A riveder le stelle - 7th December 2020

Luca Salsi Foto Brescia-Amisano

Baritone. A native of San Secondo Parmense, Luca earned a diploma in voice from the Arrigo
Boito Conservatory in Parma with Lucetta Bizza and further developed his talents under Carlo
Meliciani. He has performed in the most prestigious venues, working with the foremost orchestra
conductors and preeminent stage directors such as Robert Carsen, Hugo De Ana, Antony Minghel-
la, Werner Herzog, Franco Zeffirelli, and David McVicar. In recent seasons he played the title role
in Macbeth with Muti in Chicago, Carlo Gérard in Andrea Chénier at the Bayerische Staatsoper,
and Scarpia in Tosca at the Rome Opera. He was Rigoletto under Damiano Michieletto in Amster-
dam and sang Amonasro in Aida with Muti in Salzburg. More recently, he inaugurated the 2017-
2018 La Scala season in Andrea Chénier and the 2018 Verdi Festival in Parma in Macbeth, repris-
ing the role in the 2018-2019 season at Teatro La Fenice with stage direction by Damiano
Michieletto and Myung-Whun Chung wielding the baton. He took the stage at the Metropolitan for
Il trovatore, Lucia di Lammermoor, and Luisa Miller. He was Macbeth with Riccardo Muti in Flo-
rence and Ravenna, Rodrigo in Don Carlo in Bologna and Madrid, Carlo in Ernani at La Scala,
Germont in La traviata in Paris and New York. He sang the title role in Nabucco and Gérard in An-
drea Chénier at the Vienna Staatsoper, and Simon Boccanegra at the Salzburg Festival with Valery
Gergiev conducting the Wiener Philharmoniker. He was Scarpia in Tosca, directed by Livermore
and conducted by Chailly, premiering the La Scala 2019-2020 season. His broad recital pro-
gramme on Piermarini’s stage in March 2019 was a compelling homage to Italian verse.

13

Giuseppe Verdi the Duke of Mantua
Rigoletto Women are as fickle
il duca di Mantova as feathers in the wind,
La donna è mobile simple in speech,
qual piuma al vento, and simple in mind.
muta d’accento Always the loveable,
e di pensiero. sweet, laughing face,
Sempre un amabile but laughing or crying,
leggiadro viso that face for sure is false.
in pianto o in riso If you rely on them
è menzognero. you will regret it,
La donna è mobil and if you trust them
qual piuma al vento, you are undone!
muta d’accento Yet none can call himself
e di pensier. fully contented
È sempre misero who has not tasted
chi a lei s’affida, love in their arms!
chi le confida Women are as fickle
mal cauto il core! as feathers in the wind,
Pur mai non sentesi simple in speech,
felice appieno and simple in mind.
chi su quel seno
non liba amore! La donna è mobile
La donna è mobil
qual piuma al vento, La donna è mobile, an aria about female
muta d’accento volubility sung by the Duke of Mantua in
e di pensier. Act III, expresses the character’s vital self-
righteousness and human vacuity. The
Henriot (Henri Maigrot), Quatuor de Rigoletto, simple lightness of the piece, articulated in
from L’Illustration of May 19, two verses and similar to a ballabile, suits
1894 (Private Collection). the sordid setting in which the Duke makes
his appearance, preparing for a tryst with a
prostitute, Maddalena, sister of Sparafucile,
the killer hired by Rigoletto to slay the
Duke. The two-verse song will have gained
dramaturgical significance and tragic irony
when we hear it again at the end of the
opera, revealing to Rigoletto that the Duke
is still alive and that Sparafucile must have
accidentally killed someone else in his place
(the buffoon’s daughter, Gilda).

C. F.

14

Vittorio Grigolo Foto Rudy Amisano

Tenor. Born in Arezzo, Vittorio later moved with his family to Rome, where he studied at the
Schola Puerorum of the Sistine Chapel, participating as a soloist in the U.S. tour of the Sistine
Chapel Choir in 1989. He debuted at the precocious age of thirteen at the Rome Opera as the Shep-
herd Boy in Tosca, sharing the stage with Luciano Pavarotti. Meanwhile, he continued his studies
under Danilo Rigosa. In 2000 he debuted at La Scala in the opening concert for the 200th anniver-
sary year of Verdi’s birth, conducted by Muti. In 2010 he debuted at the Metropolitan as Rodolfo
in La bohème, a role that would become one of his mainstays. He commands a broad repertoire
embracing the leading roles in Italian and French opera. In 2011 he sang ‘Nessun dorma’ at the in-
auguration of the Special Olympic Games in Athens and on Bastille Day 2013 he sang ‘Che gelida
manina’ in Paris before an audience of 200 thousand. He headlined La traviata at the Zürich sta-
tion, L’elisir d’amore at Milan Malpensa Airport, Marco Bellocchio’s film Rigoletto live broadcast
from Mantua, and La bohème in a live satellite broadcast from the Metropolitan. He has made nu-
merous forays into pop music: in 2015 he performed with Brian May at the Arena of Verona and in
2016 with Sting, Bruce Springsteen, and James Taylor at Carnegie Hall. He has won numerous
awards, including the Caruso Prize, the Puccini Prize, the National Italian American Foundation’s
Special Achievement Award, and the Opera News Award.
His recent engagements have included Lucia di Lammermoor in New York, Tosca in New York,
Vienna, London, and Paris, Gianni Schicchi in Paris, L’elisir d’amore in Munich, Paris, and Milan
(La Scala), Rigoletto in New York, La traviata at the Arena of Verona, Faust in Tokyo, and
Werther in Vienna. In January 2020 he returned to Piermarini’s stage to lead Roméo et Juliette, di-
rected by Bartlett Sher with Lorenzo Viotti on the podium.
vittoriogrigolo.com

15

Giancarlo Judica Cordiglia
Many have sacrificed themselves, many have
died for an ideal. An idea can be something
beautiful – equality, solidarity, friendship.
What is a community without shared ideals?
Without an ideal, how can we imagine we
belong to something greater than us? We
all may feel such sentiments: in this we are
all truly equal. And everyone goes – or can
go – to the opera house… And they hear
words of homeland and freedom, of dignity
and love. Enthusiasm and passion come to
life at the opera: the tenor who struggles,
the baritone who opposes him…
Not all stories end well.
And yet, even in the most painful, the most
horrible, moments, the choir always reminds
us of the need for humanity, the profound
meaning of cohesion. Then, after the lights
have gone out, you return home but these
thoughts remain, they dwell in all of us.

16

Giuseppe Verdi
Don Carlo (1867)

(Libretto by Joseph Méry and Camille du Locle,
translated into Italian by Achille De Lauzières
e Angelo Zanardini)

After Un ballo in maschera, Verdi had become inextricably interwoven.
promised himself he would retire to private The protagonists? A grand monarch,
life and put the ‘years of gaol’ that, from Philippe II, an austere bass, who meddles
Nabucco on, had forced him to struggle to in the fates of his country and family
meet deadlines while jobs piled up. But in while caught between the constraints of
the end he was swayed by an invitation to Politics and the implacable dictates of the
the Paris Opera, as he had been earlier by Catholic Church. In the aria ella giammai
one from the Imperial Theatres of St. m’amò, we find him alone at night,
Petersburg. The choice of subject, of ruminating sleeplessly at his desk. In the
course, was his, and it fell to one of his turmoil of emotions it is mainly jealousy
best loved authors, Schiller, and to a drama that has burrowed under his skin as he
where public history and private affairs, thinks back on the days when he met his
religious conflict and family tensions, bride, so much younger than he.

E.F.

To the left Don Carlos, to the right Philip II.
Cameo (Florence, Museo degli Argenti).

17

Giuseppe Verdi
Don Carlo

Filippo ii Philip ii
Ella giammai m’amò! She does not love me!
No, quel cor chiuso è a me, No! Her heart is closed to me,
amor per me non ha! she has never loved me!
Io la rivedo ancor I can see her still,
contemplar triste in volto looking silently
il mio crin bianco il dì at my white hair, the day
che qui di Francia venne. she arrived from France.
No, amor per me non ha! No, she does not love me!
Ove son? Quei doppier presso a finir! Where am I? Those candles
L’aurora imbianca il mio veron! are burnt out... Dawn silvers the
Già spunta il dì! window-panes,
Passar veggo i miei giorni lenti! the day is here!
Il sonno, o Dio, sparì Alas! Healing sleep, God,
da’ miei occhi languenti! has flown forever from my eyelids!
Dormirò sol nel manto mio regal, I shall sleep alone in my royal cloak,
quando la mia giornata è giunta a sera, when the last hour arrives for me,
dormirò sol sotto la volta nera, I shall sleep beneath the stone arches
là nell’avello dell’Escurial. in the vaults of the Escurial!
Se il serto regal a me desse il poter If only our royal station gave us the power
di leggere nei cor, che Dio può sol veder! to delve into the depths of hearts,
Se dorme il prence, veglia il traditore;
il serto perde il re, il consorte l’onore! [where God alone sees all!
Ella giammai m’amò! If the King sleeps, treason is hatched,
No, quel cor chiuso è a me, he is robbed of his crown and his wife!
amor per me non ha! I shall sleep in my royal cloak, etc.
She does not love me!
No! Her heart is closed to me,
she does not love me!

Ella giammai m’amò

That which the voice does not say,
chastely restrained in a memorable
recitative, is revealed in this scene by the
instruments: a solo cello, almost his alter
ego; muted violins; weeping oboes; and
over it all a repeating phrase, twisting
around itself, bound, claustrophobic,
hopeless.

