Giacomo PUCCINI (1858-1924)
Il Tabarro (1918)
Franco Vassallo (baritone) – Michele: Maria Jose Siri (soprano) – Giorgetta: Angelo Villari (tenor) – Luigi: Antonio Garès (tenor) – Tinca: Eugenio di Lieto (bass) – Talpa: Anna Maria Chiuri (mezzo-soprano) – Frugola: Dave Monaco (tenor) – Ballad seller: Costanza Fontana (soprano), Claudio Zazzaro (tenor) – Lovers: Thalida Forgasi (soprano), Leonardo Sgroi (tenor) – Offstage voices
Chorus and Orchestra of Maggio Musicale Fiorentino/Valerio Galli
rec. live, 20 and 23 November 2019, Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Italy
DYNAMIC 57872 Blu-Ray [54 mins]
Back in the 1950s, when ‘respectable’ critical reputation of Puccini was at its absolute nadir and at the time when I was first beginning to make the acquaintance of his operas, I recall reading the opinions of one intrepid detractor who, having loaded his shotgun, proceeded to let La Tabarro have it with both barrels. It was an anomaly, he charged, a throwback to the cheap verismo days of the composer’s youth, with a plot of such crass ugliness that it would repel most listeners. Indeed, like the remainder of the three one-act operas of Il Trittico with the possible exception of Gianni Schicchi, it was best consigned to oblivion; and the fact that it was almost never staged except as part of the ill-fated triple bill was an eloquent testimonial to its deserved fate. There were, it is needless to say, so many misfires in this fusillade of abuse that it is difficult to know where to start. In the first place its definition of Puccini’s early operas as verismo – slices of ‘real modern life’ presented on stage – is decidedly wide of the mark; only La Bohème could possibly be slotted into that description, and even then the drama is distanced by a gap of some eighty years from the date of its composition. Comparisons with more authentically verismo scores such as the ubiquitous Cav and Pag (presumably excepted from the critic’s condemnation by their uniform popularity with audiences) show Il Tabarro in a very different light, as well. Where Leoncavallo and Mascagni give us comparatively straightforward stories of sexual jealousy and murder, Puccini seeks to explore the underlying psychology of the characters: the sense of grinding poverty and infant mortality which undermines the sanity and balance of the unfortunate protagonists, leading them to extremes of violence and suspicion. And he reinforces this with a vivid depiction of urban claustrophobia – both the women in the opera express their longing to escape to the fresh air of the suburbs or the countryside – with the grey river lapping eternally at the filthy barges in the Seine. All of this is rendered with an impressionistic sense of fidelity, complete with tugboat sirens and motor horns as well as passing incidental characters – a sort of antidote to the more conventionally romanticised Paris of Charpentier’s Louise (with even its street walkers rendered with a halo of wistful sentiment) written a decade before.
However given the near-universal opprobrium visited on the score over the years (I have selected from memory only one of the more extreme examples), it is not surprising that Il Tabarro is still rarely performed in the opera house unless as the first part of Il trittico. And of course the sheer combined length of the three operas themselves, making up a very substantial evening, tends in turn to militate against its appearance there. I can recall only one television broadcast many years ago where Il Tabarro was detached and given as part of a double bill with Pagliacci, and then this was as a star vehicle for a Pavarotti-Domingo double act at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. The opera had to wait until 1955 for its first commercial recording, and even then a somewhat shamefaced EMI producer took it upon himself (presumably in an attempt to avoid charges of vulgarity) to excise all of Puccini’s sound effects so carefully and precisely notated in the full score. After that there were no other recordings made except as part of a complete set of the Trittico until Erich Leinsdorf’s superbly atmospheric RCA performance with the starry line-up of Leontyne Price, Placido Domingo and Sherrill Milnes, which was the first rendition to alert me to the real potential of the music.
