Opera Productions Old and New 6. Two Views of Verdi: Aïda /Attila

was halted by a combination of famine and delaying tactics by the Roman army, though Church tradition assigns most of the credit to Opera Pope Leo I, who met with the invader near Mantua and persuaded him into a treaty. The subject had a political resonance for Verdi’s Productions contemporaries as Northern Italy was then under the rule of Austria. But it has less resonance us today. The Huns left little or no art or Old and New achitecture, making it hard for us to imagine their world, and our knowledge of the Roman empire is mostly of an earlier period. La Scala opened its 2018–19 season with a new production of Attila by Davide Livermore that looks to our own time for relevance: to all those news photos (and in some cases memories) of wartime destruction and occupation from WW2 to Yugoslavia. It is not a consistent approach, as we shall see, but it is never less than interesting. Verdi: Attila.La Scala, Milan, 2018. Saioa Hernández (Odabella), Fabio Sartori (Foresto), George Petean (Ezio), Ildar Abdrazakov (Attila), Gianluca Buratto (Leone); c. Riccardo Chailly; d. Davide Livermore; des. Giò Forma . After a glimpse of a more conventional staging from St. Petersburg, we shall look at two substantial scenes from La Scala, plus some shorter excerpts. The first is the Prologue. Attila has just conquered the city of Aquileia and is surprised that some female inhabitants have been left alive. The resistance fighter Odabella pours scorn on the Huns who leave their women quietly at home. Her attitude intrigues Attila. — Attila, Prologue. Opening scene 13½ — Attila, Act I, scene 1. Intro to Odabella’s aria 1 — Attila, Act II, scene 2. Dance at Attila’s banquet 2½ The freak storm that blows the lights out at the end of that excerpt from the Act II finale is an omen of Attila’s eventual fall. But he has already received an even more disturbing omen in the dream which 6. opens the last scene of Act I, and then becomes real (or does it?) in his encounter with Pope Leo I that forms the Act I finale. Two Views — Attila, Act I, scene 2. Attila’s dream and finale 15 of Verdi: Aïda /Attila http://www.brunyate.com/opprodmcc/ the Liceu in Barcelona in 2003, does not exactly reproduce these Two Views of Verdi things, but it comes close, principally by reusing the hand-painted paper scenery designed by Josep Mestres Cabanes beginning in 1936, We listen to Verdi for his music; we watch for the human interest as a deliberate return to the illusionistic painting of Verdi’s time, and of his stories. With the single exception of La traviata, however, all inevitably the kind of production that would take place in front of it. of his 29 operas are set in the historical past, mostly far removed Verdi: Aïda, Liceu Barcelona, 2003. from our own time. In this class, we shall examine two different Daniela Dessi (Aïda), Elisabetta Fiorillo (Amneris), Fabio Armiliato strategies for having the audience identify with these settings. One (Radames), Juan Pons (Amonasro), Roberto Scandiuzzi (Ramfis), is to depict the milieu in such detail as to carry the audience there Stefano Palatchi (King); c. Miguel Martínez; d. José Gutiérrez. as on a magic carpet. The other is to find parallels in events closer After a brief survey of the Cabanes sets, we shall look at two scenes to our own time, and harness the emotions they evoke. from the opera, and part of a third. The famous triumphal scene that ends Act Two contains all the elements that make Aïda a French grand Giuseppe Verdi opéra in all but name: historical subject, theatrical spectacle, moral conflict, huge choruses, and of course the ever-present ballet. Giuseppe Verdi (1813–1901) was (with Richard Wagner, born in the same year) one of the two — Aïda, Act II, scene 2. Triumphal march and ballet (part) 5½ internationally dominant opera composers of — Aïda, Act II, scene 2. Entrance and aria of Amonasro 8½ the mid-19th century. Verdi’s output of 29 By contrast, the scene between Aïda and her father Amonasro in Act operas is generally divided into two periods, Three contains only two people. It is a development of the cavatina/ separated by the remarkable trio of Rigoletto, action/cabaletta model from bel canto opera, but here used with Il trovatore, and La traviata in 1851–53. remarkable subtlety, and culminating in an emotional coda. Before are his “years in the galleys,” which — Aïda, Act III. Amonasro/Aïda scene 8½ produced numerous operas in a popular style, often with strong patriotic overtones. Attila Finally, if time, we shall hear the very end of the closing scene. It is a (1846) is one of these. After Rigoletto come distillation of all that ethereal music Verdi gave to his dying sopranos, works of increasing subtlety, flexibility of form, only this time shared with the tenor, as Aïda and Radames die in each and musical invention, culminating in his masterpieces in the French other’s arms. tradition, Don Carlos (1867) and Aïda (1871), and the two remarkable — Aïda, Act IV, scene 2. Duet: “O terra addio” 5 Shakespearean fruits of his old age, Otello (1887) and Falstaff(1893). and Back Into Our Own To a Distant World . Attila the Hun was an historical figure who ravaged much of Europe in When, in the search for “authenticity,” we try to imagine what a Verdi the 5th Century as warlord of a group of warrior tribes from the East premiere might have looked like, there is much we cannot know, in and center of the continent. One of his last campaigns was the terms of the acting conventions of the time. But with some of his later invasion of Italy. After destroying the city of Aquileia, causing its works, Aïda among them, we have designs for scenery and costumes, survivors to seek refuge in the marshes of what would later become and detailed production books, showing the disposition of chorus and Venice, and laying waste to much of the country north of the Po, he principals in all the main scenes. The production we shall show, from .

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