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key mi frena in tal momento

For those who are interested, the following clip will help establish the tonality of Rolando Villazòn‘s final aria last night.

Rolando’s key

(This clip was sent to La Cieca by a member of the cher public who prefers to remain anonymous. The clip is provided for discussion purposes only.)

96 comments

  • quoth the maven says:

    well, unless there’s a modulation between the orchestral intro and the aria itself, he sang it a half-tone higher than Bergonzi in this clip:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJT8venvXP0

    Is it me, or do some Parterre Boxers like singers to fail?

  • doug says:

    well, that’s certainly down a half-step. brilliant heading, btw.

  • David Utterback says:

    I know that the ending is sometimes transposed down, but I’m not familiar with precedents for the transposition starting at the beginning.

  • Quanto Painy Fakor says:

    Laughing my head off at that stupid clip!

  • kashania says:

    Incandescent! :)

  • Lindoro says:

    well, could we get some more excerpts from the actual singing? For discussion purposes obviously.

  • Lucky Pierre says:

    wasn’t he announced as sick? why such unnecessary glee?

  • Lindoro says:

    Because Pierre, it sounds suspicious. He relied on an allergy announcement in London even though he had been working at the theater for weeks. He has been using the health excuse for a while.

    Having the entire act, or at least the entire scene dropped down is a sign that his voice is deteriorating. Villazon and I are the same age, and we are both tenors; trust me the scene is a bitch to sing, but the tessitura is not unsustainable. There are issues there…

  • Perfidia says:

    Aren’t transpositions planned in advance?

  • La Cieca says:

    Perfidia: I would think that most transpositions are planned in advance. But a transposition that is done as often as the half-step in the last act of Lucia would be easy enough to get together on short notice.

    That said, I would assume that Villazon generally sings the scene transposed down, sick or not sick, so in this case probably it was planned from the beginning.