Met’s screening of Aida, Evelyn Mandac at the Met

CCP President Dr. Raul Sunico pointed out that with the screening of the latest Metropolitan Opera productions at the CCP Little Theater, opera lovers need not fly to New York, stay at a hotel or buy tickets at prohibitive prices. Besides, artistic director Chris Millado added, there are no DVDs of current Met productions.

Verdi’s Aida on film is fabulous. The seven-level stage is enlivened by towering statues of pharaohs, trotting horses, a picturesquely-costumed cast of thousands consisting of royal personages and courtiers, soldiers, prisoners of war and dancers, besides the principals. These are Liudmyla Monastyrska as Aida, the enslaved Ethiopian princess; Roberto Alagna as the heroic warrior Radames; Olga Borodina as the arrogant Egyptian princess Amneris. All three, as also the King of Egypt (bass), the King of Ethiopia Amonasro (baritone) have powerful voices, particularly the Egyptian king. Further, Aida’s voice soars above the chorus and the orchestral accompaniment.

Conductor Fabio Luisi provides ideal accompaniment in mounting crescendos or controlled pianissimos. The movingly persuasive acting affirms the Met’s highest emotive standards.

One is amazed at the fluid movement of the cast of thousands which involves tremendous directorial skill and administrative capability behind the opera’s mounting. Costs of sets, costumes and honorariums must be incalculable. Will our own opera productions ever match the Met’s in style or grandeur?

We don’t have a dearth of operatic talent. Margarita Gomez can sing Aida’s role; Camille Lopez-Molina can portray Princess Amneris; Andrew Fernando has the thunderous voice of the Egyptian king. Many of Phil. Opera Co.’s young talents are just waiting to appear in opera. If I remember correctly, the late Conching Rosal sang as Aida, her voice rising above chorus and orchestra. Of course the staging was very modest compared to the Met’s.

If the taipans and tycoons listed in Forbes magazine as well as those not included, were to contribute even a fraction to production costs, opera lovers might yet see presentations as incredibly grand as those at the Met.

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Evelyn Mandac is the only Filipino to have sung at the Metropolitan Opera House. In her ten years of professional engagements abroad (in 1980 she was in her late thirties), she essayed the lead or one of the leads in more than 20 operas produced by the Met and other opera houses in SF, Baltimore, Houston, Washington, Seattle, Sta. Fe, Pittsburgh, Atlanta and almost every musical port-of-call in Europe.

Further, she sang in such prestigious international festivals as England’s Glynde-bourn, Austria’s Salzburg and Hellbron, Italy’s Ravinia, the US’ Saratoga and Ann Arbor.

Mandac was soloist with major US orchestras, e.g., the Philadephia and the American Symphonies, the LA Philharmonic, the Boston Symphony under Seiji Ozawa and the Cleveland Symphony under James Levine.

The engaging soprano has sung with Met tenor Jan Peerce in a concert version of Don Giovanni and with other Met luminaries: tenors Placido Domingo and Richard Tucker, Swedish baritone Hakan Hagegard, mezzo-sopranos Marilyn Horne, Jennie Tourel, Shirley Barrett and Marion Lippert.

During a rehearsal break for a Seattle Opera presentation, the Swedish Wagnerian Soprano Birgit Nilsson gathered the lissome Mandac in her arms and gushed: “My dear, you sing like an angel!” I heard Nilsson ages ago at the Royal Swedish Royal Opera House as Leonore in Fidelio: She of the huge build and towering height, her stentorian voice filling the auditorium to the rafters. Yet here she was unreservedly praising Mandac! Critics have praised the Filipino singer just as highly. Of her Carmina Burana recording with Ozawa, Stereo Review adjudged it the best yet. Paul Hume of the Washington Post described Mandac “a specially beautiful singer” after her appearance in Handel’s Rinaldo with Marilyn Horne.

Despite all the foregoing distinctions of Mandac, which distinctions supersede those gained by earlier divas Fuentes, Tapales, Gaston and Aldava, Mandac’s contract with the Met was not renewed, according to a reliable source, because her voice, albeit “angelic” lacked volume. This proves Met’s exacting measuring rod; thus the screenings at the CCP Little Theater are a rare treat!