Puccini’s in the Air

A concert version of Puccini’s “La Boheme” Sunday at the Hollywood Bowl wasn’t just a great night at the Bowl. It was a great “Boheme.”

This was all the more striking because it’s harder to hold attention or follow the action of an opera without costumes and staging and, especially these days when we’ve gotten so used to them, without supertitles. Hollywood Bowl Orchestra conductor John Mauceri gave useful introductions from the stage and pointed out that there was a synopsis in the program booklet. Still, many people must have missed the intricate and comic line-by-line byplay between the characters, but the cheers at the end indicated there was not much lost in the way of communication.

Credit Mauceri and the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, a superb cast of singers--two of whom were assaying their roles for the first time, all but one of them making Bowl debuts--and an amplification system that delivered the voices strongly, clearly and with balance. Puccini’s ensemble writing could be savored in ways often obscured in the opera house.

Unencumbered with details of staging, Mauceri could maintain a brisk pace, but doing that did not prevent him from exploiting nuance and detail or expanding Puccini’s lyrical lines gloriously. It would be easy to single out how well he handled the big romantic climaxes, but making a single line swell and ebb to signal the impact of Mimi’s death during Musetta’s prayer is beyond the usual.

Without supertitles, the singers had to project their characters through vocal acting as in days of old, and here there was no laziness or generality.

Ramon Vargas was a sensitive, ardent, gentle Rodolfo who soared in the heights and brought world-class singing to the performance from the get-go. Patricia Racette was a subtle and vulnerable Mimi. When she asked Marcello how she should respond to Rodolfo’s jealousy, it was just one of her heartbreaking readings of lines that often sound perfunctory.

Singing her first Musetta, Christine Goerke went far beyond the usual bombshell-with-a-good-heart interpretation. She certainly had all the requisite sexiness, but she was also spontaneous and innocent, qualities all too easily misunderstood by Marcello.

Nathan Gunn, who has sung at the Bowl before, sang his first Marcello with great strength and dramatic interpretation, given that he was reliant upon a score. Wait until he’s entirely off-book.

The ensembles were tight and vocally vivid. Though no director was credited, the characters actually listened and reacted to one another. Earle Patriarco (Schaunard), Alan Held (Colline) and Thomas Hammons (Benoit and Alcindoro) created distinct personalities. The Opera Pacific Chorus and the Mitch Hanlon Children’s Chorus also contributed strongly.