Giuseppe VERDI
(1813-1901)
A conspectus of his life and a review
of the audio and video recordings of
his works.
PART 4.
[See also Part
1, Part
2, Part
3]
Verdi’s great final operas from La
Forza del Destino (1862) to Falstaff
(1893).
Including the revisions
of Macbeth and Simon Boccanegra
and The Requiem.
Plus appendices of collections
of arias, overtures and choruses.
For ease of navigation this extensive
part is split into the following:-
Section 1.
La Forza del Destino. 1862 original
and 1869 versions; the 1865 revision
of Macbeth.
Section 2. Don
Carlos and Don Carlo. The original
French version of 1867 to the Modena
version of 1886 in Italian.
Section 3. Aida
and The Requiem.
Section 4. The
revised Simon Boccanegra if 1881,
Otello and Falstaff.
Appendix.
Collections of overtures, choruses and
arias.
Section 1. La
Forza del Destino, its 1862 and 1869
versions and the 1865 revision of Macbeth.
The new decade of the
1860s opened with Verdi, aged 46, more
involved in politics than composition.
After Un ballo in Maschera had
received its much-delayed premiere on
17 February 1859 in Rome, he and Giuseppina
did not, unusually, return to Busseto
straightaway. At a social evening with
friends, including the Rome impresario
Jacovacci, Verdi had intimated that
he had given up composing and was intent
on enjoying the fruits of his labours
in a more relaxed manner, particularly
in spending time on country pursuits
at his farm estate, Sant’Agata, at Busseto.
Back at Busseto life
was anything but normal and peaceful.
On 29 April 1859, goaded by Cavour,
Austria invaded Piedmont. With military
help from France, to whom Cavour had
cleverly allied Piedmont, a peace treaty
was signed. But the political pot of
the call for the union of Italy had
been stirred and there was much support
among neighbouring states for Vittorio
Emmanuele, King of Piedmont, as a focus
for future Italian unity. Verdi was
elected to represent Busseto in an Assembly
at Parma that voted for combining with
neighbouring Modena and annexing to
Piedmont. Verdi went to Turin in September
1859 as part of a delegation to present
the petition for annexation to the King.
Whilst in Turin he met Cavour. Piedmont,
with tacit approval of France, England
and other European states merged north
and central Italy into one state. Garibaldi
started fighting in Sicily before rapidly
moving north to take Naples, proclaiming
he would go on to Rome. In the cause
of unity Garibaldi ceded his conquests
without reaching Papal Rome. This might
have brought repercussions and the destruction
of the progress made thus far. Despite
the fact that Venice was still occupied
by the Austrians, and Rome under Papal
Rule, Cavour called for elections to
a National Parliament. At Cavour’s personal
insistence that his presence, as a pre-eminent
Italian, would add lustre to the Parliament,
Verdi stood and was duly elected on
3 February 1861 as one of the 450 deputies.
Initially Verdi attended
parliamentary sessions in Turin regularly.
He spoke in favour of financial support
from the state for the theatres of Rome,
Naples and Milan so as to enable them
to have a permanent ensemble including
orchestra and chorus. He always voted
the same way as Cavour, but worn out
by his efforts, the great statesman
and father of Italy died on 6 June 1861.
Thereafter Verdi became less assiduous
in his attendance and wanted to resign.
The time was never deemed right and
he served until the elections of 1865
when he refused to stand again.
Meanwhile in December
1860, whilst Verdi was away in Turin,
Giuseppina received a letter from a
friend in Russia. Also enclosed was
an invitation from the great Italian
dramatic tenor Enrico Tamberlick, who
Verdi knew and admired. Acting on behalf
of the Imperial Theatre of St. Petersburg
the letter invited Verdi to write an
opera for the following season. Despite
the likelihood of temperatures of minus
22 degrees below zero, the prospect
appealed to Giuseppina and she promised
to use all endeavours to try and persuade
Verdi to accept. Whether it was her
skills of persuasion, the fact that
he was missing the theatre, or the conditions
of the contract, and particularly the
fee, that appealed, Verdi agreed.
Despite having been
promised carte blanche as to the choice
of subject, the Russians at first demurred
at an opera based on Victor Hugo’s Ruy
Blas, a play about a common valet
who becomes the lover of an Empress
and later Prime Minister of his country.
As time dragged on without Verdi signing
a contract, Tamberlick sent his son
- some say younger brother - to see
the composer with the message that the
Russians would accept anything he demanded,
even Ruy Blas, as long as he
would compose for them. With the continued
encouragement of Giuseppina and the
prospect of a large fee, which would
help fund the major alterations at Sant’Agata,
Verdi searched sedulously for a suitable
plot. He eventually settled on the subject
of the Spanish romantic drama ‘Don
Alvaro, o La fuerza de sino’ by
Angel Perez de Saavedra, Duke of Rivas.
This was deemed suitable in Russia and
Verdi asked his long-time collaborator
Piave to provide the libretto. As usual
the composer drew up the synopsis for
Piave to versify. The dark core of Rivas’s
drama involves scenes set among the
common people including a gypsy fortune-teller.
Verdi lightens the dark plot with its
multiple deaths somewhat further than
the play. To do so he uses a scene from
Schiller’s Wallenstein Lager involving
a panorama of life in a military encampment
including soldiers, vivandieres,
gypsies and a monk who preaches in the
funniest and most delightful manner
in the world. The monk would become
Melitone in the opera. Elsewhere there
is the necessary conflation of the two
sons of Leonora’s father and the student
Pereda from the play into the dramatic
baritone role of Don Carlo who pursues
both lovers for all three to die in
the closing scene of the original version.
The contract Verdi
signed with the Imperial Theatre of
St Petersburg allowed him ownership
and rights in all parts of the world
outside Russia. To the detailed generous
conditions Verdi, in his own hand, added
the caveat that should he fail to
fulfil his obligations (other than by
reasons of illness or force majeure)
he will pay an indemnity of sixty thousand
francs to the Management of the Imperial
Theatre. Verdi worked with Piave
throughout the summer of 1861 as Giuseppina
made the domestic arrangements for the
shipment of Bordeaux wine, Champagne,
rice, macaroni cheese and salami for
themselves and two 
servants.
The composition, except for scoring,
was finished in early November. The
Verdis travelled to St. Petersburg via
Paris and Berlin, presumably to avoid
Austria, arriving on 6 December. Temperatures
of twenty degrees below outside, and
only fourteen above inside, met them.
They were also met with the illness
of the leading soprano scheduled to
sing Leonora. With no possible alternative
singer available it became obvious that
a postponement to the following season
was the only solution and Giuseppina
and Verdi returned to Paris after a
brief visit to Moscow.
In Paris Verdi found
that he had to travel to London to provide,
as Italy’s representative, a composition
for the International Exhibition scheduled
in that city. He commissioned a young
poet named Boito, who twenty years later
was to greatly influence him and Italian
opera, to write the words for a cantata
that became the Inno del nazioni
(Hymn of the Nations). Verdi conducted
several performances of the work in
London to some acclaim. Back at Busseto
the composer spent much of August 1862
orchestrating La Forza del Destino
his 24th opera, before returning
to St. Petersburg, arriving on 24 September.
All the cast were fit and present and
the rehearsals went well. Having written
the music with particular singers in
mind, it was performed in what he described
as extremely lavish sets and costumes
for which 200,000 francs had been set
aside with the Tsar also making available
the chorus of his Royal Regiments. The
opera was a great success at its premiere
at the Imperial Italian Theatre, St.
Petersburg, on 10 November 1862. Prevented
by illness from attending the premiere
the Tsar came to the fourth performance
when, greatly impressed, he asked Verdi
to his box where the composer was showered
with compliments by the Tsarina. Shortly
before the first night the Tsar awarded
the composer with the Cross of the Royal
and Imperial Order of St Stanislaus.
The lavish nature of
the original mise-en-scène can
be appreciated in our day because the
Mariinsky Theatre of St Petersburg performed
La Forza del destino in 1998
in reconstructions of the 1862 sets.
