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Verdi in the Caribbean Parma
Busseto (Teatro Verdi)
09/27/2024 - & September 28, October 5, 12, 18* 2024
Giuseppe Verdi : Un ballo in maschera
Giovanni Sala*/Davide Tuscano (Riccardo), Lodovico Filippo Ravizza/Kang Hae* (Renato), Caterina Marchesini/Ilaria Alida Quilico* (Amelia), Danbi Lee (Ulrica), Licia Piermatteo (Oscar), Giuseppe Todisco (Silvano), Agostino Subacchi (Samuel), Lorenzo Barbieri (Tom), Francesco Congiu (A judge, Amelia’s servant)
Coro del Teatro Regio di Parma, Martino Faggiani (Chorus Master), Orchestra Giovanile Italiana, Fabio Biondi (Conductor)
Daniele Menghini (Stage director), Davide Signorini (Sets), Nika Campisi (Costumes), Gianni Bertoli (Lighting)
(© Roberto Ricci)
Experiencing an opera by Verdi in Busseto, the master’s birthplace, is a stirring experience for any lover of Italian opera. Parma’s Verdi Festival had the excellent idea to stage operas and concerts in venues beyond Parma’s Teatro Regio, to include the whole city and its environs. A few years ago, I saw a production of Il trovatore in a rarely‑used opera house in the small town of Fidenza. Keeping with tradition, the Festival presented a Verdi opera in the 300‑seat theatre named for the composer in Busseto.
The cast featured a new generation of singers, unknown to most opera lovers. Given the results, this augurs well for the future of opera, as almost all would have delighted in major opera houses. The small size of the venue allowed smaller voices to sound grander than in larger venues.
The most remarkable voices were those of the amorous couple, Amelia and Riccardo, and the fortune‑teller Ulrica. Ilaria Alida Quilico is a magnificent lirico spinto soprano with a distinct voice and natural trills. Her voice is large, warm, italianate and expressive, and with an unusual ease in the upper register. She was simply thrilling in her Act II aria, “Ecco l’orrido campo” and moved us to tears in her Act III aria, “Morrò, ma prima in grazia”.
Italian tenor Giovanni Sala, who continues to enjoy a stellar career gracing Europe’s major stages, was a formidable Count Riccardo. He never fails to please with the beauty of his voice and elegant elocution. Unsurprisingly, Sala is a Mozartian, singing expertly Tamino in Die Zauberflöte, Ferrando in Così fan tutte, Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni and the title role in La clemenza di Tito.
Riccardo is possibly Verdi’s most elegant role for tenor, demanding a refined lyric tenor such as Carlo Bergonzi, Luciano Pavarotti, and the young José Carreras. Despite the unusual staging, Sala exuded virility and nobility, even when dressed in women’s clothes. His elegant phrasing was impressive in his Act I arias, “La rivedrò nell’estasi”, “Di’ tu se fedele” and “È scherzo od è follia”. He was at his most passionate in the glorious Act II duet, “Teco io sto”. Finally, he was riveting in his Act III aria “Ma se m’è forza perderti,” and in his death scene. This was my first time hearing Sala, and I will make a point to hear him again.
South Korean mezzo Danbi Lee was fabulous as the fortune‑teller Ulrica. For such a young singer–she is only 29–to possess such an impressive low voice and such poise as an actress is most unusual. Her Ac I “Re dell’abisso, affrettati”, where she summons the dark forces, was bloodcurdling, thanks to her amazing voice and convincing acting. I have seen many Ulricas, and Lee is one of the best.
South Korean baritone Kang Hae was a convincing Renato, Riccardo’s advisor and best friend. Either he is a rigid actor or Menghini chose to make him stiff. This peculiarity suited the psychology of the prudent Renato, concerned for his friend’s safety and later so outraged by the apparent tryst with his wife that he joins the plot to murder him in the “masked fall”. Hae’s baritone is powerful and virile and his diction exemplary.
