Gioachino Rossini (1792-1868)
Messa di Gloria
Eleonora Buratto (soprano)
Teresa Iervolino (mezzo-soprano)
Lawrence Brownlee & Michael Spyres (tenors)
Carlo Lepore (bass)
Orchestra e Coro dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia/Antonio Pappano
rec. live composite, 27-29 January 2022, Auditorium Parco della musica, Rome, Italy
WARNER CLASSICS 5419723452 [61]
While I acknowledge that any pretensions to piety Rossini might have had should be regarded with a fair degree of scepticism, I find much to enjoy in liturgical works such as his Stabat mater and Petite messe solennelle, despite the lack of the “sacred” in their style. Verdi’s Requiem is still similarly lumbered with the taunt “his greatest opera” but it surely contains a great deal more of the reverential than we find in the youthful Rossini’s Messa di Gloria, which at times has far more in common with opera seria – and even buffa - than music suitable for the Catholic Mass.
In truth, I was first rather surprised that the venerable Sir Tony, saw fit to record it but he goes out of his way, as reported in his conversation with Jon Tolansky included as notes in the booklet and translated into French and German, to emphasise that this is “a mass of light…fear is not really present”, which is why the Credo and Crucifixus are omitted as too sombre in content. He skips round the question of whether Rossini was devout by pointing out that, like Verdi and Puccini, he was brought up immersed in and surrounded by the trappings of piety and was at the very least “a cultural Catholic” (my words, not his) through and through, and therefore the question of the composer’s faith is irrelevant. The importation of operatic tropes and even direct borrowings Pappano ascribes to being integral to Rossini’s true style, and I cannot argue with that; nonetheless, there are inevitably occasions when the style of the music jars with the text or skirts banality.
The series of dissonant chords opening to the Kyrie is certainly grand and arresting but immediately defaults in the chirpy, perky, “chugging” mode of the overture to Il barbiere. However, that perkiness is counteracted by the weight of the choral contribution and the density of the orchestration, it is true. The ensuing tenor duet on ‘Christe eleison’ is certainly catnip to operaphiles; the display pieces for the tenors were specifically designed to show off the talents of singers such as Rubini and high tenor Lawrence Brownlee has been recruited here to tackle those…arias, as we must surely call them and he impresses – but after his florid, high-tessitura contribution we are subjected to a second choral Kyrie which definitely approaches the banal and the orchestral introduction to the Gloria is scarcely more dignified.
Pappano describes the work as requiring “virtuosity in the orchestra and the voices” alike, but on the evidence of my ears, his team of five singers features only two singers whom I would confidently describe as virtuoso performers, and that is Brownlee and Michael Spyres; when all the singers make their first combined contribution in the Gloria I am unimpressed but the windy, groaning bass and I hear nothing exceptional in the first solo contribution of the soprano in the Laudamus te, although she is pleasant enough, if a bit shrill of tone and the music itself is conventional, bordering on the formulaic and trivial. The mezzo-soprano is similarly competent but without an especially rich lower register. A nice cor anglais solo precedes another showpiece – the longest movement here and clearly central - for Brownlee whose voice, as I can attest from attending live performances, is sweet and agile but really quite small and I cannot hear how the import of the sacred text is reflected in his vocal pyrotechnics, for all Pappano’s assertion the Latin lends it gravitas.
The Qui tollis and Qui sedes movements provide the opportunity for Michael Spyres to exercise his vocal flexibility. His is a larger, flexible but not especially beautiful voice without the same ease up top as Brownlee but he flicks a top C-sharp successfully twice; his music is demanding if unremarkable in content and rather empty of emotional content. The bass heaves and grumbles his way through the Quoniam which is distinguished by an adept clarinet solo. The concluding Cum sancto spirito – almost certainly written with the help fugue specialist Pietro Raimondi – for the lusty but precise chorus only is rather dry and conventional – apart from a striking halt and emphatic reprise halfway through.
The orchestra, having been brought on by Pappano, is as good as any these days. A composite recording, assembled from live performances, its sound is exemplary - plenty of space around it without losing detail or balance.
Ralph Moore
Published: October 13, 2022
