Naples, San Carlo Theater – The Barber of Seville – Connected to the Opera
A pompous and funny Don Bartolo doctor of dazzling quality, an Almaviva not only of grace but tenor with full and vibrant cantability, a thoroughbred Latin, one would say, a Figaro of noble school with some heroic thrust more than in comedy rank, a well sonorous but a bit gloomy. And, above all, a middle soprano Rosina rather than with the acrobatic bel canto ball, as a serious prima donna or sidereal Donizetti queen, ready to challenge – wherever possible – texture, style and context, role and staves. Including libretto which, according to the eighteenth-century retelling of improvisation well collected and reformulated by the antiromantic composer, leads the barber to report that the beloved by his master has hair that is not black but blond (like that of the interpreter), and then launches himself into the pretense music lesson not with the canonical aria of Pesaro from the novella opera The useless precaution (Against a heart that ignites love), or with the usual variations in use, but pirouetting at the top with the most pyrotechnic and Central European trunk air that one can choose: the tightrope walker Theme and variations “Deh, come back, my good” by the Viennese Heinrich Proch.
It would seem the remix metateatral of one of the most famous and beloved systems of cartoon characters in music of the early nineteenth century and, instead, this is the recipe of the cast of vaglia as from the unusual mixture proposed with The Barber of Seville from Gioachino Rossini returned to San Carlo Theater in Naples in the well-run staging created in 1999 for the same Foundation by the director Filippo Crivelliwho passed away last February at the age of 93 and therefore reassembled on the occasion with the same gestural charge by Luca Baracchinidelicious in the scenes between hardcover fairy tales and azulejos of the equally unforgettable Lele Luzzati plus the beautiful tradition costumes of Santuzza Calì.
Therefore, a known container, very delicious net of the flowery explosion and a little tacky in the final final and, therefore, substantially predictable. But no. Because, to move the dynamics, there were not a few surprises, starting from the peculiar internal resources of the singing team and a musical direction that guides the opera with always perfectly tight and tense reins. Up to some lively inventions such as the guitar played on stage by Figaro accompanying, in an overwhelming fandango rhythm, the Song of the Count “If my name know you really crave”.
In the light of a similar painting, it is immediately clear that the hinge and the glue of the entire execution must be sought on the podium. And it is precisely there that the master from Brescia Riccardo Frizzaguest artist of the major theaters in the world, today one of the most interesting interpreter for the Italian operatic nineteenth century (he will direct theAnna Bolena di Donizetti on the poster in June 2023 at the San Carlo) and for three months Principal Conductor of the Symphony Orchestra and Chorus of the Hungarian Radio, writes a Rossini who has the exact beat of the theatrical comedian. Resolute in the rhythms, fast and cohesive in the dynamics, subtly telluric and punctual in the construction of the fundamental crescendo, sensitive in the colors, solid and discreet in the support to the singing both in the instrumental rebound effects and in the wide-ranging glimpses. And even where the Orchestra does not follow him too much in the detail work – except the well-sharpened and very fast violins guided by the shoulder Gabriele Pieranunzipercussion and castanets (Franco Cardaropoli) of absolute perfection – the iron holding of the whole is appreciated even more, especially along the paths that are not always in line in style and tradition with the context.
In the foreground, with his extraordinary performance on double stage and singing front, the bass now veteran of the role parades Carlo Lepore, Don Bartolo funny and noble at the same time, powerful in the range of accents, always exact in his expressive strokes as in the projection of every nuance of sound, between mutterings and interjections, jealousies and protests. In fact, the most convinced applause of a theater finally full between boxes and stalls went to him, as well as to the director Frizza.
In truth, the Almaviva by the very young tenor from San Sebastián, already praised in the three-voice gala for Caruso and, like the conductor, also still in Naples in a year for the Bolena. It is about Xabier Anduaga, a beautiful musical talent of just twenty-seven who, with a clear but virile timbre, perfectly hits the Rossini figure of grace (to a lesser extent the coloratura, which in the Allegro tends to plane), uniting you at the same time, albeit with some excess in the opening of some sounds and in the thrust of some syllables or second notes in ligature, softness of attack, line and expansion. In this way he confers temperature and Mediterranean substance to a role that is generally always a little pale if not goatish (and often with an air cut off) distilling his generous cantability with different pitches both in the debut Serenade and seductive Song with Figaro, in the sensational scenes of disguise and then easily rise in altitude in the final aria “Cessa di più resistere”, mainly governed in the sound and in the florets.
Technique, style, volume and attention to the poetic word therefore shows off the baritone’s Figaro Davide Luciano, for dress and gesture similarity to a good Manzoni, stentorian and dry in his famous cavatina “Largo al factotum”, even heroic in the impetus of the duet “All’idea di quel metallo”. In terms of color and metric precision, he soon proved to be fundamental for all his interventions on the grave in the ensemble as well as for the excavation in the recitative passages.
A separate discussion should be made for the true bel canto singer Jessica Pratt that aims to bring on stage and at home a hyper-flowering Rosina truly in her own right, not flirtatious at all but abstract and astral for texture and rarefaction of sounds, gestural static and character, for style choices and expressions light years away from the connective tissue of the work, even in the perspective of improvisation. His cavatina undoubtedly wins for the unprecedented artifice of notes, trills and volatines but loses substance in the medium-low area and enamel in many acute points. The choice for the lesson of Proch’s Theme and variations is also singular, the author’s only ten pages left in the repertoire. Undoubtedly a courageous and prodigious choice for technique without a net, so much so as to earn the predictable ovations of the rite. But, even here, too out of context, linked to a living room concert cliché of the full nineteenth century, even if variations present in the wake of a singing and Rossinian tradition ranging from Luisa Tetrazzini to Toti Dal Monte, from Elvira de Hidalgo to Callas, from Gruberova at Pratt.
Finally the Don Basilio of the bass not too funny Riccardo Fassi he sculpts his slander with beautiful timbre and depth, even though he is protected from that malicious and insinuating turn of the screw that gives reason itself to the crescendo and the cannon. Brava, not only for the infinity of sneezing, the Berta del soprano Daniela Cappiello who, with wisdom, intones and colors his unique sorbet air on senile love. At the end, the Fiorello of Clemente Antonio Daliottithe officer of the chorister Giuseppe Scaricothe theatrical and hyperkinetic Ambrose of mime Armando De Cecconthe notary of Salvatore Totaro. Punctual male choir instructed with great sensitivity and rigor by José Luis Basso.
San Carlo Theater – Season 2021/22
THE BARBER OF SEVILLE
Comedy in two acts by Cesare Sterbini
Music by Gioachino Rossini
Count d’Almaviva Xabier Anduaga
Rosina Jessica Pratt
Don Bartolo Carlo Lepore
Figaro Davide Luciano
Don Basilio Riccardo Fassi
Berta Daniela Cappiello
Fiorello Clemente Antonio Daliotti
Ambrose Armando De Ceccon
A notary Salvatore Totaro
Orchestra and Chorus of the San Carlo Theater
Director Riccardo Frizza
Choir director José Luis Basso
Direction Filippo Crivelli
taken from Luca Baracchini
Scene Emanuele Luzzati
Costumes Santuzza Calì
Lights Valerio Tiberi
Production of the Teatro di San Carlo
Naples, 6 July 2022
Photo: Luciano Romano
Photo: Luciano Romano
Photo: Luciano Romano
Photo: Luciano Romano
Photo: Luciano Romano