“Pelléas is a one-off”, says François-Xavier Roth in the sleeve notes to his new recording, “The first exemplar of what opera was to become in the 20th and 21st centuries and of what it can no longer be”. As one of the turning points in the evolution of opera, Debussy’s masterpiece is already very well represented on disc, but Roth’s performance, which stems from a production at Opéra de Lille last year, differs from all its predecessors by having the period instruments of Les Siècles in the pit.
In an opera whose drama depends so much on the minutest nuances of the word-setting and the web of orchestral motifs underpinning it, the use of gut strings and turn-of-the-20th-century woodwind and brass adds an extra dimension to the expressive palette. The gains are obvious right from the opening, where the dark, slowly churning strings, playing without vibrato, conjure up the atmosphere of ambiguity and veiled menace that pervades the whole work, right through to the trickle of woodwind tears with which it ends.
