JoyceDiDonato

Press

• Dead Man Walking

  The Metropolitan Opera

  Sep 2023

  • By now, Sister Helen can hold few secrets for DiDonato. This, after all, was the vehicle for the self-styled Yankee Diva’s New York City Opera debut in the work’s local premiere in 2002 – and she has revisited it since in Houston and Madrid. You might worry at this late date that by now her interpretation had hardened into routine, but that’s not the case at all. DiDonato traces Heggie’s music in tones of limpid purity, phrasing with an ingenuousness that scorns effect even as it strikes to the heart of her character’s hard-won radical empathy. Clear through the still a cappella ending, the radiance burns true.

    • Classical Voice North America
    • 28 September 2023

  • Joyce DiDonato has lived with the role of Sister Helen for over two decades now, and one gets the sense that it’s a character she identifies strongly with: an earnest optimist struggling to do good in an increasingly bleak world. DiDonato brings her customary intelligence and thoughtfulness to the role. She commits fully to van Hove’s characterization of Sister Helen – haunted from the first moment she appears onstage, she brings a brittle neuroticism to the character. We see her palpably confront her faith and her feelings of uselessness as she has nothing but apologies to offer the parents of de Rocher’s victims, angry that she has chosen to take his side. van Hove’s Sister Helen is unyieldingly serious, and it’s all the more impressive given DiDonato’s down-to-earth warmth.

    • Parterre Box
    • 28 September 2023

  • The MVP of the night was Joyce DiDonato, who, at this point, is an American treasure. Last season she was the star of “The Hours” and that was no different on this night. From her opening “He will gather us around,” sung with the most delicate and thread-like sound, you were with her. There was both serenity and yearning in her singing, the contradiction perfectly establishing the character’s emotional journey throughout. From there, she sang with ebullience when “He will gather us around” turned into a full-blown choral celebration with the children and Sister Rose before singing with similar brightness and charm during the drive to Angola. That’s about as long as that cheery nature would last, with DiDonato’s Helen shifting toward increased desperation during her scenes with De Rocher. The first scene pitted the two characters against one another in stark terms, but in the second, where she tells him that “The Truth Will Set You Free,” her singing takes on a more delicate quality, and at one point when he turns to her and acknowledged that he liked that, you could see him visibly shake with hope as she said “Me too,” her singing full of warmth. One of the standout moments for DiDonato (which is where I double down and say that Van Hove’s decision to bring in the camera at the top of Act was unnecessary) was during the Courtroom scene where Sister Helen is often on the sidelines and gets the brunt of the attack from the parents of the victims. A lot of the time, her back is to the audience, her attention on the other characters. And even then, her body language communicated the conflict. The pain at listening to them and understanding and even siding with them and yet holding on to a conviction that was more than that somehow. It was all there, on stage, in DiDonato’s performance. No need for a closeup to emphasize it. The same for the top of Act two, where her own moral quandary is at its greatest following a dream. In places, DiDonato was at her most agitated, her voice and articulation of the text pointed. But as Sister Rose comforted her, she settled back into that serenity of the opera’s opening for the sublime duet. In subsequent scenes, that calm remained even as she begged Joe to speak the truth, and the ending sequences of the opera, in which DiDonato was just asked to listen, were among her strongest moments. It was through her, not Joe, that we were experiencing the horrors. And at those moments, we could understand what it was she was searching for. Having her gentle voice end the opera was a balm to the chilling experience, and even as I write this, I can still hear it. It is going to haunt me for some time.

    • Operawire
    • 27 September 2023

  • There’s no dearth of fine roles. Joyce DiDonato, whom many would call opera's finest singing actor, is a remarkable Sister Helen. Apprehensive, timid and secure at once, wide-eyed when she enters the prison. She stands up to both the prison Chaplain and the Warden without ever letting go of her reserve and dignity. The warmth of the lower part of DiDonato’s voice is used to fine effect, especially when comforting her special prisoner, and the slightly wiry tone at the top adds urgency.

    • Bachtrack
    • 27 September 2023