So up early to write about it! Where do I start?
In a nutshell the story (after a poem by George Crabbe-a silent part in the opera):
Peter Grimes, an ambitious fisherman in love (?) with widowed childless Schoolteacher Ellen Orford, becomes the villager's victim because he seems (to them) not one of them. Grimes, perhaps mentally unstable already, he seems to prefer being alone. Mob hysteria takes over instigated by several villagers - foremost another woman, Mrs. Sedley who stalks Grimes, and hounds him deeper into insanity.
Britten's operas seem like onions to me, as soon as you have peeled away one layer, there is another, and another and another. There are stories or rather suggestive ideas within the obvious story! Never quite fully fleshed out - Britten likes to leave that to the viewers/listeners imagination to complete or fill in.
And we have layers:
Grimes/Orford - Orford, childless, sees something vulnerable, childlike perhaps, in Grimes,
Grimes sees her as part of his imagined future as rich merchant with house, wife and family for which he grimly strives!
Grimes/Balstrode - Sane Friend and/or mentor of death?
Grimes/Mrs. Sedley - Has she had designs on Grimes and was rebuffed?
Is that the cause of her stalking him relentlessly.
Or has her addiction to laudanum turned her into maliciousness personified?
Grimes/Ned Keene - Keene, supplier of laudanum, also of apprentice boys to Grimes, which he 'bought' from the workhouse. Is he really a voice of sanity? Or is he secretly fomenting the hysteria using Mrs. Sedley?
And the list goes on:
Lawyer Swallow: Another voice of sanity? Or a 'just' man?
Bob Boles: Does envy/hatred/what of Grimes lead him to push the crowds to mass hysteria?
Reverend Adams: truly a man of God? Or misguided zealot?
Auntie: innkeeper, brothel keeper.. can she really be that uninvolved?
The Nieces: Unconcerned "ladies of loose morals"? Or lethally mischievous teenagers?
You see the layers... you see the numerous interpretations open to the listener/viewer.
Was Britten influenced by what had happened in Germany? The hounding to almost extinction of a people by people under a mesmerizing leader of doom.
Is the village a portrait of the nadir human beings fall when they do unconscious evil to others not understood?
The questions are endless and each person will answer them according to his/her own experience.
And this is just about the poem/contents of this masterwork.
He paints with music physical gales, thunder, lightening, stormsurge and the ensuing destruction only 'mother nature' can cause.
Then he turns around and paints with similar strong music psychotic emotions of a rabid, out for blood mob, slavering after its prey. He uses solo instruments (flute, harp, etc,) to emphasize moments of peace or wishful dreaming, elsewhere he uses the organ to enrich the furor of his music.
And he uses instrumental music for rather lengthy periods of time that have you on the edge of your seat panting for the unknown, only to be stunned into chaos, once more. This is music that devours you and leaves you limp and drained, but serene and at peace as well.
Music that forces you back into your seat quivering in fear.
Then he gives a respite by symphonic pieces that lull you into peace..or so it seems.
Always there is the underlying danger of violence, of hatred surging through the tranquil normalcy of village life - just as he ends this opera with deceptive calmness after the violent and deadly events the night before which the village no longer remembered - a village that remains a latent cauldron of horror!
The huge chorus, relentlessly surging towards Peter Grimes,
sweeps anyone who dares to show some sanity, into its flow.
Forcing them to join for their own safety.
One wants to escape this avalanche of vicious sound.
One feels for Grimes, feels how he is driven into madness.
One wants to push against it, wants to stop it, make it go away!
And Grimes in the end - escapes or did he?
We know the boat sank, but was he in it?
Did he find his final restful 'home' in the waters?
See there it is again, the answer Britten leaves to our imagination.
The friend, attending with me, felt, Grimes sailed to a far away island to start a new life and 'burned his bridges'-so to speak- by sinking his boat.
The setting:
reminiscent of a high school auditorium with curtained stage center rear. I did not care for it much!
The costumes:
suitable to the period of time in whoich Britten composed the opera ..poor villagers clad starkly.
The lighting:
done as skillfully as one could produce storms and gales at sea indoors.
But for me, THE iconic performance happened in Santa Fe several years ago when Mother Nature took on that job, lightening, thunder, gales of wind lashing in sheets of rain ..what a night for that opera! Spell binding underscore to Britten's monumental music!
Now to the singers:
Anthony Dean Griffey (we remember him as Lenny from some years ago) delivered a stunning vocal portrayal of a simple man, dreaming to achieving peace by becoming rich and respected but turned haunted and hunted and finally insane. His tenor is more lyrical than others I've heard in this role. And that made his Grimes all the more vulnerable.
Katie Van Kooten, as Ellen Orford, sang, perhaps, the role of her life, rich, melodious, bell like and yet strong, touching all hearts.
Meredith Arwady as Auntie used her powerful richly shaded contralto extermely well.
Christopher Purves, was the strong and warm voiced embodiment of Captain Balstrode, trying to reason, trying to be a friend ending adviser of solitary death to avoid a hanging by the hysterical vengeful mob.
Catherine Wyn-Rogers as Mrs.Sedley, sang (and whispered insiduously as the role calls for, at times) with aplomb, it must not have been easy for a healthy woman to portray a decaying, drug crazed old woman, but she did it truly well.
Former studio artists, baritone Liam Bonner as Keene, and tenor Beau Gibson as Boles, made strong impressions - singing with conviction.
Patrick Carfizzi, sang Swallow and Joseph Evans was Reverend Adams, Robert Pomakov filled the role of Hobson-all smallish parts but very essential to the story.
The nieces were sung by current studio members Deonarine and Wheeler in matching outfits with exuberant youthful spirits.
Actor Marty Fleck portrayed the non-singing, non-speaking Dr. Crabbe with dignity.
The opera calls for acting singers or singing actors and HGO found them!
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