опять же инглиш. Как я без этой оперы?)))“Il Trovatore” by Giuseppe Verdi
What can I write about this opera?
Situation is standard for Verdian and some verismo operas. Love triangle “baritone-soprano-tenor” and the terrible end “And they all died, expect baritone, who will repent about tragedy, that he made with own hands, and the reason is, of course, - love”. And now stands a question: “Why soprano chosen tenor?”.
No one can understand the sopranos’ logic.
Count di Luna (baritone) is choleric temperamentally. He deeply and passionate loves Leonora, and when he sees soprano in embraces of Manrico, the tenor troubadour (trovatore), fiery jealous overwhelms his heart and obscures his mind. Now he doesn’t think other then: “Leonora will be my wife!” and sincerely believes in it, but maybe intuition whispers: “No. Remember – you’re baritone. And baritones never had happy-end although if it was a comic opera. But no, it’s Verdi”. But di Luna didn’t knew, that he lives in opera. For him all this was reality, and his fatal mistakes – too. He’s young and foolish, and this is his main problem.
Leonora, the blind soprano, - standard “fair innocent girl, who loves, of course, tenor”. But maybe she loved baritone, but wanted make him to be jealous. But she overdid it. It’s her fault and the same tragedy, as di Luna’s – youth and foolish teenage love.
Manrico isn’t attractive character for me, he is so ideal, and it’s a main problem. But no charisma in this person, I think so. I can’t many about him, because.
The plot is very difficult and complicated. And it’s a legend, that in one Milano bar there is a very old and closed bottle of a rare wine. This bottle can open that Great_Hero, who can retell shortly and clear all the story of “Il Trovatore”. They say, the bottle is closed to our days…
Yes, plot is “great”, but MUSIC! But such melodies, some of them are very famous – for example, choir of gypsy people, song of Azucena (mezzo-soprano, gypsy women and “mother” of Manrico) and cavatina of Ferrando (great bass, like-a-father for young count).
One of the best recordings of this opera ever is a black-white film-opera, 1957 with fantastic baritone Ettore Bastianini as Count di Luna, awesome soprano Leyla Gencer as Leonora, great mezzo-soprano Fedora Barbieri as Azucena , famous tenor Mario del Monaco as Manrico and magnificent bass Plinio Clabassi as Ferrando.