Cavalleria Rusticana

Boy, I was pretty excited about getting a recording of thisAWESOME opera, and now I know why it's so cheap. This recording is pretty old... it was recorded around 1955. A lot of the music is a tad fuzzy and hollow sounding. If you're into really old recordings of awesome operas, then this CD is for you. Otherwise, go for the Domingo recording...

(Note: the following review duplicates the one I wrote for the more expensive Myto release of the same performance. At times Opera d'Oro competes on equal grounds, but in this case their muffled, distant sound is grossly inferior to Myto's.)There are so many visceral, strongly sung recordings of Cavalleria that it's easy to find your shelves overflowing. For many, cutting the Gordian knot means choosing Callas and di Stefano on EMI, and there's no doubt that Callas, who only sang Santuzza as a teenager in Athens (imagine, a fifteen-year-old in this passionate role), gives a great performance in a strong cast, the only drawback being the boxy mono sound. Looking farther afield, the casting turns into musical chairs. You can have DiStefano with Simionato, or Simianato with Corelli, and Guelfi on both. These are only the front-runners from Italy in the early fifties. I thought I'd attempt to straighten a few out, since Cavalleria, for me, is the ultimate masterpiece of verismo and an an undying favorite.Myto's sound for this La Scala broadcast is very cleaned up, a bit muffled and dull, but well-balanced. dynamics are lmited but the voices clear. Giulietta Simionato is placed a bit too distantly for "Voi lo sapete," but there's no doubting her passion and commitment. She relies on her voice rather than wrenching emotionalism to carry Santuzza's pain, so if you prefer the near-hysteria of Renata Scotto (as I do), she underplays a bit. More important to some will be Simionato's fast vibrato,which appears under pressure, and the fact that she is a mezzo, which darkens the timbre of the role. the main advantage of using a mezzo is that Simionato doesn't have to fake or force her chest voice, which Santuzza's music often calls for.Di Stefano, on the other hand, pulls out all the stops -- well, not all of his stops, since he could go completely over the edge (listen to his hair-raising Cavaradossi from Mexico City with Callas). as always, the vocal production is open, a fatal flaw in the long run but here a tremendously exciting element. Di Stefano once remarked that audiences adored him because he committed vocal suicide on stage, and sadly, that was about right. Here the tenor is so electric that Simionato feels a little frumpy; their emotional temepratures don't match. the best Cavallerias are ones where the two leads inspire each other to greater and greater passion. Yet Simionato's vulnerable Santuzza, resigned and doomed from the first moment, is touching in its own right.The est of the cast is to the manner born, and Antonio Votto, to my surprise, actually does a more than adequate job. He pulls di Stefano back in the brindisi, but not so badly that one throws up one's hands. Di Stefano is fierce and defiant in that number but collapses into pitiable fear when he bids his mother farewell. It's a great performance and the deciding reason for buying this recording.

