GRAMOPHONE: From Where I Sit – November 2020
Among the many treasured recordings that I have found refuge in during a spring, summer and autumn of discontent for live music and theatre this year a souvenir DVD of the fabulous 2005 David McVicar staging of Handel’s Guilio Cesare at Glyndebourne brought back especially potent memories of an unforgettable opening night where opulence was all around and a new stage star was born in Danielle de Niese. I remember writing my notice for The Independent and describing this sexy showbizzy Cleopatra as (and literary finesse had already deserted me) ‘a complete knock-out’. If singing was about mind, body and spirit this lady had it in abundance. All the elements – voice, musicality, theatricality, physicality – were in alignment. She belonged on a stage.
I pride myself in knowing within five seconds if that is the case with any performer and I put it recently to both de Niese and Sarah Connolly (her Caesar) in a couple of audio podcasts that this was a production in which everyone belonged on that stage. Connolly recalls the first rehearsal where McVicar had placed a single director’s chair in the rehearsal space and upon her entrance she had instinctively gravitated to it and sat down – because important people sat while everyone else stood. That was her performance right there.
De Niese had to play catch-up as believe it or not she was a late replacement for Cleopatra. Career-defining performances don’t usually start that way – though if you think about it her beauty and superstardom are talking points long before we actually set eyes upon her. When I set eyes upon de Niese something else struck me about her – and that was an indefinable air of West End and Broadway. So it came as no surprise to learn that she was weaned on musical genre-hopping and at seven she had auditioned for the Young Cosette in the Australian premiere of Les Miserables.
Last summer she pulled off an astonishing ‘double’ alternating Massenet’s Cendrillon (conducted by John Wilson) at Glyndebourne and Aldonza in Mitch Leigh and Joe Darion’s Man of La Mancha at ENO. Both require operatic reach and a natural stage magnetism but the vocal production requires significant adjustments shifting the centre of gravity of the voice to achieve more of a ‘chest dominated’ mix. When you have a healthy legit soprano as your foundation (and de Niese has steered clear of insane offers like Aida which one legendary director tried to lure her with) such adjustments are less of an issue. Look at Broadway leading ladies like Kelli O’Hara, Laura Benanti, Audra McDonald – all legit sopranos and then some. The other thing is a natural ability to connect with the vernacular of the text. Dawn Upshaw is a shining example of someone who could do that instinctively.
De Niese is drawn to all branches of the musical stage and clearly longs to alternate Handel, Mozart, and the Bel Canto repertoire with the likes of Jason Robert Brown (The Bridges of Madison County has been suggested) and Adam Guettel (she looked on as Renee Fleming gave her Margaret Johnson last year). I have offered to compile a list of possibilities. But now she is lady of the manor at Glyndebourne could this be the time that Frank Loesser’s The Most Happy Fella finally makes it there? John Wilson is aching to do it.
