Renata's revenge
After more than a quarter of a century, Renata Scotto gets the last word over that silly queen who made a career of disrupting her Met performances. The DVD of the "Live from the Met" telecast of Luisa Miller was released today, and is available at Amazon.com at a 30% discount off the list price. This is the performance of January 20, 1979, during which Fernando or whatever her name was shrieked "Brava Maria Callas!" in the instant of silence before Scotto launched into "Lo vidi, e 'l primo palpito." No word so far as to whether the DVD preserves this non-Verdian interpolation, but the important news here is that this Luisa Miller is one of the triumphs of the early James Levine era at the Met, with Placido Domingo, Sherrill Milnes, Bonaldo Giaiotti, James Morris and of course La Scottissima herself in A+ form. If memory serves (remember, it's been 25 years since La Cieca's weary eyes have feasted on this video), the live camerawork is far simpler and more immediate than the overly tweaked fussiness that plagued the Brian Large extravaganzas of the 1980s.
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100 Comments:
It indeed is a great performance of one of my favorite operas. Im so glad they are finally releasing it!!
Well, now I have it to add it to my (ever-growing) list of DVDs to buy. I do like this opera very much.
Already ordered it this morning!! Yay! Brava Scotto! Now let's get them to release her Trittico and Don Carlo Elisabetta...
Good memory dearest La C, considering you were but 5 at the time. But so precocious in your knee-pants, I'm sure. :)
Yes winpal, I too was about 5 or 6 (yeah right!); however, I vividly remember the performance and it was great. In fact, the subject performance turned me on to Verdi's Lusia. I especially love Luisa's knock down drag out with Wurm--it's what I love about opera! With the right singers (as in this performance) it melts the stage lights!
I'm waiting with bated breath for the day when they finaly decide to give us the Scotto Trittico. I love that one.
You know, callasorphan, your comments and others are prompting me to get this. I have only seen a couple of so-so performances over the years (somehow missed this telecast, and believe me it was not because I was too young) and as a result tend to put Luisa lower down on my Verdi list. I suspect Renata will be the one to finally open my eyes and ears. I too would love to see her Trittico. I adore her Suor Angelica recording.
GET IT winpal! Believe me, you wont regret it!!!!
Damn, as if I don't have enough Verdi in my DVD collection...lol.
Oh, and Trittico would be great. When Scotto was in form, she was a force...
baryton francais, one can't have too much Verdi. I gave up years ago trying to stop buying Verdi. I love dear Joe Green too much!!
But if you really have to cut back, I suggest beginning with Falstaff.
I pretend to laugh at its robust comedy in about the same spirit as I pretend to find Chaucer's Miller's Tale anything beyond frat house humor.
Still haven't been able to enjoy Luisa. Unfortunately my only experience of it in the opera house was at Aix-en-Provence back in the 70's.
The performance was Aix at its most provincial. It was memorable for only one thing: the tenor, whose name I have mercifully forgotten, was soundly booed after his second act (?) aria. Next thing we knew he jumped off the stage and came at the unfortunately gentleman who had been booing. Two stagehands ran out to hold him back. The gentleman doft his tuxedo jacket, handed it to this wife and offered to take the tenor on. Then the audience, in true French fashion got into the act. Half were shouting that he had the right to boo he had paid for his ticket, the other half wailing that it was impolite to boo. The performacne ground to a halt for 10 minutes. Had the staging been anything but traditional and jad it not been 1974, it could have been mistaken for a piece of regie-theatre. As it was it just added excitement to a very dull evening.
That was also the year they did Clemenza with a tenor Sesto and a baritone (Alan Titus) Annio. Bad year at Aix!
The one good - no make that great - thing about music in Provence that year was the Caballé-Vickers-Veasey Norma at Orange. I was there that incredible night and it made the whole trip worth it.
I have seen the "Luisa Miller" DVD and I don´t find the "Brava, Maria Callas" in the silence before "lo vidi é il primo palpito". If you want to hear this awful moment you can find the video (without the editing) in Youtube
Apart from this, this DVD is by far the most dramatic and beautifully singed "Luisa Miller" that one can hope for.
You know, the logic of the human mind bogels me. If you're going to a Met performance Solely to praise Callas and Boo Scotto, why not do it at a performance where the Soprano is singing a role Callas actually SANG? A Scotto Norma or Violetta or Tosca surely would have been more apropriate for such a comment.
Willym saw the famous 74 Norma in Orange? (AAARGHH! What an amazing memory to have...) And actually boringwhitegirl, I think Falstaff is great... IMO, there really isn't much of Verdi that I could find myself passing up, especially if it has some great singers singing it!
I have a dirty little confession to make: I'm really not too much of a Early Verdi fan. No, don't get me wrong, I love the man. Everything after RIGOLETTO is gold. But NABUCCO? ERNANI? MACBETH? They leave me cold, and what's more, i can't tell them apart. So I don't have too great a love for LUISA MILLER.
got this video last night, ran home and watched it. yes the boo is edited out. (Of course)the performance is truly sublime. prime Scotto, buy it immediately and relish what commitment and artistry really are (ARE YOU LISTENING RENEEEEEE)
about the famous boo. There was this demented Brazilian ex ballet dancer who use to come to the standing room line all the time with this ancient cassette recorder on which she would blast really poor quality tapes of Maria, annoying everyone within fifty feet of her. She was really angry over Renata's interview on a documentary on Maria in which Renata describes Maria's less than charitable attitude towards Renata after Renata's success in Sonambula and their work together on the MEDEA recording for Cetra (I believe Callas wanted Scotto's aria cut) This queen was so angry, that not only did she shout Brava Maria Callas at the broadcast, she also, I have been told, tried to attack Renata with a shopping cart in the old A&P near Lincoln Center.