E. F.

18

ildar Abdrazakov Foto Anton Welt

Bass. Born into a family of artists in Ufa (Bashkortostan, Russia), after winning a series of voice
competitions, Ildar debuted at the Mariinsky Theatre in 1998 in the title role of Le nozze di Figaro.
He gained international attention in 2000 by winning the 5th International Maria Callas Competi-
tion in Parma. This marked the beginning of a brilliant career: the following year he debuted at La
Scala at the young age of twenty-five in Bellini’s La sonnambula and went on to sing on the
world’s premier stages under illustrious conductors. An active soloist in concerts and recitals, he
has performed in such prestigious venues as the Royal Albert Hall in London (BBC Proms) and
Carnegie Hall in New York. A regular guest at the Metropolitan Opera since his debut in Don Gio-
vanni in 2004 with Levine conducting, he has also sung in Le nozze di Figaro, Il principe Igor, An-
na Bolena, Khovanshchina, Carmen, Attila, and Semiramide, and more recently in Don Giovanni,
Macbeth, and La damnation de Faust. In 2009 he debuted at the Salzburg Festival in Rossini’s
Moïse et Pharaon conducted by Muti. Other favourite roles include Mephistopheles in Faust,
Oroveso in Norma, Selim in Il turco in Italia, Walter in Luisa Miller, Oberto in Oberto conte di
San Bonifacio, and Banquo in Macbeth. He recently sang Don Carlos (French version) and Boris
Godunov at the Paris Opera (broadcast live in cinemas around the world), L’italiana in Algeri at
the Salzburg Festival, and Don Carlo at the Bolshoi. His most recent performances at La Scala in-
clude Silva in Ernani (2018) and the title role in Attila, inaugurating the 2018-2019 season.
He was named ambassador for the philanthropical project Zegna & Music in 2007 and since 2014
he has been Artistic Director of the Elena Obraztsova International Academy of Music.
ildarabdrazakov.com

19

Giuseppe Verdi Rodrigo
Don Carlo Ah! With what joy I hold you to my breast!
Rodrigo I have saved you!
Felice ancor io son se abbracciarti poss’io! We must take our leave. O my Carlos!
Io ti salvai! This is for me the supreme day,
Convien qui dirci addio. O mio Carlo! we will never see each other again;
Per me giunto è il dì supremo, God permits us still to love one another
no, mai più ci rivedremo; near him, when we are in heaven.
ci congiunga Iddio nel ciel, I see your tear-filled eyes:
ei che premia i suoi fedel. why are you weeping?
Sul tuo ciglio il pianto io miro; Don’t be sad, death has charms
lagrimar così, perché? for him who dies for you!
No, fa’ cor, l’estremo spiro Listen, Carlos, your mother
lieto è a chi morrà per te. expects you tomorrow at San Yuste;
O Carlo, ascolta, la madre t’aspetta she knows all! Ah! The earth
a San Giusto doman; tutto ella sa... slips away from me … Carlos, give me
Ah! La terra mi manca... Carlo mio,
a me porgi la man! [your hand!
Io morrò, ma lieto in core, Ah! I die with a happy soul,
ché potei così serbar since you are alive, saved by me,
alla Spagna un salvatore! a saviour for Spain!
Ah! Di me non ti scordar! Ah, do not forget me!
Regnare tu dovevi, ed io morir per te. Yes, you must reign, and I must die for you!
Ah! La terra mi manca... Ah! The earth slips away from me…
La mano a me... Ah!... Salva la Fiandra... Carlos, your hand… Ah!.. Save Flanders!
Carlo, addio, ah!... Ah! Farewell, Carlos, ah!... Ah!

Libretto of Don Carlo, four-act version Per me giunto è il dì supremo...
(Milan, Museo Teatrale alla Scala). Io morrò

Hope, on the other hand, is a faithful friend
to Rodrigo, one of opera’s rare ‘good’
baritones. Even in the gloom of prison,
confiding to his fraternal friend Don Carlo
that he will soon die in his stead, his voice is
illuminated by a positive note gently
suffusing the noble, soft and articulate
melody ‘cantabile’, as Verdi prescribes.
Toward the end, as Rodrigo dies in Carlo’s
arms, his words are immersed in a celestial
light generated initially by cornets, then
flutes and also harps (‘Io morrò, ma lieto in
core’ – ‘I die with a happy soul’).

E. F.

20

Ludovic tézier Foto Cassandre Berthon

Baritone. Born in Marseille, Ludovic studied at the Paris Opera’s École d’Art Lyrique, debuting in
1992 at the Grand Théâtre of Geneva as Pompeo in Benvenuto Cellini by Berlioz. He went on to
join the ensemble of the Lucerne Opera and, in 1997, the ensemble of the Lyon Opera, where he
stayed for three years singing numerous roles. In 1997 he debuted at the Opéra Comique and at
Glyndebourne, marking the beginning of a brilliant international career that led him to the world’s
most prestigious theatres and festivals under conductors of the calibre of Myung-whun Chung, An-
tonio Pappano, Riccardo Muti, Philippe Jordan, and Zubin Mehta. His repertoire includes the title
roles in Hamlet, Eugene Onegin, Don Giovanni, Simon Boccanegra, and Werther (baritone ver-
sion), as well as Count Almaviva (Le nozze di Figaro), Renato (Un ballo in maschera), Ford (Fal-
staff), Prince Yeletsky (The Queen of Spades), Enrico (Lucia di Lammermoor), Germont (La travi-
ata), Chorèbe (Les Troyens), Wolfram (Tannhäuser), Posa (Don Carlos), Count Luna (Il trova-
tore), Don Carlo di Vargas (La forza del destino), Amfortas (Parsifal), and Athanaël (Thaïs). He
was Marc-Antoine in Cléopâtre by Massenet in Salzburg and Paris, Alphonse XI (La favorite),
Rigoletto and Iago (Otello) in Munich and Florence, Don Carlo (Ernani) in Marseille, Scarpia
(Tosca) in Dresden and Salzburg, Giorgio Germont, Scarpia, Simone, and Lescaut (Manon) in
Paris, Sir Riccardo Forth (I puritani) and Carlo Gérard (Andrea Chénier) at the Sydney Opera in
Australia, Don Carlo di Vargas in London, Count di Luna in Madrid, Scarpia in Berlin, and Don
Giovanni a Vienna.
His upcoming engagements include Thaïs in Monte Carlo, Aida and Tosca in Paris, Parsifal in Vi-
enna, Le nozze di Figaro in Munich, and Don Carlos in Zürich.

21

Giuseppe Verdi the Princess of eboli
Don Carlo
O fatal, detested gift,
Principessa di eboli the present of an angry Heaven,
which makes us so vain and proud,
O don fatale, o don crudel I curse you, o my beauty!
che in suo furor mi fece il ciel! Fall, fall, bitter tears!
Tu che ci fai sì vane, altere, I have lost hope, I must suffer!
ti maledico, o mia beltà. My crime is so horrible,
Versar, versar sol posso il pianto, I will never wash away my sin!
speme non ho, soffrir dovrò! Farewell, my Queen, innocent victim
Il mio delitto è orribil tanto of my heart’s crazy passions!
che cancellarlo mai non potrò! In a convent I shall forever
O mia regina, io t’immolai bury myself and my grief!
al folle error di questo cor. And Carlos? O God, tomorrow
Solo in un chiostro al mondo omai perhaps I will see him die!
dovrò celar il mio dolor! Ah! I’ve still got one day left!
Oh ciel! E Carlo? A morte, domani... There is some hope left for me,
Gran Dio! A morte andar vedrò! one day more, Heaven be blessed!
Ah! Un dì mi resta, la speme m’arride! I shall save him!
Sia benedetto il ciel! Lo salverò!

The Princess of Eboli, from Schillers Werke O don fatale
illustriert von ersten deutschen Künstlern, vol. II,
Stuttgart und Leipzig 1877 Instead, against a dark contralto grain,
(Milan, Museo Teatrale alla Scala). Eboli’s aria O don fatale, in which the
princess curses her own beauty, is a
dramatic explosion of inconsolable grief.
While this might seem the most frivolous
among the many Verdi maledictions, it is
perhaps the most human and despairing.
After weeping over her betrayal of the
queen, she is struck by resolve and decides
to remedy the damage done and at least save
Carlo. Her invective and fragmented,
convulsive singing then transforms into the
exaltation of the long final melodic arc.

E. F.

22

elīna Garanča Foto Brescia-Amisano

Mezzosoprano. Born into a musical family in Riga, Elīna studied at the Music Academy of Latvia.
In 2001 she was a finalist in the BBC Cardiff Singer of the World competition. She began her ca-
reer as a resident artist with the Südthüringischer Staatstheater before joining Oper Frankfurt. Re-
cent roles include Dalila in Samson et Dalila at the Vienna Staatsoper, the Metropolitan, and the
Berlin Staatsoper with Daniel Barenboim; she debuted as Eboli in Don Carlos at the Paris Opera;
she sang in La favorite at the Bayerische Staatsoper and in Der Rosenkavalier and La damnation
de Faust at the Metropolitan. In 2007 she was named ‘Singer of the Year’ and ‘Female Singer of
the Year’ by MIDEM and ECHO Klassik, respectively. In 2010 she was Musical America’s ‘Vocal-
ist of the Year’. She has given numerous recitals and concerts in prestigious venues, including
Carnegie Hall in New York and Wigmore Hall in London; she was a soloist in Mahler’s Third
Symphony with the Berliner Philharmoniker conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin and in Verdi’s
Requiem, conducted by Riccardo Muti at the Baden-Baden Festspielhaus and by Mehta at Maggio
Musicale Fiorentino. She recently sang Sea Pictures by Elgar with Daniel Barenboim at the Berlin
Staatskapelle and the Wesendonck-Lieder with Christian Thielemann at the Salzburg Festival. Her
future commitments include Aida (Amneris) at the Opéra Bastille, Parsifal (Kundry) in Vienna,
and Carmen in the Italian premiere of 7 Deaths of Maria Callas by Marina Abramović, inaugurat-
ing the 2020-2021 season at Teatro San Carlo, Naples.
In May 2013, the Vienna Staatsoper awarded her the title of ‘Kammersängerin’ in recognition of
her devotion to theatre: since debuting there in 2003 as Lola in Cavalleria rusticana, she has sung
18 roles in over 140 performances.
elinagaranca.com

23

Michela Murgia

Opera is a rich spectacle, but not a drama of a child bride sold by her
spectacle for the rich. We would be family but falling in love with a man
wrong to be fooled by the whose abuse she mistakes for love.
sumptuous costumes, the majesty of Tosca anticipates #metoo, showing
the music, or the gilded stuccowork us the arrogance of power that
of the theatre: opera is an art form extorts with threats that which can
for all, and the working classes, even only truly be given by consent. And
if they are in the gallery, have always also Le nozze di Figaro begins with a
been in attendance. The reason is maid who confesses to her swain the
simple: opera is about them. molestations of her master. Lucia di
Over the centuries, opera librettos Lammermoor evokes the agony of a
have recounted the adventures of young woman whose affections men
the downtrodden much more than believe they can dictate, and the
those of the powerful. The authors cruelty in La traviata ridicules the
have often sided with the weak, bourgeois hypocrisy whereby women
dragging the presumption of the are now allowed anything, except
powerful before the court of public their freedom. The libretto heroines
opinion. There are three categories often perish, because in the societies
of the ‘weak’ who owe much to portrayed on stage, the grave is the
opera: servants, the poor, and only place for a woman who wants
women, all people with diminished to be exactly who she is. So that all
rights forced to live in a world where can live, male and female, we have
it is only the rich man who can to envision another world; the stage
dictate laws. When the curtain thus serves as a workshop to explore
opened on Britten’s Billy Budd, so possibilities that have yet to become
did social debate on the death possible elsewhere.
penalty in Britain. The precariat of There is a golden thread that runs
artists (still precarious today) in La through opera librettos like a secret
bohème appears to us in all its cruel embroidery: it is the eternal demand
fate and the relationships between for justice by those who have no
servants and masters in the operas of voice. The opera theatre is the place
Mozart highlight the beginning of where the silence of the disinherited
the crisis of a society that up to then has transformed into a powerful
had stood solely on the inequality of high note reverberating ceaselessly
rights. But it is to women and across the centuries, shattering the
through women that opera transmits crystalline certainties of the lords of
its most revolutionary message. every era. This is what art does: it
There is a long history of women’s shatters the old world and forces us
affirmation in opera that still to imagine a new one where the
dialogues with the present, all we right to be happy finally belongs to
have to do is listen. everyone.
Thus, note by note, Madama
Butterfly brings to the stage the Michela Murgia, 2020

