Her hypnotizing and slightly ironical Habanera indulged us in a dark mellow tone, and her Seguidilla was filled with folklore musicality as Johnson performed a flamenco-inspired dance around her Don José (and husband of only two months) tenor Benjamin Warschawski. Mezzo-soprano Heather Johnson did not wear a costume, but a red flower in her hair, her long ruffled outfit and no shoes on her feet made her look the part. No sooner than the Act I chorus of the cigarette girls (beautifully performed by the BCO choir) ended, when a dark silhouette appeared in the ballroom doorway. However, this was not the case with Baltimore Concert Opera, whose performance, contrary to the established tradition, focused on the development of the opera’s title character, Carmen. With many stage directors tending to see the title heroine as a consistently unfaithful girlfriend whose love “doesn’t last over six months”, it is Don José who, due to his moral downfall, becomes the central figure in most productions. Even though, due to the concert format of this event, there were no sets or costumes, and the stage of the ballroom (our opera house for the evening) was really tiny, this performance shed light on the things that I had never noticed about Bizet’s opera before and gave it a completely new meaning. On Friday night the Engineers Club, located in the heart of historical Baltimore, hosted a performance of Bizet’s Carmen, offered by the artists of Baltimore Concert Opera.
But let’s face it: how often does an opera artist get an opportunity to express his/her own vision of the character? Hardly ever, unless, liberated by the absence of director’s demands, the artist gives the role a bold treatment, and through it, inspires the audience to see a familiar opera at a different angle. Don’t take me wrong: I do enjoy a well-directed opera production with a concept. One of my favorite things about opera in concert is the absence of director’s concept.
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