[7/31/2011] Sunday Classics: The seething revolutionary rage of "Andrea Chénier" certainly strikes a chord at our present moment (continued)

Mario del Monaco sings the Improvviso in a 1961 Japanese video performance of Chénier.


ABOUT THE PERFORMANCES

When we put this scene back together, in addition to the 1938 San Francisco performance with Beniamino Gigli and Elisabeth Rethberg, we're going to hear two perfectly okay-sounding studio recordings. In our "breakdown" sequence, though, the way it worked out the recordings we're going to hear don't sound all that nice. I think they're all listenable, though, and especially since the excerpts are brief or briefish, I hope you can bear with them. You can always jump ahead to the stereo recordings of the full scene.

One oddity in the choice of recordings is that the two I chose for the excerpts in which the novelist Fléville is featured prominently (Nos. 1 and 3) I gravitated to performances that boast about-to-be front-line baritones: Kostas Paskalis (who went on to quite a distinguished career) in the 1960 Vienna performance and Enzo Sordello in the 1955 La Scala performance.

Speaking of which, I wound up using it for all seven of our scenelets, for two reasons. In increasing importance:

(1) It really is a good performance, with some good singers in crucial roles, like Sordello as Fléville and comprimario tenor Mario Carlin as the Abbé. I've had an old Cetra LP edition of it sitting on my shelves for decades, rarely listened to -- partly because of the mediocre sound and partly because its one major cast letdown is in a role that, as you may have gathered, matters a lot to me: Carlo Gérard. Since it's his great monologue that starts the opera off, the combination of the mediocre sound and the sound of one of my least favorite baritones, Aldo Protti, pretty well put me off.

(2) In order to see what kind of sound I could coax out of the LPs in MP3 form, I went ahead and did all the work to make all of the audio files, which created a strong disposition to use them. I hope I'm not kidding myself about the sound, which I realize is limited, and distorts considerably at even moderate signal levels, is surprisingly listenable.

Okay, here we go. I've included timings for our performances in brackets just to give you a sense of the size of each scenelet.

GIORDANO, Andrea Chénier, from Act I --

1. The first important guest arrives (with entourage),
soon eclipsed by the really important guest [1:24, 1:13]

Fléville, "Commosso, lusingato"

Among the guests (the COUNTESS has told MADDALENA) are two notables: a distinguished writer coming from Italy and an Abbé coming from Paris. The writer, FLÉVILLE, arrives first, with two fellow artists in tow, a composer and a young poet, and is touched by the effusiveness of his reception -- only to be better-dealed as soon as the really important guest, the Abbé coming from Paris, arrives.

Kostas Paskalis (b), Fléville; Elisabeth Höngen (ms), Contessa di Coigny; Renata Tebaldi (s), Maddalena di Coigny; Fritz Sperlbauer (t), the Abbé; Vienna State Opera Orchestra, Lovro von Matačić, cond. Live performance, June 26, 1960
Enzo Sordello (b), Fléville; Maria Amadini (ms), Contessa di Coigny; Maria Callas (s), Maddalena di Coigny; Mario Carlin (t), the Abbé; Orchestra of the Teatro alla Scala, Antonino Votto, cond. Live performance, Jan. 8, 1955

2. The Abbé brings alarming news from Paris [1:13, 1:08]

Abbé, "Devole è il rè"

I adore this little scene, which it seems to me we've somehow touched on. (I really should try to dig up the link if there is one.) The lines I love in particular are the Countess's in response to the Abbé's news of the (unspecified) abuse of the statue of Henri IV, first asking where it will all end, then wailing: "They no longer fear God."

ABBÉ [graciously flattered by this demonstration, kisses numerous hands and makes bows that resemble genuflections; meanwhile the COUNTESS personally serves him some jam]: The king is debilitated.
FLÉVILLE: Has he given in?
ABBÉ: He was badly advised.
COUNTESS: Necker?*
[*Jacques Necker was Louis VXI's finance minister, who was pressing serious reforms on the king, including the formation of the Third Estate in the 1789 Estates General, representing the populace other than the clergy ( the First Estate) and the nobility (the Second Estate). Later that year the Third Estate would be reconstituted as the National Assembly.]
ABBÉ: Let's not speak of him! [Tastes the jam, sighing in a gesture of supreme affliction.]
THE OTHERS: That Necker!
We're dying of curiosity!
ABBÉ [this time resolutely attacks the jam, digging into it with the whole spoon]: We have the Third Estate!
THE OTHERS: Ah! Ah!
ABBÉ: And I've seen abused . . .
THE OTHERS: Who?
ABBÉ: The statue of Henri IV.
THE OTHERS: Horror!
COUNTESS: Where will it all end?
ABBÉ: I was wondering that too.
COUNTESS: They no longer fear God!
ABBÉ [handing his cup to a young man]: Indeed, fair ladies, I'm desolate to bring you such news.

