Marc-Antoine Charpentier didn’t write many operas, particularly when set against the many hundreds of his sacred works, because for most of his lifetime, he was barred from the genre by the monopoly granted to Lully. In 1688, however, he managed to sneak in David et Jonathas, denoting it as a “biblical tragedy” and having it staged at the Jesuit Collège Louis le Grand in Paris. Seeing Marshall Pynkoski’s new production at the Chapelle Royale at the Château de Versailles – very much more Charpentier’s stamping ground than the adjacent Opéra Royal – makes one wish the Louis XIV had relaxed Lully’s monopoly a lot sooner than he eventually did.
The orchestra and chorus were the Chœur et Ensemble Marguerite Louise, conducted by their youthful founder Gaétan Jarry, an organist who has spent a lot of his career around Versailles. They were a force of nature. I lost count of the number of wow moments of propulsive playing and could only marvel at the energy they generated, unflagging over more than two hours of music. The timbre of every period instrument was a delight, most notably the joyous explosions from the trumpets and sonorous underpinning of the three viole da gamba. As a conductor, Jarry is both sweeping and precise in his movements and his rapport with the players and singers – the chorus split between the stage and orchestral level – was obvious. Charpentier gives the chorus some glorious contrapuntal music and they took every advantage, producing moments of intensity that were just as thrilling as their instrumental colleagues.
It’s not that often that I hear a tenor who simply blows me into the back of my seat, and even less so in Baroque music. Reinoud van Mechelen did exactly that, from his very first notes. He has a huge voice, but the power levels are achieved with immense sweetness through the range, while he is able to exquisitely shape a phrase or develop a single note. His depiction of David was utterly enthralling.
David et Jonathas falls outside the operatic norms in various ways. David is an all-conquering hero, but his only wish is to avoid violence so that he can be with his beloved Jonathan. The love triangle is similarly unusual, since the baritone seeking to disrupt the relationship of our heroes is not another lover but Jonathan’s father King Saul – who has been befuddled by the predictions of the Pythoness (the Witch of Endor in the Bible) and persuaded that David is a traitor by the scheming Philistine general Joabel. The Prologue and Acts 1 and 2 set up the drama in a somewhat leisurely manner; after the interval, Acts 3-5 pick up the pace and the second half flashes by.