The 20th-Century Baritone: Pavel Lisitsian (1911-2004)

 The voices of Lawrence Tibbett Leonard Warren, Robert Merrill, Ettore Bastianini, and Tito Gobbi have been preserved in complete recordings of the great Verdi roles. An earlier cohort of Italians, Antonio Scotti, Pasquale Amato, and Giuseppe De Luca, left a rich legacy of recorded excerpts. And my apologies to those excellent singers whose names I have omitted. But no list of Verdians should be without Pavel Lisitsian, a Soviet artist of Armenian descent who was the principal baritone of the Bolshoi from 1940 until the mid-1960s.

Lisitsian rarely sang outside of the Soviet Union. He did make a rapturously reviewed recital tour of the United States in 1960 and sang twice in opera, once in New York (March 3), once in San Francisco (as Valentin in Faust) a month later. In a chilling coincidence, his sole Met appearance was as Amonasro on the night before Leonard Warren, the Met’s leading baritone, died onstage while singing in a performance of La Forza del destino.

Along with the standard Russian repertoire, Lisitsian sang the major Verdi roles, all in the vernacular, as was the custom even in the major European opera houses through the 1950s.

Lisitsian’s instrument is utterly even from top to bottom, resting on an endless supply of breath that gives him access to a wide dynamic span. His pristine timbre sustains a clarity of diction and an expressive range of interpretive choices. His recording of Renato’s aria from Un Ballo in mashcera, “Eri tu,” encompasses the character’s fortissimo rage over what he thinks is his wife’s betrayal and his pianissimo regret at the loss of her affection.

 

 

Prince Yeletsky’s aria in Act II of The Queen of Spades, a heartfelt declaration of love, demonstrates Lisitsian’s exceptional legato, the precision of his intonation and attacks, and ease throughout his range. This recording is the gold standard for one of Tchaikovsky’s most haunting melodies.

Lisitsian concertized extensively. His recitals included Russian art songs, but also German lieder, in Russian. (During his North American tour, he sang in German and Italian.) Here is Schubert’s “An die Musik” in an odd arrangement with orchestra, taken much more slowly than by most artists, but overflowing with passion and gorgeous tone.

 

 

P. S. YouTube has a good number of items performed by Lisitsian, all of them worth hearing. Here is the Act III Aïda-Amonasro duet, apparently from a live performance at Moscow’s Bolshoi, with the thrilling Galina Vishnevskaya (her 1961 Met Aïda was memorable).

 

Puccini’s La Rondine: The Swallow Returns

 

It took La Rondine many decades to stake out a secure place in the repertoire of the world’s opera houses. The work’s birth was troubled. In 1913, Puccini was approached by a prestigious Viennese theatre to create songs for an operetta. The terms were favorable, but the composer soon transformed the commission into his preferred form, a sung-through opera. The Great War intervened and Italy and Austria became enemy belligerents. The 1917 premiere of La Rondine therefore took place in neutral Monte Carlo; the leads were the marvelous Gilda dalla Rizza and Tito Schipa.

Puccini, famous for revisions to his scores, changed the register of the secondary tenor, the poet Prunier, to baritone, then back again to tenor, also adding an aria for the tenor lead, Ruggero. This version did not succeed at Vienna’s Volksoper in 1920.

Subsequently, and with difficulty, La Rondine found its present ending: Magda, the former mistress of a rich Parisian, is thought “virtuous” by the naive Ruggero. She decides to return to her protector, thereby leaving her beloved young lover rather than marry him under the weight of her shady past. The similarities to Verdi’s La Traviata, without the tragic conclusion, are evident.

Puccini’s hummable score brims with the waltz and other dance rhythms and provides lilting melodies to the two couples, Magda and Ruggero, and Prunier and Magda’s maid, Lisette. Magda is a rich opportunity for a lyric soprano with an easy top register and access to floating pianissimos, both attributes called for in Act I. Each of her two arias reflects on her own life and desire.

The first, “Chi il bel sogno di Doretta potè indovinar? (Who could guess the beautiful dream of Doretta?),” tells the story of Doretta who prefers the kiss of a poor student to that of a king. There is a plethora of lovely versions of this aria on YouTube. Among the very best is Anna Moffo’s, with its creamy timbre and perfectly judged acuti (high notes). The clip is drawn from the opera’s 1966 complete recording, conducted by Francesco Molinari Pradelli.

Near the conclusion of Act I, Magda recalls an evening when she found romance at the famous dance hall, Bal Bullier. Here is “Ore dolci e divine (Sweet and Divine Hours)” from Leontyne Price’s 1971 recital disk, conducted by Edward Downes. Price’s soft-grained rendition reminds us that, had she chosen, she would have been one of the greatest lyric sopranos of the 20^th century instead of the era’s preeminent Verdi dramatic soprano.

 

In search of true love, Magda runs off to the Bal Bullier where, in Act II, she and Ruggero fall in love. The tenor launches one of the most thrilling ensembles in all Puccini: “Bevo al tuo fresco sorriso (I drink to your young smile).” Roberto Alagna and Angela Gheorghiu are the principal artists in this performance.

 

P.S.

Highly recommended are these two selections found on YouTube:

The touching final scene in which Magda leaves Ruggero: “No! Non lasciarmi solo! (Don’t leave me alone!)” The clip is from the telecast of a live New York City Opera performance starring Elizabeth Knighton and Jon Garrison.

