Verdi Il Trovatore
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Giuseppe Verdi
Genre:
Opera
Label: DG
Magazine Review Date: 11/1984
Media Format: Vinyl
Media Runtime: 0
Catalogue Number: 413 355-1GH3
Tracks:
| Composition | Artist Credit |
|---|---|
| (Il) trovatore |
Giuseppe Verdi, Composer
Aldo Verrecchia, Messenger, Tenor Alfredo Giacomotti, Old Gypsy, Bass Anna di Stasia, Ines, Soprano Brigitte Fassbaender, Azucena, Mezzo soprano Carlo Maria Giulini, Conductor Evgeny Nesterenko, Ferrando, Bass Giorgio Zancanaro, Count di Luna, Baritone Giuseppe Verdi, Composer Plácido Domingo, Manrico, Tenor Rosalind Plowright, Leonora, Soprano Santa Cecilia Academy Chorus, Rome Santa Cecilia Academy Orchestra, Rome Walter Gullino, Ruiz, Tenor |
Composer or Director: Giuseppe Verdi
Genre:
Opera
Label: DG
Magazine Review Date: 11/1984
Media Format: Cassette
Media Runtime: 0
Catalogue Number: 413 355-4GH2
Tracks:
| Composition | Artist Credit |
|---|---|
| (Il) trovatore |
Giuseppe Verdi, Composer
Aldo Verrecchia, Messenger, Tenor Alfredo Giacomotti, Old Gypsy, Bass Anna di Stasia, Ines, Soprano Brigitte Fassbaender, Azucena, Mezzo soprano Carlo Maria Giulini, Conductor Evgeny Nesterenko, Ferrando, Bass Giorgio Zancanaro, Count di Luna, Baritone Giuseppe Verdi, Composer Plácido Domingo, Manrico, Tenor Rosalind Plowright, Leonora, Soprano Santa Cecilia Academy Chorus, Rome Santa Cecilia Academy Orchestra, Rome Walter Gullino, Ruiz, Tenor |
Composer or Director: Giuseppe Verdi
Genre:
Opera
Label: DG
Magazine Review Date: 11/1984
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 140
Catalogue Number: 413 355-2GH3
Tracks:
| Composition | Artist Credit |
|---|---|
| (Il) trovatore |
Giuseppe Verdi, Composer
Aldo Verrecchia, Messenger, Tenor Alfredo Giacomotti, Old Gypsy, Bass Anna di Stasia, Ines, Soprano Brigitte Fassbaender, Azucena, Mezzo soprano Carlo Maria Giulini, Conductor Evgeny Nesterenko, Ferrando, Bass Giorgio Zancanaro, Count di Luna, Baritone Giuseppe Verdi, Composer Plácido Domingo, Manrico, Tenor Rosalind Plowright, Leonora, Soprano Santa Cecilia Academy Chorus, Rome Santa Cecilia Academy Orchestra, Rome Walter Gullino, Ruiz, Tenor |
Author: Alan Blyth
After listening to a clutch of new opera sets that any decent enough but don't seem to me to have any real raison d'etre, it was a relief and a pleasure to encounter this Trovatore. Not only is it carefully prepared but it also has a definite viewpoint—like it or not, and I like it—of the score in hand, deriving inevitably from Giulini's close acquaintance with the work over many years. Nothing is undertaken lightly by him, and he restudied the autograph before starting the well-rehearsed sessions. That accounts for many unusually measured tempos here—they derive from Verdi's own metronome marks. Thus, the orchestral introduction to the whole piece, ''Mal reggendo'', ''Il balen'', ''Di quella pira'', ''Miserere'', ''Di tale amor'', ''Vivra contende'', to mention just the most important passages, are all the slower often marginally so, that what we are accustomed to hear. Check with Verdi, and you will find Giulini speaks for the composer. In the majority of cases the added breathing space (almost literally) allows the singer to articulate the little notes, such a feature of Trovatore's vocal line, with much greater ease than usual; that is particularly true of the cabalettas. Only in ''Il balen'' and ''Miserere'' did I find the slower pace dramatically debilitaing.
Of course, it is not only the singers who can benefit from measured tempos. For this recording Giulini has gone back to the Santa Cecilia Academy, its chorus, orchestra and its new home. He played in the orchestra (then the Augusteo) before the war, and has fond memories of being twelfth viola in that band. Here he has drawn from his successors' playing of both fire and refinement, the slower speeds allowing us to appreciate more immediately, for instance, the leaping phrases, so expressive of impassioned feelings, just before the First Act trio and the gurglings of the lower wind as Azucena describes her outstretched hand seizing the fatal victim in her Racconto.
