Composed and performed at Cadiz during Mercadante’s five
year sojourn in Spain, this opera here receives its “world
premiere recording” on Naxos. Compiled from three live
performances at the Rossini Festival in Wildbad, its appearance
at that festival is a clear acknowledgement of Mercadante’s
indebtedness to Rossini. That influence is equally clearly tempered
by the inclusion of Spanish folksongs and rhythms and what sound
to modern ears like frequent echoes of Donizetti, when in fact
the influence probably went in the other direction. Donizetti,
although the greater composer, obviously learnt from Mercadante.
Mercadante’s aim was to introduce Italian opera to a Spanish
audience largely unfamiliar with its conventions. He wanted
to avoid over-complicating the form, plot or musical style of
the work so devised an innovative combination of elements of
both opera seria and opera buffo in one, short, single Act opera.
These are couched in indigenous Spanish song and dance rhythms.
Thus we have Neapolitan-style parlando passages melding into
arias and cavatinas, an extended duet for the young lovers reminiscent
of a Donizetti “melodramma giocoso” like “L’elisir
d’amore” and a Finale which requires an ensemble
of eight voices and a Rossini crescendo. For all its eclectic
originality, the opera nonetheless remains rather formalistic
and conventional simply because Mercadante rarely displays the
kind of melodic fecundity or dramatic flair which Verdi and
Donizetti had in abundance, nor is he quite able to make the
music lift the way Rossini could.
The plot - an episode lifted from Chapter 20 of the iconic novel
- is flimsy, though that would matter less if the music and
performance themselves were more involving. There are characteristics
of Mercadante’s music that I always enjoy: his martial
energy, his prominent use of woodwind and his harmonic daring
but they are more in evidence in other of his operas such a
“Il giuramento” and “Orazi e Curiazi”
than they are here.
The overture is sprightly, striking and positively reeks of
Spain with its biting, insistent three-quarter-time refrain
punctuated by brass and woodwind chords; it is hardly surprising
that this music has been popular as concert piece entitled “Sinfonia
caratteristica spagnola” (not “spagnuola”,
as the Naxos notes have it). For me it is by far the most enjoyable
ten minutes in the whole opera - which rather sadly suggests
that things go downhill from there. To be frank, the jolly,
Donizetti-style introductory chorus which follows soon reveals
the ladies of the San Pietro a Majella Chorus to be a lamentably
squawky lot - and they don’t improve. Nor was I cheered
by the dry, gritty, almost voiceless Sancio and the two, similarly-voiced
tenors who have that small, constricted, “cutting-edge”
sound so prevalent today. The other two principals are more
pleasing but of no special quality: Ugo Guagliardo possesses
an agile, well-tuned bass of no distinction and soprano Laura
Catalani has quite a big, blowsy sound with something of an
edge and a good facility in coloratura. The Brno chamber orchestra
are competent although there are intonation problems. Conductor
Antonio Fogliani is now Director of the Rossini Wildbad Festival
and has been building himself something of a reputation as a
champion of early 19th century works. He conducts
very well, with sensitivity and variety. The recorded sound
is first-rate: clear and atmospheric with virtually no extraneous
noise.
I would like to be more enthusiastic about a world premiere
of a neglected opera by a composer whose star has long been
eclipsed by his greater contemporaries Donizetti, Bellini and
Verdi but this remains a work slight of plot and musically very
formulaic; it will not pass as much more than a mild curiosity.
Ralph Moore
Don Chisciotte - Ugo Guagliardo (bass) 