With costume design by Peter J Hall,
directed by Elijah Moshinsky and conducted
by Valery Gergiev, a performance is
available on DVD (Arthaus Music 100
078). The sets are quite magnificent
and atmospheric. They are also, for
the most part, matched by the solo singers
and, above all, by the conductor and
orchestra. For his tenor friend Tamberlick
Verdi wrote the most demanding music
in respect of both length and demand
of vocal weight. In this 1862 version,
the role of Alvaro is certainly not
for a lyric tenor with aspirations.
Although not the most romantic in appearance
Gegam Grigorian as Alvaro on the DVD
sings with wide dynamic, full ringing
tone and no little vocal grace. Although
his fated lover, Leonora, gets quite
a long rest after her big sing in acts
one and two it is a role that requires
a full spinto voice with a wide range
of expression and colour. In this performance
Galina Gorchakova fulfils all expectations
and copes admirably. Verdi had written
the role of Melitone with the baritone
de Bassini, who had created Seid (Il
Corsaro), the Doge (I Due Foscari)
and Miller (Luisa Miller), in
mind. He was not a buffa and Verdi wrote
to him to assure him that he did not
see the singer or the role in that context.
What Verdi wanted, and got from de Bassini,
was a full-toned and tuned bass-baritone
with capacity for an acted and vocal
turn of humour. This is what Georgy
Zastavny conveys in this performance
in a role that is often seen as a precursor
to the composer’s conception of Falstaff.
The Carlo of Nikolai Putilin is strong
if a little dry and monochromic as is
the Padre Giardano of Sergei Alexashkin.
Preziosilla the gypsy is full-toned
but lacks in vibrancy. This original
1862 St Petersburg version has considerable
differences from the later revision
dealt with below. Although two audio
versions exist, this DVD should have
pride of place over either in a Verdi
collection. It is far easier to comprehend
the differences in the sequencing of
the unfolding drama in the original
version of this complex and episodic
opera, compared with the more commonly
performed revision, when seen rather
than merely read about.
A year prior to the
performance caught on DVD, Gergiev and
‘his’ company recorded an audio-only
version of the St Petersburg edition
for Philips (446 951-2) with largely
the same cast except for two important
differences. The first was the substitution
of Olga Borodina as Preziosilla, a significant
if minor improvement. However, that
improvement is not a compensation for
the woolly toned and glottal enunciation
of Mikhail Kit as the Father Guardian.
Since the availability of the BBC series
of Verdi original versions from Opera
Rara 
there
is now meaningful competition on CD.
Recorded in London in August 1981 the
Opera Rara account features Martina
Arroyo and Kenneth Collins as the lovers,
Peter Glossop as Carlo, Janet Coster
a vibrant Preziosilla and Don Garrard
a solid Father Guardian, all idiomatically
conducted by John Matheson. Recorded
without audience it has many virtues
and is an ideal complement to the St
Petersburg DVD. Review.
With the glory of St
Petersburg in his ears, not to mention
its honours and generous fees in his
bank, Verdi returned to Paris. He did
not attend the Italian premiere of the
opera in Rome under the title of Don
Alvaro. The Papal Censor was still
interfering and Verdi was also disappointed
by the casting by the impresario Jacovacci,
particularly of the role of Melitone.
Instead, he and Giuseppina travelled
to Madrid where he conducted the Spanish
premiere on 13 January. It was well
received by the public. The press however,
considered that it desecrated the Duke
of Rivas’s play. The elderly author,
present in the audience on the first
night, shared that view. Contrary to
some statements, Verdi did not withdraw
the St Petersburg score from further
performances in Italy after the premiere
in Rome. The version was seen in several
Italian cities in 1863 as well as in
Madrid again in 1864 and in Vienna in
1865. It was reprised in St Petersburg,
with largely the same cast, in the two
seasons following its premiere. Verdi
did, however, withhold the score from
theatres that he considered incapable
of doing it justice. It is evident that
he recognised the need for alterations
early on when he transposed the tenor
aria in act 3 downward on the basis
that only Tamberlick was capable of
meeting its demands. He instructed his
publisher, Ricordi, to include the alteration
in the scores he hired out. Verdi was
unhappy with other aspects of the score
as it stood, particularly the three
violent deaths in the final scene. When
in Paris negotiating for Don Carlos,
Perrin, the director of the Opéra
raised the question of a French version,
with the addition of a ballet. After
some consideration Verdi declined the
opportunity, as he considered that additions
would make the work too long. Already
the performing practice in Italy included
excision of the quarrel duet. Not until
after the revision of Macbeth
and the composition of Don Carlos
did Verdi find a way forward when Tito
Ricordi proposed a revival for the 1869
La Scala carnival season. By then Piave,
the original librettist, had suffered
a stroke that paralysed him for the
last eight years of his life during
which Verdi provided much financial
help to his family. The task of versifying
the revisions fell to Antonio Ghislanzoni
who the composer had met at the time
of the writing of Attila and
with whom he developed a cordial relationship.
The revised
La Forza del Destino was
premiered at La Scala on 27 February
1869. The presentation marked a rapprochement
between Verdi and the theatre and the
revision and performances are considered
here out of calendar order. The alterations
of the score from the original version
are significant rather than major. They
involved the substitution of the prelude
by a full overture, which nowadays is
often played as a concert piece. A major
revision of the end of act three includes
the removal of the demanding tenor double
aria whilst the whole final scene is
amended avoiding the triple deaths.
It is replaced by the Father Guardian’s
benediction as Leonora dies and Alvaro
is left alive. Made in 1954, La Forza
del Destino was Callas’s first Verdi
opera recording under her contract for
EMI (556323). It has remained at full
price ever since, despite the poor recording
and inadequate colleagues. Needless
to say Callas brings many insights to
Leonora’s plight but I find these no
compensation in a role that needs a
bigger voice and purer tone. Decca came
into the field with a stereo version
featuring Tebaldi in glorious voice
with the other roles all well taken.
This performance is worth hearing for
her assumption of Leonora and that of
Bastianini as Carlo (421 592-2). Strangely
Decca competed against themselves by
issuing RCA’s recording with Milanov,
somewhat past her best as Leonora; Richard
Tucker, Callas’s Alvaro, repeats his
rather inelegant assumption. This version
has not to my knowledge made it onto
CD. RCA went back into the studios in
1964 with Leontyne Price in pristine
voice as a superb Leonora in an all-American
cast conducted by Thomas Schippers.
This recording is also distinguished
by the young Shirley Verrett as Preziosilla
and the strong singing of Robert Merrill
as Carlo. Tucker, again, as Alvaro is
better than on his other two studio
recordings (GD 87971). In 1969, with
a carefully considered international
cast, EMI at last ventured their first
stereo version. With Carlo Bergonzi
replacing the scheduled contracted company
artist, his is the most elegantly sung
and phrased as well as tonally beautiful
recorded Alvaro of any on
record. Cappuccilli is a strong Italianate
Carlo whilst his compatriot Raimondi
is sometimes a little vocally ponderous
as he seeks tonal sonority. Whilst Martina
Arroyo does not match the glorious tone
of Price on her first recording, hers
is a Leonora with the capacity to soar
over the orchestra and characterise
well. With that ever-idiomatic Verdian
Lamberto Gardelli on the rostrum, and
although not perfect in all its casting,
it remains my personal favouriteaudio
recording (567124-2 not
reviewed). RCA recorded Leontyne
Price as Leonora again in 1976 alongside
the young Domingo with James Levine
on the rostrum. Levine’s interpretation
is more dramatic than Gardelli’s but
not over-driven in the manner of his
earliest Verdi recordings. Price’s Leonora
has many virtues but does not match
her earlier recorded assumption. Domingo
is a vocally strong and young-sounding
Alvaro and with Sherrill Milnes as Carlo
and Fiorenza Cossotto adding quality
interpretations this a very competitive
set (74321 39502-2).
The digital age brought
two final recordings of note of La
Forza del Destino and also
frustration to the prospective purchaser.
The frustration came in the form of
nearly simultaneously recorded and issued
performances and the split of an ideal
cast. EMI set up recording sessions
in London with the Philharmonia Orchestra.
These were to be conducted by Muti who
had earlier made several admired Verdi
recordings for the company with that
orchestra. But Muti decamped for La
Scala to succeed Abbado, Sinopoli took
over the orchestra and DG took over
the recording with him on the rostrum.
