Customer Reviews

Rossini: L'Assedio di Corinto

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

You MUST buy this album for a great bel canto experience! You won't be sorry! This is singing of the highest order from all concerned. Beverly Sills filled in for a pregnant Renata Scotto at the last minute, having never sung at La Scala. Horne was making her La Scala debut. Justino Diaz and Thomas Schippers conducting made this the "Seige of the Americans". Sills sings like a goddess. Bubbles takes risks here "LIVE" on the stage of La Scala that most singers wouldn't attempt in a private practise room. Hair raising coloratura, one aria with four pages of what Sills said was the fasted singing of her life. At one point she sings a candenza that goes up to a beautiful pianissimo high E flat above high C, then she stops the note (!!!!) and comes right back in a half step down on a high D above high C before ending the aria on a G - very difficult and very brave to sing! There are two astonishing trios with Horne and a young Franco Bonisolli - stunning ensemble between the singers. Horne knocks 'em dead with her extended scena, pouring it on for the Italian audience as only she can do. I have treasured this recording for 25 years since I first encountered it in vinyl form. It opened a world of opera singing that I didn't dream existed - imagining the kind of singers that Rossini was writing for - the level of performance that he took for granted. This opera was his display piece in Paris at the beginning of his stay there. He wrote fat, juicy solos for the first chair orchestra players to win them over, re-ornamenting an earlier opera of his in order to show them, and his singers, to best advantage. This recording is a hodge-podge of editions but seems to work theatrically. It is one of my top "desert island" selections. You won't be sorry!

First off, this recording is definitely one of those moments of magic that we all hope to hear at some point in our lives. To hear Beverly Sills in her La Scala debut along with Marilyn Horne is a real treat. Sills takes many risks that others only dream of accomplishing and the fact that she did it on the stage of the world's greatest opera house and in front of what may be the most critical audience is a testament to how strong of an artist she is. Every time she sings on this cd set, I am left hanging on the edge of my seat. I am not simply impressed with her technique. I am also moved by the emotions that pour forth unsparingly. I have a similar reaction to Horne though her role does not leave her many opportunities to really do much as far as character/musical development. There are also many ensemble numbers that stand out. Musically, this cast was all on the same page. Rossini fans will love this opera(in my opinion) and I love this opera because it lets us see the more serious side of this composer. Lately, we are so used to hearing his more comic operas with the exception of William Tell. This is a welcome change from Il barbiere di Siviglia or La Cenerentola. I give this cd set 5 stars and a "+".

This is absolutely the most spectacular coloratura singing ever done by Beverly Sills. It's her debut at La Scala and it was a truimph. I have had this "L'Assedio di Corinto" for many years. It is one of my most treasured operatic recordings, along with Sills' Giulio Caesar", "Anna Bolena", and Sutherland's "Semiramide" and "Lucia". I also love Sills' Puritani as much as I love Sutherland's. I can't do without either. Does that make me unusual? No, all my college friends who are opera fans love both Sills and Sutherland. I don't understand the rumored rivalry.
When I first heard Sills sang this opera I was totally dumbfounded. I'm surprised that no one has mentioned the scene and aria "Cielo, che diverro...Si, ferite". Quite possiblily the most difficult thing that Rossini ever wrote. Or I should say that Beverly Sills ever wrote(it's all in the embellishments). I'm not sure. All I know is that it contains about three minutes of the most complex and difficult series of runs and arpeggios I've ever heard. She follows with "Del soggiorno degli estinti", a slow section with plenty of high notes including many notes above high C. She should have included the even more difficult cabaletta with a high E that follows, but she saved that for her Met debut in 1975, also as Pamira. I also have her Met Pamira and I say it is unbelievable.
Horne's great scene,aria, and cabaletta "Non temer...Del periglio al fero aspetto" is so spectacular that I don't know what to say. At one point in a single phrase she goes from low G all the way to high B in a single series of coloratura runs. She definitely sings it better than she did in her Rossini Cd that is so renowned. It is as much a tour de force as "Si ferite". But then who ever mentions the mezzo in reviews??
Another fantastic highlight is "Giusto Ciel". This aria is actually very easy. But it's the way Sills embellished it that makes it extremely difficult. Taking tessituras so high that it awed the La Scala audience. The ovation after it was the largest of the evening.
I say that Pamira is Sills' greatest role ever. That's why she used it as her debut at the world's two most demanding and famous Opera Houses, La Scala, Milan, and the Met, New York. It is a tour de force that is second to none. And a complete triumph for all.

