Word: traviatas
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...Opera grew into one of the most interesting companies in America. It never had chic like Salzburg or Bay-reuth-but then, the European festivals do not offer beer, hot dogs and wild animals to patrons bored with La Traviata and Rigoletto. Besides, where else could one hear Gladys Swarthout and Rise Stevens break in their Carmens, see Jeanette MacDonald in Faust, catch James Melton in his first Madama Butterfly, or stroll into a Rigoletto and hear Jan Peerce and Robert Weede making their professional debuts...
...responsible for the transformation is Stage Director Frank Corsaro, 43, who believes that operatic tradition is often nothing more than a catalogue of yesterday's clichés. As he showed with his productions of La Traviata and Madama Butterfly, Corsaro is a determined spoiler when he confronts the creaking plots of traditional opera. If he wants to bring on familiar characters at unexpected moments, he does so. If he decides to invent minor characters, he does that...
...known as Beverly Sills, shares with her mother Shirley. Alone in the living room, Beverly sings the despairing recitative, Where Has It Got Me?, and tells how she performed 63 Micaelas in 63 one-night stands of Carmen, and 54 Violettas in 63 nights of La Traviata. A messenger enters, bearing an offer from the Frankfurt Opera to star in La Traviata, Faust and Carmen for $125 a week. Over whelmed, Beverly sings the beguiling aria, To Frankfurt Will I Wander...
...Only Lasted One Day in Frankfurt, and explains that because she found it a gloomy, unfriendly place, she returned to New York without having stepped foot on the Frankfurt stage. The audition now begins. Beverly walks to the front of the stage and sings Sempre Libera from La Traviata. Applause is heard from the pit, and it is obvious that she has finally captivated the City Opera...
Last week she rounded off a series of three appearances in a production of La Traviata created for her at the Frankfurt Opera. It was a lusty performance that emphasized the low-life origins of the heroine (who in the Dumas novel went from waif to courtesan to wreck within eight years). Silja contributed considerably to that characterization with a tense, far-ranging voice (31 octaves) and a spectacular stage presence that can flash with the music's mood from tigress to tragedienne. The ultimate tribute to the Silja Traviata was apparent immediately after each performance; at the Frankfurt...