EMI then set up live sessions at La
Scala under Muti featuring Domingo and
Freni as the lovers and the vocally
graceful Zancanaro as Carlo. Domingo,
with many Otellos under his belt,
sings strongly but Freni just hasn’t
got the heft and sounds seriously strained.
Muti’s hectic speeds, the dry La Scala
acoustic, add the inadequacies of a
woolly-toned and wobbly Father Guardian
and a weak Melitone and this set is
best avoided (747485-2). The Sinopoli
recording fares significantly better
in respect of soloists with Rosalind
Plowright singing powerfully as Leonora,
Agnes Baltsa’s tangy mezzo ideal for
the gypsy and Bruson and Burchuladze,
despite the latter’s glottal delivery,
far superior to their EMI rivals. The
whole is recorded in a warm acoustic
with Sinopoli showing more feel for
Verdian line than on his recorded Nabucco.
Regrettably the good news stops there.
Carreras as Alvaro is seriously over-parted.
His singing is far too often strained
and unsteady to the extent that I personally
cannot listen to him in this role (DG
419 203-2).
At the time of writing
two DVD issues of the revised
version of La Forza del Destino
are readily available. Both exemplify
something of performance practice in
respect of either 
sequencing
or cuts. The Met recording of 1984,
in sets dating back to 1952, features
Leontyne Price, perhaps the greatest
Verdi soprano of her generation. She
had dominated performances of the role
at the Met since she first sang it there
in the 1967-68 season with Corelli as
Alvaro. She had to overcome racial prejudice
to become one of the most loved singers
in the company’s roster and the performance
recorded is from her last assumption
of the role. She is not in the vocal
condition of her 1976 audio recording
let alone her pristine condition of
1964. Nonetheless, hers is an assumption
worth having. Levine conducts. (Review).
The performance is given in three acts
with a reordering of the original act
three which finishes with the recognition
and duel duet between Alvaro and Carlo
rather than Preziosilla’s Rataplan.
An earlier DVD in black and white dating
from 1958 has Renata Tebaldi alongside
Franco Corelli as the lovers with Bastianini
as Carlo and Christoff as Padre Giardano.
This cast of great singers makes it
a classic for collectors.
Rather late in the
day and when the composition of the
original version of La Forza del
Destino was well under way, Verdi
received a suggestion from his well-read
friend Andrea Maffei alerting him to
an unfinished play by Schiller that
might be of interest to the Russians.
The play was The False Demetrius,
which deals with Boris Godunov and the
struggle over imperial succession. Verdi
later commented on it favourably. Had
Verdi chosen it the course of Russian
opera might have been very different.
Whilst recognising the Russian influence
on La Forza del Destino, particularly
in Verdi’s choral writing, it is equally
important to recognise the episodic
nature of the work as an influence on
Mussorgsky’s composition of the Boris
story and also that of other Russian
composers. As it was, their emergence
saw the gradual decline in Italian opera
in St Petersburg, accelerated by the
emergence of the Mariinsky, although
Verdi’s operas continued to be performed
in that theatre alongside those of the
Russian school.
After the performances
of La Forza del Destino in Madrid
in February 1863, Verdi and Giuseppina
toured Spain before returning to Paris
where Verdi was to rehearse Les Vêpres
Siciliennes for performances at
The Opéra and for which he had
composed a new romance. The conductor
and orchestra refused to rehearse to
Verdi’s satisfaction. The composer had
been rehearsing at the piano with the
singers for over three months and he
walked out. The same conductor, who
had been responsible for a disastrous
Tannhäuser two years earlier,
was dismissed. Verdi and his wife returned
to Italy with the composer swearing
never to deal with the Paris Opéra
again. After Parliamentary business
in Turin Verdi resumed his preferred
life as a country gentleman farmer at
Sant’Agata.
The Verdis went, as
usual, to Genoa for the winter of 1863-64
with trips to the Turin Parliament when
his attendance was required. Whilst
in Genoa Verdi was visited by his Paris
representative Léon Escudier
who informed him that Paris’s Théâtre
Lyrique had enquired if the composer
would write ballet music for insertion
into Macbeth, his 10th
opera of 1847, (see PART
2) for performance at the
theatre. Later, when a formal approach
was made, Verdi’s response was more
than Escudier could have hoped for,
indicating that the composer wished
to undertake a radical revision, in
French, of the opera he had written
eighteen years before. Verdi’s proposals
for the revised Macbeth
included new arias for Lady Macbeth
and her husband and a new last act finale
deleting Macbeth’s death scene. There
were other detailed revisions as well.
The composer did not attend the premiere
on 21 April 1865 but it met with mixed
success as it did in Italian translation
elsewhere. Audiences had become used
to the sonorities of Un Ballo in
Maschera and La Traviata
and the unrevised parts of the work
do stand out in their relative musical
immaturity, harking back to the Risorgimento
operas. However, it is in this revised
form that the opera is performed, in
Italian, in the present day, often with
the re-insertion of at least Macbeth’s
death scene. This is also the situation
in respect of audio and video recordings.
The neglect of Macbeth,
Verdi’s first Shakespearean opera, continued
until the Verdi revival in Germany in
the 1920s. Its premiere in England was
not until 1938 at Glyndebourne under
Fritz Busch. La Scala mounted it in
1952 for Callas whilst the first performance
at New York’s Metropolitan Opera did
not take place until 1959. This New
York performance was the basis for the
recording issued the following year
by RCA with Leinsdorf conducting Leonie
Rysanek’s lyrical Lady and Leonard Warren’s
dark brooding Macbeth. (GD 84516). Decca
followed in 1964 with Giuseppe Taddei,
one of the best Macbeth’s on record,
and Birgit Nilsson’s gleaming tones
cutting through the textures as a rather
wilful queen. Regrettably Decca allowed
the conductor, Thomas Schippers, to
make brutal cuts. The company tried
again five years later whilst attempting
to repeat the success of their Nabucco
by featuring Elena Souliotis alongside
Tito Gobbi under Gardelli’s baton. The
best-laid plans went awry when Gobbi
called off ill and Fischer-Dieskau was
substituted. Souliotis’s singing is
wayward and Fischer-Dieskau’s affected.
Gardelli is superb and Pavarotti and
Ghiaurov lend good support to an enterprise
that failed despite the best efforts
(440 048-2).
With the revised Macbeth
firmly established in opera house repertoires
other recordings were bound to follow.
La Scala staged the work in 1975 under
Abbado in a widely acclaimed production
by Giorgio Strehler. With Abbado a contracted
artist, DG rushed to record the work
in January 1976. With the La Scala theatre
not available during the season they
used the part-completed Centro Telicinematografico
Culturale in Milan to produce a warm
yet detailed acoustic. Abbado’s conducting
is idiomatic and vibrant and set a theatrical
benchmark for his soloists. As the Queen,
Shirley Verrett is smoky-toned and musically
correct, perhaps lacking a little of
the vocal wildness that Verdi had in
mind and specified for 
the
role. Cappuccilli as Macbeth is characterful
and expressive, just the odd moment
of dry tone intruding, but without Leonard
Warren’s vocal power. Ghiaurov’s bass
is a rock-solid tower of strength whilst
Domingo as Macduff sings an eloquent
lament for his lost family in a vocally
commanding performance (DG Originals
449 732-2). A disappointment for me
in this performance is the relative
vocal passivity of the La Scala chorus,
a matter brought into stark relief in
the recording that followed within a
few months from EMI. Conducted by Riccardo
Muti and made in London in July 1976,
it features a vibrant and involved Ambrosian
Opera Chorus with Fiorenza Cossotto
a very Italianate Queen of idiomatic
inflection and power. Sherrill Milnes’s
Macbeth is well characterised with many
felicitous vocal details. Cossotto’s
assumption is perhaps more like what
Verdi envisaged for a role in which
he was specific is eschewing tonal beauty
alone. Milnes’s juicy voice is well
suited to the role of Macbeth and only
lacks a little Italianata. Ruggero Raimondi
and José Carreras sing the other
principal roles of Banquo and Macduff,
the former having to reach for his lower
notes and the latter a little stretched
at times (5 567128 2). Unlike Abbado
who includes Macbeth’s death aria, Muti
sticks strictly to the revised 1865
version. On a personal level I own both
Abbado’s and Muti’s mid-price issues
and my affections swing between the
two recordings. Sinopoli’s digitally
recorded version for Philips has never
appealed to me as a rival to the DG
or EMI issues despite my fondness for
Bruson’s Macbeth. Sinopoli’s exaggerated
tempi and Neil Schicoff’s penny plain
Macduff are not to my liking. I also
find Mara Zampieri’s tone too hooty.
