Pacini Maria Regina d'Inghilterra
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Giovanni Pacini
Genre:
Opera
Label: Opera Rara
Magazine Review Date: 7/1998
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 172
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: ORC15
Tracks:
| Composition | Artist Credit |
|---|---|
| Maria, Regina d'Inghilterra |
Giovanni Pacini, Composer
(Geoffrey) Mitchell Choir Alastair Miles, Gualtiero Churchill, Bass Benjamin Bland, Raoul Bruce Ford, Riccardo Fenimoore, Tenor David Parry, Conductor Giovanni Pacini, Composer José Fardilha, Ernesto Malcolm, Bass Mary Plazas, Clotilde Talbot, Soprano Nelly Miricioiu, Mary Tudor, Soprano Philharmonia Orchestra Susan Bickley, Page, Mezzo soprano |
Author:
Opera Rara staged Maria, Regina d’Inghilterra under the name of Maria Tudor at the Camden Festival in 1983, meeting little encouragement from the critics: the review in the June issue of Opera dismissed it as “the Identikit Ottocento opera, to which levity seemed the only proper response”. It would not be a proper response to this recording. The musical banalities so often encountered in even the best early nineteenth-century ‘discoveries’ are remarkably scarce here; and though the drama has its share of implausibility, bafflement and cliche, it is well-structured and does not leave the composer short of opportunities. As the recording of his Saffo suggested (Marco Polo, 5/97), Pacini wrote happily within the formal conventions of Italian opera in his time. Opening chorus, aria and cabaletta, duet likewise in two ‘movements’, big ensemble as finale of the middle act, ‘brilliant’ solo for prima donna just before the final curtain: this, it is quite true, is the ‘identikit’ Pacini uses. But it is a strength, not a weakness. The form (like sonata form or sonnet) is a good one, perhaps the best for opera to be itself in, rather than a play set to music; and for the most part Pacini exploits the form admirably.
The plot is adapted from the play by Victor Hugo, and tells of Mary I’s love for a scheming courtier, an Italian in Hugo, the Scotsman Fenimoore in Pacini. This Fenimoore, being the tenor, is loved by two ladies and is deceiving both. The other woman, Clotilde, is protected and loved by the baritone Ernesto, who of course finds out about Fenimoore, to accomplish the downfall of whom he puts himself at the disposal of Fenimoore’s enemy, the Lord Chancellor (bass). A great point about such a set-up is the scope it provides for duets, and these are both plentiful and good. There are choruses of merrymakers, soldiers and Londoners out for blood. The ensemble, an excellent example of its kind, comes at the point when Fenimoore is cornered and feelings run high.
So do the voices. The role of Fenimoore was written for Nicola Ivanov, a tenor with a supple, high-lying voice, master of the mezza voce and at one time understudy for Rubini, for whom Bellini wrote the role of Arturo in I puritani. We are lucky to have Bruce Ford. At a fortissimo he may sound underpowered, and he does not play imaginatively with mezza voce effects, but he much more than copes: in florid passages he moves swiftly and gracefully, he appears to be comfortable with the tessitura, and in the Prison scene, which provided Ivanov with his greatest success, he sings with feeling and a sense of style. The women have suitably contrasting voices, Mary Plazas’s fresh and high, Nelly Miricioiu’s older in tone, more dramatic in timbre. Both are expressive singers, and though Miricioiu too habitually resorts to the imperious glottal emphasis associated with Callas and Caballe, she brings conviction to all she does. The baritone, Jose Fardilha, has a touch of the flicker-vibrato that can give distinctive character, and Alastair Miles confers nobility of utterance upon the vindictive Chancellor. The cast, in fact, is worthy of the opera, which in this recording has probably its most important performance since the premiere of 1843. At that event the composer was called on stage to acknowledge the applause “about 42 times” and afterwards was carried in triumph from the theatre “passing through streets which, as if by enchantment, were all lit up an hour after midnight”.
This information is given in Jeremy Commons’s scholarly essay, part of a handsomely produced booklet accompanying the three discs. But that is a regular feature of the Opera Rara series, as is the fine work of the Geoffrey Mitchell Choir and the Philharmonia under David Parry. Recorded sound is clear and well-balanced, and the production handles the drama well. Some of those who saw the opera on stage in 1983 seem to have concluded that there was no such thing, or none to deserve the name. Listeners to the recording are likely to find themselves playing straight through from start to finish, chafing at any interruption; and that says something for both the music and the drama.
The plot is adapted from the play by Victor Hugo, and tells of Mary I’s love for a scheming courtier, an Italian in Hugo, the Scotsman Fenimoore in Pacini. This Fenimoore, being the tenor, is loved by two ladies and is deceiving both. The other woman, Clotilde, is protected and loved by the baritone Ernesto, who of course finds out about Fenimoore, to accomplish the downfall of whom he puts himself at the disposal of Fenimoore’s enemy, the Lord Chancellor (bass). A great point about such a set-up is the scope it provides for duets, and these are both plentiful and good. There are choruses of merrymakers, soldiers and Londoners out for blood. The ensemble, an excellent example of its kind, comes at the point when Fenimoore is cornered and feelings run high.
So do the voices. The role of Fenimoore was written for Nicola Ivanov, a tenor with a supple, high-lying voice, master of the mezza voce and at one time understudy for Rubini, for whom Bellini wrote the role of Arturo in I puritani. We are lucky to have Bruce Ford. At a fortissimo he may sound underpowered, and he does not play imaginatively with mezza voce effects, but he much more than copes: in florid passages he moves swiftly and gracefully, he appears to be comfortable with the tessitura, and in the Prison scene, which provided Ivanov with his greatest success, he sings with feeling and a sense of style. The women have suitably contrasting voices, Mary Plazas’s fresh and high, Nelly Miricioiu’s older in tone, more dramatic in timbre. Both are expressive singers, and though Miricioiu too habitually resorts to the imperious glottal emphasis associated with Callas and Caballe, she brings conviction to all she does. The baritone, Jose Fardilha, has a touch of the flicker-vibrato that can give distinctive character, and Alastair Miles confers nobility of utterance upon the vindictive Chancellor. The cast, in fact, is worthy of the opera, which in this recording has probably its most important performance since the premiere of 1843. At that event the composer was called on stage to acknowledge the applause “about 42 times” and afterwards was carried in triumph from the theatre “passing through streets which, as if by enchantment, were all lit up an hour after midnight”.
This information is given in Jeremy Commons’s scholarly essay, part of a handsomely produced booklet accompanying the three discs. But that is a regular feature of the Opera Rara series, as is the fine work of the Geoffrey Mitchell Choir and the Philharmonia under David Parry. Recorded sound is clear and well-balanced, and the production handles the drama well. Some of those who saw the opera on stage in 1983 seem to have concluded that there was no such thing, or none to deserve the name. Listeners to the recording are likely to find themselves playing straight through from start to finish, chafing at any interruption; and that says something for both the music and the drama.
Pacini Maria Regina d'Inghilterra
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