24

VOICE TO THE WEAK

Gaetano Donizetti
Lucia di Lammermoor (1835)

(Libretto by Salvatore Cammarano)

The quintessential Italian romantic to Donizetti in his operas. Beyond the
melodrama, Lucia di Lammermoor vehement fury of the male characters, the
embodies the ideal of an opera seria with audience’s imagination is also struck by
tragic vocation as was the norm in the 1830s Lucia’s melancholic languor, her
in theatres up and down the Italian hallucinatory madness, making them feel
peninsula. Adventurous intrigues, stories à as if the passions on stage are their own,
la Walter Scott set in murky English history, that they are directly involved in the
burning passions that erupt with devastating horrific narrative, arousing compassion
effect, heroes perishing in despair on stage, and stirring their souls to pity.
crushed by inexorable destiny: these are the
ingredients that were particularly congenial C. T.

Prina. Lucia and Edgardo
at the fountain.
Cover of Lucia di Lammermoor
Ricordi, Milano ca. 1880
(Private Collection).

25

Gaetano Donizetti Lucia
Lucia di Lammermoor At dead of night,
in the silent darkness,
Lucia a pallid ray of eerie moonlight
fell upon the fountain...
Regnava nel silenzio when a low moan
alta la notte e bruna, was heard on the breeze,
colpia la fonte un pallido and there on the verge
raggio di tetra luna, the spectre appeared to me, ah!
quando un sommesso gemito I saw her lips moving
fra l’aure udir si fe’ as if she were speaking,
ed ecco, su quel margine and with her lifeless hand
l’ombra mostrarsi a me, ah! she seemed to beckon me to her;
Qual chi favella, muoversi for a moment she stood motionless,
il labbro suo vedea, then suddenly vanished...
e con la mano esanime and the waters, so clear before,
chiamarmi a sé parea; reddened as with blood.
stette un momento immobile, He brings light to my days,
poi ratta dileguò... and solace to my suffering.
e l’onda pria sì limpida When, lost in ecstasy
di sangue rosseggiò. of ardent passion,
with the language of the heart,
Egli è luce a’ giorni miei, he swears eternal love,
e conforto al mio penar. I forget my sorrows
Quando rapito in estasi and joy dries my tears,
del più cocente amore, and it seems that when I am near him,
col favellar del core Heaven opens for me!
mi giura eterna fe’;
gli affanni miei dimentico,
gioia diviene il pianto...
parmi che a lui d’accanto
si schiuda il ciel per me!

Regnava nel silenzio have nothing of it.
In Regnava nel silenzio, Lucia tells her
In Lucia’s opening cavatina, she anxiously maid of her vision, initially in long,
awaits Edgardo at dusk near a fountain; it distended and regular vocal arcs; but as
was on this spot, years ago, that one of the nightmare gains in anguish, the
Edgardo’s ancestors killed the woman he narration in drama, Lucia’s song begins
loved in a fit of jealous rage. Lucia tells to break up and lose its symmetry,
her maid Alisa that she has seen the slain finishing in coloratura flourishes that
woman’s ghost, which stained the waters vividly evoke her hallucinatory state.
of the fountain red. Alisa pleads with
Lucia to give up her love for Edgardo, C. T.
harbinger of misfortune, but Lucia will

26

Lisette Oropesa Foto Crystal Green

Soprano. Born into a Cuban family in New Orleans, Lisette played the flute for ten years before
taking up voice at Louisiana State University. She debuted at the young age of 22 as Susanna in Le
nozze di Figaro at the Metropolitan Opera and went on to sing many roles there in more than one
hundred performances, including Gilda in Rigoletto, Manon in Massenet’s homonymous opera and
in Puccini’s Manon Lescaut, and Violetta in La traviata. She was Marguerite de Valois in Les
Huguenots at the Paris Opera and played title roles in Lucia di Lammermoor at the Royal Opera
House of London and at Teatro Real of Madrid, La traviata at the Arena of Verona and in Madrid
and Athens, and Rodelinda at the Liceu of Barcelona. She sang Gilda in Rigoletto at the Rome
Opera, the Grand Théâtre of Geneva, and the National Opera of Amsterdam, Konstanze in Die
Entführung aus dem Serail in Munich and Paris, Adina in L’Elisir d’amore in Paris, Isabelle in
Robert le diable at the Théâtre de La Monnaie in Brussels, Ophélie in Hamlet at the Lausanne
Opera and in Washington, and Norina in Don Pasquale at the Glyndebourne Festival in Pittsburgh.
She debuted on Piermarini’s stage in 2019 as Amalia in I masnadieri, directed by David McVicar
and reprised at the Savonlinna Festival. A much sought-after concert hall artist, she has sung under
conductors of the calibre of Riccardo Muti, Antonio Pappano, Daniele Gatti, Fabio Luisi, James
Levine, Ivor Bolton, and Yannick Nézet-Séguin. She was recently Rosina in Il barbiere di Siviglia
at the Paris Opera and debuted as Konstanze at the Vienna Staatsoper. She will soon don Violetta’s
garb once again in Barcelona, and in 2021 will make her debut at the Zürich Opera in a new pro-
duction of Lucia di Lammermoor.
lisetteoropesa.com

27

Giacomo Puccini collaboration with Illica and Giacosa. The
Madama Butterfly (1904) interaction between East and West
allowed Puccini to explore new
(Libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa) compositional territories and craft a
refined musical exoticism. However, at its
Cio-Cio-San, the protagonist of Madama premiere at La Scala on 17 February
Butterfly, is the first Puccini heroine 1904, Madama Butterfly was greeted with
hailing from outside the Western world. cold hostility. Puccini revised the opera,
The tragic consequences of the marriage restaging the new version on 28 May at
between this lovely Japanese musmé Teatro Grande in Brescia.
(young, unmarried woman) and the
Lieutenant in the United States Navy, R.P.
Pinkerton, as narrated in a short story by
John Luther Long and adapted to the
stage by David Belasco, are the subject of
the third and last opera Puccini wrote in

Cio-Cio-San Cio-Cio-San
Tu? Tu? Piccolo Iddio! You? You? You? Little idol of my heart.
Amore, amore mio, my love, my love,
fior di giglio e di rosa. flower of lily and rose.
Non saperlo mai: Never know that, for you,
per te, pei tuoi puri for your innocent eyes,
occhi, muor Butterfly Butterfly is about to die...
perché tu possa andar so that you may go away beyond the sea
di là dal mare without being subject to remorse
senza che ti rimorda ai dì maturi, in later years
il materno abbandono. for your mother’s desertion.
O a me, sceso dal trono Oh, you who have come down to me
dell’alto Paradiso, from high Heaven, look well, well
guarda ben fiso, fiso on your mother’s face,
di tua madre la faccia, that you may keep a faint memory of it,
che ten’ resti una traccia! look well! Little love, farewell!
Addio! Addio, piccolo amor! Farewell, my little love!
Va’! Gioca, gioca! Go and play.

Tu? Tu? Piccolo Iddio!

The aria tu? tu? Piccolo iddio! occupies staccato phrasings of the orchestra and
the central part of the highly calibrated launches into an extreme lyrical plaint (‘O
architecture of Cio-Cio-San’s ritual a me, sceso dal trono’ – ‘Oh you who have
suicide, which is momentarily interrupted come down to me’), where she asks
when her son, Sorrow, bursts into the Sorrow to remember his mother’s face.
room, the orchestra surging in transition. Then she bids him farewell, telling him to
The appearance of the young boy marks a go off and play, and resumes her solitary
passage from the austerity of the Oriental death ritual.
rite to the fervent love of the mother: Cio-
Cio-San embraces her child over the abrupt R P.

28

Kristine Opolais Foto Polina Viljun

Soprano. Born in Latvia, she studied at the Jāzeps Vītols Academy of Music in Riga and started
her career as a member of the Latvian National Opera Chorus in 2001. She made her debut at the
Staatsoper Unter den Linden in Berlin in 2006, followed by her debut at the Wiener Staatsoper in
2008. In the same year she debuted at La Scala as Polina in Prokof’ev’s The Gambler, returning to
Milan in 2011 as Nedda in Pagliacci. She maintains a strong relationship with the Metropolitan
Opera since her debut as Magda in La Rondine, and in the last years her appearances in La bo-
hème, Madama Butterfly, Manon Lescaut, Rusalka, have all been broadcast in cinemas worldwide
as part of the ‘Met’s Live in HD’ series. Famously, in 2014 she made history at the Met, with two
role debuts in 18 hours: she gave an outstanding performance as Butterfly, only to step in for a
matinee of La bohème the next day, which was live broadcast. She starred in Manon Lescaut,
Madama Butterfly and Tosca at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden and in Jenůfa at the Opern-
haus Zürich. She has a strong relationship with the Bayerische Staatsoper since her debut in Rusal-
ka in 2010; since then, she has sung in Munich Manon Lescaut, Madama Butterfly, Onegin (as Tat-
jana), Mefistofele (as Margherita) and La clemenza di Tito (as Vitellia). In the 2020-2021 season,
she returns to the Semperoper Dresden as Tosca following her role debut there last season. She re-
turns to the Greek National Opera in Athens for Madama Butterfly, and to Munich for her signa-
ture title role in Rusalka, which she reprises at the Wiener Staatsoper, too. Her concert and recital
appearances include performances at the Salzburg Festival, BBC Proms, Tanglewood Festival, and
Carnegie Hall, to name only a few.
kristineopolais.com

29

Sax Nicosia

Who is the hero? Who was the hero to the
people of ancient Athens? Who is a hero
today?
The modern hero lives in a world they are
unable to grasp. The world is an enigma.
Like Oedipus before the Sphinx, the word
itself has become a mystery.
For Faust, for Hamlet, for Othello, the world
is illusion, deception. It is pain. The dream
transforms into a nightmare, reality
transforms into elusive appearance.
The story of the modern hero is no longer
marked by a distant destiny, but by the
profound difficulty to understand the
world. Heroes carry with them their own
tragic end: life is around them, yet they do
not see, they do not understand, they think
they understand but do not.
They are alone.
‘Unhappy the land that needs heroes’, said
Brecht. But in this world of darkness, on
this day marked by pain and sickness, other
heroes stand forth. No longer defeated
titans, but people, men and women of our
time: heroes in a daily battle for life, who
fight to lift the veil of a fearsome night,
awaiting the light of dawn.

