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--- lshd08:hd_il_trittico_may_19 [2008/05/19 20:13] – tomgee
+++ lshd08:hd_il_trittico_may_19 [2008/05/21 02:52] (current) – tomgee
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-We went to this in Cary on a Sunday afternoon at 3PM. Before the performance I won two tickets to Long Leaf Opera Festival next month by answering a trivia question about the name of the third of the Il Trittico operas after Gianni Schicchi and Suor Angelica. The answer was Il Tabarro.\\
+===== Il Trittico from La Scala moviecast =====
+**Tom's Take:** We went to this in Cary on a Sunday afternoon at 3PM. Before the performance I won two tickets to Long Leaf Opera Festival next month by answering a trivia question about the name of the third of the Il Trittico operas after Gianni Schicchi and Suor Angelica. The answer was Il Tabarro.\\
 The first opera, Il Tabarro, was very dark. The barge occupied the stage, the singing was great but the sound seemed distant. The second, Suor Angelica, was just plain weird. Why in the world there was a madonna laying on stage that the singers climbed up and down was beyond me. The third, Gianni Schicchi, seemed to be the barge but draped in red. Leo Nucci was outstanding with his colorful acting and excellent singing. It was my favorite of the three. What a great afternoon of opera. We left the theater in a pouring rain. Stopped for dinner at La Cocina, our mexican restaurant near Krogers.
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 Highly recommended.
+----
+My second trip to Morristown, New Jersey for La Scala at the movies (you can read
+about the non-functioning projector for Maria Stuarda in the archives) was better
+than the last one, but there were many problems.
+The La Scala production was a new one by Luca Ronconi, and several of the principals
+were in the Met's Trittico last season, notably Juan Pons' Michele and Barbara
+Fittoli's Angelica.  I apologize for not having a complete cast list, but the
+website for Emerging Pictures is limited, and you got only one chance through the
+cast before each opera, and I didn't see the listing in the theatre for Schicchi
+(the intermission was less than 6 minutes).  The Ronconi Tabarro was very standard
+with the barge filling the stage, and I thought marginally better in conception than
+the Met's "uber Zeffirelli" effort-- the simpler the better for Tabarro in my view.
+The Met staging of Luigi's murder was much more exciting. Paoletta Marrocu is best
+known for her Lady Macbeth in the ZUrich Hampson production.  She was OK vocally if
+in no way memorable, but her acting was extremely external and if not so zaftig as
+Guleghina, neither was a patch on Scotto in the Met's first telecast 20+ years ago.
+Contrary to the website, Luigi was sung by Antonello Palombi, not Miro Dvorski.
+This guy's a brute, and though the vocalism was OK; Licitra was much better last
+year at the Met, and Moldoveanu better still with Scotto. Pons is on Freni's
+recording of Trittico, the Met gala with Domingo, last year's Met production, and
+now here with La Scala. It is not such a remarkable performance that it should be
+encountered everywhere, but I am not pitching for a Carlo Guelfi effort either.
+Michele was one of  Cornell MacNeil's best efforts, and while I have copy of the Met
+telecast, this telecast should be issued by the Met (there is one minor technical
+glitch in the Tabarro with I think 40 seconds or so lost from the actual house
+transmission, but it is by far the best of the mainline Tritticos (the older Scala
+one with Gavazzeni, last year's Met, or this year's Scala).  A hand for the splendid
+work of all 3 principals on the Tebaldi Tabarro (Merrill never did the part on
+stage, but talk about powerful vocalism).
+Suor Angelica was a hideous production with a giant Madonna, the size of the barge
+in Tabarro on its side and draped so that the nuns were constantly traversing the
+statue.
+It most reminded me of the Jurgen Rose MEt Elektra with the huge equestrian statue
+on its side in the courtyard, but performers arent asked to climb all over it.
+Frittoli is a moving Angelica, and some sections of this difficult part were a bit
+better on the La Scal transmission, but I felt the production worked against her,
+and am glad her first outing in the part was at the Met and videod for posterity.
+The Met moved the chronology for Angelica forward to fascist Italy, but kept the
+setting very close to traditional for the convent.  I felt Stephanie BLythe at the
+Met last year was not old enough or elegant enough for the part, though she sang it
+very well. Let me temper those complaints now that I have seen Marianna Lipovsek's
+Zia Principessa.  She was sternness and implacability to the max, but she was also
+frightening to look at, the make up not subtle enough for  high definition, and the
+vocalism hooty and old (not wobbly, but not pleasant). Lipovsek was a great
+Klytemnestra when I saw Marton in London in 1990, and she did the Ring mezzo roles
+to a fare thee well in CHicago in 1994 or 1996 (Eaglen's first complete Ring when
+she could still make an effect), but this was not a way to remember her.  I really
+liked Fabrizio Melano's simple and effective work with Scotto and company in the
+first Met Angelica, and Frittoli  most moving last year.
+Gianni Schicchi  featured Leo Nucci as Schicchi (he too is on Freni's recording). I
+can't say who were the Rinuccio (the website says Stephano Secco, but i looked at
+HIS website, and he was not on the screen) or the Lauretta  who is listed as Nino
+Machaidze.  The setting was a giant bed with red flocked floor and sheets that was
+nothing on the Met's splendid design (I don't like the final use of the lift to show
+a very fakey Florence, but the action centering on the Buoso and the relatives
+scheming is delightfully done, and brings out Jack O'Brien's skill at creating an
+ensemble).  Some of Nucci's late work (Met Nabucco and Vespri) have been very good,
+but he seemed very glued to the conductor, and nowhere near the charm of a Bacquier
+or Corbelli (the two Met interpreters on video)
+Ricardo Chailly was a solid conductor, but not on the level of his Aida (the Urmana,
+Alagna Zeffirelli effort) which was at the movies a few months ago.  Levine  was
+better, but some of this may relate to how much better the orchestra was captured by
+Met mikes.
+Technical issues.  During Schicchi we had about a 6 minute sound outage near the end
+when Schicchi throws the relatives out of his newly inherited house.  I am assuming
+this was a local failing.  The screen using DLP technology seemed a good bit
+brighter than the Met, but it also seemed totally fake, and except for acough during
+the miracle section of Angelica, you wouldnt know an audience was there.  No
+audience laughter during Schicchi?  The sound was acceptable but no more, and no
+richness for the orchestra.
+Even the Met's digital mikes don't catch the bloom of a voice like you hear when you
+are in the opera house, but they're a lot better than this.  Compared to the Aida,
+the video direction was a great improvement, but a cutaway to the orchestra during
+the interlude before Angelica poisons herself totally broke the mood.  If the Met is
+too abrupt with
+curtain calls, La Scala gives EVERYONE even a second round.  When I saw the Aida,
+they had the dancer Roberto Bolle going on and off repeatedly.  The Trittico treated
+all the bit players as if they were Roberto Bolle.  Lots of "atmospheric"  shots of
+the orchestra before each opera, but I felt no energy from the performance at all.
+The Emerging PIctures website lists a 2008-2009 season, but there's nothing there
+when you click.  Poor marketing, some very bad choices in terms of how the
+performances are put together weaken a potentially competitive effort to the Met.  I
+saw the La Scala Tristan on my home DVD  thanks to a European colleague, and of
+course I missed the Maria Stuarda.  In the end, the Aida and the Trittico were duds.
+ The San Francisco
+movies are not readily accessible for me.  It takes more than technology to make the
+whole thing work.
+{{lshd08:img951.jpg?640|}}