Sunday Classics preview: In Verdi's "La Traviata," Violetta's first life-transforming event

Valerie Masterson sings the torturous "Martern aller Artern" ("Tortures of all kinds") from Mozart's Abduction from the Seraglio, at Glyndebourne, 1980, with Charles Mackerras conducting the London Philharmonic. Constanza, held captive in the Turkish Pasha Selim's harem, makes clear to the pasha that nothing he can do will be sufficient to make her yield voluntarily to his amorous wishes.

by Ken

If there's anything does supremely well, it's representing life-transforming events and experiences. I'm inclined to think that with its combination of music with all the rest of the theater's dramatic resources, it does this better than any other dramatic medium. I'd like to try to demonstrate what I mean this week and the week after next. (We have other business next week.)

For several weeks now we've been hearing Valerie Masterson in all manner of repertory, from G&S to Rodgers & Hammerstein by way of Handel, Verdi, and Wagner. Now we close in on her admirable (and admirably well-preserved phonographically) assumptions of two of the central roles in the core operatic literature: first, Violetta in Verdi's La Traviata; then, Marguerite in Gounod's Faust.

THE VALERIE MASTERSON FLASHBACK/PREVIEW POSTS

Part 1: We haven't quite finished with this lovely soprano
WAGNER: The Rhinegold: Opening Scene excerpts. G&S: Sorcerer: "Oh, happy young heart" (plus two other sopranos' versions); Incantation Scene (with John Reed et al.) Video: HANDEL: Julius Caesar: "V'adoro, pupille" (with Janet Baker; ENO, Mackerras)
Part 2: We STILL haven't finished with Valerie Masterson
G&S: Pirates of Penzance: "When the foeman bears his steel" . . . "Go, ye heroes"; Ah, leave me not to pine (with Robert Tear). Mikado: "Were you not to Ko-Ko plighted" (with Tear). VERDI: La Traviata: Prelude & Opening Scene; "I saw a vision ethereal"; Act II, Scene 1: "What's that?" . . . "Love me, Alfredo" (with John Brecknock; ENO, Mackerras). Video: HANDEL: Acis and Galatea: "Oh, happy we" (with Anthony Rolfe Johnson)
Part 3: Traveling with Valerie Masterson from 1994 to 1967
G&S: Pirates of Penzance: Poor wandering one (three versions). Yeomen of the Guard: "I have a song to sing, O" (with John Cartier). RODGERS & HAMMERSTEIN: The King and I: "Getting to know you"; "When I think of Tom" . . . "Hello, young lovers"; March of the Siamese Children"

SO, THIS WEEK TRAVIATA

In the course of the opera's three acts Violetta experiences three of those transforming events. The first is a happy one, and that's the one we're going to concern ourselves with in tonight's and tomorrow night's previews. Tonight we hear the actual convulsions of that first event; tomorrow night, as Act I concludes, we hear what she makes of it. (The good news continues into the beginning of Act II, but unfortunately that's going to be the extent of the good news. On Sunday, Violetta and we will have our first encounter with Alfredo's father, and for her everything changes.)

But first, it has become something of a tradition here, when we're dealing with an opera, to hear how the thing starts, just to help set the mood. We've already heard the Prelude to Act I of Traviata, and for that matter we're going to hear it several more times in the click-through, as part of the opera's opening scene, but I don't see any reason why we shouldn't take a moment just to enjoy this remarkable little piece.

Or two moments, actually, because we're going to hear two performances, featuring the same conductor (Herbert von Karajan) and orchestra (that of La Scala), recorded a week apart in December 1964. I think they're interestingly different, and will explain in the click-through the difference in circumstances that I think explains the differences.

VERDI: La Traviata: Prelude to Act I


Orchestra of the Teatro all Scala, Herbert von Karajan, cond. Both recorded live, December 1964


TO CONTINUE OUR EAVESDROPPING ON VIOLETTA'S
FIRST LIFE-TRANSFORMING EXPERIENCE, CLICK HERE.

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