I'm not big on live recordings, but this is one of such historical significance that I figured I had to have it. And I was curious. Could Sills really be as marvelous as legend and the other Amazon reviews have said? Well, yes...and then some. OK, she hits one clinker somewhere on the first disc (nobody's perfect), but this is a truly goosebump-inducing performance. Now I get why Sills became the mega-star she did. And the supporting cast (Diaz & Horne in particular) are just as good. Electrifying from start to finish, this is a must-have for anyone interested in the history of 20th century operatic performance -- and those who just want to wallow in thrilling music and splendid singing.

Sills brought the house down at La Scala when she sang Pamira in 1969. The voice was at its short but magnificent prime at that time. I can recall no coloratura soprano with as accurate a technique as she had when she was on. And she was on that night. The "Giusto Ciel" was amazing. She practically rewrote its second verse, singing it an octave higher than written. Making it's tessitura what might be the highest I've heard in a single aria. Obviously, the Italians went crazy, screaming and choking on their shouts of Bravissima.
Although Sills was past her prime when she made her long awaited debut at the Met in 1975, she sang a Pamira with even more ornamentations and added several more cabalettas than she did at La Scala. I was there, and she was fantastic. She again rewrote much of Rossini's already rediculously difficult music and made it twice as fast and taxing. Surprisingly, even though she was near the end of her career, her high notes were especially good that night. In fact, I remember them being much bigger and more radiant than they were in a much earlier recital I had attended about six years earlier. Her fioratura was unbelievable, as was her trill. It was one of the most memorable nights I've ever attended at the opera.

SOURCE:
Live performance at La Scala in Milan, April 14, 1969.

SOUND:
Not very good, no better than fair--and that is a very generous assessment. Rest assured, anyone who buys this set must do it for the performance, not for the sound reproduction.

From the applause heard so close to the microphone pick-up, it is clear that this set was recorded from the audience. Since the orchestra and voices are in fairly good balance--or at least, not in as bad balance as found on many pirate recordings--and the cheering from the audience in the cheap seats is rather distant, my guess is that the pirate-recordist was sitting on the main floor, but away from the stage, well toward the back of the house. His or her recording equipment was far from state-of-the-art for 1969.

CAST:
Pamira - Beverly Sills
Neocle - Marilyn Horne
Cleomene - Franco Bonisolli
Maometto II - Justino Diaz
Jero - Paulo Washington
Omar - Gianni Foiani
Ismene - Milna Paoli
Adrasto - Piero Di Palma.

CONDUCTOR:
Thomas Schippers with the Orchestra and Chorus of La Scala, Milan.

TEXT:
This is one of those operas that offers--or rather suffers from--a multiplicity of texts. In Rossini's time, the best way for a worldly young composer (of which Rossini was a sterling example) to make pots of money was to write operas. Operas were commissioned by impresarios for performance during a specific season for a specific theater. After that, any scoundrel who could get his hands on the score or a reasonable facsimile thereof, could offer the piece as he saw fit--and Rossini (or Bellini or Donizetti) could whistle for his money. Only the presence of the composer on the spot to oversee an authentic performance was likely to guarantee that any money would find its way into his pockets.

In 1820, Rossini delivered this opera as "Maometto II." It came with a tragic conclusion. Two years later, he obtained another payday, but at a less sophisticated theater whose impresario demanded a happy ending. Rossini dutifully delivered one. Some years after that, Rossini hit the jackpot by receiving an invitation to present his opera in Paris, at the richest opera house in the world. The French, of course, fancied themselves as more cultivated than the over-emotional Italians. They certainly regarded Italianate vocal fireworks as more than a bit uncouth, so they demanded more sedate and dignified vocal lines as well as translation into their own language. Since the cause of Greek independence from the Ottoman Empire had become fashionable, they also demanded a change in plot: the opera would no longer sing the tale of the overwhelming of Negroponte, an Italian military colony; now it would be about the fall of Corinth, a suitably Greek town. Rossini gave them everything they wanted with the renamed "Le siege de Corinthe," then happily counted his money.

