Performance Reviews: DON GIOVANNI, Seattle 2007

"Seattle Opera director Chris Alexander and designer Robert Dahlstrom continued their unbroken string of hits last weekend with the new "Don Giovanni", aided by a brilliant opening-night cast and a genuine star in the title role.

Mariusz Kwiecien: Difficult to spell and easy to admire, this is a baritone who commands the stage so completely that he seems to suck up all the oxygen in McCaw Hall. He moves like a panther, modulating that powerful voice to the most caressing tones in his many seduction scenes. At last we have a singer who makes the audience realize why Don Giovanni has such a long list of conquests."

Melinda Bargreen, "New production sets stage for stellar Don Giovanni",
Seattle Times, January 16, 2007

"Over the past year, Seattle Opera has done a number of high-concept productions that have been justly admired. Mozart's "Don Giovanni," which opened this weekend at McCaw Hall, is the newest, and from the waves of loud applause Saturday night and Sunday afternoon, it should be among the most successful.

It has three principal virtues: Robert Dahlstrom's brilliant unit set, both elegant and functional; Chris Alexander's electric and buoyant staging; and Mariusz Kwiecien's bravura portrait of the title character.

[...] Despite some of the most alluring set pieces in the repertory, the opera is really about sex: Don Giovanni's pursuit of women to seduce. This, Alexander makes quite clear, by ripping open an 18th-century sense of discretion in favor of contemporary frankness. Donna Anna, Donna Elvira, Zerlina can moan and groan about Don Giovanni's callous behavior toward themselves and women in general, but his sexual power remains. For this, the production needs a man who not only can sing the music Mozart gave him, but also be persuasive in the role da Ponte created for him, based on a whole slew of literary precedents dating to the early 17th century.

The Polish baritone is just that. Kwiecien has made Don Giovanni something of a signature role for himself. He has a baritone that can sound lyrical and smooth-limbed yet can growl with ferocity. Both athletic and graceful, he is young, slim, good-looking, with a long ponytail that is surprisingly suggestive. He can act and possesses genuine stage presence, living the role Saturday night. Kwiecien's Don Giovanni moves like a panther: a predator - arrogant, bold, aristocratic, seductive - with little to admire except courage in the face of damnation."

R.M. Campbell, "Don Giovanni tempts the masses",
Seattle Post-Intelligencer, January 15, 2007

"Mariusz Kwiecien - with his panther-like physicality and smoldering good looks - had all of the requisite charisma and complete domination of the stage on the opening night. Although he is only 34 and has a lyric baritone often employed on the lighter side, he has a plenty of power for the darker role of Giovanni, a role he has sung at four other operas. Kwiecien tiltingly steamed up the stage with a sultry voice that could melt the stoniest heart, an inexhaustible supply of the most persuasive sweet nothings and a stage exit on a big, shiny motorcycle."

Maggie Larrick, "Sealing the deal",
Queen Anne News, January 17, 2007

"Mariusz Kwiecien's reading is spot-on. He plays the role with an air of mystical sensuality that feels like the Vampire Lestat, making use of his genuine good looks, charisma, and a sultry baritone that could melt butter (or, more likely, milkmaids). This came through especially in his duet with Zerlina, "La ci darem la mano," and in the famed canzonetta serenade "Deh, vieni alla finestra," accompanied by onstage mandolinist David Bartley."

Michael J. Vaughn, "A revealing Giovanni",
The Opera Critic, January 26, 2007

"The devil, they say, is a gentleman, and young Polish baritone Mariusz Kwiecien played Don Giovanni as a devilishly handsome one. Kwiecien exuded lascivious nastiness, yet never have I heard the words "a bocca dolce piu del miele" (a mouth sweeter than honey) in the Don’s Act II serenade sung with such ineffable sweetness. His voice, throughout its range, sounded perfectly centered and was produced with the greatest of ease. He is a magnetic stage presence: his performance raised goose bumps again and again."

John F. Hulcoop,
Opera News, April 2007