It is a pity that a contretemps between
conductor and scheduled soprano deprives
us of Ghena Dimitrova’s queen (Review).
On DVD one of
the most enjoyable performances of Macbeth
is one of the oldest, that from Glyndebourne
in 1972 and directed by Michael Hadjimischev.
The sets are evocative and the passing
of the Kings eerily effective. It features
the fine Greek baritone Kostas Paskalis
as Macbeth and Josephine Barstow as
a superbly acted queen with John Pritchard
pacing the drama well. Apart from the
4:3 format and dated colours, a major
drawback is the performance cuts. At
125 minutes too much good music, mainly
of the witches, is left behind (Arthaus
101095). From the same stable is the
DVD cousin of Philips’ audio recording.
Conducted by Sinopoli
from performances at Deutsche Oper Berlin
in 1987 and directed Luca Ranconi it
has Bruson and Zampieri as the plotters
with James Morris as Banquo and Dennis
O’Neill as Macduff. At 150 minutes playing
time it is comparable to the audio recordings
referred to (Arthaus 100140). Later
recordings include a 2002 performance
from Zurich conducted Franz Welser-Möst
in a production by David Pountney whose
version at the English National Opera
caused furore with its green blood dripping
from the dagger. He cannot escape gimmicks
here either with the witches having
outlandish hairdos and spectacles and
seeming to live in a suburban world
that does not lie easily with Verdi’s
music. The production focuses on the
erotic relationship between Macbeth
and his spouse. In that role Paoletta
Marrocu gives a particularly convincing
performance vocally and histrionically.
The 
singing
of Thomas Hampson as Macbeth is impressive
with Roberto Scandiuzzi and Luis Lima
giving support. The quoted time of 185
minutes includes 45 minutes of interviews
from singers and production team convincing
each other of the virtues of the staging
(TDK DV-OPMAC). The most recent recorded
performance is that of Phyllida Lloyd’s
production at Barcelona in 2005 with
Carlos Alvarez firm of voice as Macbeth
and Maria Guleghina a powerful Queen
(Opus Arte OA 0922D). Bruno Campanella
on the rostrum does not always keep
the orchestra on its toes and the chorus
singing could be much better.
Section
2. Don Carlos
and Don Carlo. The original French
version of 1867 to the Modena version
of 1886 in Italian.
Back in Busseto after
the premiere of the revised Macbeth,
Verdi found himself in dispute with
his town. They had, over the previous
six years, constructed a municipal theatre,
and assumed that the composer would
allow it to be named after him. For
his part, although originally supportive,
he had thought construction should have
been put off and the funds used to support
the earlier war against the Austrians.
Feeling coerced he at first refused
before relenting and in August donating
a sizeable cheque. Although a box was
put at his disposal he never entered
the theatre. That same month, having
vowed never to have anything to do with
the Paris Opéra again, Verdi
was persuaded to relent and signed a
contract to give a revised La Forza
del destino and also compose a new
opera for that theatre. After resigning
from the National Assembly in September
and spending time in Genoa he and his
wife arrived in Paris on 1 December
1865. After considering several subjects,
including, yet again King Lear, Verdi
settled on Schiller’s Don Carlos,
Infant von Spanien of 1787. Verdi
stayed in Paris until March 1866 working
with the librettists Joseph Méry
and Camille Du Locle, the former dying
a few months later. When Verdi returned
to Busseto the libretto was virtually
complete and during the spring and summer
he worked at the music, his concentration
being disturbed by the onset of the
Third War of Independence between Italy
and Austria that started on 19 June
1865. After Italy’s defeats it needed
the Prussians to rescue the situation
with Austria making peace and ceding
Veneto first to France, and after a
plebiscite, to Italy. Verdi was greatly
upset by the manner of the acquisition
but Rome, as capital of Italy, remained
a dream.
In Paris, Perrin the
administrator of the Opéra was
manoeuvring his roster of singers so
as to make the best available for Verdi’s
new work, Don Carlos,
his 25th opera. There was
trouble with the bass assigned for the
Grand Inquisitor whilst Verdi also wanted
changes in the last act and to improve
cohesion and spectacle elsewhere. The
casting of the role of Eboli also proved
problematic. Verdi made transpositions
to accommodate the singer allocated
although the wide tessitura remains,
and as a consequence continues to be
a challenge for casting directors to
this day. At the rehearsal of the whole
opera in February 1867 it became obvious
that Don Carlos, was, at three
hours forty-seven minutes, too long
to allow time for suburban Parisians
to get their last trains home. Verdi
reluctantly excised over twenty minutes
of music. All this music was thought
lost until at the Verdi Congress in
Parma in 1969 David Rosen, an American
scholar, produced a previously unknown
section of the Philip-Posa duet that
had been folded down in the conducting
score prior to the premiere. The English
musicologist Andrew Porter, acting on
a hunch, visited the Paris Opéra
library and asked to see the score.
He was amazed to discover that the pages
of the music that Verdi omitted from
the premiere, and subsequently thought
to be lost, were simply stitched together.
These excisions give greater cohesion
and explanation of the details of the
complex story as the work unfolds. With
permission Porter copied out the missing
parts. Back in London, Julian Budden,
the renowned Verdi scholar, then Head
of BBC Classical Music, planned a recording
for broadcast purposes and including
the newly discovered parts. It was the
first public performance ever of the
opera as Verdi originally intended.
It took place before a small invited
audience on 22 April 1972. For this
unique premiere Budden assembled a cast
of mainly French-speaking singers supported
by stalwart British principals from
the London’s 
Covent
Garden and Sadler’s Wells companies.
The seminal broadcast by the BBC took
place on 10 June 1973 after which the
performance disappeared from the public
domain until its re-emergence on CD
by Opera Rara made it properly and readily
commercially available (Review).
The music had previously appeared as
an appendix to Abbado’s recording of
the original French version. With somewhat
non-idiomatic French from a mainly Italian
cast, and recorded in an over-resonant
acoustic, this performance has serious
limitations (DG 415 316-2). A more recent
CD recording from the Vienna State Opera
on 18 October 2004, conducted by Bertrand
de Billy claimed world premiere status
as the first staged performance of what
Verdi had originally intended. The production
by Peter Konwitschny was not received
well and there is much audience noise.
The singing is adequate, no more (Review).
Performances of what was seen in Paris
at the premiere, with the addition of
some excised music, were recorded in
Paris in 1996 in a production shared
with other theatres including Covent
Garden. Conducted with vigour by Antonio
Pappano it is also available on DVD
(Review)
and CD (EMI 556152 2). Karita Mattila
sings wonderfully as Elisabetta and
is well supported by Roberto Alagna
as Carlos. On CD one is spared Rodrigue’s
stupid hairstyle and can appreciate
his well-sung portrayal. Elsewhere,
particularly in respect of José
van Dam’s vocally lightweight Philip
and Waltraud Meier’s Germanic portrayal
of Eboli, the performance is flawed.
On DVD the weakness of the portrayal
of the auto-da-fé is a disappointment.
Verdi wanted spectacle in that scene
and this production by Luc Bondy fails
badly in that respect as well as being
perversely idiosyncratic elsewhere.
The premiere of Don
Carlos on 11 March 1867 was only
modestly received by the public and
only played for three performances more
than the contracted forty, after which
it was not seen at the Opéra
until the revival conducted by Pappano
in 1996. Meanwhile an Italian version
as Don Carlo, by Achille de Lauzières,
had been prepared the previous autumn.
In offering the rights to Tito Ricordi,
Verdi again sought to insist that it
only be made available with safeguards.