Gabor Carelli (t), the Abbe; George Cehanovsky (b), Fléville; Martha Lipton (ms), Contessa di Coigny; Zinka Milanov (s), Maddalena di Coigny; Metropolitan Opera Chorus and Orchestra, Fausto Cleva, cond. Live performance, Dec. 28, 1957
Mario Carlin (t), the Abbé; Enzo Sordello (b), Fléville; Maria Amadini (ms), Contessa di Coigny; Maria Callas (s), Maddalena di Coigny; Chorus and Orchestra of the Teatro alla Scala, Antonino Votto, cond. Live performance, Jan. 8, 1955

3. Fléville successfully changes the subject [4:34, 4:01]

Fléville, "Passiamo la sera allegramente"

"Let's spend the evening merrily," says the novelist, and he introduces a pastoral entertainment based on his new novel, in which regretful bands of shepherds and shepherdesses bid each other farewell.

Kostas Paskalis (b), Fléville; Fritz Sperlbauer (t), the Abbé; Vienna State Opera Chorus and Orchestra, Lovro von Matačić, cond. Live performance, Jun 26, 1960
Enzo Sordello (b), Fléville; Mario Carlin (t), the Abbé; Chorus and Orchestra of the Teatro alla Scala, Antonino Votto, cond. Live performance, Jan. 8, 1955

4. Attention turns to the junior member of
Fléville's party, the young poet Andrea Chénier [0:33]

I want to do some pretty fine subdividing of the lead-up to the Improvviso, so we're going to break down just the 1955 La Scala recording into these mini-component parts, and then hear Nos. 4-7 from a 1957 Met performance in one fell swoop (allowing for a CD track switch at the start of the Improvviso).

Contessa, "Signor Chénier?"; Chénier, "Madama la Contessa?"

"Your muse is silent?" the Countess says to the young poet, who tells her his muse as "retiring" and wishes to be silent. Other guests poke fun at him, and Maddalena bets her friends that she can get the poet to poeticize.

Maria Amadini (ms), Contessa di Coigny; Mario del Monaco (t), Andrea Chénier; Enzo Sordello (b), Fléville; Mario Carlin (t), the Abbé; Maria Callas (s), Maddalena di Coigny; Orchestra of the Teatro alla Scala, Antonino Votto, cond. Live performance, Jan. 8, 1955

5. Maddalena proceeds to set the young poet up [1:12]

Maddalena, "Al mio dire perdono" . . . Chénier, "Il vostro desio è commando gentil"

FIORINELLI, the musician brought by FLÉVILLE, sits at the harpsichord and begins to play. MADDALENA goes up to CHÉNIER.

MADDALENA: Pardon my words and my boldness!
I'm a woman, and I'm curious.
I long to hear
an eclogue of yours, a poem
for a nun or for a wife.
HER FRIENDS: For a nun or for a wife.
CHÉNIER: Your wish is a kind command.
But, alas, the imagination
is not amenable to command or to humble prayer.
Poetry is indeed capricious,
in the manner of love.
[MADDALENA and her friends burst out laughing.]

Maria Callas (s), Maddalena di Coigny; Mario del Monaco (t), Andrea Chénier; Orchestra of the Teatro alla Scala, Antonino Votto, cond. Live performance, Jan. 8, 1955

6. Maddalena explains the joke [0:54]

Contessa, "Perchè ridete voi?"

The Countess wants to know why the girls are laughing. Maddalena explains that she bet her friends she could get the poet to use the word "love," which she herself had had thrust at her in the course of the evening by assorted leches among her mother's guests, singling out (according to the stage directions) "a ridiculous old man," an abbé, "a fat old marquis," and "a young man remarkable for his ugliness."