30

THE HERO

Richard Wagner the domineering Hunding. However,
Die Walküre (1870) hospitality is sacred, and Siegmund is
allowed to spend the night; but, on the
(Libretto by Richard Wagner) morn he must duel Hunding. The host’s
wife, moved by an overpowering
After the sort of heavenly prologue of Das attraction to the stranger, drugs the man
Rheingold, where we meet dwarves, giants, she was forced to marry and goes that
sprites, undines, and divinities, with Die night to the sleepless, despairing, and
Walküre, Richard Wagner brings us back to unarmed Siegmund to show him a sword
earth, projecting us into the long saga of buried to its hilt in the massive ash tree
the tetralogy of his Ring, the story of how that towers in the room.
the ring of the Nibelung brought ruination
to the entire cosmos. Act I opens with a E. F.
tempest and ends with a love duet: two
classic moments in opera, but here given
wholly novel twists. The tempest has
driven the escaping Siegmund to take
refuge in a house; unfortunately, it is
fatefully inhabited by one of his pursuers,

Joseph Bernhardt. Portrait
of Richard Wagner, 1868;
from Martin Geck,
Die Bildnisse Richard Wagners,
Munich, 1970.

31

Winterstürme wichen
dem Wonnemond

In this duet Siegmund and Sieglinde
confess their love for each other. Because
of its relatively traditional form, the duet
would scandalize the ‘Wagnerian
purists’, who saw it as a concession to
outdated melodrama; however, it enticed
Italian audiences to overcome their
prejudices and warm to an opera that
would remain one of the favourites in the
repertoire. The two (actually long
separated brother and sister) have been
talking for some time as outside the
storms begins to abate. A final gust of
wind throws open the door to the house
startling Sieglinde: ‘Who goes? Who
comes?’ she cries. ‘No one went,’ replies
Siegmund sweetly, ‘but one has come in,
springtime is laughing in the hall.’ Thus
begins a memorable passage somewhere
between a Lied, a duet, and an endless
melody, carried aloft by murmuring
strings that evoke spring breezes, all
nurtured by an inspiration halfway
between ecstasy and passion, in an
interweave of past memories and current
passions. At the end of the duet,
Siegmund, full of hope, seizes the sword
and pulls it out of the tree, thus gaining
blade and bride in a conclusion as
thrilling as it is illusory.

E. F.

Heinrich and Therese Vogl as Siegmund
and Sieglinde in the first act of Die Walküre.
(Munich, Hoftheater, 26 June 1870.

32

Richard Wagner Winter storms have waned
Die Walküre in the moon of May,
Siegmund, Sieglinde with tender radiance
sparkles the spring;
Winterstürme wichen on balmy breezes,
dem Wonnemond, light and lovely,
in mildem Lichte weaving wonders,
leuchtet der Lenz; on she floats;
auf linden Lüften o’er wood and meadow
leicht und lieblich, wafts her breathing,
Wunder webend widely open
er sich wiegt; laughs her eye.
durch Wald und Auen In blithesome song of birds
weht sein Atem, resounds her voice,
weit geöffnet sweetest fragrance
lacht sein Aug’. breathes she forth:
Aus sel’ger Vöglein Sange from her ardent blood
süß er tönt, bloom out joyful blossoms,
holde Düfte bud and shoot
haucht er aus; spring up by her might.
seinem warmen Blut entblühen With gentle weapons’ charm
wonnige Blumen, she forces the world;
Keim und Sproß winter and storm yield
entspringt seiner Kraft. to her strong attack:
Mit zarter Waffen Zier assailed by her hardy strokes now
bezwingt er die Welt; the doors are shattered that,
Winter und Sturm wichen fast and defiant, once
der starken Wehr: held us parted from her.
wohl mußte den tapfern Streichen To clasp her brother
die strenge Türe auch weichen, hither she flew;
die trotzig und starr ’twas love that lured the spring:
uns trennte von ihm. within our bosoms
Zu seiner Schwester deeply he hid;
schwang er sich her; now gladly he laughs to the light.
die Liebe lockte den Lenz; The brother is freed
in unsrem Busen by his bride and sister;
barg sie sich tief: in ruin lies
nun lacht sie selig dem Licht. what held them apart;
Die bräutliche Schwester joyfully greet now
befreite der Bruder; the loving pair:
zertrümmert liegt, made one are love and spring!
was je sie getrennt;
jauchzend grüßt sich
das junge Paar:
vereint sind Liebe und Lenz!

33

Sieglinde Sieglinde
Du bist der Lenz, Thou art the spring
nach dem ich verlangte that I have so longed for
in frostigen Winters Frist; in frosty winter’s spell.
dich grüßte mein Herz My heart greeted thee
mit heiligem Grau’n, with blissfullest dread,
als dein Blick zuerst mir erblühte. as thy look at first on me lightened.
Fremdes nur sah ich von je, Strange has seemed all I e’er saw,
freudlos war mir das Nahe; friendless all that was round me;
als hätt’ ich nie es gekannt, ike far off things and unknown,
war, was immer mir kam. all that ever came near.
Doch dich kannt’ ich When thou camest
deutlich und klar: all was made clear:
als mein Auge dich sah, as my eyes on thee fell,
warst du mein Eigen; mine wert thou only:
was im Busen ich barg, all I hid in my heart,
was ich bin, all I am,
hell wie der Tag bright as the day
taucht’ es mir auf, dawned on my sight,
wie tönender Schall like echoing tones
schlug’s an mein Ohr, struck on my ear,
als in frostig öder Fremde as in winter’s frosty desert
zuerst ich den Freund ersah. my eyes first beheld the friend.
Siegmund
O süßeste Wonne! Siegmund
O seligstes Weib! O sweetest enchantment!
Sieglinde Woman most blest!
O laß in Nähe
zu dir mich neigen, Sieglinde
daß hell ich schaue O let me closer
den hehren Schein, to thee still press me
der dir aus Aug’ and see more clearly
und Antlitz bricht, the holy light
und so süß die Sinne mir zwingt! that forth from eyes
Siegmund and face doth break
Im Lenzesmond and so sweetly sways all my sense.
leuchtest du hell;
hehr umwebt dich Siegmund
das Wellenhaar; Beneath spring’s moon
was mich berückt, shinest thou bright;
errat’ ich nun leicht, wrapped in glory
denn wonnig weidet mein Blick. of waving hair:
what has ensnared me
now well I know
in rapture feasteth my look.

34

Sieglinde Sieglinde
Wie dir die Stirn How broadly shines
so offen steht, thy open brow,
der Adern Geäst the wandering veins
in den Schläfen sich schlingt! in thy temples entwine!
Mir zagt es vor der Wonne, I tremble with the rapture
die mich entzückt! of my delight!
Ein Wunder will mich gemahnen: A marvel wakes my remembrance:
den heut’ zuerst ich erschaut, my eyes beheld thee of old
mein Auge sah dich schon! whom first I saw today!

Siegmund Siegmund
Ein Minnetraum A love-dream wakes
gemahnt auch mich: in me the thought:
in heißem Sehnen in fiery longing
sah ich dich schon! cam’st thou to me!

Sieglinde Sieglinde
Im Bach erblickt’ ich The stream has shewn me
mein eigen Bild my pictured face,
und jetzt gewahr’ ich es wieder: and now again I behold it:
wie einst dem Teich es enttaucht, as from the water it rose,
bietest mein Bild mir nun du! show’st thou my image anew!

Siegmund Siegmund
Du bist das Bild, Thou art the image
das ich in mir barg. I held in my heart.

Sieglinde Sieglinde
O still! Laß mich O hush! Again
der Stimme lauschen: the voice is sounding:
mich dünkt, ihren Klang I heard it, methinks,
hört’ ich als Kind... once as a child...
doch nein! Ich hörte sie neulich, but no! Of late I have heard it,
als meiner Stimme Schall yes, when the echo’s sound
mir widerhallte der Wald. gave back my voice in the woods.

Siegmund Siegmund
O lieblichste Laute, O loveliest song
denen ich lausche! that sounds as I listen!

Sieglinde Sieglinde
Deines Auges Glut Thine eyes’ bright glow
erglänzte mir schon: erewhile on me shone:
so blickte der Greis the stranger so glanced,
grüßend auf mich, greeting the wife,
als der Traurigen Trost er gab. as he soothed with his look her grief.

35

An dem kühnen Blick By his glance then
erkannt’ ihn sein Kind; knew him his child;
schon wollt’ ich beim Namen ihn nennen! almost by his name did I call him!
Wehwalt heißt du fürwahr? Wehwalt art thou in truth?
Siegmund Siegmund
Nicht heiß’ ich so, Ne’er call me so,
seit du mich liebst: since thou art mine:
nun walt’ ich der hehrsten Wonnen! now won is the highest rapture!
Sieglinde Sieglinde
Und Friedmund darfst du And Friedmund may’st thou
froh dich nicht nennen? gladly not name thee?
Siegmund Siegmund
Nenne Heiße mich du, Call me, thyself,
wie du liebst, daß ich heiße: as thou wouldst I were called:
den Namen nehm’ ich von dir! my name I take but from thee!
Sieglinde Sieglinde
Doch nanntest du Wolfe den Vater? Yet calledst thou Wolfe thy father?
Siegmund Siegmund
Ein Wolf war er feigen Füchsen! Wolf was he to fearful foxes!
Doch dem so stolz But he whose eye
strahlte das Auge, proudly did glisten,
wie, Herrliche, hehr dir es strahlt, as, fairest one, glistens thine own, of old,
der war Wälse genannt. Wälse was named.
Sieglinde Sieglinde
War Wälse dein Vater, Was Wälse thy father,
und bist du ein Wälsung, and art thou a Wälsung?
stieß er für dich Struck was for thee
sein Schwert in den Stamm, the sword in the stem,
so laß mich dich heißen, so let me now name thee
wie ich dich liebe: as I have loved thee:
Siegmund, Siegmund,
so nenn’ ich dich! so name I thee!
Siegmund Siegmund
Siegmund heiß’ ich Siegmund call me
und Siegmund bin ich: for Siegmund am I!
bezeug’ es dies Schwert, Be witness this sword
das zaglos ich halte! I hold now undaunted!
Wälse verhieß mir, Wälse foretold me
in höchster Not in sorest need
fänd’ ich es einst: this should I find:
ich faß’ es nun! I grasp it now!