 

Lucrezia Bori was the Met’s first and only Magda between 1929 and 1936. Here, her art and charm survive despite poor sound unflattering to her brilliant timbre. The clip ("Ore dolci, divine")

is from a 1937 recording, made after her retirement from opera.

 

  

 

 

 

.

Singers Remembered, 1: Kathleen Ferrier (1912-1953)

Singers Remembered is Operapost’s series devoted to the most representative clips of artists whose memory is alive for today’s operaphiles.

Kathleen Ferrier’s death from cancer truncated the career of one of the most beloved and admired singers of the 20^th century. International fame came to this British contralto in 1946 when she participated in the premiere performances of Benjamin Britten’s opera The Rape of Lucretia. A favorite of star conductors Bruno Walter and John Barbirolli, her concert tours brought her to America and Europe beginning in 1948. Her sole roles in opera were Britten’s Lucretia and Orfeo in Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice. The repertoire of her song recitals was drawn principally from German lieder, English art songs, and English folk songs. She was a frequent soloist in Handel’s Messiah and in the orchestral/vocal works of Elgar and Mahler. Ferrier’s rich column of sound, evenness of emission, and deep immersion in music and text are haunting. Once heard, her timbre is not forgotten.

Among the many tributes from her colleagues, that of Bruno Walter has been highlighted by biographers: "The greatest thing in music in my life has been to have known Kathleen Ferrier and Gustav Mahler—in that order."

Ferrier was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1951 but continued to sing, often in great pain, until eight months before her death. Her final performance was as Orfeo at Covent Garden in Feb. 1953, conducted by Barbirolli. She had contracted to sing the opera four times, but during the second her femur collapsed. She got through to the end by standing immobile and relying on the cast members to improvise the action. Several hospitalizations were unable to arrest the disease; she died in October.

Here is a recording of Orfeo’s aria, “Che faro senza Euridice (What will I do without Euridice)” taken from a live 1951 performance in Amsterdam, soon after she learned of her cancer diagnosis.

Ferrier’s a cappella recording of the Northumberland folk song, “Blow the Wind Southerly,” documents the richeness of her voice, the evenness of her scale, and her penetration of the text.

Lieder featured prominently on Ferrier's recital programs. This is her moving interpretation of Schumann’s “Widmung (Dedication).”

Known for the wit she was rarely called upon to express in her predominantly serious repertoire, here is her rollicking rendition of Schubert’s delightful “Der Musensohn (The Son of the Muses).

With Bruno Walter conducting the Vienna Philharmonic, “Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen (I am lost to the world), is evidence of Ferrier’s strong affinity for Mahler.

 

Youtube has many Ferrier clips. All are recommended. The excerpts from Handel’s “Messiah” are remarkable.

 

 

 

La Forza del destino

The Metropolitan has mounted four productions of La Forza del destino and has presented the opera more than two hundred times, about as often as Fledermaus and Manon Lescaut. Late in entering the company’s repertoire, its 1918 premiere was notable for its stellar cast of Enrico Caruso, Giuseppe De Luca, José Mardones, and the debut, on any opera stage, of Rosa Ponselle. Rudolf Bing counted Forza among the notable Verdi revivals of his regime; opening night 1953 had Zinka Milanov, Richard Tucker, Leonard Warren, and Cesare Siepi. The remarkable décor designed by Eugene Berman was seen in fourteen out of thirty or so subsequent seasons. The 1996 edition of Verdi’s work, also decked out in traditional sets and costumes, fared much less well; it earned but one repetition more than a decade later.

 

It is doubtful if the 2024 Forza would be recognized by the artists who played Leonora, Alvaro, Carlo, and Padre Guardiano in the past. Mariusz Trelinski plants the narrative, based on a 19^th century Spanish melodrama, in a contemporary and post-Apocalyptic America, as he teases out the themes of Patriarchy and War.

This post recalls a few of the great singers who made Verdi’s brilliant, but sprawling and problematic La Forza del destino, such a frequent repertory item.

Leonora, the beleaguered heroine who seeks asylum and solitude after her beloved Alvaro accidentally kills her father, pleads for the help of the Virgin in her Act II aria “Madre, pietosa vergine.” Zinka Milanov, who holds the record for the most Leonoras at the Met, was at her peak for the 1953 revival. The depth, roundness, and power of her sound never prevents her from making a soft landing on the high notes. Her famous pianissimo is but one feature of this deeply felt rendition of the piece, drawn from a recital disk.

Carlo Bengonzi, acknowledged as the consummate Verdi tenor of his generation, is heard here in a 1965 live performance. Bergonzi applies his warm timbre and scrupulous phrasing to the tragic Act III aria, “O, tu che in seno agli angeli.” Disconsolate, Alvaro evokes Leonora, whom he believes dead and among the angels.

The most familiar music in La Forza del destino is Leonora’s final aria, “Pace, pace, mio dio.” Alone in her hermitage, she declares her love for Alvaro, whom she, too, believes dead, and prays for peace. Her outburst in the final moments is a curse on those who dare invade her asylum. The clip is from a 1953 live performance of the opera from Florence, conducted by Dimitri Mitropoulos. Leonora is Renata Tebaldi who unstintingly deploys her lush voice in one of her favorite roles.

YouTube is a treasure trove of Forza excerpts; Rosa Ponselle, Beniamino Gigli, Eileen Farrell, Franco Corelli,  RichardTucker are highly recommended. Of particular interest are the Enrico Caruso/Giuseppe De Luca and Jussi Bjorling/Robert Merrill duets.