Less than the sum of its parts

LEHAR'S Merry Widow, know into her nineties (she first saw the light of day in 1905), is credited with having revived the flagging fortunes of Viennese operetta. The work has held its appeal, and as recently as 1994 found an unexpected new recording partner in John Eliot Gardiner, who brought his full period-instruments' sensibility to bear on what was his first project with the Vienna Philharmonic.

RTE's new production at the National Concert Hall, directed by none other than the station's Head of Music, Cathal MacCabe, treads a more traditional path. Pat Murray's art-nouveau designs, under a suspended tangle of coloured gauze, set a suitable mood; but, with the chorus from the Glasnevin Musical Society tucked away in the choir stalls, the advertised description of "fully staged" (in spite, even, of the commitment and zest of the Act III grisettes) is really a bit optimistic.

MacCabe's production seems to aim for a sort of sparkling camp, with much hamming up of accents and a focus on well-tried movements and manoeuvres.

Kevin Hough (Njegus) and John O'Flynn (Zeta) sounded in their element when, as occasionally happened, the vagaries of the NCH sound system made it possible to hear what they were saying. For this event, I was seated in the balcony. It may well be that the problems of audibility were less acute in other parts of the house.

The Widow herself (the charming Andrea Huber) did not escape lightly from the tricks of the microphone (her voice was often reproduced with an unusually hollow tone, save in the highest register), though the one true object of her affections (Karl Daymond) came through with greater consistency.

Balances between the singers on stage and the members of the RTE Concert Orchestra in the pit varied a lot more than could be accounted for by the suavity of Albert Rosen's conducting. What with the loss of words and the oddity of the musical balances (singers dominating the orchestra, or vice versa, for no discernible reason) this Merry Widow doesn't quite manage to realise the potential of the performers who have been gathered together for it.