These included that it be performed
in its entirety although he was prepared
for another ballet to be substituted
for his music as long as it was played
as an add-on at the end. The first performance
in Italian was not given in Italy but
at Covent Garden on 4 June 1867. Despite
Verdi’s wishes that carried no weight
in London, it was given with the first
act and ballet removed completely along
with various other excisions. Such practices
were standard at Covent Garden as at
most other European houses. The Italian
premiere of Don Carlo at Bologna
in September 1867 was given in full,
whilst in Rome, still under Papal control,
the censor changed the Inquisitor into
a Gran Cancelliere. Despite being seen
all over the peninsula the Italians
were slow to take Don Carlo to
their hearts and it was not long before
first the ballet and then the Fontainebleau
act were dropped. The arrival in Italy
of the shorter and grander Aida
added to the difficulty of the opera’s
length and after a failure in Naples
in 1871 Verdi made his first revisions
for a revival under his own supervision.
These changes involved the dramatic
Philip-Posa duet in act 2 and it is
the only part of any version of the
opera that was not composed to a French
text. Still the fortunes of the opera
disappointed the composer and as early
as 1875 he began seriously to consider
shortening the work himself. He asked
Nuitter, archivist at the Opera and
translator into French of the revised
Macbeth and La forza del Destino,
to derive a new scenario for versifying
by du Locle, his original librettist.
With other demands, not least the commission
and writing of Aida, Verdi did
not begin serious work on this until
1882, concluding his revision into a
four act version the following March
with the premiere at La Scala having
to wait until 1884. Except for the example
quoted of the Philip-Posa duet, for
all the revisions of Don Carlos Verdi
worked from a French libretto, as he
considered the opera to be conditioned
by the prosody of the language and traditional
French metres. Angelo Zanardini, who
also revised Lauzières’ original,
put the new lines into Italian and it
has become known as the 1884 version
after it received its premiere at La
Scala in January of that year. This
four-act revision of Don Carlo,
Verdi’s own, involved much rewording
to explain the sequence of events and
maintain narrative coherence that is
otherwise seriously affected by the
removal of the original first act. Verdi
moved the act one tenor aria from the
original to the new act one. He also
removed the act three ballet, the Inquisitor’s
chorus in act five as well as making
many other detailed changes elsewhere.
The premiere of the new four act Don
Carlo was a great success and featured
the tenor Tamagno who three years later
was to create Otello.
When Don Carlo
became more popular in the 1930s it
was in the form of the four act 1884
version in Italian, many conductors
and managements seeing virtue in its
shorter length and tauter drama. The
first studio recording, by HMV in 1954
in mono, is of this four-act version
and features the formidable duo of Boris
Christoff as Philip and Tito Gobbi as
Posa, pre-eminent in their roles. Their
duet is one of the high points of recorded
opera and where the 
frisson
of their performance overcomes the somewhat
flaccid conducting of Santini (EMI Références
5677479-2). In 2007 this recording was
issued in bargain-priced re-masterings
from both Naxos
and Regis, the former bringing out the
sound to a remarkable degree. Karajan
favoured this four-act version and recorded
it in a red-blooded performance after
staging it at Salzburg. Mirella Freni
as Elisabetta and Carreras as Carlos
are stretched to their limits whilst
Cappuccilli’s Rodrigo in a long-breathed
death scene is formidable, an applicable
adjective also for Baltsa and Ghiaurov
as Eboli and Philip. Karajan does allow
his orchestra to overwhelm his singers
from time to time (EMI 769304 2). A
live recording from Vienna has its virtues.
It features Franco Corelli’s vocally
strong, even excessive, Carlos milking
every high note and Gundula Janowitz
as Elisabeth. This recording also has
Shirley Verrett as Eboli and Marti Talvela
as the Inquisitor and who take the real
vocal laurels (Orfeo C 649 053). A live
performance under Muti at La Scala in
1992 has Pavarotti as Carlo, Luciana
D’Intino as Eboli and Sam Ramey as Philip
in a rather uneven cast. The tenor notoriously
cracked on the opening night in what
was his debut in the role and was booed.
Fortunately for recorded posterity of
his assumption he did better in subsequent
performances, a conflation of which
is available on CD at bargain price
(EMI 3 58631-2) and also DVD
which enables appreciation of Franco
Zeffirelli’s lavish and evocative production
(EMI 99442 9). Rolando Villazon, one
of the latest and most exciting of tenors
to emerge on the international stage
sings the eponymous role on a DVD recording
of Willy Deckers’ production in Wolfgang
Gussman’s imposing unit set for Netherlands
Opera in 2004. The tenor and the conducting
of Ricardo Chailly are the main virtues
of this performance.
After the 1884 performances
of the four act Don Carlo a friend
asked Verdi if he did not regret the
loss of so much music from the original
score. He had already told his friend
that the new version had more concision,
more muscle and added that those
who complained about the loss of so
much beautiful music from the first
act quite possibly did not notice its
existence before. But others were less
sure and performances were given in
Modena in 1886, claimed to be with Verdi’s
permission, which reintroduced the original
act one to the 1884 revision. It was
in this five-act form, albeit with minor
cuts, that Don Carlo was launched
to the post-Second World War operatic
public in a production by Visconti and
conducted by Giulini at London’s Covent
Garden on 12 May 1958. With a first
rate cast including Christoff as the
King, Gobbi as Posa and the young Jon
Vickers as an ardent Don Carlo it made
a big impact in operatic circles and
has influenced recording and theatre
practice
ever since. The official release in
2006 of a recording in the Royal Opera
House Heritage Series of the second
of these seminal performances is particularly
welcome and is in good sound (Review).
Giulini draws from Christoff one of
the most telling performances the singer
made of the role of Philip on disc and
betters that on the first stereo recording
made when DG added the La Scala imprimatur
to their credits (NLA). Regrettably,
DG did not surround Christoff with colleagues
and a conductor of the quality heard
at Covent Garden although Cossotto’s
Eboli is first class. With Georg Solti
in charge at Covent Garden, and using
the house orchestra and chorus, Decca
recorded a five-act version in London
in the summer of 1965 with John Culshaw
as producer. In Carlo Bergonzi it features
the best-sung Carlo on record and with
Ghiaurov as Philip and Martti Talvela
as the Inquisitor the act four confrontation
is hair-raising. As Elisabeth, Renata
Tebaldi is past her very best but does
not let the side down and whilst the
casting of Fischer-Dieskau as Rodrigo
is flawed he too does not spoil an enjoyable
performance (Decca 421 114-2). Whatever
its virtues Solti’s recording was seen
to be eclipsed when Giulini recorded
the extended five act Modena version
in 1971. With the young Domingo as an
ardent Carlos, Caballé only failing
with a tentative act five Tu che
le vanita and with Milnes as Posa
and Verrett as Eboli it has many strengths
(Review).
A 1992 studio recording based on New
York Met performances conducted by Levine
with Aprille Millo a fine queen and
Chernov an excellent Rodrigo is marred
by inadequate singing elsewhere, particularly
from the basses (Sony S3K 52500). Haitink,
who had conducted the Covent Garden
performances of the French version recorded
by Pappano in Paris, got his chance
in 1996 in what is likely to be the
last studio recording of the opera.
With the Canadian Richard Margison a
lyrical Carlo and Russians as Elisabeth,
Eboli and Posa it has not lasted the
pace at full price and is now available
at bargain level (Philips 475 252-2).
Haitink is lyrical and affectionate
in his conducting yet lacking some of
the drive of Solti. I heard the London
Promenade live performance that followed
the recording with Sylvie Valayre as
a more impressive queen than Gorchakova
on the CD issue, the whole having significantly
more frisson than the studio version.
Perhaps it will become available one
day. Haitink paces Don Carlo
well on a DVD of the Covent Garden
Visconti production. Made in 1985 and
whilst not of the quality that Giulini
conducted in the production’s first
outing in 1958, the cast includes a
distinguished Rodrigo from Giorgio Zancanaro
alongside Louis Lima
as Carlos and Ileana Cotrubas
as the queen, both a little stretched
(Warner 510110242-2). The other major
DVD recording of the five-act version
is that from the Met in the mid-1980s
with Levine conducting a fine cast of
Domingo, Milnes, Grace Bumbry as Eboli
and the husband and wife team of Ghiaurov
as Philip and Freni as Elisabeth. As
with Karajan, Freni is musical but at
her vocal limits, the part being a size
to large for her. The production is
wholly appropriate and makes ideal home
viewing (DG 00440073 4083).
