One Verdi Opera per Day: Otello

OTELLO    

Arrigo Boito after Shakespeare  January 5, 1887  La Scala, Milan



Mario del Monaco, Renata Tebaldi, Leonard Warren, Martha Lipton, Paul Franke, Luben Vichey, James McCracken (Roderigo) Fritz Steidry conducts  Metropolitan Opera broadcast  March 12, 1955

This gets harder. It wasn't too difficult to offer impressions of the early Verdi operas. I liked Aroldo and Alzira , didn't care much for Giovanna d'Arco. But when you get into Aida=Don Carlo it gets harder to know what to say. Otello is harder still. I love this opera. I'm thrilled by it. But I seldom listen to it. So real does the tragedy become for me that I can't bear knowing what's to come, even from act I. Still, what tenor has a greater entrance than Otello's 'Esultate!'.  What baritone has a more sinister monologue that Iago's Credo.

And what soprano has the exquisite Salce and Ave Maria for Desdemona.




I avoid listening to Otello partly for what I've already stated, and partly because I fear the miracle of it won't hit me. I listened again today. I got hit.

Look at the devices used to relive tension. The Fuoco di gioia! chorus in Act I. The magnificent offstage serenade of Desdemona in Act II. Then in Act III, after Desdemona is insulted by her husband ('vil cortigiana!) Iago seduces Cassio-I intend that word, seduce-first with bel canto:Vieni...l'aura e deserto...and then piu rapido.


The final act orchestration always sound spare. Not just eerie, but haunted. Otello's suicide till keeps wit hit a degree of dignity-he remains a heroic figure, an important person, even after falling prey to Iago and murdering his wife. Verdi forbids us to regard Otello as stupid. Which is easy to do!

The Met in HD 2012-2013, Ready, Set...GO!

The Metropolitan Opera's live in HD presentations in movie theatres world wide begins tomorrow with a new production of Donizetti's delightful L'elisir d'amore (The Elixir of Love). And it is delightful, an opera filled with wit and charm and opportunities for gorgeous bel canto singing. I'm not always on the Anna Netrebko bus, but God love her she seems to be the only artist who can guarantee a sell out today. I'm a big fan of Matthew Polenzani's who tomorrow sings Nemorino, the role loved by Bonci, Caruso, Gigli and Pavarotti.


It looks like a cute, down home type staging that won't get in the way of Donizetti's delicious music.

Verdi's Otello is next, October 27. The press is raving over Renee Fleming, and quacking "this is your last chance" to hear her Desdemona. If she drops the role now I'll bet she can clam to have sung it for years without one less than gorgeous note. South African tenor Johan Botha sings the title role. He had a good success with this demanding part a few years ago. Allergies apparently sidetracked him a few weeks ago. I've always liked his voice and his singing. In this rare instance I will comment on an artist's weight to say I hope it doesn't rob Botha of the energy and the passion as Otello must have. German baritone Falk Struckman's Iago is being greatly admired. His is a less than rich and beautiful baritone, but he uses his voice with terrific attention to subtext and insinuation. For a bonus, we get tenor Michael Fabiano as Cassio. In Columbus he's remembered for his magnificent singing of Verdi's Requiem here last season.

And so to Thomas Ades's The Tempest. I've loved this opera on
recording and anticipate it eagerly on November 10.