John Corigliano & Mark Adamo: The Lord of Cries
Pentatone

Artists of remarkable calibre pool their talents for this exceptional treatment of The Lord of Cries (2021) by composer John Corigliano (b. 1938) and librettist Mark Adamo (b. 1962). The collaborators benefit immensely from the involvement of celebrated conductor Gil Rose and the Boston Modern Orchestra Project (BMOP) and Odyssey Opera Chorus (OOC), both companies Rose-founded. The Grammy-nominated world premiere recording is also distinguished by the artistry of an incredible cast of singers, with countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo in the role of Dionysus leading the way.

This is the fourth nomination in five years the BMOP and OOC have received in the 'Best Opera Recording' category, X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X (2022), The Trial at Rouen (2020), and Fantastic Mr. Fox (2019) the other three and the latter a winning recipient. While releases by Rose and the BMOP typically appear on BMOP/Sound, The Lord of Cries is their debut appearance on Pentatone, and the label has given the 137-minute release the deluxe treatment by housing its two discs and booklet within a sturdy and attractive case. Of the recording, the composer states, “I've had the privilege of collaborating on many, many records of my music over my six-decade career, and this is, far and away, one of the very finest.” Even a single listen supports his assessment.

The Lord of Cries is a significant release for many reasons, including the fact that it's Corigliano's first opera since The Ghosts of Versailles, premiered by the Metropolitan Opera in late 1991 and the work's Pentatone recording the winner of two Grammy Awards. Boasting impressive credentials of his own, composer-librettist Adamo has produced four previous operas, including 1998's Little Women. The story he concocted for the Corigliano collaboration is a fascinating one. Desire is fundamental to the project, specifically erotic desire that's so upsetting it leads to repressive self-denial. Adamo first thought of The Bacchae of Euripides as the perfect vehicle for exploring the idea and then, in a brilliant move, decided to superimpose Bram Stoker's Dracula onto the earlier text and in this way embed the theme within a relatable contemporary context without losing the relevance of the original idea. In Adamo's mind, “Euripides admitted what Stoker couldn't: that the monster isn't on the mountain, or in the city, but in the mirror.” Given that, it's understandable that the opera would end with the chorus intoning, “You may assuage the priest without: But not the beast within / You shall enrage the beast within.”

Such a libretto demanded a provocative musical response, and Corigliano obliged by fashioning a score that's wildly imaginative in orchestral colour and responsive to the text (in his words, “in sung drama, vocal contour should generate orchestral texture”). Consider the prologue by way of illustration. When Dionysus, the Greek god associated with wildness and abandon, enters, a restrained arrangement of piano, harp, and percussion accompanies his musings. Determining that the lessons he taught to the people of Thebes must be re-introduced to a world that has forgotten them, the scene shifts to a London reeling from death and murder and music that's blustery and frenzied. There, the composer has a discombobulated Jonathan Harker (tenor David Portillo) rant “in unpitched phrases” and surrounds him with “pointillistic solo instruments and undulating clusters of sound”; only in dreams, evoking an earlier saner time, does he sing lyrically. Conversely, Lucy Harker (soprano Kathryn Henry) begins with tender expressions that only later, after acknowledging the rage she's repressed, grow jagged and harried (see, her “Tell me, Seward!” episode, for instance, in the opening act). Similar equivocations between the emotional states of the opera's characters and the music appear throughout.

Interestingly, Dracula doesn't appear within the opera as an actual presence; in fact, the name appears only a handful of times in the libretto (in the first act's opening scene, Jonathan refers to him as “Dracul, Dracula: the Lord of Cries!” and Dionysus later sings, “Dracul, Dracula: Lord of Cries—Dracula calls his band!”), and the word “vampire” is absent altogether. That choice is consistent with Corigliano's musical concept, which, consistent with his contention that animal urges are always with us and must be recognized lest they take over, presents a “civilized, triadic, ‘surface' score through which you … hear, more and more, an obsessive, ecstatic music of truth.” In those moments where the characters are more truthful, the music takes on a more primal quality as if to suggest that their “real” selves are present but allusively.

Highlights are plentiful, from the suggested clacking of a typewriter as a London newspaper correspondent (tenor William Ferguson) describes young women being attacked at night and suffering throat wounds. Adding to the effect, an ominous foghorn blares alongside flurries of percussion and choral voices to simulate the state of chaos and terror in the city. Hear also how dynamically the orchestra blazes to reinforce Dionysus's “Listen!” scene near the end of the first act and uses shimmering strings and woodwinds to evoke the hush and mystery of midnight at the start of act two. Throughout Corigliano makes full use of the orchestra to inventively paint scenes and calibrates musical mood and tone to match them. As an example, compare the extreme contrasts in musical character during the second act's lullaby scene when Lucy tries to comfort Jonathan, she tender and he distracted, as wolves howl in the distance. Notice as well how the frenzied activity at the opera's start eventually becomes the cryptic nightmare of the finale.

January 2024