Section 3. Aida
and The Requiem.
Over the nineteen years
that elapsed whilst Verdi made his revisions
of Don Carlos much happened to
him and to Italy. On 14 January 1867
whilst Verdi was in Paris preparing
the premiere of the opera his father
died. Back at Busseto after the March
premiere he worked on his farm, which
he wanted to be a model for the district.
He was not in a happy frame of mind,
dissatisfied with the reception of Don
Carlos and a host of niggles elsewhere.
In May Giuseppina went to Milan to buy
furniture for their new apartment in
Genoa and unknown to Verdi called on
his long-time friend the Countess Maffei.
Verdi and she had corresponded regularly
but had not met for over twenty years;
the two ladies had never met. They got
on famously and together went to see
Alessandro Manzoni who Verdi revered
and described, alongside Rossini, as
one of the two greatest living Italians.
Verdi had read Manzoni’s novel ‘I Promessi
Sposi’ when aged sixteen and in his
fifty-third year he wrote to a friend,
according to me, (he) has written
not only the greatest book of our time
but one of the greatest books that ever
came out of the human brain. The
novel has been described as representing
for Italians all of Scott, Dickens and
Thackeray rolled into one and infused
with the spirit of Tolstoy. It was not
merely the nature of Manzoni’s partly
historical story that gave the work
this ethos, but the language. With it
Manzoni made vital steps towards a national
Italian language to replace the proliferation
of dialects and foreign administrative
languages extant in the peninsula. Giuseppina
returned from Milan with a signed photograph
from Manzoni and an invitation to Verdi
to visit him.
In July 1867 Verdi’s
niggles of mind over Don Carlos
and difficulties with the Town Council
of Busseto were put in perspective when
Barezzi died aged 79. He was not only
the father of Verdi’s first wife Margherita,
but also the benefactor without whose
financial support Verdi would never
have attained the heights he did. The
composer and Giuseppina were at his
bedside where Verdi played Va pensiero
on the piano at the dying man’s last
wish. After Barezzi’s death Verdi asked
a friend to search in Milan for the
graves of Margherita and his young son
Icilio. The report came back that these
had long ago been opened and the remains
interred in a common grave. In Busseto
the grave of his daughter Victoria had
also been lost, perhaps in the same
way. All Verdi had of the past were
the marriage rings he and Margherita
had exchanged, together with two pieces
of her jewellery. Verdi kept these mementos
in a little copper box. To these poignant
artefacts he added a lock of Barezzi’s
hair. On the box he wrote mementos
of my poor family.
After Barezzi’s funeral,
Verdi and Giuseppina went to Paris to
see the Great Exposition and also the
latest sites in the rebuilding and reordering
under Haussemann. As well as the usual
tourist itinerary, which included the
city’s new modern sewer system, the
Verdis also visited 
the
magnificent building for the Opéra.
Designed by Garnier at Napoleon III’s
behest it did not, as a consequence
of war and political changes, open until
1875. Recently refurbished it is a highlight
of any trip to Paris in the present
day. For the rest of 1867 and the early
part of the following year Verdi’s life
followed uneventfully in the usual domestic
cycle. In the spring of 1868 he and
Giuseppina went to Milan. It was Verdi’s
first visit since the cinque giornate
of 1848. Verdi at last realised a dream
and went to meet the ageing Manzoni.
How the two great Italians greeted and
spent their time together is not recorded.
On their return to Busseto, Du Locle,
one of the librettists of Don Carlos,
and with whom a warm friendship had
developed, visited the Verdis. In the
years that followed du Locle, who never
despaired of tempting Verdi into another
collaboration, kept sending him ideas
as to possible projects one of which
was to come to magnificent fruition.
During 1868 Verdi was
not compositionally idle. As I have
indicated above, he had long wanted
to revise La Forza del Destino
and when Tito Ricordi proposed a revival
for the 1869 La Scala carnival season
he accepted. The revised opera was premiered
at La Scala on 27 February 1869 and
marked a rapprochement between Verdi
and the theatre after a hiatus of twenty-five
years. But for Verdi 1868 did not go
out without a sting in its tail when,
on 13 November, Rossini died aged 76.
The two, whilst not close, were friends.
Rossini had once written in a letter
to Verdi, Rossini, ex-composer and
pianist of the fourth class, to the
illustrious composer Verdi, pianist
of the fifth class. Verdi wrote
to the Countess Maffei Rossini’s
reputation was the most widespread and
popular of our time; it was one of the
glories of Italy. When the other like
it (Manzoni’s) no longer exists,
what will remain of us. Even before
the Memorial Service had been held in
Paris, Verdi wrote to Milan’s Gazzetta
Musicale suggesting that the musicians
of Italy should unite to honour their
great compatriot by combining to write
a Requiem for performance on the anniversary
of his death. No one would receive payment
for his contribution with volunteers
to each write one section of the Mass
being drawn by lot. After the performance,
which Verdi recognised would lack artistic
unity, the score was to be sealed up
in the Bologna Liceo Musico, Rossini’s
home town. The idea was enthusiastically
received and a committee set up to 
oversee
the project. To Verdi, pre-eminent among
the names, fell the closing section,
the Libera Me. He had his composition
ready in good time despite revising
La Forza del Destino along the
way. Problems arose in respect of the
chorus and orchestra, for which Verdi,
somewhat unfairly, blamed his friend
the conductor Mariani and the project
floundered. Verdi met the costs incurred.
A Warner Vision issue (50-51011 7396-2-0)
of a performance of this original Rossini
Requiem is reviewed by a colleague Full
Review.
Whilst Verdi resisted
du Locle’s overtures to compose for
the Paris Opéra he did consider
doing so for the Opéra Comique.
But then in late 1869 du Locle brought
along a more interesting proposal. He
told Verdi that the Khedive (Viceroy)
of Egypt wanted the composer to write
an opera on an Egyptian theme for performance
at the new opera house in 
Cairo
constructed to celebrate the construction
of the Suez Canal. The theatre had opened
in November 1869 [a
copy of La Scala Milan itburnt down
in 1971] with a performance of
Rigoletto conducted by Verdi’s
former pupil Emanuele Muzio. The Suez
Canal was officially opened on the 17th
of the same month. Verdi at first turned
down the request repeating his refusal
when in Paris the following spring.
But Du Locle was not deterred and sent
Verdi a synopsis by Mariette, a French
national and renowned Egyptologist in
the employ of the Khedive. Stimulated
by the synopsis, and also, perhaps,
by the fact that Du Locle had been authorised
to approach Gounod or Wagner if he continued
to prove reluctant, Verdi wrote to Du
Locle on 2 June 1870 setting out his
terms. These stipulated his control
and ownership of the libretto, and that
he, Verdi, retained all rights except
for performances in Egypt. He also stipulated
a fee of 150,000 Francs, payable at
the Rothschild Bank in Paris on delivery
of the work. Mariette announced acceptance
of these terms to Du Locle on 10 June.
The fee made Verdi the highest paid
composer ever. Du Locle met Verdi at
Sant’Agata soon after and thrashed out
an outline of the opera in prose based
on Mariette’s earlier synopsis. Verdi
asked his publisher, Ricordi, to approach
Ghislanzoni to put it into Italian verse.
Throughout the process the composer
was keen to achieve the greatest historical
accuracy. For example he asked Du Locle
to gather information from Mariette
about the sacred dances of the Egyptian
priestesses. Verdi was intent on a Grand
Opera of spectacle and ballet as though
he were writing for the Paris Opéra.
Aida,
Verdi’s 26th opera was
ready for premiere in Egypt in January
1871, but a war distant from Egypt,
intervened. Bismarck had engineered
a Franco-Prussian confrontation in Autumn
1870. The French army was defeated at
the Battle of Sedan and the Emperor
Napoleon III captured. With Paris under
siege the scenery constructed there
could not be got out and shipped to
Cairo. Although Verdi’s composition
was completed Aida was not premiered
until Christmas Eve 1871. This delay
also caused the postponement of the
Italian premiere at La Scala as the
contract stipulated that the first performances
of the opera would be given in the Cairo
Opera House.
