Commentary on Krishna – the mystery of John Tavener’s ‘mystic pantomime’ and why it was founded | Classical music

Tthe first thing you need to know John Tavener2005 opera Krishna so it’s basically a “mystical pantomime”. If the very idea gives you even the faintest thrill, this is not the opera for you. The second thing you should know is that at the end of the video of Krishna dying at the Grange Park Opera, the singers gave a hearty applause.

It has to be done. Without Ross Ramgobin‘great devotion, fixed as a Heavenly Narrator, or Eliran Kadusisweet, flexible like the young Krishna, or very intelligent, the wonderful soprano of Rosa Sparks (son of Krishna), Nazan Fikret (his wife Rukmini) and Jennifer Statham and Julia Sitkovetsky (Radha being a child and a woman respectively), this short work would have been unsustainable.

In the pit, the Gascoigne Orchestra provided frequent bass drones and brass stampedes. There were forms that flashed and forms that thumped and hummed, multiple gongs that vibrated against Tavener’s post-Wagnerian post-minimalism. Rehearsals came as usual, as did sudden changes and stops, led by the conductor Mark Shanahan it’s the dispassionate art of a former traffic cop. Nao Masuda’s drumming on stage – fierce and playful – marked the 15th scene of the episode and was the most amazing thing that happened.

Krishna is a set of vignettes from the life of a Hindu deity, each introduced by a Heavenly Author. The Sanskrit and English libretto is by Tavener himself, although the British Hindu scholar Ranchor Prime credits it with “some inspiration and allusions and lyrics”. Many of the recordings were inaudible – thanks to the high, clear vocals on one side and the muddy music of the orchestra and choir – and the surtitles were often missing before the given words were sung.

In David PountneyIn the production, the characters stood around and sometimes showed off, leaving only six female players. During their “love drama”, Radha and Krishna faced the audience before tumbling on separate beds on different sides of the stage. The worst came several times in the wash of red light. The deadly snake was a huge inflatable, Krishna’s struggle with it was known to anyone who tried to carry an airbed. In one scene, the singer – sitting in a pyramid throughout, as if it were a projection screen – inexplicably did a quick Mexican wave.

The high standards of culture have changed a lot in the 20 years since Krishna was written. But it didn’t just feel old-fashioned in its wide-eyed, white British writing about the world’s great religion; it sounded and looked like it came straight out of the playbook of 19th-century operatic Orientalism. Grange Park’s willingness to create a world-class show during the financial crisis is commendable. But some jobs are better left.