Mozart: Don Giovanni

COMPOSERS: Mozart
LABELS: Supraphon
ALBUM TITLE: Don Giovanni
WORKS: Don Giovanni
PERFORMER: Andrei Beschany, Dalibor Jedlicka, Nadezhda Petrenko, Vladimìr Dolezal, Jirina Marková, Ludek Vele, Zdenek Harvánek, Alice Randová; Prague National Theatre Chorus & Orchestra/Charles Mackerras; dir. David Radok (Prague, 1991)
CATALOGUE NO: SU 7012-9

PRESENTATION: ***







At the end of 1991’s Mozart



anniversary year, Sir Charles



Mackerras conducted a Don



Giovanni in the very Prague theatre



– the Estates – in which the opera



had been premiered in 1787. The



film of the live performance begins



and ends with the Don in track-suit



and trainers, making his way into



and out of the theatre, and toying



with an apple. That is just about



the only concession to the 20th



century. Otherwise, what you watch



is a ‘period’ staging: 18th-century



recessed perspectives within the



proscenium; make-up and costume



which dictates only the most



decorous of stage movement; and



plenty of stand-and-deliver arias.



In this opera, of all Mozart’s,



it’s not exactly what we’ve become



used to. All the ‘attitude’, though,



is within the alchemising baton of



Mackerras and his players. It’s also



a totally unstarry cast: most parts



are sung adequately, with one or two



lurches between stage and pit. Only



Nadezhda Petrenko’s Donna Anna,



and Ludek Vele’s rough-and-tumble



Leporello really make their mark.



There are no track-listings and



no synopsis: you simply sit down and



watch from start to finish. But there



is a handsomely shot, pleasing and



perceptive 45-minute accompanying



documentary telling, through the



letters of Mozart’s singer-friend



Josepha Duschek, the story of his



relationship with Prague: the city



which taught him to follow ‘whatever



his heart dictated’, and where his



music was sung, played and whistled



not in palaces, but in the streets –



just as it is today. Hilary Finch