Dying of shame: Rattle and the LSO excel in a superb Jenůfa

In recent seasons the London Symphony Orchestra have been performing Janáček operas in concert and then releasing them on their LSO Live CD label. Each has been directed by Sir Simon Rattle, now their Conductor Emeritus. This Jenůfa was indeed “in concert”: no semi-staging, costumes or acting, and a row of music stands at the front of the stage to put scores on, oratorio style. This really ought not to work with such a visceral drama, but somehow it does. The intense focus on surtitles, playing and singing, with no directorial hand offering its interpretation of character and situation, or adding stage business, brings its own rewards. I found this more moving than any of the stage productions I have seen.

The playing and singing has to be superlative, or it adds its own distractions. But Rattle’s commitment to this mode of performance was never in doubt, nor his skill in directing these large forces, cueing singers who are alongside him, not on a stage before him, and urging the London Symphony Chorus, clearly well prepared by Simon Halsey, to relish their folk-derived music aurally even while holding scores, even in the “Every couple has its misfortunes” number, hardly the strongest piece in the work. Rattle’s belief in this opera was everywhere evident, lifting the dance rhythms, generating ominous power from the Prelude on, investing the music to which Jenůfa falls asleep with great tenderness – telling us she sleeps a mother, but will wake childless. The LSO’s playing was from its top drawer, which is saying something.

The cast was as strong as any opera house could assemble today. Agneta Eichenholz, replacing the previously-announced Asmik Gregorian, sang Jenůfa superbly. Other sopranos have more amplitude at times, but vocal acting coming from inside the role is the critical virtue in the part. Eichenholz’s Act 2 prayer to the Virgin for the health of the child she does not yet know has been killed was very affecting in its stillness and sincerity.

As the infanticidal Kostelnička, Katarina Karnéus was as good as one could ever hope to hear, so secure even in those demanding outbursts at the close of Act 2, so convincing as her community’s moral compass who loses her own moral direction. Act 2, with its sequence of dialogues bringing her to her disastrous decision, makes her literally the central figure of the opera. The impressive Aleš Briscein as Laca, the only Czech among the leads, almost stole the vocal honours from the women, with his fine tone and ringing top register, he made this character more sympathetic than usual. Nicky Spence was his shallow half-brother Števa, singing with his customary authority. He swaggered and shrugged, gestured at others, while sporting a biker’s leather jacket like The Wild One, the Brando of Brno. Clearly the Scottish tenor missed the memo about no costumes or acting required, but had fun. All the smaller roles were well cast, led by the Grandmother Buryjovka of mezzo-soprano Carole Wilson, impressive as ever.

Jenůfa is a great tragic opera, but whose tragedy is it? It might be called The Tragedy of Two Mothers: Jenůfa is redeemed, but loses her child; her stepmother Kostelnička, in turn, loses her reputation, her daughter and her grandchild because she fails to see the right priorities among them. Perhaps only a concert presentation, with its inescapable foregrounding of words and music away from any staging, can allow us to focus on such issues which would have been central for the work’s creators. But to draw us in, the performance has to be of this calibre.