Giuseppe VERDI (1813-1901)
I Vespri Siciliani - an opera in 5 acts (1855)
Guido di Monforte - Leo Nucci (baritone); Il conte Vaudemont - Andrea
Mastroni (bass); Arrigo - Fabio Armiliato (tenor); Giovanni da Procida -
Giacomo Prestia (baritone); La duchessa Elena - Daniela Dessì
(soprano); Ninetta - Adriana Di Paola (mezzo); Danieli - Raoul D’Eramo
(bass); Il sire di Bethune - Dario Russo (bass); Tebaldo - Roberto Jachini
Virgili; Roberto - Alessandro Battiato; Manfredo - Camillo Facchino
Chorus of Teatro Regio Di Parma/Martino Faggiani
Orchestra of Teatro Regio Di Parma/Massimo Zanetti.
rec. live, Teatro Regio di Parma, 13 and 17 October 2010
Pier Luigi Pizzi: stage director, set and costume designer
Vincenzo Raponi: lighting designer
Roberto Maria Pizzuto: choreographer
Picture format: NTSC 16:9
Sound format: PCM Stereo / DTS 5.1
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: Italian, English, German, French, Spanish, Chinese,
Korean, Japanese
Bonus: Introduction to
I vespri Siciliani
Also available in Blu-Ray format
C MAJOR 723808
[170:00 + 11:00]
This performance comes from the 2012 Verdi Festival in Parma to mark
the Verdi bicentenary; he lived in nearby Busseto. This opera was one of two
commissions from the Paris Opera and Verdi was determined to give of his
best to please the French. They would expect the writing to take place
within a year and in return would allow him the choice of artists and
guarantee forty performances. To this end he asked Eugène Scribe to
provide the book. Because Scribe missed his deadline he proposed to adapt a
previous libretto based on a real historical event, Le Duc d’Albe.
However he shifted the action and date to an earlier time where the French
occupy Sicily. Scribe’s lyrics, “The Sicilian men are jealous
and their women haughty” would not have gone down well with the
Sicilian Italians. The French disliked this ugly episode in their history
and were equally uncomfortable at performances. The resulting plot was to
upset the French and Italians alike and the grand opera was not the hoped
for success. There is certainly some good material but it is generally
confined to the opera beyond Acts I and II. This Italian version came out
six years after the première.
The singing and musicianship here is of a high standard and Zanetti
conducts with verve. Sadly, I find that this quality does not easily come
over to the viewer because of the distant arrangement of microphones. Yet
despite the loss of detail the singing is strong throughout. Massimo
Zanetti’s orchestra is excellent and in the charming and enigmatic
overture/sinfonia the playing has excellent intonation. I noticed another
pleasing point of detail: how the delicately modulated timpani give support
to string chords without masking them. The singers are well chosen for their
roles, but their characterisations are largely superficial. Regrettably the
microphone placing is an obstacle to accurate commentary on vocal timbre.
Certain aspects of Pier Luigi Pizzi’s production are good
while others are somewhat disappointing. We have to remember that this is
not a large-scale travelling opera production with wide resources and the
Parma Festival makes a good attempt at what it sets out to achieve. Yet even
with allowances being made one has to be honest when matching up to
large-scale productions. The cast rarely interact well and the static chorus
lacks purpose when intended to react to a situation, a possible sign of
under-rehearsal. The character portrayals tend to be shallow with little
depth, the accent being given much more to the vocals than to Scribe’s
characters: this may not be a bad thing. To have the women’s chorus at
the rear of the auditorium may well work for a live audience, However, as
Verdi’s intention was to complement the on-stage singing there seems
no point at all in having camera-shots of them when existing in a different
environment. Just to have heard them would have been better. Soloists also
regularly use the auditorium as an extension to the stage which seems
gimmicky and pointless.
Generally, the camera-work, both in quality and composition, is good
and the technical mastering is of a high order. At times the changes of shot
do not complement the action or focus of interest. This is a hazard of live
editing anywhere. In festival productions, I always find it amazing that so
much energy is expended on engaging good artists and musicians yet
production staff dismiss the visual aspects of a stage. This one looks bleak
and poor in detail. It will not do to dress a set with three rowing boats on
a neatly planked floor with a plain white backcloth for Acts I and II, then
have the tabs partly drawn for Act III (with a sofa and chairs placed in the
background), and then add a large hanging mirror to suffice for Acts IV and
V. Likewise, opportunities were missed with the lighting. It could have been
imaginatively lit to enhance the bland set, but instead a mood of cold blue
is retained for all acts.
Subtitles are generously provided in eight languages; Italian,
English, French, German, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese and Korean. The notes in
English are modest and provide a clearly written synopsis. A nice feature is
an 11 minute Introduction that takes clips from the opera to provide a
useful commentary on the plot.
Raymond J Walker