Word: sopranos
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Last week New York's Metropolitan Opera offered a new Norma production with Joan Sutherland in the title role. Hardly had she finished her first duet with Mezzo-Soprano Marilyn Horne (as Adalgisa) than the audience began to cheer and occasionally stamp and yell. The enthusiasm was fully justified. Sutherland's voice warmed toward a soaring, languorous tenderness. Horne, making one of the greatest Met debuts, showed a vocal reach and richness that exceeded nearly anybody's gasp. In Mira, O Norma, closing Act III, the two together floated along like two strings of a violin being...
...Home was not interested in making her debut in such customary mezzo roles as the bitch (Amneris) in Aida or the witch (Azucena) in Trovatore. What she wanted and got was a role demanding enough to show off a voice already broader in stylistic range than that of any soprano singing opera today...
...opening-night audience sat in stunned silence, then broke into shouts of enthusiasm. They called for Composer Floyd and for Director Frank Corsaro. With Baritone Julian Patrick as George, Tenor Robert Moulson as the doomed half-wit Lennie, and Soprano Carol Bayard as the ranch-house temptress who teases Lennie once too often, Of Mice and Men seems uniquely American. Like Steinbeck's depression-depressed characters, Floyd's opera has calluses on its hands and hot blood in its heart. It will probably be around a long time...
...however, Bernstein fell in love with Composer Pietro Mascagni's original score, which calls for much slower tempos than the opera customarily is given. (His performance ran a full ten minutes longer than the normal 70 minutes.) Tension and excitement drained away as Tenor Franco Corelli and Soprano Grace Bumbry (Santuzza) dutifully sacrificed dramatic pacing to accuracy, concentrating on breathing deeply to manage the long phrases...
...Rise from the Deadly. Zeffirelli's Sicilian setting was full of church steps and free of novelty. His Pagliacci included a dusty road, a gnarled tree, a brilliant sunset and a great deal of lively Method movement. Here, if the pace was present, the voices were lacking. Dynamic Soprano Teresa Stratas fell sick and had to be replaced at the last minute. Veteran Tenor Richard Tucker had neither the warmth nor the fire to create dislike in the audience and then transform it into pity. Only Baritone Sherrill Milnes as the deformed Tonio had the strong, rich reserves...