36

Heiligster Minne Holiest love’s
höchste Not, most highest need,
sehnender Liebe love-longing’s
sehrende Not, piercing passionate need,
brennt mir hell in der Brust, burning bright in my breast,
drängt zu Tat und Tod: drives to deeds and death:
Notung! Notung! Nothung! Nothung!
So nenn’ ich dich, Schwert! So name I thee, sword!
Notung! Notung! Nothung! Nothung!
Neidlicher Stahl! Conquering steel!
Zeig’ deiner Schärfe Shew now thy biting,
schneidenden Zahn: severing blade!
heraus aus der Scheide zu mir! Come forth from thy scabbard to me!
Siegmund, den Wälsung, Siegmund, the Wälsung,
siehst du, Weib! seest thou here!
Als Brautgabe As bride-gift
bringt er dies Schwert: he brings thee this sword;
so freit er sich so wins for him
die seligste Frau; the woman most blest;
dem Feindeshaus from foe-man’s house
entführt er dich so. thus bears her away.
Fern von hier Far from here
folge mir nun, follow me now
fort in des Lenzes forth to the laughing
lachendes Haus: house of spring:
dort schützt dich Notung, das Schwert, there guards thee Nothung the sword,
wenn Siegmund dir liebend erlag! when Siegmund lies captive to love!
Sieglinde
Bist du Siegmund, Sieglinde
den ich hier sehe, Art thou Siegmund,
Sieglinde bin ich, standing before me?
die dich ersehnt: Sieglinde am I,
die eigne Schwester who for thee longed:
gewannst du zu eins mit dem Schwert! thine own twin sister thou winnest at once
Siegmund with the sword!
Braut und Schwester
bist du dem Bruder: Siegmund
so blühe denn Wälsungen-Blut! Bride and sister
be to thy brother:
then flourish the Wälsungs for aye!

37

Camilla nylund

Soprano. Born in Vaasa, Finland, Camilla began her musical studies with Eva Illes and continued
in the voice and opera programme at the Mozarteum in Salzburg. In December 1995 she won the
Lilli Lehmann Medal from the Mozarteum International Foundation. After a series of roles in Han-
nover and at the Semperoper of Dresden, she is now regularly invited to perform in the world’s
preeminent opera houses. Her repertoire spans all the major roles of classical-romantic opera, but
her international fame is based particularly on her interpretation of Wagnerian heroines (Elisabeth
in Tannhäuser, Elsa in Lohengrin, Eva in Die Meistersinger, Sieglinde in Die Walküre, Senta in
Der fliegende Holländer) and those of Richard Strauss (the Marschallin in Der Rosenkavalier, the
title roles in Arabella and Salome, the Countess in Capriccio, Chrysothemis in Elektra, the Em-
press in Die Frau ohne Schatten, and Ariadne in Ariadne auf Naxos). She has been a distinguished
performer at the Bayreuth Festival for many years, debuting in 2011 as Elisabeth in Tannhäuser,
and currently singing in Lohengrin and Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. In 2017, at the Deutsche
Oper am Rhein in Düsseldorf, she added Marie in Wozzeck to her repertoire. Particularly active on
the recital circuit, with Helmut Deutsch she currently focuses on German romantic Lieder and
composers from her homeland, particularly Jean Sibelius. She will soon sing the title role in
Janáček’s Jenůfa in Berlin. In recognition of her long and acclaimed artistic work with the Vienna
Staatsoper, in 2019 the theatre named her ‘Kammersängerin’; this prestigious title was also con-
ferred upon her by the Semperoper of Dresden.
camillanylund.com

38

Andreas Schager Foto David Jerusalem

Tenor. After graduating from the Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst in Vienna, Andreas
began his career singing lyrical roles in operettas and Mozart operas before moving to heroic tenor
parts in works by Wagner and Richard Strauss. In the summer of 2009 he debuted as David in the
Meistersinger von Nürnberg at the Tiroler Festspiele Erl. He was then Florestan in Fidelio, Max in
Freischütz, the title roles in Rienzi and Tristan, and Siegfried in Siegfried and in Götterdämmerung
in mid-sized theatres. It was his interpretation of Siegfried at the Staatsoper Unter den Linden in
Berlin, at the BBC Proms, and at La Scala, with Barenboim on the podium in each case, to launch
his international career. He is now a regular performer in the most prestigious venues under world-
renowned conductors, including Christian Thielemann, Valery Gergiev, Daniele Gatti, Franz
Welser-Möst, and Riccardo Chailly. Under Barenboim he has sung in Fidelio, Tristan und Isolde,
and Parsifal. His CV also lists Tannhäuser in Berlin; Daphne, Lohengrin, and Der Freischütz in
Vienna; Parsifal and Tristan at the Opéra Bastille, Der Ring des Nibelungen with Kent Nagano in
Hamburg and with Philippe Jordan at the Metropolitan in New York, as well as Parsifal at the
Bayreuth Festival. He debuted at La Scala in Götterdämmerung in 2013, returning in 2019 in Die
ägyptische Helena. Highly in demand in concert halls, he sang Schönberg’s Gurrelieder at the
Paris Philharmonie, Das Lied von der Erde with Gergiev at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg and
Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 with Chailly in Lucerne. His recent and upcoming engagements include
Daphne in Frankfurt, Die Frau ohne Schatten and Die Zauberflöte in Vienna, Fidelio in Zürich
and Berlin, Siegfried in Madrid, and Ariadne auf Naxos in Berlin.

39

Massimo Popolizio
They eyed each other, they played with
and chased one another, they drew
reciprocal inspiration. Cinema and Opera
are two neighbouring but distant worlds.
Contemporary Opera has stolen much from
Cinema and Cinema has stolen from Opera:
soundtracks, hybrid themes, repertoire,
drama. And if Opera has taught the world
how to do theatre, Italian Cinema has
woven unforgettable dreams.
Federico Fellini has thrilled us, amazed us,
moved us with his unforgettable characters.
Opera and Cinema: places where every
spectator can suspend their incredulity
and surrender to wonder.

40

THE OPERA, THE CINEMA

Gaetano Donizetti with characters who are anything but
Don Pasquale (1843) stylized. By rescuing them from the
traditional emotional indifference of comic
(Libretto by Giovanni Ruffini and Gaetano Donizetti) opera and imbuing them with real
sentiments, Donizetti presents his
An old miser who has caught the itch of characters in all their ardent humanity. In
love and would like to marry a much other words, he reinvents a genre that was
younger woman; the young woman who nearing the end of its long tradition,
tricks him and schemes with her young breathing new vitality into the threadbare
swain; an entourage of connivers seeking mechanisms of comic theatre.
some advantage in it all: these are classic
ingredients of a story endlessly depicted C.T.
in comic theatre. While seemingly built
on a hackneyed set of circumstances,
Donizetti’s opera is his own personal take
on the comic style. Although he employs
a well-worn model, the composer
modifies it in Don Pasquale to tell a story

The story of Don Pasquale in a barber’s calendar, 1936.

41

Gaetano Donizetti so anch’io come si bruciano per inspirare amor,
Don Pasquale i cori a lento foco; conosco l’effetto,
d’un breve sorrisetto ah! Sì, ah sì,
norina conosco anch’io l’effetto, per inspirare amor.
“Quel guardo il cavaliere di menzognera lagrima, Ho testa bizzarra,
in mezzo al cor trafisse, d’un subito languor. son pronta, vivace,
piegò il ginocchio e disse: Conosco i mille modi brillare mi piace,
Son vostro cavalier. dell’amorose frodi, mi piace scherzar.
E tanto era in quel guardo i vezzi e l’arti facili Se monto in furore,
sapor di paradiso, per adescare un cor. di rado sto al segno,
che il cavalier Riccardo, D’un breve sorrisetto ma in riso lo sdegno
tutto d’amor conquiso, conosco anch’io l’effetto, fo presto a cangiar.
giurò che ad altra mai conosco, conosco, Ho testa bizzarra,
non volgeria il pensier.” d’un subito languor; ma core eccellente,
Ah, ah! Ah, ah! so anch’io la virtù magica un core eccellente.
So anch’io la virtù magica
d’un guardo a tempo e loco,

norina Ha, ha! Ha, ha! or suddenly to sigh.
“With just one glance she I too have seen how magical Yes, I have learnt the secret
pierced him, a timely little glance is. of inspiring hopeless love.
right to his inmost being; I too have seen how passionate Ah! Yes, the secret of inspiring
kneeling before her and a smouldering romance is; love!
weeping, I know just how to please them, I’m full of adventure,
‘I am your champion’, he said. exactly when to tease them, I’m clever and pretty,
That glance, so laden with to wipe away a furtive tear I like to be witty,
promise, so full of heav’nly or suddenly to sigh. to laugh and to play.
sweetness, conquered the brave For men have no conception If I lose my temper
Sir Richard with such profound of amorous deception; it’s never long lasting:
completeness, you only need to smile at them: you’ll soon find me laughing
he swore that he would never they’re yours until they die. my troubles away.
think of another fair maid.” I know just how to please them, I’m full of adventure,
exactly when to tease them, but really kind-hearted.

