It is only two months since Jakub Hrůša’s rightly acclaimed and idiomatic conducting of Leoš Janáček’s penultimate opera at Covent Garden. Now, like the proverbial London buses, here comes the same piece again (though this time calling itself The Makropulos Affair rather than the Royal Opera’s The Makropulos Case), with Simon Rattle leading two concert performances at the Barbican Hall.
Rattle’s first-night account was simply sensational. He plunged at almost manic speed into Makropulos’s compellingly exciting prelude, and barely let up for the best part of two hours, as the opera played without an interval. The fierce tension may occasionally have come at the expense of some of the lighter touches that beguiled in Hrůša’s approach. Yet Janáček’s extraordinarily deft ear for orchestral detail and harmony – like the bassoon solo announcing the central character’s first appearance – was never sacrificed. The LSO played thrillingly.