In more general terms the precision of the playing is always put at the service of the music and not, as in the case of some of his younger Italian contemporaries, used to draw attention to the conductor. The choral singing, praise be, is truly Italianate in depth and warmth and, lest it be thought Giulini is always wedded to the measured beat, the Soldiers' Chorus actually runs at a faster speed than Verdi's, and in the opera's many melodramatic climaxes, as distinct from its reflective moments, his direction wants nothing in fire. As a whole, the interpretation encompasses everything from the dark, conspiratorial air of the start (Nesterenko quite excellent) through the ardent statements of love from three of the principals ( ''Ah, si, ben mio'' beautifully shaped) to the rollicking extroversion of gipsies and soldiers. Maybe it just lacks the ultimate in swagger and rhythmic lift that still makes the old Karajan/HMV version so exciting.
Inevitably a Giulini recording takes its character from the conductor, most positively in his insistence on the singers studying or restudying their roles with his reading in mind. The troubadour of this set hardly needed such a refresher course, for Domingo's Manrico is a virtually faultless performance that I don't expect to hear bettered on record, more refined and subtler than his account of the role in the deleted Mehta/RCA set (SER5586/8, 7/70). He is now the epitome of the upright, heroic lover, his key recitative before ''Ah, si, ben mio'' phrased with aristocratic style and the aria itself a lesson in legato. Even better is the phrase (repeated) beginning ''Riposa, o madre'' in the Last Act duet with Azucena: it is taken, Caruso-like, in a single breath, the tone properly plangent and appealing. ''Di quella pira'' is sung as written, apart from the interpolated high C, not perhaps Domingo's favourite note but here attacked unflinchingly.
His Leonora, Rosalind Plowright sings all her music virtually as written, including cadenzas, and encompasses almost everything with technical aplomb. The voice expands, as in the theatre, grandly at the top, while the dark timbre at the bottom is most telling. She is also capable of a floating line as both her arias indicate, and yet copes easily with the coloratura of this tricky role.
But I find the effort to get the vocalization right robs her performance of spontaneity and a real sense of character, just what Ricciarelli, for Davis (Philips), with much more falliable resources, achieves. A greater care over words, and particularly consonants, would be a help. Still, for a first major studio recording, the achievement is appreciable, and in the final two scenes of the work, when Plowright forgets about caution, her performance takes fire.
Fassbaender, at first, seemed an odd choice for Azucena. ''Not really her repertory'', ''resources like to be over-stretched'' were the gossip-words going around. Well, she has sung Eboli and Amneris in the theatre, and specially studied Azucena with Benaglio for this recording, commenting that he taught her to concentrate on two elements ''vendetta e furore'', and ''also coached me in producing a legato line, something all Italians are brought up to do but Germans are not''. However that may be, she gives a performance that compels sympathy and pity for the old gipsy, conveying the horror of her past with memorable accenting of the text allied to a vibrant (sometimes too vibrant) tone. As the recent Das Lied (DG 413 459-1GH, 10/84) showed she has an instinctive rapport with Giulini (see October, page 453), and again they produce moments of special inwardness, not least in ''Ai nostri monti''. I miss only the bite and fiery attack that Barbieri brought to the part (Karajan), but she had about half Fassbaender's understanding.
I have for some time thought Zancanaro the best of the modern school of Italian baritones, and here he rewards faith in his first Verdi recording, his voice strong, his manner properly forcedul, more idiomatic than Wixell (Davis) more sensitive though not so bitting as PAnerai (Karajan).
The recording offers a simulation of stage balance, with the orchestra seemingly in the pit and the voices more prominent, the whole somewhat too recessed, even a little foggy, for my taste. Maybe the Academy's present hall is a little too long and reverberant to make an ideal recording venue. I eagerly await the CD version to see if the low level of transfer on LP may be part of the cause of my reservations on this count. From an interpretative point of view, I would unhesistatingly recommend this version to even the most jaded Verdian because, as with Giulini's Rigoletto (DG 2740 225, 9/80) and Falstaff (DG 2741 020, 2/83), especially the latter, it offers a break with routine and tradition. As an entirely different, and equally valid reading I shall still keep the Karajan by me, not least for Callas's incomparable Leonora, but I am sure Giulini's should be the modern recommendation.'
Of course, it is not only the singers who can benefit from measured tempos. For this recording Giulini has gone back to the Santa Cecilia Academy, its chorus, orchestra and its new home. He played in the orchestra (then the Augusteo) before the war, and has fond memories of being twelfth viola in that band. Here he has drawn from his successors' playing of both fire and refinement, the slower speeds allowing us to appreciate more immediately, for instance, the leaping phrases, so expressive of impassioned feelings, just before the First Act trio and the gurglings of the lower wind as Azucena describes her outstretched hand seizing the fatal victim in her Racconto.
