[4/2/2011] Preview -- In which we get in an "Otello" frame of mind (continued)

Here's the latter portion of Birgit Nilsson's Salome Final Scene, with Karl Böhm conducting, from the Met's 1972 Rudolf Bing Gala. (The complete performance can be heard below, if by chance the server gods smile on us.)


THAT AURAL SNAPSHOT OF CORELLI AS OTELLO

Corelli never did sing Otello, but as I mentioned last night we do have a lovely souvenir from the April 1972 Met gala honoring retiring general manager Rudolf Bing. It was included on what DG billed as "Volume I" of highlights from the gala -- there was never a Volume II, and I've never seen a CD transfer even of "Volume I." Here then is my own dub of the sublime Act I love duet, with the Polish soprano Teresa Zylis-Gara as Desdemona. Zylis-Gara had been the Desdemona of the premiere the month before of the new Otello production by Franco Zeffirelli, which got an enormous amount of use before it was finally replaced in 1995.

The surprising choice to conduct that production had been Karl Böhm. Although he conducted a fair amount of Verdi in Europe (there's a tingling 1970 broadcast performance of Macbeth from the Vienna State Opera with Christa Ludwig singing a gorgeous, chilling Lady Macbeth), this was his only Italian-opera assignment at the Met (unless you count The Marriage of Figaro and Don Giovanni, which I don't). I've always regretted that that season's broadcast was still in mono -- the following season, 1972-73, Met broadcasts went stereo. I think this excerpt gives us a glimpse of what we missed -- Böhm's Otello was the shapeliest we would have at the Met until . . . well, unless I've missed someone, and I don't think I have, we're still waiting.

WARNING: The site I use for the audio clips has been behaving utterly insanely tonight. I still haven't been able to create one of the clips I planned for this post, so it looks like we're going to lose the planned second bonus selection. For that matter, I'm not at all confident that we're going to get music out of the two clips I do have, officially. Well, we've got the video clips. I think.

OH WAIT . . . As perhaps an exercise in self-flagellation, I tried once more to create the file, and it went through! BUT WAIT AGAIN: Except that when I tried to play the clip, the audio file couldn't be found! Gosh, this is the funnest evening I've had in, hmm, at least a day. I'll keep trying, until I stop trying.

VERDI: Otello: Act I, Love Duet, "Già nella notte densa"

Franco Corelli (t), Otello; Teresa Zylis-Gara (s), Desdemona; Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, Karl Böhm, cond. DG, recorded live at the "Metropolitan Opera Gala Honoring Sir Rudolf Bing," Apr. 22, 1972

I never thought I would be offering the Final Scene of Strauss's Salome as a "throw-in," but as long as I had to clean the DG LP of Bing Gala excerpts, I thought we ought to hear something else from it, and why not this? You'll note that there's not much finesse in the orchestral playing, but then, finesse never figured prominently in Böhm's approach to Salome and Elektra; he went for slam-bang effect, and especially when he had Birgit Nilsson in the title role of either, as he often did, he knew he didn't have to hold back. This Salome final scene reaches a walloping climax.

R. STRAUSS: Salome, Op. 60: Final Scene

Birgit Nilsson (s), Salome; Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, Karl Böhm, cond. DG, recorded live at the "Metropolitan Opera Gala Honoring Sir Rudolf Bing," Apr. 22, 1972

And as a final bonus, we may or may not have Leontyne Price singing "Dove sono" from The Marriage of Figaro. (What would life be without a bit of mystery?)

MOZART: The Marriage of Figaro, K. 492: Aria, Countess Almaviva, "Dove sono"

Leontyne Price (s), Countess; Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, Francesco Molinari-Pradelli, cond. DG, recorded live at the "Metropolitan Opera Gala Honoring Sir Rudolf Bing," Apr. 22, 1972


IN TOMORROW'S SUNDAY CLASSICS POST

We hear Margaret Price as Verdi's Desdemona in 1976-77 and 1985, and some other folks as well.


RETURN TO THE BEGINNING OF THE POST

#