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Gioachino ROSSINI (1792-1868)
L’italiana in Algeri - Opera giocosa in two
acts
Mustafa, Bey of Algiers - Simone Alaimo (buffa bass)
Elvira, Mustafa’s wife - Jeanette Fischer (soprano)
Haly, captain of the Algerian pirates - Anthony Smith (bass)
Lindoro, a young Italian and Mustafa’s favourite slave - Bruce Ford
(tenor)
Isabella, an Italian lady - Jennifer Larmore (mezzo)
Taddeo, Isabella’s companion and infatuated with her - Alessandro
Corbelli (buffa baritone)
Orchestra and Chorus of the Paris Opera/Bruno Campanella
rec. live, Opéra National de Paris, Palais Garnier, April 1998
Stage Director: Andrei Surban
Set and costume designer: Marina Draghici
Sound format: DD 5.1. PCM stereo
Picture format: 16:9
Region: 0 (worldwide)
Introductory notes in English, German, French
Subtitles in Italian (original language), English, German, French,
Spanish
ARTHAUS MUSIK
107 127 [148:00]
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The year 1813 was a groundbreaking one for Rossini. He had
made his mark in a highly competitive profession with a series
of five
farsi presented at Venice’s small San Moise theatre. He
had come to the notice of the city’s premier theatre, La Fenice,
which commissioned him to write an opera seria. The last of
the one act farsi, Il
Signor Bruschino for the San Moise was premiered in late
January 1813 with the opera seria, Tancredi, based on
Voltaire’s tragedy, but given a happy ending, following on 6
February 1813. This was received with acclaim.
After presenting a revised Tancredi in Ferrara (see review),
Rossini returned to Venice to write, at very short notice, a
full-length comic opera, his first, for the Teatro San Benedetto
after another composer failed to deliver. With a timetable of
less than a month, short-cuts were inevitable. First it was
decided to recycle, with some revisions, the libretto of an
existing opera, Luigi Mosca’s L’Italiana in Algeri of
1808. Second, Rossini outsourced the recitatives and also Haly’s
short act 2 La femmine d’Italia (CH 33).
Rossini’s L’Italiana in Algeri, his eleventh opera,
was premiered on 22 May 1813 to almost constant
wild, general applause according to a contemporary review.
It is the earliest of the composer’s truly great full-length
comedies. It certainly has speed as well as felicitous melodies.
Although it fell from the repertoire for a period early in the
20th century it is one of the few Rossini operas to have had
a presence in the recording catalogue since the early days of
LP. The role of Isabella has drawn many of the great post-Second
World War mezzos to record it in audio versions including the
redoubtable American Marilyn Horne (Erato 2292-45404-2 in 1981)
highlights
of which are reviewed on this site and the Italian Lucia Valentini-Terrani
whose second audio recording is also reviewed.
Both these singers have considerable vocal ranges with particular
strength in the lower mezzo area. Jennifer Larmore, the Isabella
on this recording has the same wide-ranging voice with the added
advantage of great smoothness across the range.
The plot concerns the feisty eponymous heroine Isabella who
has been sailing in the Mediterranean in search of her lover
Lindoro and who is accompanied by an elderly admirer, Taddeo.
After her ship is wrecked Mustafa, the Bey of Algiers, finds
her the ideal replacement for his neglected wife who he intends
to marry off to a slave who happens to be Lindoro. After complicated
situations involving Taddeo being awarded the honour of Kaimakan
and Mustafa becoming a Pappataci, a spoof award invented by
Isabella, to keep him obeying strict instructions, all ends
well in a rousing finale.
The sets and costumes of this 1998 Paris production are a melange
of styles with a lot oversized. These include the large ship
seen sinking behind the captive Isabella, another that arrives
to take everyone to freedom and also including the stomachs
of the harem eunuchs and the muscles of the Italian sailors.