So anch’io la virtù magica she too knows the feminine wiles and the
art of seduction. And suddenly we are
In her opening cavatina, Norina is on confronted by a moment of masterful
stage reading a book. It is a love story set representational realism: her voice
in ancient times, telling of a knight changes, becoming more spirited,
bedazzled by a lady to whom he swears revealing all her mischievousness and
eternal love. But Norina’s lyrical youthful vivacity.
dreaminess in retelling the story does not
last long: the young widow quickly offers C. T.
a more realistic self-portrait. In So
anch’io la virtù magica, she declares that

42

Rosa Feola Foto Todd Rosenberg

Soprano. Born in San Nicola La Strada (Caserta), Rosa earned her diploma at the Giuseppe Mar-
tucci Conservatory of Salerno, going on to refine her talents at the Opera Studio of the Santa Ce-
cilia Academy under Renata Scotto. In 2009 she debuted as Corinna in Il viaggio a Reims at the
Santa Cecilia National Academy and gained international attention the following year by winning
the Operalia Plácido Domingo Competition at La Scala. She sang Ines in Mercadante’s I due Fi-
garo, conducted by Muti at the Ravenna and Salzburg Festivals, at Teatro Real of Madrid and
Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, and Gilda in Rigoletto in Ravenna, Zürich, Turin, Munich, Naples,
Chicago, and New York. Her Elvira in I puritani won her the Welsh Theatre Award and nomination
for the International Opera Award 2016. In 2017 she debuted at La Scala in La gazza ladra under
the baton of Chailly, returning in 2018 for Don Pasquale, in 2019 for L’elisir d’amore, and in 2020
for Il turco in Italia. She was Susanna for the restaging of the historical production of Le nozze di
Figaro by Giorgio Strehler in Rome and that of Jean-Pierre Ponnelle in Yokohama. Muti was on
the podium for her American debut in 2012 in Carmine Burana in Chicago. Again with the Chica-
go Symphony Orchestra and Muti she sang in Schubert’s Messa n. 5, Mozart’s Requiem, Mahler’s
Fourth Symphony, and Falstaff. She was recently Lauretta in Gianni Schicchi, Musetta in La bo-
hème and Gilda in Rigoletto in Munich, Dircé in Médée by Cherubini in Salzburg, Ilia in Idomeneo
in Rome, Sandrina in La finta giardiniera and Fiorilla in Il turco in Italia in Zürich. Her upcoming
engagements include L’elisir d’amore and Don Pasquale in Vienna, and La traviata and Le nozze
di Figaro in Munich.

43

Gaetano Donizetti nemorino
L’elisir d’amore (1832) Una furtiva lagrima
negli occhi suoi spuntò...
(Libretto by Felice Romani) Quelle festose giovani
invidiar sembrò.
With L’elisir d’amore Donizetti takes Che più cercando io vo?
up the challenge of a new genre, M’ama, sì, m’ama, lo vedo.
carving a path to the revitalization of Un solo istante i palpiti
comic opera, which at the time was del suo bel cor sentir!
beginning to show its obsolescence. He I miei sospir confondere
broke with convention in emotional per poco a’ suoi sospir!
portrayal and brought the genre out of I palpiti, i palpiti sentir,
the mire of improbability plaguing confondere i miei coi suoi sospir!
traditional comic theatre and into much Cielo, si può morir...!
more realistic stories and characters. Di più non chiedo.
Ah! Cielo, si può, si può morir...!
C. T. Di più non chiedo.
Si può morir... si può morir d’amor!
Una furtiva lagrima
nemorino
Nemorino espies ‘a furtive tear’ in the eye A single furtive tear
of lovely Adina and realizes that the from her eyes sprang:
young lady is not as indifferent to him as of those gay young girls
she might seem. Lost in his dream of love, envious she seemed to be.
he sings a romance of ineffable sweetness. What more need I look for?
una furtiva lagrima is the most famous She loves me! Yes, she loves me, I see it,
aria from L’elisir d’amore. With its subtle
and penetrating melancholic vein – [I see it!
perhaps the most characteristic trait in Could I but feel for an instant
Donizetti’s style – it has always moved the beating of her lovely heart!
audiences in theatres all over the world. Could my own sighs become as one
Its melodic denouement arouses empathy, fleetingly with her sighs!
making us see Nemorino not as an Heavens, I could die!
abstraction – the traditional simpleton of I can’t ask for more.
comic opera expressing stylized Ah! Heavens, I could die, yes I could!
emotions – but as a human being I can’t ask for more.
expressing real pathos. We thus move Ah! Heavens, I could die... yes, die of love.
away from the mannered slush and
emoted sighs of opera buffa tenors: in his
romance, Nemorino gives voice to
authentic tenderness, beautifully
emphasized by the soulful timbre of the
bassoon, and to a sentiment emerging
directly from the heart. The novel signs
of romantic melodrama are more than
evident here.

C. T.

44

Juan Diego Flórez Foto Manfred Baumann

Tenor. Born in Lima in 1973, Juan Diego sang and played rock and Peruvian popular music when he
was a boy, later going on to study at Peru’s National Conservatory of Music, soon winning a scholar-
ship to the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. In 1996 he debuted at the Rossini Opera Festival
in Pesaro as Corradino in Matilde di Shabran. He was only 23 when he debuted at La Scala in
Armide, conducted by Riccardo Muti to premiere the 1996-1997 opera season. Since then he has
been invited to the world’s most prestigious theatres to work with conductors of the highest calibre.
In 2007 he made history at La Scala by performing an encore – breaking a taboo dating to 1933 – of
‘Ah! Mes amis’, the famous aria from Donizett’s Fille du régiment with no fewer than nine chest-
voice high Cs. The audience implored him to repeat the feat the following year at the Metropolitan in
New York and at the Paris Opera in 2012. He recently sang in La traviata at the Metropolitan, Manon
in Paris and Vienna, Werther in London, La bohème in Zürich and held recitals at the Rossini Opera
Festival in Pesaro, the Salzburg Festival, and the Liceu of Barcelona. His upcoming engagements in-
clude L’elisir d’amore, Faust, and Les contes d’Hoffmann at the Vienna Staatsoper.
He has won numerous accolades and awards, including the title of Österreichischer Kammersänger
and his native country’s highest honour: the Order of the Sun. In 2011 he founded the ‘Sinfonía
por el Perú’, an important social project inspired by ‘El Sistema’ of Venezuela to promote the per-
sonal and artistic development of young children and adolescents through music; in 2012, UN-
ESCO named him Goodwill Ambassador for this initiative. In 2014 he received the Crystal Award
from the World Economic Forum.
www.juandiegoflorez.com – www.sinfoniaporelperu.org

45

Caterina Murino
I put on clothes, a mask, and invent
myself – and it is only by inventing
myself that I recognize myself. I hide
before the mirror, peering into the
dizzying depths of my self: I seek within
me the rage of Medea; I don the desire
in the eyes of Desdemona; I clad myself
in Joan’s war, Tosca’s brave love,
Violetta’s despairing solitude, and her
breathing; Rosina’s anxious wait during
the storm. By covering myself with her
fear I understand her and comprehend
myself.
I slip into lies that know they might be
true. I feel authentic in falsehood,
a life that is not mine, but could be.
It is only in this attempt that I confront
myself, in becoming that I am
finally me.

46

the nutcracker THE DREAM FACTORY

Adagio from the Grand pas de deux, Clara’s flight on princely
Act II shoulders
Coreografy by Rudolf nureyev
Music by Pëtr il’ič Čajkovskij The harmonious grace that pervades the
Costumes by nicholas Georgiadis entire score of The Nutcracker – the
quintessential Christmas ballet – is part of
the reason it has become a stable fixture in
the symphonic repertory as well, together
with its elusive aspects, its hidden magic,
the enchantment of white snow covering
everything in muffled softness, but also the
chill of disquiet. The poetic world of The
Nutcracker by Pyotr Ilych Tchaikovsky
lies at the divide between nostalgia for
childhood coming to an end and the
uncertainty of adolescent happiness that is
but a vague promise. All of this is captured
in the pas de deux from the Act II of the
ballet, entrusted on this special evening of
7 December 2020 to Nicoletta Manni and
Timofej Andrijashenko, two exquisite
Principal Dancers of Teatro alla Scala.
Among the many new versions of classics
in the repertoire of Rudolf Nureyev, a
choreographer sui generis, his Nutcracker
stands out for its deep evocation of the
ambiguity of the music, its lost sincerity,
emphasizing the paradoxical nearness of
the child’s world to the memory of the
adult’s. Nureyev debuted his two-act,
three-scene ballet in 1967; it would be
staged by the La Scala Ballet two years
later. It was immediately clear how and
why he succeeded in giving us an evolved
version of Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov’s
masterpiece of music and dance – first
performed at the Mariinsky Theatre in St.
Petersburg on 17 or 18 December 1892
(some sources say the 5th) – but one that
still breathes the air of tradition. The
psychological-introspective and/or
sociological reinterpretation of the fairy
tales on which many ballet classics are
based always intrigued the consummate
dancer in his role as choreographer,
perhaps achieving its most complete and
successful result in The Nutcracker.
Conceiving it as the dreamlike journey of

47

initiation of a young girl (Clara) soon to Plum Fairy, whom she will finally come to
enter adolescence and pairing her with a incarnate in a sumptuous glittering tutu.
Prince who is the same mysterious Drosselmeyer, lame in Act I although not
character (Drosselmeyer) that gifted her a exactly elderly, rejuvenates in the dream.
victorious nutcracker/soldier gives us two He becomes the Prince, yet with some
pairs of characters on stage, specular and recollection of maturity and experience
opposite, that move on two parallel that gives him the air of a magical helper
tracks – and take care with this word who drives off the girlchild’s subconscious
‘parallel’, because it will be necessary to phantoms and fears in the tumultuous
decode the dance of Clara and her prince, passage from childhood to adolescence. He
that is, the movements that they make in thus has little in common with the princes
unison in their pas de deux. In her dream of other ballets in the repertoire.
Clara becomes an adolescent, that is, she Those who think that all pas de deux in the
begins to ‘age’ and resemble the Sugar classic ballet repertory are similar will
learn something new here. Even though
Foto Piccagliani Manni and Andrijashenko are not
immersed in the full ballet (with its three
waltzes and three pas de deux), they
clearly occupy its true magical and poetic
core, following the Waltz of the flowers
and preceding the Final waltz and
Apotheosis. Their initial poised arabesques
and the perfect interplay of their parallel
yet well separated lines (social distancing
here too) are accentuated by the andante
maestoso tempo. But as we stated above,
here the parallel lines have a reason for
existing. The pas de deux – or better,
grand pas de deux –, of which we only see
the initial part (the Adagio, without the
Variations or the Coda), is a particular and
demonstrative encounter, not a true love
tryst between equals. The lifts and catches
end in spectacular poses, such as the fish
or he in an arabesque supporting her on a
shoulder and one arm as if she were a
butterfly that had alighted: or an
adolescent ready to take wing from the
shoulders of her Prince-tutor.

M.G.

Carla Fracci and Rudolf Nureyev in The Nutcracker
at the Teatro alla Scala, Sason 1970-71.