It comes then as something of a surprise to encounter this Blu-Ray disc which presents Il Tabarro in total isolation, without any other music. The booklet note by Michele Girardi, drawn from a MMF programme, discusses the opera in the context of a complete performance of the Trittico, and indeed it is clear that all three operas have been issued as separate items, a very extravagant exercise. Be that as it may, this is a very solid rendition of the score, perhaps lacking the ultimate in impressionist atmosphere but certainly with a strong sense of engagement under the baton of Valerio Galli. The sound effects are all firmly in place – indeed, the tugboat siren is very prominent for a sound described in the score as “più lontana” than the already “lontana” automobile horns – and the two lovers indicated as “due ombre sulla strada” are firmly in evidence on the bank immediately adjacent to the barge at the front of the stage. And the three principal singers, all of them roles that demand a great deal of their performers, give their full resources both vocal and dramatic to the presentation of the music. Franco Vassallo as the cuckolded bargeman has a voice of iron quality, and the final phrase of his monologue rises to a stentorian high G over the fff chords of the orchestra. At the same time he can break the listener’s heart earlier with his desperate appeal to his wife “Resto vicino a me!” As his wife Maria Jose Siri gives us a warm-hearted woman whose attempts to escape from poverty and domestic misery are doomed to failure but still enable her to sympathise with the ridiculous pretensions of Anna Maria Chiuri’s scavenging baglady as well as daydreams of her younger and happier days. As her new lover Angelo Villari is a tower of strength in his crucifyingly strenuous threats at the end of their ‘love duet’ trumpeting out his chain of repeated G sharps over the unrelenting orchestra in a manner that simply lies beyond the capacity of so many tenors who are otherwise adequate to the conventionally romantic sections of their role. He is the only singer whose performance elicits audience applause to interrupt the flow of the music, although his singing of his mini-aria Hai ben ragione is stronger on bitterness than lyricism. In fact the applause of the audience is lukewarm even at the end – it fades away altogether before all the singers have left the stage after their single curtain call – which does scant justice to the performers. Presumably the audience reserved their full appreciation for later on. Among the numerous supporting cast Eugenio di Lieto is a noteworthy Talpa, although he looks far too young and personable for a character whom Michele dismisses as a possible lover for his wife as “troppo vecchio”.
Puccini’s orchestral writing, as well as his atmospheric effects, almost demand a realistic setting for the action; indeed I find it hard to see how any attempt to change either the period or the milieu of the plot could do anything other than damage the effect of the opera irreparably. Here we are given a set, designed by the producer Denis Krief, which consists almost entirely of a vast painted backdrop of the Seine – complete with a curiously immobile passer-by and his dog – which frames a basic series of blocks depicting the barge. While not as immediately convincing as some sets I have seen (the brushstrokes of the artwork are clearly visible in close-up shots) it does no violence to the action, and allows the singers to stand and deliver forward when the music demands this without ruining the sense of verisimilitude. On the other hand the lighting, also attributed to the producer, comes close to undermining the result. When Luigi steals surreptitiously back onto the barge at the end, it is impossible to credit that he has mistaken the signal of the lighted match and cannot see Michele standing in wait for him, or that he can be taken by surprise by the latter when he strangles him from behind. But then immediately afterwards the dusk falls with startling and unrealistic rapidity, to allow Giorgetta to be properly surprised by the sight of her lover’s body emerging from underneath her husband’s cloak. It is only at moments like these that the viewer’s engagement is alienated – that, to use Tolkien’s singularly gruesome phrase, disbelief has not only to be suspended but hung, drawn and quartered. Mind you, Krief thankfully does tone down the singularly gruesome final scene where Michele pushes his wife’s face onto her lover’s body, a touch of grand guignol that does lend weight to accusations of verismo brutality.
Competition for rival video recordings of the opera are not large, certainly not as many as one would expect for a Puccini work. The Covent Garden set of the complete Trittico would be considerably cheaper as a purchase (all three operas on one disc, as opposed to three!) but I must admit to finding some of the updating and amendment of the staging (especially in Suor Angelica) irritating rather than illuminating. I recall with considerable delight a high-quality television relay from the Metropolitan Opera some years ago – this also featured an updated staging of Gianni Schicchi, but otherwise gave us highly realistic depictions of the action. For some unknown reason – possibly the presence on the podium of James Levine? – this never seems to have made the transition to commercial video release. It should do. If on the other hand Dynamic were to issue all three of their Trittico recordings on a single disc, the performance under consideration here would become a very high contender for a primary recommendation.
The quality of the picture and the video direction by Tiziano Mancini are both well managed; the booklet with its comprehensive track listing and lengthy and informative essays comes in English and Italian only, but subtitles are provided in Italian, English, French, German, Korean and Japanese.
Paul Corfield Godfrey
Previous review (DVD): Colin Clarke
