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The silent green star
2005
Original article by Graeme Kay (photograph by Johannes Ifkovits). Translated by Ursula Turecek.
This article appears to have originally been in English and translated into German. Uschi has kindly translated this back into English for us, but if you have the original English text we would very much like to see it.
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As recently as in April this year, George Hall, critic of the Opera Magazine, wrote in a review of Keenlyside’s performance as Papageno in Covent Garden: "Forgetting for the moment (though of course you never will) the genuine risk-taking athleticism of his performance – nothing would induce me to slide halfway across the stage on my knees like that, not even Mozart in person – and the perfectly judged Chaplinesque blend of pathos and comedy he brings to the role, avoiding entirely the sentimental or the vulgar, there's the skill of a great lieder singer on top form every time he opens his mouth. Each generation, perhaps, throws up one, maybe two, great Papagenos. Keenlyside is certainly ours. It says nothing about the artist, of course, that he withdrew so swiftly from the tumult of applause that greeted his curtain call, so as to avoid embarassing the next performer to take one, but it does say something about the man." – Great praise indeed and worth being quoted at length, because thus Simon Keenlyside has not only a permanent place in the tradition of great British Papagenos like Benjamin Luxon and Thomas Allen but it also gives some hints to the man behind the artist. Keenlyside has played the role of Papageno regularly for 15 years and will take it to Salzburg this summer for Graham Vick’s new production of the Magic Flute. Although directors never discuss their concept with the ensemble before the beginning of the rehearsals we can probably assume that neither Vick nor Keenlyside will be interested too much in an interpretation of Papageno as a country lad wearing lederhosen as it is popular in Continental Europe. “I prefer Schikaneder’s original ‘feathered’ conception of the role”, as Keenlyside admits. He certainly has good reasons to feel close to nature: Keenlyside studied zoology at Cambridge University before beginning his vocal studies with John Cameron at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester. He confesses to be a “passionate nature lover” and states: “My profession gives me the possibility to see some wonderful things on my journeys.”
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Simon Keenlyside’s successful career – his other showpiece-roles at famous opera houses, from La Scala via Paris and Vienna to the Met and San Francisco, among them Don Giovanni, Count Almaviva, Pelleas, Onegin and Billy Budd - has made it possible for him to give nature something in return by planting trees on his highlandfarm in the hills of Wales. “I have claimed a government aid programme and planted thousands of trees over the intervening years – species that grow rapidly like birch and species that grow slowly like oak. You can design woods to attract species of birds and animals that you are interested in. I may see some birches grow but the oaks will reach maturity long after my death. I see myself as the caretaker of this piece of land – I want to leave it better than I found it.”
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Our conversation takes place at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden; in fact after rehearsals for Keenlyside’s interpretation of the role of Winston in Lorin Maazel’s opera 1984, stage designs and production by Robert Lepage. Keenlyside throws himself on to the dressing stool in his dressing room and admits frankly that he has not “caught” on the role from the vocal score alone; only when he began to rehearse with Maazel and the orchestra he realised not only the reality of the music but also that Maazel really would keep his promise that the singers would be audible over the orchestra (“That’s what they always say !”) and that he would lead them through the representation more or less by the hand. “Meantime I’m sure that this will become a classic”, he asserts enthusiastically. “It’s a brilliant piece.”
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While 1984 is in the making Keenlyside is looking forward to another summer in Salzburg. “I love it: When you are ready with work you have got time to see other events and I enjoy the possibility of going hiking in the mountains – I always try to reside somewhere on the way to the Untersberg. As Salzburg has not submitted to the trend of shortening rehearsals you have two months to work hard, play much and meet friends.” Although Keenlyside prefers not to play Papageno more often than about every 18 months, this part has been on his schedule rather frequently lately. “Am I able to reinvent myself again ? Well, I don’t really fathom Zauberflöte”, he says. „The more I think to control the role the more I discover. Of course you’ve got to leave some space for the directors to convey their ideas – but I wish for a director who has given the role as much thought as I have.” Mainly concerning the text, he adds, as befitting for a singer who is praised for his interpretations of lieder as much as for his operas.
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Keenlyside undertakes his walking-tours in the mountains of the Salzkammergut often accompanied by the music that his i-pod provides – it has loaded not only complete standard recordings of the songs of Schumann, Schubert, Brahms, Beethoven, Wolf and all the other great song composers but also the beloved jazz into which his father, a violinist, introduced him in London’s famous Ronnie Scott’s Club. With the prospect of a year full of not only Papagenos but also Posas (Madrid), Fords (Munich) and Billy Budds (London), Keenlyside asserts contentedly: “When people ask me what’s on my wish list I can say honestly: My wishes are just being fulfilled. And it is a question of keeping my life balanced, so that I have time to see my dear ones – and these trees...”
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(GK is the former editor of Opera Now and of the BBC Music magazine. At the moment he is working as classical producer for BBC Radio 3 Interactive and as moderator for Radio 3.)