48

nicoletta Manni timofej Andrijashenko

Born in the province of Lecce, Nicoletta was admit- A native of Riga, Latvia, Timofej studied at the State
ted to the La Scala Academy Ballet School at the age Academy in his hometown. After winning a scholar-
of 13. After graduating, she joined the Staatsballett of ship at the City of Spoleto International Dance Com-
Berlin (2009), working with them for three seasons. petition, he enrolled in 2009 in the Russian Ballet
In 2013 she became a member of the La Scala Corps College of Genoa, directed by Irina Kashkova, grad-
de Ballet and in April 2014 she was elevated to Prin- uating in 2013. He has won numerous awards, in-
cipal Dancer. Her repertoire includes leading roles in cluding the Gold Medal at the 12th International
numerous productions, including Swan Lake, Don Dance Competition in Moscow. In 2014 he was hired
Quixote, and The Sleeping Beauty by Nureyev; Jew- as an xtra dancer in the Corps de Ballet of the Rome
els (Diamonds and Rubies), Symphony in C, A Mid- Opera, nevertheless dancing principal and soloist
summer Night’s Dream, and Apollon Musagète by roles. In November 2014, he joined the La Scala
Balanchine; Russian Seasons, Concerto DSCH, The Corps de Ballet, where he danced leading roles in
Sleeping Beauty, and Swan Lake by Ratmansky; Pink Cello Suites and Goldberg Variations by Heinz Spo-
Floyd Ballet by Petit; Romeo and Juliet and Manon erli, The Sleeping Beauty and Swan Lake by Ratman-
by MacMillan; Cello Suites and Goldberg Variations sky, Romeo and Juliet by MacMillan, Giselle, Excel-
by Heinz Spoerli; Cinderella and Progetto Han̈ del by sior, Symphony in C, A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Bigonzetti; Onegin by Cranko; The Lady of the and The Nutcracker by Balanchine, Shéhérazade by
Camellias by John Neumeier; Giselle by Yvette Eugenio Scigliano, Onegin by Cranko, The Lady of
Chauviré; The Nutcracker by Nacho Duato; Excel- the Camellias by Neumeier, and Petite Mort by Jiří
sior, Petruška, and Le Corsaire by Anna-Marie Kylián. In April 2018 he was named Primo ballerino
Holmes; Petite Mort by Jiří Kylián; Woolf Works by at La Scala. He has danced in Le Corsaire by Anna-
Wayne McGregor (Becomings); Sylvia by Manuel Marie Holmes, Serata Nureyev, Don Quixote, Woolf
Legris; and Sarcasmen by Hans van Manen. Works by McGregor (I now, I then, and Becomings),
She danced at the Bolshoi as the only female Italian and The Sleeping Beauty by Nureyev. He also head-
contestant (and nominee) in Benois de la Danse lined MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet as guest artist of
2015. She has danced in numerous galas and theatres the Royal Ballet.
all over the world and has been a member of Roberto He won the Danza&Danza Prize as Performer of the
Bolle & Friends since 2014. In September 2020 she Year in the 2016 season. In September 2020 he was
was among the winners of the 48th edition of Posi- among the winners of the 48th edition of the Positano
tano Premia la Danza – Léonide Massine. Premia la Danza – Léonide Massine.

Foto Brescia/Amisano
Foto Brescia/Amisano

49

Laura Marinoni
I saw him, I blushed; I paled at the sight.
Pain swelled in my troubled heart outright.
My eyes saw nothing; I couldn’t speak for pain.
I felt my whole body frozen, and in flame.
Racine, Phèdre, 1677

50

Giacomo Puccini LOVE AND OBSESSION
turandot (1926) theatre fable by Carlo Gozzi (rewritten
by Schiller and Maffei). Unfortunately,
(Libretto by Giuseppe Adami and Renato Simoni) Puccini died before he was able to
complete the final duet. The opera
Set ‘in Peking in the age of fables’, received its baptism on 25 April 1926 at
Turandot manifests Puccini’s interest in the La Scala in the hands of the conductor
early twentieth-century theatre of masks chosen by Puccini, Arturo Toscanini.
and disguises (on stage and in music) that
had already produced such masterpieces as R. P.
Ariadne auf Naxos by Hofmannsthal and
Strauss. The librettists Giuseppe Adami and
Renato Simoni got the story of the ardent
Prince Calàf and the ‘princess of ice’
Turandot from the eighteenth-century

Giacomo Puccini
around 1920.

51

Giacomo Puccini Liù
Turandot My lord, listen, ah, listen!
Liù Liù can bear it no more!
Signore, ascolta! Ah, signore, ascolta! My heart is breaking!
Liù non regge più! Alas, how long have I travelled
Si spezza il cuor! with your name in my soul,
Ahimè, quanto cammino your name on my lips!
col tuo nome nell’anima, But if your Fate
col nome tuo sulle labbra! is decided tomorrow
Ma se il tuo destino, we’ll die on the road to exile!
doman, sarà deciso, He will lose his son...
noi morrem sulla strada dell’esilio! And I... the shadow of a smile!
Ei perderà suo figlio... Liù can bear it no more!
io l’ombra d’un sorriso! Ah, have pity!
Liù non regge più!
Ah, pietà! Signore, ascolta

Maria Zamboni, the first Liù Signore, ascolta!, the first brief aria of the
(Milan, Museo Teatrale alla Scala). slave Liù, which opens the vast finale of
Turandot’s Act I, is triggered by Calaf’s
decision to risk his life in the test of
enigmas in order to conquer the ‘divine
beauty’ of the princess. His father Timur
and the three ministers Ping, Pong and
Pang plead with him to no avail: when it
appears that no ‘human voice’ can bring the
prince back to reason, Liù comes forward,
and ‘pleading, weeping’ begs him not to
abandon Timur and herself, revealing to
Calaf how she has never forgotten his
smile. The soft song of the slave girl in
love caresses the notes of the black keys of
the piano, tracing a melody with a delicate
exotic hue, which reaches its climax at the
end (‘Liù can bear it no more! Ah, have
pity!’) on the precious harmonies of the
strings interspersed by the glissandos of the
harp, just before the woman collapses to
the ground sobbing.

R.P.

52

Aleksandra Kurzak Foto Gregor Hohenberg

Soprano. Born in Brzeg Dolny, Poland. After earning her diploma in violin, Aleksandra studied
voice at the Karol Lipínski Academy in Wroclaw, honing her skills later at the Hochschule für
Musik und Theater in Hamburg. She was twenty-one when she debuted at the Wroclaw Opera as
Susanna in Le nozze di Figaro: her mother, and first teacher, Jolanta Żmurko was also on stage in
the role of the Contessa. Between 2001 and 2007 she sang with Opernstudio and then in the en-
semble of the Hamburg Staatsoper. Notable roles include Marzelline (Fidelio), Nannetta (Fal-
staff), Ännchen (Der Freischütz), Gretel (Hänsel und Gretel), Musetta (La bohème), Adele (Le
Comte Ory), Marie (La fille du régiment), and many Mozart heroines. She recently returned to
Hamburg as Desdemona in Otello. In 2004 she debuted as Olympia in Contes d’Hoffmann at the
Metropolitan Opera, returning there to sing Adina (L’elisir d’amore), Nedda (Pagliacci), and Mi-
caela (Carmen). She also debuted in 2004 as Aspasia in Mitridate, re di Ponto at Covent Garden,
where she would later sing Norina (Don Pasquale), Matilde (Matilde di Shabran), Fiorilla (Il tur-
co in Italia), Rosina, Gilda, Lucia, and Liù. In February 2010 she made her first La Scala appear-
ance in Rigoletto, returning for Le nozze di Figaro in 2012 and Le Comte Ory in 2014. Her reper-
toire includes Rachel (La Juive), Violetta (La traviata), Juliette (Roméo et Juliette), Fiordiligi
(Così fan tutte), Amenaide (Tancredi), Alice Ford (Falstaff), and Luisa (Luisa Miller). She recently
performed in La traviata in New York and London, Pagliacci in Berlin, Barcelona, London, and
the Arena of Verona, and Falstaff in Munich; she debuted as Elisabetta in Don Carlo at the Paris
Opera and as Santuzza in Cavalleria rusticana at the Arena of Verona.
aleksandrakurzak.com

53

Georges Bizet love, and José is finally only able to
Carmen (1875) possess her by pulling a knife and killing
her at the arena of Seville while the crowd
(Libretto by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy) at the corrida inside thunders. Parisians
were not ready to see such primal violence
On 3 March 1875 the Opéra-Comique of on stage, but Carmen marked a point of no
Paris premiered Carmen. It was a time return for melodrama, condensing in a
when French theatre began to be single character all the brutal
populated by weak men manipulated by contradictions of love, ‘the deadly hatred
bewitching, heartless femmes fatales. of the sexes’ as Nietzsche would put it.
Bizet made his contribution by bringing a
gypsy woman to the stage (the literary A. M.
source is a novella by Prosper Mérimée)
who is as treacherous as she is beguiling.
In her own words: ‘Carmen will never
yield! Free she was born and free she will
die!’ The Corporal of Dragoons Don José
falls into her net: he gives up everything
for her—the army, his pious fiancée
Micaëla. But Carmen cannot be caged by

Georges Bizet
54

Prélude

The Prelude is a microcosm of the
entire opera. We hear in succession
some of the main themes of the score:
the frenetic rhythm of the corrida, the
virile anthem of the toreador Escamillo,
and a fatalistic theme that
commentators have associated with
death, or with love, or with Carmen
herself. We already have a perfectly
clear snapshot of the drama before the
curtain rises. The following scenes will
tell of an individual tragedy in continual
dialectic with collective euphoria. The
allusion to joyful Spanish folklore, so
dear to Parisians in the late nineteenth
century, intermixes with a presage
of blood and femicide.

A. M.

Maggy Monier. Watercolours for Carmen
by Prosper Mérimée, Paris, 1928
(Milano, Museo Teatrale alla Scala).

