy entrances. The orchestra sounded better in Acts II and III, although Macatsoris’s regularly audible shouted instructions to specific players suggested lingering problems that should have been worked through in rehearsals.

But the performers onstage compensated for glitches from the pit — particularly in the third act, played as affectingly here as I’ve ever seen it. Dominguez, Sewell, and Renner will only continue to grow in their parts over the course of the run, to say nothing of their prospects in future professional productions. That they’re already so accomplished is reason to rejoice.