It is one of the best opera performaces I ve EVER seen on film/video - and I seen plenty!!!
The last act is sublime.
why does it say general manager: joseph volpe, on the back of the dvd....he was neither general manager then nor now.
Yes...I remember this performance well. I love "Luisa Miller." Once we get past the opening chorus of Act 3, it is very easy to proclaim the rest of the act as "when Verdi moved from his Gallery Years to his Middle Years Greatness." I love the sequence of duet, duet, trio, finale of Act 3.
About Scotto....I traveled with a pack of rich old queens that hated her. Yet one oldster in the group told me, "Scotto gave me some of my worst nights in the opera house, but she gave me some of my best."
I would always go into a Scotto performance expecting booing, but I would usually leave with enormous respect for her. I saw a bad "Ballo," a dreadful "Werther" opposite Kraus. Yet I also saw a moving "Butterfly," "Bolena,"
"Norma," "Tosca."
I saw the infamous San Francisco "Gioconda" with the fourth act booing and heckling, and it remains one of the most dramatic and thrilling opera experiences because of all the extra drama it carried with it.
I always wished she had done "Iris" and "Resurrezione," but there are only so many roles and so few years in a diva's career.
I'm grateful that so much of her work got preserved on CDs and now we will get the DVDs.
Like Rysanekfreak, I heard a lot of performances by Scotto when she was in poor vocal condition and there was usually a lot of booing. In fact, by the time I was in a position to hear her live, she was really past it. But, I have a lot of her recordings, and am always moved by her singing and her artistry. She has a wonderful sense of line and an absolutely beautiful legato. She truely lives the characters she is singing. And, she has a way with Italian that just can't be taught. It's pure instinct. I'll be getting this recording this weekend.
And you get a blond Placido too.
Have to say if I had been in range of that vile queen who tried to dissrupt Madame Scotto, I'd have hit the bitch with the nearest object I could lay my hands on. What a frigging cheek!
I think such "fits" not only insult the artists - they also insult every other audience member- who've paid very good money to be there.
Wish I knew where one could buy books like Scotto's biography- don't see them here at all- perhaps I should try ebay.
Know what you mean boringwhitegirl- I love most of Mr Green's work passionately but no matter how hard I try I just can't get into Falstaff- even though musicologists go into raptures over it. I know its brilliant - but just like Britten- it just doesn't do it for me- I must have a circuit board missing...:(
BRAVA CALLAS!
Could it be that Mr. Green and his script writers were not really successful with works from German sources (Stiffelio, Luisa, Don Carlos?) I know--Joe and Arigo had success with Shakespeare, so I will let someone set me aright on my pondering.
"Don Carlos" is not really successful????? Those are almost fightin' words to me.
OK, a big chunk of Don Carlos Works-except for the confused ending. Joe Green himself wrote that Schiller took great liberties with the historical facts about the real Carlos' mental mess, and what the real Eboli and Posa were like--But Joe's music is great, and the opus is a masterpeice on its own terms. Sorry about my snarks.
I just came from Don Carlo at Los Angeles Opera, actually. My problem is I can only remember the tunes to the Friendship duet and the Veil song when all is said and done. By the way, Don Carlo is a MUCH better role for Salvatore Licitra than his abysmal Alvaro last season. Zajick, by the way, was amazing. And Furlanetto's still got it. REALLY still got it.
Baritenor -- you're right about Furlanetto. I just saw him last night on a PBS broadcast here of the Vienna State Opera 50th Anniversary of Reopening gala (taped last Fall). He was really great in Leporello's aria and the finale of Act 1 of Don Giovanni. My favorite singer of the evening.
Speaking of that Vienna Gala, I have a few questions.....
1. When did Agnes Baltsa morph into Elaine Strich?
2. Who wrote that bizarre concert ending to the Amneris-Radames duet?
3. Who was the poor mezzo who sang only word...as Amneris...at the end of the Act 3 excerpt? In real life, did she at least get to sing the beginning of Act 3 and it just didn't make it through the editing process?
4. Someone on another forum mentioned some "Frau ohne Schatten" scenes that were performed but cut. Does anyone know the who and what of that?
5. Why does Gruberova sing Mozart like it's Donizetti?
6. If Violetta Urmana is going to be a big star now, shouldn't she get a stylist to make her seem less frumpy?
I saw Scotto a few times, and even turned pages for her accompanist at a recital she gave in Denver in 1979 (or thereabouts). It must have been "Fernando" who yelled out "Brava Callas" in the opening night "Norma" ca. 1981 that got a lot of media attention at the time. In fact, Scotto's Norma was a mess. I said at the time that I could have sung it as well as she did, but the costume wouldn't have fit me.
Seriously, she was a wonderful actress, as others have said -- I still remember her being really scary in "Idomeneo" (as Elettra?), stomping across the stage in four-inch heels -- so the "Luisa Miller" should be excellent. Do you want to hear my theory? Good, here it is: she ruined her voice on dramatic roles she wasn't suited for, because they were, well, the most dramatic, and then went on singing after her high notes were no longer there. As divas go there was nothing unusual in that, but her acting chops were one of a kind.
Scotto is poison to the ear. Everything above a moderate E is an empty husk of whisked air. High drama, low vocal production..Who enjoys this woman?
-Brava Maria Callas!
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Build a watch in 179 easy steps - by C. Forsberg.
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Lottery: A tax on people who are bad at math.
When there's a will, I want to be in it.
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Suicidal twin kills sister by mistake!
Hello all!
When there's a will, I want to be in it.
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