55

Georges Bizet Carmen
Carmen Love is a rebellious bird
that no one can tame,
Carmen and it’s quite useless to call him
if it suits him to refuse.
L’amour est un oiseau rebelle Nothing moves him, neither threat nor plea,
Que nul ne peut apprivoiser, one man speaks freely, the other keeps mum;
Et c’est bien en vain qu’on l’appelle, and it’s the other one I prefer:
S’il lui convient de refuser. he’s said nothing, but I like him.
Rien n’y fait, menace ou prière, Love is a gypsy child,
L’un parle bien, l’autre se tait; who has never heard of law.
Et c’est l’autre que je préfère, If you don’t love me, I love you;
Il n’a rien dit; mais il me plaît. if I love you, look out for yourself!
L’amour est enfant de bohème, The bird you thought to catch unawares
Il n’a jamais, jamais connu de loi, beats its wings and away it flew;
Si tu ne m’aimes pas, je t’aime; love’s far away, and you can wait for it;
Si je t’aime, prends garde à toi! you wait for it no longer, and there it is!
L’oiseau que tu croyais surprendre All around you, quickly, quickly,
Battit de l’aile et s’envola; it comes, it goes, then it returns
L’amour est loin, tu peux l’attendre; you think you can hold it, it evades you,
Tu ne l’attends plus, il est là! you think you evaded it, it holds you fast.
Tout autour de toi vite, vite,
Il vient, s’en va, puis il revient;
Tu crois le tenir, il t’évite;
Tu crois l’éviter, il te tient!

Célestine Galli-Marié L’amour est un oiseau rebelle
de l’Isle, the first
Carmen. L’amour est un oiseau rebelle marks
Carmen’s entrance on stage. Musically, it
is a habanera, a Spanish dance with
syncopated rhythm, already well known
in nineteenth-century Paris. The explicit
model is an analogous composition by
Sebastián Yradier, but in Bizet’s hands
the song is charged with sensuality, an
irresistible temptation arousing Don
José’s animal erotic impulses. The lyrics
equate love with rebellion, offering a
perfect portrait of Carmen, who would
sooner die than deny freedom to her
sentiments.

A. M.

56

Marianne Crebassa

Mezzosoprano. Born in Montpellier, Marianne studied musicology, voice, and piano at the local
Conservatory. In 2008, barely twenty-one, she debuted at the Montpellier Opera in Schumann’s
Manfred, conducted by Hervé Niquet. For the Radio France Festival, she went on to sing in Fedra
by Pizzetti, Le Martyre de Saint Sébastien by Debussy, Zaira by Bellini, Friederike by Lehár,
Wuthering Heights by Bernard Herrmann, and La Magicienne by Halévy. In 2010 she joined the
Paris Opera’s Atelier Lyrique, performing in productions such as Lulu, Rigoletto, and Madama
Butterfly. In 2012 she debuted in Salzburg in Handel’s Tamerlano, returning the following year for
Lucio Silla and in 2014 as protagonist in a new opera by Marc-André Dalbavie on the life of
Charlotte Salomon. Her La Scala debut dates to 2015 in Lucio Silla, and she was soon back for
L’Enfant et les sortilèges and Le nozze di Figaro in 2016, Tamerlano in 2017, and La Cenerentola
in 2019. She debuted in the United States in 2016 as Stéphano in Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette at the
Lyric Opera of Chicago and was one of the soloists at the inauguration of the 50th Mostly Mozart
Festival in New York. In 2017 she was named ‘Opera Singer of the Year’ at the Victoires de la
Musique Classique, and sang Offenbach’s Fantasio at the Opéra Comique, where she later took part
in the 2018-2019 season premiere with Orphée et Eurydice. She was Sesto in La clemenza di Tito
in Paris, Dorabella in Così fan tutte in Chicago, Mélisande in Pelléas et Mélisande and Rosina in Il
barbiere di Siviglia in Berlin, Cherubino in Le nozze di Figaro at the Metropolitan, and sang the
title role in Handel’s Ariodante in Grenoble and Bordeaux. Upcoming engagements include La
damnation de Faust in Florence and La Cenerentola in Vienna.
mariannecrebassa.com

57

Georges Bizet Don José
Carmen The flower that you threw to me
stayed with me in my prison.
Don José Withered and dried up, that flower
La fleur que tu m’avais jetée always kept its sweet perfume;
Dans ma prison m’était restée, and for hours at a time,
Flétrie et sèche, cette fleur with my eyes closed,
Gardait toujours sa douce odeur; I became drunk with its smell
Et pendant des heures entières, and in the night I used to see you!
Sur mes yeux, fermant mes paupières, I took to cursing you,
De cette odeur je m’enivrais detesting you, asking myself
Et dans la nuit je te voyais! why did destiny
Je me prenais à te maudire, have to throw her across my path?
À te détester, à me dire: Then I accused myself of blasphemy,
Pourquoi faut-il que le destin and felt within myself,
L’ait mise là sur mon chemin! I felt but one desire,
Puis je m’accusais de blasphème, one desire, one hope:
Et je ne sentais en moi-même, to see you again, Carmen, to see you again!
Qu’un seul désir, un seul espoir: For you had only to appear,
Te revoir, ô Carmen, oui, te revoir! only to throw a glance my way,
Car tu n’avais eu qu’à paraître, to take possession of my whole being,
Qu’à jeter un regard sur moi, o my Carmen, and I was your chattel!
Pour t’emparer de tout mon être, Carmen, I love you!
Ô ma Carmen, et j’étais une chose à toi!
Carmen, je t’aime!

La fleur que tu m’avais jetée

La fleur que tu m’avais jetée is the
romance where Don José declares his love
for Carmen. We are in Act II, in Lillas
Pastia’s ribald inn. Don José, just out of
prison for having allowed Carmen to escape
arrest, arrives in the middle of a disinhibited
meeting of smugglers. In prison he had found
the flower that the gypsy had thrown to him
on their first encounter, and the wilted
blossom had ignited the flame of his passion,
inexorably intermixed with tormented
thoughts (‘Pourquoi faut-il que le destin l’ait
mise là, sur mon chemin?’ – ‘Why did
destiny have to throw her across my path?’).

A. M.

Giuseppe Palanti. Sketch for Don José in Carmen
at the Teatro alla Scala, 27 March 1913.

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Piotr Beczała Foto Brescia-Amisano

Tenor. A native of Czechowice-Dziedzice, Poland, Piotr studied at the Katowice Academy of Mu-
sic under Pavel Lisitsian and Sena Jurinac. After his initial engagement at the Landestheater in
Linz, in 1997 he joined the ensemble of the Zürich Opera, singing leading roles in a long series of
operas. He debuted as the Duca di Mantova in Rigoletto in 2006 and has gone on to perform regu-
larly at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, where he has sung Lensky in Eugene Onegin, the
Prince in Rusalka by Dvořák, Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor, Rodolfo in La bohème, Des
Grieux in Manon by Massenet, Vaudémont in Iolanta by Tchaikovsky, Riccardo in Un ballo in
maschera, and the title roles in Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette and Faust. The year 2006 also marked
his debut at La Scala in Rigoletto; he would return in 2012 for La bohème and in 2013 for the sea-
son premiere as Alfredo in La traviata. He performs regularly at the Bayerische Staatsoper in Mu-
nich and at its Viennese counterpart. He debuted at the Salzburg Festival in 1997 as Tamino and
has since been a regular guest. His engagements during the 2020-2021 season include a recital
with Sondra Radvanovsky at the Liceu of Barcelona, a tour in Spain with the pianist Sarah Tys-
man, concerts at the Musikverein of Graz, the Konzerthaus of Vienna, the Semperoper of Dresden,
the Teatr Wielki in Warsaw, the Philharmonie am Gasteig in Munich, and the Tchaikovsky Hall in
Moscow. He will also perform in Verdi’s Messa da Requiem at the Grafenegg Festival. His opera
schedule includes Werther in Warsaw and Vienna, Der Rosenkavalier and Rusalka in Vienna, Lu-
cia di Lammermoor in Zürich, and Lohengrin at the Bayreuth Festival. In 2014 he was named
ECHO Klassik’s ‘Singer of the Year’, and ‘Österreichischer Kammersänger’ in 2019.
piotrbeczala.com

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Sax Nicosia
Sax Nicosia
When death comes, it will have your eyes.
This death that is always with us,
From morning till evening, sleepless,
Deaf, like an old remorse
Or some senseless bad habit. Your eyes
Will be an empty word,
A stifled cry, a silence;
The way they appear to you each morning,
When you lean into yourself, alone,
In the mirror. Sweet hope,
That day we too shall know
That you are life and you are nothingness.
For each of us, death has a face.
When death comes, it will have your eyes.
It will be like quitting some bad habit,
Like seeing a dead face
Resurface out the mirror,
Like listening to shut lips.
We’ll go down into the vortex in silence.
Cesare Pavese, Verrà la morte e avrà i tuoi
occhi, 1950, translated by Julian Peters

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LOVE AND DEATH

Giuseppe Verdi who sends her out into the darkness to
un ballo in maschera (1859) collect a magical herb in a wild and
frightening place. Riccardo (tenor) has the
(Libretto by Antonio Somma) bad idea to follow her; what’s worse, her
husband (baritone) follows him to protect
This masterpiece of mixed styles, lofty him from the two assassins. The result is
and popular, dramatic and brilliant – in that the husband, beside himself with rage,
other words, quintessential Verdi – takes is about to kill his wife, who begs him to
inspiration from the composer’s numen, let her see her young son one last time
Shakespeare, even though the subjects
hail from another source. Two operetta E. F.
assassins, a fortune teller, a young
delightfully joyful page, and two lovers
kept apart: he is Riccardo, governor of
Boston; she is married to Riccardo’s best
friend, Renato. To free her mind of him,
she seeks advice from the fortune teller,

1859 Calendar featuring
the New Year’s Eve Party
at the Teatro alla Scala
(Milan, Civica Raccolta delle
Stampe “Achille Bertarelli”).

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Giuseppe Verdi Amelia
Un ballo in maschera
Amelia I shall die, but first, in kindness,
Morrò, ma prima in grazia ah, let me at least
deh, mi consenti almeno clasp to my breast
l’unico figlio mio my only child.
avvincere al mio seno. And if to your wife
E se alla moglie nieghi you deny this last favour,
quest’ultimo favor, do not refuse the prayer
non rifiutarlo ai prieghi of a mother’s heart.
del mio materno cor. I shall die, but let his kisses
Morrò, ma queste viscere console this body,
consolino i suoi baci, now that the end has come
or che l’estrema è giunta to my brief life.
dell’ore mie fugaci. Once she is dead by his father’s hand
Spenta per man del padre, let him touch with his hand
la mano ei stenderà these eyes of a mother
sugl’occhi d’una madre, whom he will never see again.
che mai più non vedrà!

Amelia

Morrò, ma prima in grazia

Her anguished, concise song, brimming with
the eloquence that only true pain can bring,
has some effect on her husband: at least it
convinces him not to kill her. Instead he
shall slay the vile seducer who stole his
beloved Amelia from him, staining her soul.

E. F.

Filippo Peroni.
A sketch for Un ballo in maschera
(Milan, Museo Teatrale alla Scala).

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