Aida is one
of Verdi’s most popular of operas with
its blend of musical invention and dramatic
expression. It is a work of pageant
with its Grand March (Gloria all’Egitto)
and ballet interludes. The music is
melodic and evocative from the outset.
The story is taut in its drama with
no superfluity of verbiage. Above all
it is a work involving various personal
relationships. That between the Ethiopian
Princess Aida, acting incognito as a
slave to Amneris the daughter of the
Egyptian King, and who both love the
soldier Radames is the core of the opera.
But Verdi always loved the complexities
and possibilities of the father-daughter
relationship and examples occur throughout
his operas; nowhere more starkly than
in Aida.
The luxuriant music
and pageant of Aida have drawn
recordings from the days of 78s with
a rapid expansion following the advent
of the LP. Likewise there are several
worthy DVDs to choose from. On 78s the
performance involving the Radames of
Gigli alongside Maria 
Caniglia
as Aida, Ebe Stignani as Amneris and
recorded in Rome in 1946 under Serafin
stands out although the recording favours
the singers. Ward Marston’s remastering
for Naxos cannot disguise original faults
but it is worth hearing (Review).
The first twenty-five or so years of
the LP era saw the record companies
compete with themselves, with repeat
recordings, as well as with their rivals.
The first LP recordings were inevitably
in mono with each company fielding their
contracted diva in the title role. Decca
were early into the field with their
FFSS superior sound derived from having
signed some of the best electronic whiz
kids from world war two. Their diva
was Renata Tebaldi who Toscanini had
invited to sing at the reopening 
of
La Scala in 1947. She is in fresher
voice than in the 1959 stereo remake
under Karajan. As Radames, Mario del
Monaco is his usual stentorian self.
Mark Obert-Thorn’s remastering makes
what he can of Santa Cecilia’s rather
confined acoustic (Review).
America’s RCA featured the Yugoslav
dramatic soprano Zinka Milanov as Aida
alongside the tasteful Jussi Björling
as Radames and the redoubtable Leonard
Warren and Fedora Barbieri as Amonasro
and 
Amneris.
This recording has also had the benefit
of Mark Obert-Thorn’s remastering art
and is particularly vibrant (Review).
Although Milanov lacks Callas’s capacity
for characterisation her steadiness
and dramatic singing are preferable
to her rival’s rather underpowered and
manufactured approach again remastered
for Naxos by Mark Obert-Thorn (Review).
Both the Milanov and the Callas performances
were recorded in 1955. By that time
Callas no longer sang the role on stage.
One of her last stage performances of
the role of Aida was at Covent Garden
in 1953 under Barbirolli. Some critics
prefer Callas’s portrayal in this performance
to her studio recording (Testament SBT2
1355).
Decca with their excellent
engineers were quick off the mark with
stereo recordings. With Karajan as conductor
they reprised Tebaldi’s Aida in 1959
with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra
and State Opera Chorus in what was to
become one of their favourite recording
venues, Vienna’s Sofiensaal. With production
by John Culshaw and using a six channel
mixing
desk, with facility to expand to eighteen,
this recording was for some time a benchmark
for Aida recordings. Karajan
luxuriates in Verdi’s music in the triumphal
scene. The young Carlo Bergonzi is the
epitome of vocal grace as Radames and
Giulietta Simionato a fine Amneris.
(Decca 460 978-2 reissued 4758240).
John Culshaw must have been mightily
impressed by the young black American
Leontyne Price, then making waves in
Europe, to build a recording 
round
her in association with RCA a mere three
years later. Made in Rome her portrayal
of Aida on this recording, where she
is accompanied by the rather over-virile
singing of Jon Vickers as Radames, is
one of the finest portrayals of the
role on record. Solti is not the ideal
Verdian but with his dramatic drive
allied to sound stunning for its time
it wears well (Decca 460 765-2). RCA
tried a reprise of Price’s Aida ten
years later for issue to celebrate the
first performance in Cairo. Made in
London in July 1970 with a mouth-watering
cast including Grace Bumbry as Amneris
and the young Placido Domingo as a more
tastefully heroic Radames than Vickers,
it should have been a competitor to
Karajan’s first recording. Regrettably,
by the late 1960s RCA no longer had
the benefit of Decca’s engineers and
the recording was poor with obvious
drop-outs among its failures when issued
on LP. The CD issue has smoothed out
some deficiencies but its sonic limitations
still represent a glorious opportunity
lost (GD 74321 39498-2)
After an ill-fated
attempt with Corelli and Nilsson (358
654 at bargain price) EMI had more success
with Karajan’s second recording made
in conjunction with performances at
the Salzburg Festival .The conductor’s
tempi are idiosyncratically slow in
parts and his more lyrical view is matched
by the casting of the lightish voices
of Mirella Freni and José Carreras
in the lead roles (0777 769300 2). EMI
returned to the competitive fray ten
years later with Riccardo Muti’s ‘all
star’ first opera recording for the
company. The sound on the original 
LPs
was compromised by efforts at ambisonics
but the CD has greater clarity in its
GROC reissue. With Montserrat Caballé
as Aida, Domingo as Radames and Fiorenza
Cossotto, Pierro Cappuccilli and Nicolai
Ghiaurov also present it is one of the
better sung of the digital recordings
(Review).
Domingo features on Abbado’s 1982 La
Scala recording, but with Ricciarelli
stretched as Aida and Elena Obraztsova
seriously miscast as Amneris, all in
a woolly acoustic. This is best avoided
(DG 410 092-2). Domingo appears yet
again for Sony alongside Aprile Millo
as Aida under Levine. The recorded sound
does no favours nor does the wooden
Amonasro of James Morris. Pavarotti
fans are best served by one of his performances
caught on DVD rather than on the CD
of his 1985 La Scala rendition under
Lorin Maazel’s unidiomatic baton. Maria
Chiara sings an appealing Aida although
a little past her best in a role she
sang regularly at Verona (Decca 417
439-2).
The pageantry of Aida
makes it a dream for any opera stage
with the necessary financial resources
and there are many versions on DVD.
The pageantry makes a big impact at
the Verona Arena although the more intimate
scenes are less well served. Catching
the dynamism of the orchestra and chorus
is also problematic. A 1982 performance
has Nicola Martinucci an upright Radames
and Maria Chiara an appealing Aida under
Anton Guadagno. A 1992 performance with
sets reconstructed from Mariette’s
designs for the arena has Maria
Chiara well past her best. Kristan Jöhannasson
as Radames lacks any Italianata and
the sound is unduly harsh (Review).
Pavarotti fans are well served by three
DVD recordings of a role he did not
sing that often on stage. The1985 La
Scala performance under Maazel is the
same as 
the
CD (Review).
In my view he is better caught alongside
the lyric and silver-voiced Aida of
Margaret Price in Sam Wanamaker’s production
recorded at the War Memorial Opera House,
San Francisco in 1981 with Garcia Navarro
on the rostrum (Review).
Alongside that Pavarotti performance
a personal favourite is the 1989 recording
from the Met conducted by James Levine.
Backed by a generous endowment to supplement
the house budget the staging is opulent.
Add the casting of Domingo, Aprile Millo
as Aida and Dolora Zajick as Amneris
sparking off each other and Sherrill
Milnes as Amonasro, this is as good
a theatre production as one is likely
to get. The Met audience are rather
too enthusiastic at times and the curtain
calls are repetitive (DG 073 001-9 GH).
For those allergic to such shows of
opulence and pageantry the antithesis
is found in Robert Wilson’s minimalist
staging. Intimate scenes involve the
singers not making eye contact as they
circle each other with hand movements
representing their emotions, or that
is what I think is being represented.
The set for the Nile Scene is visually
effective whilst that for the Tomb Scene
has resemblances of realism to go alongside
the Wilson’s minimalism
(Review).
Outside the narrow
confines of the world of opera, 1870
and 1871 were momentous years in Europe
and had a direct impact on the staging
of Aida as I have shown. As Verdi
worked on the libretto of Aida,
Pio Nono, the longest ever serving Pope,
proclaimed the dogma of Papal Infallibility
at the 20th Vatican Council
on 18 July 1870. The next day France,
protector of Papal Rome, egged on by
Bismarck, declared war on Prussia over
the possibility of a German prince acceding
to the Spanish throne. In the first
week of August German soldiers crossed
into France and Napoleon III withdrew
the French army from Rome to help defend
the homeland. To protect what was left
of the independent Papal States Pio
Nono had only his own thirteen thousand
men. On 2 September the French army
was humiliated at Sedan and with Napoleon
himself captured the Second Empire fell
and the Third Republic was proclaimed.
