Sheer delight this
album – Bonynge’s inspired, sparkling
production of Emmerich Kálmán’s
The Gypsy Princess, brims with
superb toe-tapping melodies – it is
Viennese operetta at its best, vividly
recorded in brilliant and involving
surround sound.
As Nigel Douglas so
succinctly puts it, Kálmán’s
gift to "Viennese operetta was
the brilliant colour, heady rhythms
and dynamic energy of his native Hungary."
The Gypsy Princess, first produced
in 1915, was, not surprisingly, considering
its wealth of intoxicating, memorable
tunes, his greatest popular success.
How its joie de vivre must have
shone through the darkness of war-torn
Europe.
The tale is simple:
Song and dancer, Sylva Varescu is preparing
to depart the Viennese stage for an
America tour. But Prince Edwin loves
her and will not let her go. She returns
his feelings but there’s a fly in the
ointment because the Prince’s parents
want him to marry the more suitable
Countess Stasi. Edwin publicly declares
his defiance and binds himself to marrying
Sylva within eight weeks after he has
sorted out his entanglements. Inevitably
misunderstandings and break-ups ensue
before the inevitable happy ending.
Yvonne Kenny, is a
feisty romantic Sylva. [Readers might
remember her in good form as Hanna Glawari
in Lehár’s The Merry Widow
on the 2003 Opus Arte DVD reviewed on
this site]. She is splendidly supported
by a most ardent and reckless Michael
Roidera as Prince Edwin. Mojca Erdman
has youthful purity and innocence as
the Countess Stasi, Edwin’s cousin and
childhood sweetheart, who finds romance
with Boni, Sylva’s manager (an engagingly
rakish Marko Kathol).
But it is the music!
Act I represents a delicious continual
outpouring of memorable melodies that
defies the listener not to hum or toe-tap
along with them. After the Overture,
Sylva sings, in her Lied: ‘Heia, Heia,
in den Bergen ist mein Heimatland’,
first nostalgically about her distant
mountain homeland to broad gypsy rhythms
before the tempo quickens and she launches
into a rip-roaring exposition of a philosophy
of life not unlike Carmen’s "If
you wish to win my heart, take care,
you will be mine body and soul ... "
supported by a lusty chorus. Then Boni,
enjoins the men’s chorus in another
big hit, the jolly raffish march-ensemble
‘Alle sind wir Sünder’ which is
very reminiscent of ‘Wie die Weiber’,
the big hit Act II male chorus from
Lehár’s The Merry Widow.
Cor anglais and celesta introduce romance
and announce Sylva and Edwin’s delectable
duet – ‘Sylva, ich will nur dich’. Boni
leads the women’s chorus in another
rollicking number the trotting rhythms
of ‘Aus ist’s mit der Liebe’ in which
he tells the girls that it is time to
bid them goodbye before going to New
York but begs just one more kiss. If
all that was not enough there follows
yet another enchanting number, ‘O, jag’
dem Glück nicht nach’ in which
Sylva sings of every woman’s search
for lasting romantic love before the
music develops into another fiery czardas.
If this level of melodic invention is
not always maintained through the remaining
two acts and a little sameness of tunefulness
intrudes, the music is always a delight.
But I must mention Sylva and Edwin’s
haunting Act II duet ‘Tanzen möchte
ich’ and Act III’s sparkling gypsy-style
trio ‘Nimm, Zigeuner, deiner Geige’
as Boni and Feri seek to dispel Sylva’s
gloom.
CD2 has more attractive
tunes - some 28 minutes of romantic
lilting music from four other lesser-known
Kálmán operettas played
with verve and style.
A sparkling production
of Kálmán’s tune-filled
operetta. Hugely enjoyable
Ian Lace
Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra and Slovak
Philharmonic Chorus/Richard Bonynge 
NAXOS
6.110075-76 [56:20 + 57:17]
