SFO: Mozart’s K. 366 “Gets no Respect”

Last night the War Memorial Opera House presented the first of five San Francisco Opera (SFO) performances of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 366 opera Idomeneo, the final opera in the 2024–25 season. When I wrote my preview for this opera at the end of last month, I invoked Rodney Dangerfield’s catchphrase “I don't get no respect!,” suggesting that the work has not received the attention heaped on the composer’s “big five” operas: Die Entführung aus dem Serail (the abduction from the seraglio, K. 384), Le nozze di Figaro (the marriage of Figaro, K. 492), Don Giovanni (K. 527), Così fan tutte (women are like that, K. 588), and Die Zauberflöte (the magic flute, K. 620). The good news is that, since my wife and I settled in the Bay Area in the fall of 1995, we have enjoyed four performances of this work, two at the San Francisco Opera (SFO) in the 1999–2000 and 2008–09 seasons, one by Opera San José that was live-streamed during the pandemic, and one by the Opera Academy of California in 2011.

Soprano Ying Fang in the role of Ilia in the current SFO production of Idomeneo (photography by Cory Weaver, courtesy of SFO)

With that much history, I was looking forward to returning to a full-length account of this opera last night. This marked the debut of Lindy Hume providing the staging, which was first presented in Australia in 2023. Things got off to a good start with the strong presence of soprano Ying Fang, also making her SFO debut in the role of Ilia. However, with the arrival of Idamante, who has fallen in love with Illia, the spirit began to fade with the weak projection of Idamante’s voice through mezzo Daniela Mack. Similarly, soprano Elza van den Heever, whom I have been following since her Adler days, never managed to capture the sharp edges in the role of Elettra. In this context tenor Matthew Polenzani definitely rose to the dramatic demands in the title role; but, by the time we encounter him, Hume’s approach to the narrative had established its downward slide. By the time she had advanced the narrative to the second act, her resorting to a revolving platform was just plain silly.

That said, I could still enjoy the fact that conductor Eun Sun Kim’s command of Mozart’s music was as strong as ever. Similarly, the same can be said of the choral work prepared by John Keene. Nevertheless, these are “contexts” in which a narrative was supposed to unfold. Hume never seemed to provide an adequate account of the individual senses of character in the members of the cast, leaving the opera with little flesh for the “structural bones” of Mozart’s music.