The revised opera was a hit in Paris. Back in Italy, French success acted as good advertising for local performances, so enterprising gentlemen translated the new French libretto into Italian as "L'assedio di Corinto," and tossed in whichever snippets of Rossini's music came to hand, even as they absent-mindedly neglected to send any money in Rossini's way.

And it has now come to pass that Amazon offers "Maometto II"--in both the 1820 and the 1822 versions, "Le siege de Corinthe" and "L'assedio di Corinto," the last in versions that reflect both Rossini's Frenchified approach and the uncorseted, unabashedly Italianate form under consideration in this review.

DOCUMENTATON:
Typical anemic Opera d'Oro package. No libretto. A few hundred words on the background of the opera. A few hundred words summarizing the plot. Track list.

COMMENTARY:
An Amazon reviewer writing back in 2003 had this to say: "This is absolutely the most spectacular coloratura singing ever done by Beverly Sills. It's her debut at La Scala and it was a triumph." I quite agree, both about the singing and the triumph. I further affirm that the singing of Marilyn Horne is equally impressive, and in no way overshadowed by Sills. On the basis of those two tremendous performances, I have no qualms about endorsing the five-star ratings assigned by eleven of the thirteen previous reviewers.

But ... I can't help remembering a story about Rossini that is so well-documented and so widely spread that it might even be true. In his old age, the grand old man lived in Paris, self-acknowledged center of all the universe. A young, up-and-coming singer of fabulous potential--she might have been Adelina Patti--was presented to him. She sang "Una voce poco fa" from "The Barber of Seville," putting into it every trill, high note and spectacular decoration of which she was capable, all in the hope of impressing the great composer. When she was finished, Rossini smiled, applauded politely and said, "That was a nice tune. Who wrote it?"

I have no close familiarity with this score. I am satisfied to take the assurance of earlier reviewers that Sills, like Patti before her, tossed in astonishing high notes, glistening coloratura passages, exquisite trills and probably a kitchen sink or two. It was perfectly proper that she do so, for opera is show biz written large, and a large part, perhaps most, of the audience comes to hear just that sort of stunt singing. They generously award their bravissimas for it, and they depart the opera house warmly content in the knowledge that they have received good value for the outrageous prices of their tickets. After they leave, only curmudgeons like me and Rossini are left to mutter, "That was nice. Who wrote it?"

The rest of the performance is all right. Justino Diaz was a good, reliable singer but not, I think, on anyone's A-list of great bass-baritones. Franco Bonisolli could sometimes be a fine, stirring tenor. Cleomene is not one of his signature roles. Schippers and the orchestra seem to be OK, but the recording quality does them no favors.

HISTORICAL NOTE:
In 1453, Sultan Mehmet (Mohammed II or Maometto II) captured Constantinople to the enormous dismay of Christendom. When the torn corpse of Constantine XI was brought before him, having been found among the piled bodies of Constantinople's final defenders and identified by the golden eagles sewn upon his shoes, the great sultan gave the last of the Byzantine emperors an honorable burial. Mehmet then divided the churches of the City equally between the victorious Moslems and his new Christian subjects and, from the very throne of the Roman Caesars, returned the pastoral staff to Patriarch Gennadius.

Mehmet busied himself with restoring, improving and re-populating the former Constantinople, now Istanbul [from the ubiquitous road signs, "eis ton polis" (to the city)]. For years he disdained to take notice of the mini-"empires" established in Greece by the tag ends of old Byzantine dynasties. In 1469, however, he wearied of the endless civil wars among the Greek dynasts. Leading a small but sufficient fraction of his total forces, the Sultan simply rolled over their strongholds, one of which was Corinth. Those of the would-be emperors that he captured he pensioned off, then sent them into exile in Rumania. Those who managed to escape to Italy and elsewhere busied themselves for the remainder of their squalid lives by selling off claims to the imperial title to any western prince foolish enough to pay them.

The mighty conqueror, Mehmet, continued to scare the bejabbers out of the princes and prelates of Europe until, to their vast relief, he died in 1481.

LEC/AM

This recording is a live performance from Italy's La Scala where Beverly Sills made her debut as Pamira in Rossini's "Siege of Corinth". That was back in 1969-1970 when Beverly Sills was at the height of her career and at the peak of her operatic powers. We find her in a fantastic singing voice. This recording, as well as the live recording of "La Fille Du Regiment" finds Sills in exquisite condition. She was an American red-head soprano with many tricks up her sleeve. She could spin out dazzling coloratura roulades, runs, arpeggios and daring leaps as effortlessly as if she were casually singing them during a bubble bath. Beverly Sills' light and lyric voice has been likened to songbirds, canary and along the ranks of such noted coloratura sopranos as Lily Pons and Roberta Peters.

