You can, on occasion, become sated with vocal beauty, particularly if it is purchased at the price of emotional coolness. This phenomenon is much in evidence in the Royal Opera's current run of La Traviata, which, at its halfway stage, has a largely new cast, preferable to the one that went before, although still by no means ideal.
There's a new Violetta in the form of Ruth Ann Swenson. She's an immaculate technician, allowing us to hear things in Verdi's score that we sometimes miss. The trills in the act one finale are all in place; most sopranos omit them. Yielding to Germont's pressure to give up Alfredo, she spins out the vocal line with a rapt, unearthly pianissimo that makes your spine tingle. Unlike her predecessor, the idiosyncratic if forgettable Inva Mula, Swenson is scrupulous when it comes to phrasing and rhythm, unshowy in her avoidance of long-held high notes.
Yet, at the same time, there's a disparity between technique and dramatic imagination. Swenson is no actress. Flouncing about in a crinoline, she looks like an uppity southern belle rather than a knowing high-class hooker. This wouldn't matter so much if she achieved an integrated vocal characterisation, but all too often we're asked to admire technique rather than musical meaning. Those trills impress because they're accurate, not because they are an expression of Violetta's nerve-ridden ennui. That flawless pianissimo sounds like an exercise in breath control, rather than the tormented sound of an emotionally broken woman.
She's rarely moving, and the emotional brunt of the performance ultimately falls on the men in Violetta's life. Alfredo is sung by the cultish, young Maltese tenor, Joseph Calleja. He has an easy, sumptuous voice with a flickering vibrato that suggests tremendous emotional urgency. Long-haired and gawky, he plays Alfredo as a man who has adopted bohemianism out of rebellion against paternal authority, although a residue of gauchness sets him apart from the posing sophisticates of Violetta's circle. His father is once again given tremendous tragic stature by Paolo Gavanelli, while conductor Paolo Carignani is even better this time around, turning the score into a series of fluid, interlocking conversation pieces rather than adopting a self-consciously operatic approach. He's outstanding and we need to hear more of him.
· In rep until January 20. Box office 020-7304 7000.
