LOS ANGELES — In his memoir Words Without Music, Philip Glass recalled developing his musical-aesthetic taste in the 1960s by seeing productions that were “either maddening or mesmerizing depending on your point of view.” His 1984 opera Akhnaten elicited both reactions when LA Opera revived its 2016 English co-production Feb. 28 at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, where it runs through March 22.
The third in Glass’ “portrait” trilogy of people who changed history in science (Einstein on the Beach), politics (Satyagraha), and religion, Akhnaten is starting to look like it has staying power.
Admittedly, his simple-seeming arpeggios, oscillating polyrhythms, and repetitive patterns are not for everybody. For some opera lovers, it can become the aural equivalent of strobe lights for epileptics. But on opening night, Akhnaten proved even sturdier than its earlier iteration — visually and sonically immersive, imaginatively directed, and radiantly sung by a fine cast and chorus.
For those who haven’t recently been to the Egyptian Museum in Cairo or the Aten Museum in Minya, Egypt, Akhnaten was a mid-14th-century BCE pharaoh. His rise, 17-year reign, and fall became fuel for Egyptologists, archaeologists, historians, and theologians. Indeed, Glass’ timing was fortuitous. “My Akhnaten fell into the wake of this big ship, which is Egyptology,” he told me in 2011. It was also predictive of today’s gender controversies. Akhnaten apparently shared physical characteristics of both male and female.
In many accounts, Akhnaten is shown as a megalomaniacal leader whose attempted regime change — his revolutionary monotheism (the sun god, Aten) versus an embedded polytheistic tradition — failed. After a reactionary rebellion, his legacy, including his creation of a new capital at Amarna, was erased and in ruins.
So the role comes with big sandals to fill, not least because until now, Anthony Roth Costanzo was thought by many to own it. (He performed in the 2016 production.) But countertenor John Holiday showed he was more than ready, delivering a fearless performance, not least when he holds a mysteriously regal presence during a long nude scene in which he slowly descends stairs before being dressed by his attendants.
In a coup de théâtre, Holiday doesn’t sing until about 35 minutes into the opera, when his commandingly pure but richly characterized countertenor suddenly kicks in. One can imagine first-timers still being surprised.
Another effective touch: the absence of violins in the orchestra, which gave Ukrainian-born Finnish conductor Dalia Stasevska, making her LA Opera debut, the chance to work a darker instrumental palette in contrast to the higher voices on stage. Stasevska, physically animated and forceful in the pit, led the musicians in a steadier, more colorful and pitch-reliable rendition of this challenging score with its constantly shifting meters than they achieved in 2016.
Director Phelim McDermott kept it all moving along smoothly. The original lighting designer, Bruno Poet, evoked an other-worldly atmosphere, Kevin Pollard’s costumes dazzled, and Tom Pye’s three-level set with its various compartments kept our eyes busy. And let’s not forget Sean Gandini, juggling choreographer. Yes, there is plenty of juggling throughout the show. (There was, in fact, juggling in ancient Egypt.) It became a visual-rhythmic analogue to the undulating music, sometimes escalating the tension of the Glass score, which once begun can easily run aground. Luckily, on opening night there were only a few small juggling and orchestral glitches.
Soprano So Young Park as Akhnaten’s mother, Queen Tye, and mezzo-soprano Sun-Ly Pierce as Nefertiti added to the drama and romance, with Pierce lending tenderness and grace to her sensuous Act 2 duet with Holiday.
Texture, so important to this production’s trance-like aesthetic, was highlighted when the married couple sang while slowly twining and untwining the long red trains attached to their Egyptian shifts. The spiraling effect complemented Glass’ similarly twisting score.
The rest of the cast, including tenor Yuntong Han as the High Priest of Amon, baritone Hyungjin Son as General Horemhab, and bass Vinícius Costa as Aye, Nefertiti’s father, acquitted themselves well, as did the six daughters of Akhnaten.
In several ways, Akhnaten is Glass’ most traditional score, featuring some lovely lines for the winds and even the brasses. It’s not just stripped-down minimalism. There’s a story arc, an operatic lead, a regular pit orchestra, and (mostly) traditional operatic voices. The exception is a character called The Scribe, performed by the imposing and clarion-voiced bass-baritone Zachary James, who also plays Akhnaten’s father, Amenhotep III; he occasionally drops in to solemnly intone in English a lot of unnecessary words.
But it must be said that Akhnaten was not composed and designed to be fully understood but rather felt as a dream-like experience. It’s a three-hour, three-act mood piece sung in Ancient Egyptian, Akkadian, and Biblical Hebrew. There were no projected titles. Indeed, at its most effective, the opera’s concentrated dive into lost ancient history seeps into our consciousness. It transports the audience to circa 1342 BCE, and in that sense, the speculative audacity of Glass’ Akhnaten is an artistic-humanistic triumph against time.