The role of Pamira features dramatic moments and coloratura arias that are difficult to undertake. The Rossini opera strays from the usual slapstick, feel-good comedy typical of the Rossini fashion and into the "grand opera" that was budding at the time. Rossini's grand opera style is gorgeously expressed in many of the dramatic scenes- such as the violent siege of Corinth before the common era, the city burning on fire, and of course our heroine Pamira sacrificing herself. The cast on this recording is superb. We have here Justino Diaz, a fine baritone singer, in excellent form. Of course, fans of Beverly Sills will not want to be without this rare recording which features Sills in her earliest performances and in her "prime". The other recordings of her in her prime are "The Ballad Of Baby Doe" and "Julius Caesar" as well as "La Fille Du Regiment" as mentioned before. The 1969 recording of Donizetti's "Roberto Devereux" also has Beverly Sills in top form. Pamira in this recording was Beverly Sills long awaited debut at New York City's The Met. Poor Beverly Sills. For many years she had struggled to debut at the Met without any success because the general manager at the time was not fond of her singing and considered her "vulgar". Beverly had already debuted at La Scala before she sang at the Met in 1975. By then, her voice was approaching its decline but fortunately she sang an incredible Pamira with exceedingly high notes and super squillo. No recording of that performance was ever made nor film. Beverly Sills now runs the Met, working as one of the administrators holding the title of Chairman. She has done so much to strengthen the cause of opera and classical music in America, teaching master classes and giving guest lectures. She will always be our Queen of Opera.

I've been fascinated by this 1969 production since I read an interview of the great Renata Tebaldi who performed the opera early in her career and who basically dismissed the way Rossini's music was performed in this Scala production. She claimed that by the time he wrote it, Rossini wanted to move away from florid music. Initially I thought Tebaldi was excusing herself for not performing the florid music but a little bit of research proved me wrong.

The great reviewer L.E. Cantrel below touched on this and his instincts were right but it isn't only the excessive ornamentation that is out of place here. The role of Pamyra is in the same group as Matilde in Gulielmo Tell and obviously Anna in Maometto. As such, the tessitura very much lies in the middle of the voice requiring anything but a high coloratura. Secondly, Assedio did not originally have a contralto but a tenor role because Rossini knew that in France, where he first presented Siege, they did not like women in male roles. The music he wrote for his tenor, unlike the trouser Calbo in Maometto, was not very ornamented.

When Schippers decided to have a contralto as Neocle in Assedio (and none other than Marilyn Horne) he also had to bring back the music from Maometto otherwise Horne would be useless. With Sills regular upward transpositions, a borrowed aria from an early Rossini opera and interpolated high notes solved the problem of Pamyra's tessitura and pleased the crowd who after all didn't know much about this obscure work.

What came out was spectacular singing by both ladies who without a doubt sieged La Scala. Rossini's intentions were of course dismissed and this ends up sounding more like most of his very florid early works without the more sophisticated style that is still preserved in Gulielmo Tell. I'm not dismissing his early works but it is nice to see a different side of him which this recording however doesn't offer us. The sound is adequate and the supporting cast good with promising beginners. For Sills, Horne and all coloratura fans it's a must but for Rossini studies you should look further as it doesn't deserve the 4 stars I gave for the singing..:-)

While the audio of this recording isn't great, and the orchestra can often be heard over the singers, especially Sills, that certainly doesn't make this recording worthless. L'assedio is still a great opera. Marilyn Horne is wonderful throughout, especially in "Avanziam... Questo è il luogo," (Track 4; CD 2), which of course, is famed through the opera world for the sheer beauty of Horne's singing, which the audience responded to, clapping and shouting mid-act. That particular part of the opera makes this recording worth it.

Sills' Pamira stands for fearless singing and fioritura to blow you away. I love Sills in anything Rossini, Donizetti, Bellini and Handel so I absolutely love this live-recording. The sound is only so-so, but so what? It's a glorious performance that shows why Beverly Sills is still appreciated and loved today. Now please re-release her Norma!