Although both ships referred to are of what might be called
the modern variety, at the start it is a small galleon which
is shown passing. Does this represent the one that brought Lindoro
to Mustafa’s kingdom? Sometimes costumes are distinctly modern,
whilst elsewhere Turkish traditional dominates. The modern includes
the opening with Mustafa’s wife, Elvira, having a massage. When
Mustafa arrives she fawns on him and performs the splits in
front of him (CHs 3-4); I have only ever seen one other soprano
do the splits in my many years of opera-going! Jeanette Fischer
also sings with clarity and acts her part well throughout. Lindoro
appears first as part of a chain-gang of convicts with ankles
manacled. The chains come in handy for Mustafa to connect him
to Elvira as the Bey makes clear his intentions for them both.
Simple but effective! In his cavatina Langir per una bella
(CH 6) Bruce Ford shows both his vocal flexibility and limitations
in terms of mellifluous tone. However, his vocal flexibility
and natural stage acting are a great strength throughout, not
least in the patter duet with the Mustafa of Simone Alaimo (CH
8). Alaimo’s is not the juiciest of buffa bass voices, but his
acting with his voice, and range of facial expressions, combine
into a consummate characterisation. He understands everything
about the role and the words come over with relish and meaning.
It is with Jennifer Larmore’s vocal and acted portrayal that
this production outshines all competitors except for that of
Marilyn Horne on her rather technically dated DVD recording
of 1986 (DG 073 4261). Her vivacious manner and vocal brio in
a vivid green dress are just the tonic needed in this Palais
Garnier production by Andrei Serban and his designer Marina
Draghici. Outrageous colours and incessant movement are the
hallmarks although not as much as in Dario Fo’s 1994 production
at Pesaro one that limited Jennifer Larmore’s singing of appoggiatura.
Her introductory Cruda Sorte (Ch. 10) shows her voice
to be in fine fettle and untroubled by the low tessitura. Most
importantly she sings across the wide vocal range without recourse
to the sort of obvious vocal gear-changes that some singers,
lacking her evenness and bravura technique, are forced to make.
She decorates the vocal line with ease and without excess. The
idiosyncrasies of the production do not detract from her very
fine interpretation that matches that on her excellent audio
recording (Teldec/Warner).
The Italian Girl arrives with her admirer Taddeo, a role long
dominated on stage and record by Enzo Dara whose renowned buffa
capabilities are matched here by Alessandro Corbelli. Character
singers such as he are required in this role and do not have
to have the vocal skills required of Figaro in The Barber
of Seville. If an artist cannot convey, by acting and vocal
nuance in their singing, the complexities of the plot situations
then the whole edifice of an opera giocosa such as L’Italiana
in Algeri collapses. I can give Corbelli no greater compliment
than to say that his performance in act 2, when Taddeo is appointed
Kaimakan by Mustafa (CHs 26-27) and then has to convince him
as to a Pappataci’s behaviour (CHs 40-41), is outstanding. That
superb characterisation and acting on Corbelli’s part makes
the realisation of the Italian Girl’s spoof, which brings about
the release of the Italians wholly believable. He achieves all
this whilst having to tolerate one of the more idiosyncratic
aspects of the production, that of being carried around on the
shoulders of a strong man who is covered by the extra long Turkish
robes that Taddeo wears as a Kaimakan. Camera-work, which includes
a lot of close-ups, means we do not see when he is lifted and
lowered.
I have referred to production idiosyncrasies, which are many,
and at times threaten to reduce Rossini’s work to farce; L’Italiana
in Algeri is a comic opera not a farsa. Regrettably,
some of the visuals only just avoid the epithet ‘slapstick’.
That being said it is a difficult work to bring off. Given the
producer’s decision to update, the variety of costumes, which
includes the imprisoned sailors appearing in football strip
in Italian colours, is vivid and varied. The lighting is imaginative
and aids the producer’s vision. Bruno Campanella’s conducting
is well paced, idiomatic, and sympathetic to his singers. His
reading of the overture is most appealing with the, by now for
Rossini, inevitable crescendo to go along with a tuneful brio.
Using the lightly orchestrated critical edition helps. He keeps
the whole opera zipping along in an ideal manner. The pictures
of Paris’s wonderful Palais Garnier during the overture (CH.
2) are a glory.
Tancredi and L’Italiana launched Rossini on an
unstoppable career that saw him become the most prestigious
opera composer of his time. Musically, the singing and acting
of the principals in this production do him justice.
Robert J Farr
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