She has what every Lulu needs: the physique du role and fearless vocal production that takes her up to some brilliantly stratospheric notes.
OPERA, JOHN ALLISON
It takes a brave cast to work with Bieito, and in Basel no one was more unstinting than Marisol Montalvo in the title role. She has what every Lulu needs: the physique du role and fearless vocal production that takes her up to some brilliantly stratospheric notes.
» Show the ArticleThe following night Marisol Montalvo´s performance as Lulu in Calixto Bieito´s full-frontal production of Berg´s opera, albeit questionably omitting the opening Paris scene of Cerha´s completion of the third act, also demonstrated brilliant theatrical panache. Bieito updates to the present day, and we are in no doubt what Lulu´s assets are as we see a succession of photographs of her nude that leave nothing to the imagination. But how many performers could stand this exposure? And how many sopranos could sing the material, let alone figure naked in the final scene of her murder ...
Montalvo sings the treacherous title role as well as she acts it. The voice is not huge but it is bright and clear, and she maintains an ease of production even in the most challenging high-lying phrases.
» Show the ArticleMontalvo conveyed a real sense of ‘possession’ right from the first scene, and in Eötvös’s music her sensuous yet stratospheric soprano was all gain...Montalvo carried the performance. She was more involved and involving in the girl’s terrible fate at the hands of the Inquisitor, giving her all to the extent of being stripped semi-naked.
.... the sweet-voiced soprano Marisol Montalvo.
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