In 1992, Boston Lyric Opera based its production on a new scholarly edition by Michael Kaye, and a somewhat freer version (including Dapertutto’s Diamond Aria, the best Offenbach song not actually written by Offenbach) is what the team of stage director Renaud Doucet and designer André Barbe have just returned to (at the Shubert Theatre, through November 18), following Offenbach’s original sequence: Hoffmann’s infatuation with the mechanical doll Olympia, then the tubercular Antonia, and finally the Venetian courtesan Giulietta. Not everything works. The Venetian scene is too cluttered (with moving bridges!); the voice of Antonia’s dead mother emerges from a statue so gigantic it dwarfs her voice. But this is the rare and admirable production in which every detail contributes to one large overarching concept, the idea that if Hoffmann is an artist, his love life must finally be secondary to his art. So tenor Matthew DiBattista here appears as Offenbach himself, sometimes in the guise of a minor character, to watch over the events. And vivid mezzo-soprano Michèle Losier, the best singer in the cast, is both Hoffmann’s best friend, Niklausse, and his Muse — much more important in Offenbach’s original idea than in later revisions.
The acting is, on the whole, more persuasive than the singing is elegant. Soprano Georgia Jarman is a hilarious mechanical vixen, yet as the frail Antonia she sometimes belts when her voice ought to melt. Baritone Gaétan Laperrière gives each villain a distinct personality. Tenor Gerard Powers is a compelling Hoffmann with power in climaxes he doesn’t always expend elsewhere. The chorus clearly relishes its many opportunities. And Keith Lockhart conducts with energy, sometimes at the expense of the singers — and the sparkling music doesn’t always sparkle.
Related:
Diva-gations, Not quite eternal, One bird's opinion, More 
- Diva-gations
Last week's Boston Symphony concert was a snaggle of contradictions. British guest conductor Mark Wigglesworth was substituting for the exciting but erratic Russian maestro Yuri Termirkanov, who'd cancelled all his American appearances.
- Not quite eternal
When what’s arguably the world’s best symphony orchestra expectations run high.
- One bird's opinion
One bird’s opinion, or Lines upon Seeing the President Struck by Avian Droppings during a Rose Garden Press Conference
- Generation gap
It’s an uneven show with a dour vision that leaves a mediciny taste in your mouth — and, I think, offers signs of a generation gap among curators.
- John McCain's economic philosophy
Big Fat Whale
- Twitheads
Is Twitter bad for journalism?
- Opening pitch
The most moving moment of this year’s Boston Symphony Orchestra opening gala came before the concert started — the standing ovation for James Levine, who looked rested and recuperated after his kidney surgery this summer, an operation that forced him to cancel most of his Tanglewood season.
- Peter Bjorn and John | Seaside Rock
It’s really pointless. And somewhat nice.
- Mobile-home game
The intersection of Brookline Avenue and Lansdowne Street, in the hours before, during, and after a Red Sox game, is not unlike a trading floor on pre-crash Wall Street: it’s chaotic, teeming with people, and everyone’s trying to make a buck.
- Is John McCain crazy?
There is something not quite right about John McCain.
- Sweet release
I don’t want to waste your time waxing philosophical about the problematic logic behind qualifying music “good” or “bad,” much less pontificating on whether “sophisticated punk” is an oxymoron.
- Less
Topics:
Classical
, David Kravitz, Barack Obama, Michael Kaye, More
, David Kravitz, Barack Obama, Michael Kaye, Paul Hindemith, Carl Orff, Carl Orff, Georges Bizet, Joel Cohen, Renaud Doucet, Andy Barbe, Less
