Word: corinth
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...downbeat at 8 p.m. But the show that everyone had been waiting for did not begin until 8:22. That was when Beverly Sills emerged from the wings at the Metropolitan Opera to join her fellow Greeks in the grim doings of Rossini's The Siege of Corinth. Looking slender and vulnerable in a long blue gown, Sills moved down a small set of stairs, but never had a chance to sing her opening line, "Che mat sento?"(What do I hear?). She knew what she heard-a minute-long roar of welcome not experienced at the Met since...
...turned, as it had to, into a free-for-all for her fans and the critics--an orgy of adulation. At 45, she's a superstar who has made it without the Met, which refused for years to recognize her and which now, with Rossini's The Siege of Corinth, has finally mounted for her the kind of production she deserves. Her fans paid up to $500 to see her on opening night and were in no mood for restraint or even courtesy: they cut off a singer in mid-phrase as soon as Sills stepped quietly on stage...
...tossed off the intricately ornamented bel canto lines with fire and easy grace; her voice is a light silvery instrument that takes cadenzas at breakneck speed and makes them sparkle. Sills the actress managed to breathe life into the flat character of Pamira--the daughter of the governor of Corinth who is torn between love for her country and love for the Turk King Maometto, her father's enemy. Sills's Pamira was emotionally focused--a earess of Maometto's arm conveyed sexual delight, and one act later a subtly different touch of the sleeve of Neocle, the Greek warrior...
This version of The Siege of Corinth, pieced together by conductor Thomas Schippers from 35 varying scores of the opera and 2800 pages of original manuscript, is seamless and vibrant, and adds a rare tragic work by Rossini to the stock of his popular comic operas. Schippers is apparently as good at sewing musical segments together as Rossini, who constantly borrowed from old operas to write new ones, and who was so cavalier about detail that if a page of his manuscript fell to the floor while he was composing, he'd write a new one from memory, being...
Thus with Siege of Corinth. It is one of Rossini's grandest operas, set in 15th century Corinth. The Turks, led by their Sultan Maometto (Justino Diaz), are hammering at the gates. Sills plays Pamira, the daughter of Cleomene (Harry Theyard), the governor of Corinth. Beverly, who talks as fast as she trills, narrates the plot in a style redolent of both Anna Russell and Rhoda Morgenstern: "It's very similar to Aida. The only difference being that my lover is a girl. Well, I mean to say, the part is played by a girl. Actually...