Review: ‘Carmen’ Returns to Its Comic Opera Roots

Do we truly know Bizet’s “Carmen”?

To be fair, the opera could single-handedly fill out a playlist of classical music’s greatest hits, with its Overture, Habanera and “Toreador Song,” among other gems. It has played at the Metropolitan Opera over a thousand times since it debuted there in 1884.

But that grand-opera version, with its recitative — and some ballet music adapted from the Bizet catalog — was finalized after the composer’s death. When the work premiered at the Opéra Comique in Paris, in 1875, audiences instead heard spoken dialogue in between the score’s rip-roaring numbers.

When you remove the subsequent meddling, and dial things back to Bizet’s original idea for “Carmen,” you get a sleeker, funnier show: one in which the tawdry violence and blithe indifference to pat morality comes off with a devil-may-care kick.

Most companies stick to the grand-opera confection. Yet MasterVoices — New York’s scrappy, pop-up music drama specialists — brought the original idea to town on Tuesday for a one-night-only performance at the Rose Theater at Jazz at Lincoln Center. (It was sung and spoken in English, using a fluid, ingenious translation by Sheldon Harnick, the Broadway veteran and lyricist of “Fiddler on the Roof.”)

As sung by the mezzo-soprano Ginger Costa-Jackson, this Carmen was suitably entrancing, but also a savvy operator. Her mix of laser-sharp intonation and a dark timbre has been heard in smaller roles at the Met, where she is a member of the young artist program, but the intimacy of the Rose Theater allowed her greater freedom for subtle dramatic effects.

When rebuffing ceaseless male attention in Act I, Costa-Jackson used cabaret theatrics, including flicks of the finger and generous servings of side eye, to emphasize how much of Carmen’s story — even her vaunted independence — amounts to a show observed by the citizenry of Seville.

There were slight signs of pushing too hard during the Habanera, but Costa-Jackson’s aggressive, overall take on the role was a success, especially by the third act: As Carmen came face to face with a grim recognition of her unalterable fate, she had full command of a glowering power, easily slicing through some of Bizet’s most dramatic scoring.

Just as strong was the soprano Mikaela Bennett as Micaëla. Her top notes sparked as clearly on Tuesday as they did in Michael Gordon’s doom-metal chamber opera “Acquanetta” in 2018. John Brancy’s suavely warm baritone made for a dashing Escamillo. And although the tenor Terrence Chin-Loy’s honeyed sound as Don José could overindulge in the character’s naïveté, he produced a climactic characterization of authentic, thrilling malevolence.

Ted Sperling, MasterVoices’ artistic director, conducted an Orchestra of St. Luke’s performance of polished, singing ease. During the first act’s expositional recounting of Carmen’s knife fight, Sperling rushed the tempo a bit, making it difficult for the skilled singers of the MasterVoices chorus to be heard as cleanly as elsewhere. Yet his reading was in service of an evening that strutted.

MasterVoices tends to underpromise then overdeliver, and Tuesday’s performance was carefully not billed as a staging. But with this cast — and some choreography by Gustavo Zajac — it was much more than a mere concert.

Previously, I have admired the way Sperling and his players can figure out a problem piece like Kurt Weill’s “Lady in the Dark” or the largely forgotten “Let ’Em Eat Cake,” by the Gershwins. Their only real problem is budgetary. Short runs or one-night performances are great for audiences in the know. But imagine a stable home, and enduring engagements, for these musicians. They could go from being a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it novelty to something that New York desperately lacks: a standing, smashing comic opera company.

Carmen

Performed on Tuesday at the Rose Theater at Jazz at Lincoln Center, Manhattan.