KEY POINTS:
Anne Sophie Duprels has been enjoying herself in the weeks running up to tonight's premiere of NBR New Zealand Opera's Jenufa.
With pleasant memories of playing Marguerite in the company's 2006 Faust, the French soprano has returned to experience one of the greatest conductors she says she has worked with.
Wyn Davies, the NBR New Zealand Opera's music director, has "so much passion for the music and none of that conductor ego that so many have. He is only driven by the music and making the most of it".
The ensemble demands of Janacek's opera have forged close bonds between the cast. Duprels singles out American Tom Randle who, just last year, played Laca to her Jenufa for Opera Holland Park.
They are both acting singers, she stresses. "We can talk about things, try things out and are very aware of what we are both doing."
But then, such is the nature of this opera that "you get to work with everybody and try to make something together by building the relationships between the characters. It's a great challenge".
Another vital catalyst in the Jenufa experience is Ashley Dean, who is restaging this Nikolaus Lehnhoff production that originated at Glyndebourne, England. "He is wonderful, amazing," Duprels almost trills. "Ashley was an actor himself and really understands what it is like to be on stage.
"The production itself is very good because it really focuses on telling the story. Sometimes the staging of this opera centres around symbols and ideas, which can be great, but this one goes for the story which makes it just so powerful.
"Everyone can feel a part of it. It is not a story of a prince rescuing a princess from her tower, but tells of a young woman who grows up with the horrible things that happen to her. A lot of it is about forgiving and being able to transform something that could have destroyed you into something that gives you the strength to go on.
"It's a very, very deep story," she confides. "There is nothing artificial about it, which is why it is so touching. You are going to be moved because it's about human relationships: truth, feelings and really heavy stuff.
"Jenufa is a very strong woman. At the beginning of the opera she is maybe not much more than 16 and pregnant. She is in a village where everybody watches everybody else and it is very claustrophobic.
"The whole opera only covers seven months and, in this time, she goes from being a child who doesn't know how to deal with things to a woman who takes charge of her own life."
Duprels is particularly pleased that the opera is being sung in the original Czech.
"It is not so different to singing in German or Russian. You learn how the language works and how to shape the phrases in a way that is your own."
She is vehement that operas should always be done in their original language.
"The composer searches out the colours in the language and, if you change that language, you change the colours associated with it," she explains. "You betray a little bit of what the composer wanted. Janacek has written very visual music. Every emotion can be heard right away in the music."
"When someone is anxious you don't even have to glance at the subtitles. The music tells you. Just let yourself go, open your ears and your eyes and let Janacek be your guide."
Performance
What: Jenufa, by Leos Janacek
Where and when: Aotea Centre, tonight at 7.30pm; Sep 23 at 6.30pm, Sep 25 and 27 at 7.30pm