Maria Amadini (ms), Contessa di Coigny; Maria Callas (s), Maddalena di Coigny; Mario del Monaco (t), Andrea Chénier; Chorus and Orchestra of the Teatro alla Scala, Antonino Votto, cond. Live performance, Jan. 8, 1955

7. And Chénier defends his use of the word "love" [4:36, including applause]

Chénier, "Colpito qui m'avete" . . . "Un dì all'azzurro spazio" (Improvviso)

Which brings us to the exact point where our second group of recordings of Chénier's Improvviso, the ones that included the lead-in "Colpito qui m'avete," picked up last night. Buried in the applause afterward

CHÉNIER: You've wounded me here where I jealously
conceal the purest beating of my soul.
Now see, dear girl, what poetry
there is in the word "Love," which rouses such ridicule.

One day into the blue sky
I gazed deeply,
and on the meadows heaped with violets
the sun rained down gold,
and with gold
the world shone;
the earth appeared an immense treasure,
and serving as its coffer was the firmament.
From the earth to my brow
came a living caress, a kiss.
I cried out, conquered by love: I love y ou,
you who kiss me, divinely
beautiful, o my fatherland!
And I wanted, full of love,
to pray!
I crossed the threshold of a church;
there a priest, in the niches
of the saints and the Virgin
accumulated gifts . . . and to his deaf ear
a trembling old man vainly
pleaded for bread and in vain reached out his hand!
I crossed the entrance of a humble abode;
a man there was cursing, slandering
the soil that barely covered his taxes,
and against God
and against men
hurled the tears of his children.
[With the exception of GÉRARD, who stands listening entranced, everyone is completely scandalized.]
In the face of such misery
what do the ranks of the nobility do?
[To MADDALENA] Only your eyes express humanly
here a look of pity,
and so I looked at you as if at an angel.
And I said: "Here is the beauty of life."
But then, at your words,
a new sorrow wounded me full in the breast.
O beautiful maiden,
do not disparage the words of a poet.
Love, divine gift -- do not scorn it.
The world's soul and life -- that's love.

Mario del Monaco (t), Andrea Chénier; Maria Callas (s), Maddalena di Coigny; Orchestra of the Teatro alla Scala, Antonino Votto, cond. Live performance, Jan. 8, 1955

4, 5, 6, and 7 (from the Countess's "Signor Chénier? through the Improvviso [8:38, including applause]

Martha Lipton (ms), Contessa di Coigny; Richard Tucker (t), Andrea Chénier; George Cehanovsky (b), Fléville; Gabor Carelli (t), the Abbé; Zinka Milanov (s), Maddalena di Coigny; Metropolitan Opera Chorus and Orchestra, Fausto Cleva, cond. Live performance, Dec. 28, 1957


AND NOW WE'RE GOING TO HEAR
THE WHOLE OF OUR SCENE

GIORDANO: Andrea Chénier: Act I, Fléville, "Commosso, lusingato" . . . "Passiamo la sera allegramente" . . . Maddalena, "Al mio dire perdono" . . . Chénier, "Colpite qui m'avete" . . . "Un dì all'azzurro spazio" (Improvviso)

John Howell (b), Fléville; Doris Doe (ms), Contessa di Coigny; Elisabeth Rethberg (s), Maddalena di Coigny; Lodovico Oliviero (t), the Abbé; Beniamino Gigli (t), Andrea Chénier; San Francisco Opera Chorus and Orchestra, Gaetano Merola, cond. Live performance, Oct. 7, 1938
Hugues Cuénod (t), Fléville; Astrid Varnay (s), Contessa di Coigny; Montserrat Caballé; (s), Maddalena di Coigny; Florindo Andreolli (t), the Abbé; Luciano Pavarotti (t), Andrea Chénier; Welsh National Opera Chorus, National Philharmonic Orchestra, Riccardo Chailly, cond. Decca, recorded 1982-84
Dino Mantovani (bs), Fléville; Luciana Moneta (ms), Contessa di Coigny; Antonietta Stella (s), Maddalena di Coigny; Piero de Palma (t), the Abbé; Franco Corelli (t), Andrea Chénier; Rome Opera Chorus and Orchestra, Gabriele Santini, cond. EMI, recorded June-July 1963


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