The first siege of Paris by the Prussians
began on 19 September. On the same day
Italy’s Victor Emmanuelle seized his
chance and despatched troops to occupy
Rome, the oldest sovereignty in Europe,
in the name of the Italian State. The
Pope retired to the Vatican’s restricted
confines with much prayer and ceremony.
The ceremony included ascending the
Santa Scala on his knees whilst blessing
his troops; it was the last act of a
Pope in Papal Rome. The resultant Concordat
gave the Vatican, the Patrimony of St.
Peter, the independent diplomatic status
that it enjoys in the present day.
As I have noted Verdi’s
composition of Aida was complete
and the score ready for delivery in
November 1870, for its scheduled premiere
in Cairo in January 1871 and performances
at La Scala later the same month. With
the Cairo sets held in Paris by the
siege Verdi agreed to postpone both
productions. The Republican government
in France moved out of Paris to Versailles
as the Parisians choked on Bismarck’s
demand that his troops parade down the
Champs-Elysées. The Paris commune
resisted its new Government with rioting
and burning including the Tuileries.
The city was put under another siege,
this time by thirteen thousand French
troops who re-took it with much loss
of life among the Communards. At last
the Aida scenery could proceed
to Cairo and the production could also
go ahead at La Scala. With Italy unified,
except for Trieste and its region, and
with Rome as is capital and France in
disarray, Europe and its personnel were
changing faster than ever before.
In the year of Rossini’s
death in 1868, aided by arrangements
connived at by his wife and long-time
friend Clarina Maffei, Verdi had visited
his idol, Alessandro Manzoni. When Manzoni
died in May 1873, after a fall, Verdi
was devastated to the extent he could
not go to the funeral for which the
shops of Milan were closed, and the
streets lined with thousands. The King
sent two Princes of the Royal Blood
to carry the flanking cords and they
were aided by the Presidents of the
Senate and Chamber as well as the Ministers
of Education and Foreign Affairs. A
week after the funeral Verdi went to
Milan and visited the grave alone. 
Then,
through his publisher, Ricordi, he proposed
to the Mayor of Milan that he should
write a Requiem Mass to
honour Manzoni to be performed in Milan
on the first anniversary of the writer’s
death. Unlike his proposal for a Requiem
to honour Rossini in 1868, there would
be no committee this time. Verdi proposed
that he himself would compose the entire
Mass, pay the expenses of preparing
and printing the music, specify the
church for the first performance, choose
the singers and the Requiem would
belong to Verdi. The city of Milan accepted
with alacrity.
Verdi began work on
his Requiem in Paris in the summer
of 1873. It was his first visit to the
city since the days of the Commune and
the ruins of the Tuileries and other
burnt-out buildings saddened him. With
artistic unity guaranteed by the single
composer model, Verdi intended his Requiem
to have a regular place in the repertoire
just like his operas and other works.
Although he had already composed a Libera
Me for the aborted Rossini Requiem,
Verdi largely re-wrote it, thus ensuring
greater compositional coherence than
might otherwise have been the case.
He selected the Church of San Marco
for the premiere, considering it to
have the best proportions and acoustics.
On 22 May 1874, the first anniversary
of Manzoni’s death, with an orchestra
of one hundred and a chorus of one hundred
and twenty it was given to acclaim.
Three days later Verdi conducted another
performance at La Scala. This was followed
by two more conducted by Faccio. Argument
raged that Verdi, although using the
ecclesiastical text, had not written
music of that oeuvre. The work is certainly
not in the tradition of ecclesiastical
works set to counterpoint and fugues,
a fact that at least some purists considered
did not detract the listener from the
religious message. Despite criticisms
of this nature the Requiem travelled
to Paris where Verdi was made a Commander
of the Legion of Honour. After Paris,
London and Vienna followed with the
work acclaimed in each.
Some cynics have referred
to the Manzoni Requiem, as the
work is sometimes called, as being Verdi’s
best opera! After the reverential and
ecclesiastical style of the opening
Requiem and Kyrie the music varies between
the beautifully lyric and the heavily
dramatic as in the Dies irae
and Tuba mirum. At least stereo
is a minimum requirement for listening
to this work and I pass over some worthy
mono recordings. At its premiere the
soloists were renowned opera singers
and ever since it is conductors and
singers with that background who bring
out its strengths, both spiritual and
vocal. There is no shortage of both
CD and DVD recordings of the work. On
CD, EMI’s 1959 recording by the
veteran Tulio Serafin 
featuring
the Lebanese soprano Shakeh Vartenissian,
a young Fiorenza Cossotto singing vibrantly
alongside the tenor Eugene Fernandi
and Boris Christoff, who sings a redoubtable
Mors stupebit, has long been
a favourite of mine (Testament SBT 2140).
Others favour the 1963 recording conducted
by Giulini over that of his elder compatriot,
but with an English chorus not matching
its Italian counterparts and the lack
of Italianata in Schwarzkopf’s and Gedda’s
interpretations it is not a view I share
(EMI GROC). Solti’s very operatic interpretation
of 1967 for Decca with Joan Sutherland
and Marilyn Horne alongside the Finnish
bass Martti Talvela and the young Pavarotti
has its fans. Recorded in the Sofiensaal
Vienna it has more than a touch of dramatic
Wagner about it. If not exactly Italianate
it is sonically exciting (Decca 311
944-2). In the following three decades
pretty well every conductor of note
joined in with his chosen, or company-contracted,
soloists. The 1987 Telarc recording
with relatively less well-known soloists
is admired for its recording quality
and choral singing (Telarc CD 80152).
Riccardo Muti’s recording of the same
year, his second, features an all-star
American trio of Cheryl Studer, Dolora
Zajick, and Samuel Ramey alongside the
Italian Pavarotti and the chorus and
orchestra of La Scala, Milan. It has
all the frisson of a live performance
with Pavarotti’s singing of the Ingemisco
a highlight, but the acoustic of the
La Scala theatre is a problem for me
(EMI CDS 7 49390-2). More recently Gergiev’s
account with Kirov forces features the
superb female duo of Renée Fleming
and Olga Borodina set alongside the
unacceptable tenor singing of Andrea
Boccelli (Philips 468 079-2). Both Karajan
with two versions and Abbado, a natural
Verdian, have recordings on CD from
DG. Abbado’s fully digital version features
Cheryl Studer, Mariana Lipovsek, José
Carreras and Ruggero Raimondi backed
by the Vienna State Opera Chorus and
the Vienna Philharmonic (435 884-2).
Despite its sonic virtues it does not
replace earlier versions among my favourites.
A bargain-priced Decca Originals double
CD, has the young Leontyne Price and
Jussi Björling in The Requiem,
conducted by Fritz Reiner alongside
Verdi’s later Four Sacred Pieces
conducted by Mehta (467 119-2).
There is no shortage
of DVD rivals in this music with
Abbado’s name as conductor featuring
regularly. His most recent recording,
from the Berlin centenary anniversary
of Verdi’s death, features the Berlin
Philharmonic, the Swedish Radio Choir
and Chamber Choir. With the Rossini
mezzo Daniela Barcellona and the conductor
the only Italians around it lacks any
natural feel and the solo singing of
Alagna is a particular trial (EMI 9269-
9 and also on CD 557168-2)). I suspect
Abbado’s earlier recordings including
that from the Edinburgh Festival featuring
Margaret Price, Jessye Norman, Jose
Carreras and Ruggero Raimondi (Arthaus
100 146) and another with Montserrat
Caballé and Lucia Valentini-Terrani
are far better sung although I have
only seen the latter advertised on the
web as Region 1. Whilst I was 
impressed
by near-veteran Zubin Mehta’s 2005 live
recording from the Santa Cecilia, Rome
(Review),
my personal favourite remains Karajan’s
La Scala performance of January 1967
with an unsurpassed quartet of Leontyne