Prior to the performance, it was announced that Licia Piermatteo would sing, despite being indisposed. Luckily, her ailment did not show in her performance. It was a pleasure to hear Oscar sung by a pleasant soprano lirico with agility and ease in the upper register rather than the usual soprani leggeri that often play this role. Menghini chose to make Oscar (Riccardo’s young male page) a barmaid in the opening scene, and a female assistant or secretary in others. Only in the final “masked ball” is Oscar dressed as a page. Her Act III “Saper vorreste” was even more thrilling and effervescent than the Act I “Volta la terrea fronte alle stelle”.
The smaller roles of the plotters Tom and Samuel were well‑performed by Lorenzo Barbieri and Agostino Subacchi respectively, both in fine voice, affording a powerful Act III trio “Dunque l’onta di tutti sol una” with Kang Hae.
The etymology of the word Italian “maschera” (and its English equivalent “mask”) is rather obscure. It’s derived from the Arabic word “maskara,” meaning buffoonery and/or harsh derision. Indeed, a closer look at Un ballo in maschera reveals a more caustic degree of bite far beyond the final act’s famous masked ball. Amelia seeks help from the soothsayer to rid herself of her passion for the King, only to be overheard by the latter, thus confirming the reciprocity of his love. Forced by her husband to draw the card designating the King’s assassin, Amelia ends up picking her own husband. Riccardo, or Gustav II in the original version set in Sweden, historically known for his homosexuality, dies for a passion never consumed.
Riccardo sees the soothsayer Ulrica while disguised as a fisherman. Amelia, wife of his minister and best friend Renato, also sees Ulrica wearing a veil to hide her identity. She is again veiled while being escorted from her encounter with Riccardo by her husband, the latter initially ignorant of her identity. Even the role of the page Oscar, though undisguised, is one of the last uses of anachronistic “trouser” roles in romantic opera (to emphasize the page’s young age, frivolity and above all sexual ambiguity). All these are elements of disguise that make travestimento omnipresent in the opera beyond the masked ball in the final act.
Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera, composed in 1859 after the triumph of Rigoletto, Il trovatore and La traviata, is possibly the Italian composer’s most dramatically compact opera. Unlike most, it doesn’t have one superfluous note. Even more than some of his greatest masterpieces, it represents a perfect marriage between music and lyrics. Given this privileged position, it offers the stage director a wealth of possibilities.
Menghini transposed the action from colonial Boston to a Caribbean island. Riccardo seems to be more of a pirate chief than a British colonial ruler. This is plausible, as the British employed pirates in their wars against other European powers, especially the Spanish. Possibly in an allusion to the homosexuality of Gustav II in the original setting of the opera, Riccardo and much of the court seem to be homosexual. The opening scene is set in a louche bar frequented entirely by drunk men who cross dress and behave lewdly. The conniving Samuel and Tom seem to be lovers with a grudge against Riccardo, possibly as jilted previous lovers. Despite their own homosexuality, they are disapproving of the court’s debauchery and overt queerness. However, the rampant homosexuality of Riccardo and his court make the former’s passion for Amelia rather implausible.
Early music specialist Fabio Biondi was a surprising choice of conductor for this mature Verdi opera, but it was perhaps appropriate in the small Teatro Verdi, where the orchestra can easily overwhelm the singers. The Orchestra Giovanile Italiana, composed of young musicians, was sometimes tentative in its playing, especially in the first act. They were more effective in Act II’s passionate love duet, where Biondi’s nervous tempi were appropriate. Likewise, they played with poise in Act III, especially during Riccardo’s death scene.
Daniele Menghini’s staging for Busseto provoked a large portion of the public, but I don’t see it as flawed. Despite the overt debauchery and insinuated drug use, I found the production to be original, managing to convey the strong emotions of the three main characters. Even those disliking the staging were impressed with the singing (as heard on the bus back to Parma.) This was a performance I’ll remember always with great fondness.
Ossama el Naggar
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