Heard Sunday in Temple Emanu-El's beautiful Meyer Sanctuary, whose extremely resonant acoustic emphasizes the strength of a voice over its warmth, Rodgers exhibited a winning, well-produced tenor of compact size and proportions. Strong and virile at the core, it grew more secure above the stave as his San Francisco Opera Center Schwabacher Debut Recital progressed. Nonetheless, the inability to swell on the very top (at least on this afternoon), combined with less than 100 percent surety above the stave, gave indications of the possible arc of Rodgers' career.
That not-so-tidy issue aside, the Tosti set was wonderful. Rodgers produced a caressingly beautiful sotto voce (quiet voice) in the middle of the song "Non t'amo piu" (I do not love you any more), and a lovely falsetto at the end of "A Vucchella" (A sweet mouth). He also treated us to the first of the many times he used his eyebrows, mouth, and gaze to charmingly illustrate a song. Even though "La Serenata" (Serenade) would have benefitted from far more softening and bending (Beniamino Gigli remains unsurpassed here), taken as a whole, the singing was marvelous.
Well-Conceived, yet Ill-Conceived
Rodgers did a fine job with the eight songs of Britten's Winter Words. His introduction, which revealed that Britten was drawn to set Thomas Hardy's poetry because its innocence spoke to him at a time of severe homosexual repression in the U.K., set the stage for songs that he clearly relished performing. After seeming taxed by the high notes of "Midnight on the Great Western," he rallied to mostly cope admirably with the high tessitura of "Before Life and After."If only Rodgers had committed himself as fully to his Schubert set. In view of his rugged sound, anyone not paying attention to his perfectly enunciated words would never have known that Liebesbotschaft (Love's message) speaks of a murmuring brooklet, a sweet beloved, and whispered dreams. But the singer caressed not a single note or phrase, which was a real shame.
Similarly, in the often-performed Ständchen (Serenade), which was misspelled in the program, Rodgers invoked softly beckoning songs, whispers in the moonlight, the nightingales' sweet sound, and silver tones in a voice that grew inappropriately more emphatic. Had Cole Porter been in the audience when Rodgers almost snarled out the final phrase, "Trembling I wait for you; Come, please me!," he might have cried out, "You're the top!"
And, as commanding as Rodgers was in Schubert's great minidrama Erlkönig (The Erl King), as Mark Morash's piano admirably galloped beneath him with equal surety, he dispensed with any attempt to imitate the various voices of the child, the Erl King, the father, and the narrator. Thus he threw away the major opportunity that this song offers every lieder singer capable of dramatic exclamation.
Five songs from Rachmaninov's Op. 26 were more successful. Although Rodgers was a little shaky on high in "Pokinem, milaja" (Beloved, let us fly), he produced a beautiful swell at the song's climax. His tone was also ideal for expressing the loneliness and emptiness of "Noch' pechai'na" (Night is sorrowful) and of "Prokhodit fsyo" (Everything passes). But despite the beauty of Morash's dancing accompaniment, Rodgers could not give "Fanton" (The fountain) the rousing climax it calls for.
Rallying on Home Turf
The tenor blossomed in the remaining two sets in English. If he could have done more vocally with the five tongue-in-cheek songs of Bolcom and Weinstein's Ancient Cabaret (Bolcom's wife and performance partner-in-crime Joan Morris must have a field day singing Aphrodite's outraged response to "the nakedest nude statue that ever was"), he compensated with hilarious facial expressions and body language. Again providing fine support, Morash whipped up a fury to portray Medea as the killer of children, making Weinstein's turn of the cliché, "blood is thicker than water," all the more wry.Much of what was missing earlier in the recital surfaced in Rodgers' total emotional investment in Sings Harry, the late Douglas Lilburn's spirited and touching setting of poems by Denis Glover. Complete with another opportunity to indulge in his marvelous falsetto, Rodgers' beautiful delivery of his fellow New Zealander's songs led the appreciative audience to demand an encore.
Thus came Youkali, which became a song 12 years after Kurt Weill it composed as wordless incidental music for the play Marie Galante. Pulling his voice back, balancing requisite spite with a beautifully sweet high ending, Rodgers gave us Weill by way of Edith Piaf. As he learns to indulge more in such gifts for vocal and histrionic expression, and to focus on repertoire that displays his strengths, Rodgers could well develop into a recitalist of distinction.