In more general terms the precision of the playing is always put at the service of the music and not, as in the case of some of his younger Italian contemporaries, used to draw attention to the conductor. The choral singing, praise be, is truly Italianate in depth and warmth and, lest it be thought Giulini is always wedded to the measured beat, the Soldiers' Chorus actually runs at a faster speed than Verdi's, and in the opera's many melodramatic climaxes, as distinct from its reflective moments, his direction wants nothing in fire. As a whole, the interpretation encompasses everything from the dark, conspiratorial air of the start (Nesterenko quite excellent) through the ardent statements of love from three of the principals ( ''Ah, si, ben mio'' beautifully shaped) to the rollicking extroversion of gipsies and soldiers. Maybe it just lacks the ultimate in swagger and rhythmic lift that still makes the old Karajan/HMV version so exciting.
Inevitably a Giulini recording takes its character from the conductor, most positively in his insistence on the singers studying or restudying their roles with his reading in mind. The troubadour of this set hardly needed such a refresher course, for Domingo's Manrico is a virtually faultless performance that I don't expect to hear bettered on record, more refined and subtler than his account of the role in the deleted Mehta/RCA set (SER5586/8, 7/70). He is now the epitome of the upright, heroic lover, his key recitative before ''Ah, si, ben mio'' phrased with aristocratic style and the aria itself a lesson in legato. Even better is the phrase (repeated) beginning ''Riposa, o madre'' in the Last Act duet with Azucena: it is taken, Caruso-like, in a single breath, the tone properly plangent and appealing. ''Di quella pira'' is sung as written, apart from the interpolated high C, not perhaps Domingo's favourite note but here attacked unflinchingly.
His Leonora, Rosalind Plowright sings all her music virtually as written, including cadenzas, and encompasses almost everything with technical aplomb. The voice expands, as in the theatre, grandly at the top, while the dark timbre at the bottom is most telling. She is also capable of a floating line as both her arias indicate, and yet copes easily with the coloratura of this tricky role.
But I find the effort to get the vocalization right robs her performance of spontaneity and a real sense of character, just what Ricciarelli, for Davis (Philips), with much more falliable resources, achieves. A greater care over words, and particularly consonants, would be a help. Still, for a first major studio recording, the achievement is appreciable, and in the final two scenes of the work, when Plowright forgets about caution, her performance takes fire.
Fassbaender, at first, seemed an odd choice for Azucena. ''Not really her repertory'', ''resources like to be over-stretched'' were the gossip-words going around. Well, she has sung Eboli and Amneris in the theatre, and specially studied Azucena with Benaglio for this recording, commenting that he taught her to concentrate on two elements ''vendetta e furore'', and ''also coached me in producing a legato line, something all Italians are brought up to do but Germans are not''. However that may be, she gives a performance that compels sympathy and pity for the old gipsy, conveying the horror of her past with memorable accenting of the text allied to a vibrant (sometimes too vibrant) tone. As the recent Das Lied (DG 413 459-1GH, 10/84) showed she has an instinctive rapport with Giulini (see October, page 453), and again they produce moments of special inwardness, not least in ''Ai nostri monti''. I miss only the bite and fiery attack that Barbieri brought to the part (Karajan), but she had about half Fassbaender's understanding.
I have for some time thought Zancanaro the best of the modern school of Italian baritones, and here he rewards faith in his first Verdi recording, his voice strong, his manner properly forcedul, more idiomatic than Wixell (Davis) more sensitive though not so bitting as PAnerai (Karajan).
The recording offers a simulation of stage balance, with the orchestra seemingly in the pit and the voices more prominent, the whole somewhat too recessed, even a little foggy, for my taste. Maybe the Academy's present hall is a little too long and reverberant to make an ideal recording venue. I eagerly await the CD version to see if the low level of transfer on LP may be part of the cause of my reservations on this count. From an interpretative point of view, I would unhesistatingly recommend this version to even the most jaded Verdian because, as with Giulini's Rigoletto (DG 2740 225, 9/80) and Falstaff (DG 2741 020, 2/83), especially the latter, it offers a break with routine and tradition. As an entirely different, and equally valid reading I shall still keep the Karajan by me, not least for Callas's incomparable Leonora, but I am sure Giulini's should be the modern recommendation.'
Verdi Il Trovatore
Verdi Il Trovatore
Verdi Il Trovatore
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