Source: Studio recording made April 14-20, 1940 at the Milan Conservatory.Sound: Fairly decent 1940 Italian mono. As is usual for the period, the voices are very well caught. Orchestral reproduction, on the other hand, is more impressionistic than precise in many places. To anyone who wants to wallow in the glorious sounds of Gigli, Simionato and Rasa, this set will be a treasure. To those who are primarily concerned with, say, matters of symphonic development or the subtleties of the second bassoon, this is not for you. Seek elsewhere.Cast: Turiddu - Beniamino Gigli (tenor); Santuzza - Lina Bruna Rasa, (soprano); Mamma Lucia - Giulietta Simionato (mezzo-soprano); Alfio - Gino Bechi (baritone); Lola - Maria Marcucci (mezzo-soprano). Conductor: Pietro Mascagni with the La Scala Orchestra and Chorus.Format: Disk 1 - Introductory remarks by Pietro Mascagni, track 1, 1:27; "Cavalleria Rusticana," tracks 2-9; 39:27. Disk 2 - "Cavalleria Rusticana" (continued), tracks 1-9; 41:53.Documentation: No libretto. Short commentary on the opera and the composer and a summary of the plot by Bill Parker. Track list identifies main solo character on each track but neglects to show timings.Pietro Mascagni (1863-1945) was a competent, energetic and moderately prolific composer who is remembered as a one-hit wonder. This is unfair, but that is the way of history. Mascagni was also a prominent Italian conductor. When Toscanini broke with the Fascisti, Mascagni took over as music director at La Scala in Milan. Unfortunately for his memory, he throughly blotted his copybook by being a strong supporter of Mussolini. There are depressing films of him conducting amid the vast extravaganzas so beloved by totalitarians while proudly wearing his Fascist black shirt. He lived long enough to learn how very wrong a political horse he had backed.Mascagni's one great hit premiered in Rome on May 17, 1890. While it shares some elements with earlier works such as "La Gioconda," "Cavalleria Rusticana" was the first and it still remains the defining work of the style that has come to be known as "verismo."There is a certain school of critics who look down their noses at verismo in general and "Cavalleria" in particular. They declare it to be crude and mean (for, as we all know, art stopped short / In the cultivated court / Of the Empress Josephine.) To those actually willing to listen, that crudity now seems sophistication when compared to the aridity of later composers and the meanness now seems a distillation of the true human emotion that was entirely leeched out of music in the latter half of the Twentieth Century.This recording was made one month short of ''Cavalleria Rusticana's" fiftieth anniversary, and, alas, one month before the fall of France in 1940. It showcases Beniamino Gigli, the leading Italian tenor of the day and Lina Bruna Rasa, Mascagni's favorite Santuzza. It was clearly intended to be the gala celebration of "Cavalleria's" golden anniversary. In addition to the strong cast, it boasts the memorable presence of the composer himself on the conductor's podium.The recording is a partial failure because of the presence of the composer on the podium.To most of its listeners, verismo implies a certain degree of impulsive, straight-ahead, pedal to the metal, explosive emotionality. This recording makes in clear that Mascagni did not agree. All through the opera, the conductor tugs at phrases and stretches scenes in ways the composer never wrote into the score, and often in ways that seem hardly conceivable the composer would condone. Perhaps Mascagni sought an elegance unnoticed by anyone else. He succeeded only in damping the white-heat that is the very core of his "Cavalleria" and the genius of his art. Furtwaengler could get away with that kind of monkey business. Mascagni could not.Gigli was fifty years old when he made this recording. He was in fine, even thrilling voice as Turiddu. Following the too early death of Enrico Caruso, he was widely recognized as the greatest Italian tenor in the world. In 1940, even with such luminaries as Bjorling, Martinelli and Lauri-Volpi above the musical horizon, that was still probably true.Sadly, Lina Bruna Rasa suffered from severe psychological problems, but there is nothing of that in her performance as Santuzza. She is a textbook example of pure verismo style.This is the first recorded appearance of the young Giulietta Simionato. Even here in this initial outing as Mama Lucia, she clearly demonstrates why she was regarded as one of the great Italian mezzos of the Twentieth Century, perhaps the greatest.Gino Bechi as Alfio and Maria Marcucci as Lola both offer excellent performances, dimmed only by the truly stellar vocal splendors of their colleagues.Fans of Gigli simply must have this performance. That is equally true for Simionato's admirers. Anyone who has felt the electric charge of the verismo in an opera house should hear Lina Bruna Rasa as one of its perfect exemplars. For the singers, this set plainly deserves five stars. For the outright oddity of its conducting and its leaden slowness (81:27 compared to Serafin's 77:48 with Callas), I reduce that to four stars.

My voice teacher recommended this recording to me. It is a strange version of this opera. I own another version with Jussi Bjoerling as Turridu which has excellent sound. Mascagni's conducting is muuuuch toooooo slooooow on this one. Gigli's singing of the opening aria is incredible. It is a shame that the background noise on this cd wasn't cleaned up before release. I find it unlistenable without usingthe subsonic filter on my amplifier. My attempt to make a tape to play in my car was a disaster. I feel that anyone looking for this excellent performance should try another label and perhaps they will be rewarded with a wonderfull listening experience. I plan to keep this cd at least until I find a better recorded version. What a shame! I have a STRANGE voice teacher.

I bought the LP version of this opera when it was new. It is a powerful performance, quite on a par with the best of more recent recordings and better than most. The great Swedish tenor, Jussi Bjoerling, probably provided a more elegant performance (on an equally old recording), but DiStefano was born to give to give an all-out, visceral and authentic account of the doomed tenor-lead. To those who would love opera, let the details of equipment and reproduction fade away before the flood of sound from the last golden age of singing.

Unfortunateky this somewhat mouth watering cast are defeated by whoever transferred tape to disc as it has been done at too high a speed. The difference is not great but it is enough to alter the voices. Buyer beware. .

マスカーニが死ぬ5年前の1940年にスカラ座で本人自身の手で指揮。巷にはざまざまな指揮者による録音があるが、カヴァレリアの忠実な演奏は、まさに本人指揮のこの盤以上のものはないだろう。ただし、録音年が古いため音源はモノラルである。すこし聞き辛いかもしれないが、カヴァレリア・ファンは必聴。ほとんどの録音がCDの録音時間いっぱいまで窮屈に録音された80分のものが多いが、この盤では思い切って2枚に分けて余裕を持って収録されている。演奏前に、マスカーニ本人によるスピーチが録音されている。マンマルチア役はシミオナートが担当。トゥリッドゥの序幕のシシリアーノは1947年にGigliによって再録音されて聴きやすいものとなっている。

名盤の多い名曲ですので、安価なもので取りあえず楽しみたい、または2枚目に何か聴いてみたい、そんな人にお薦めです。但し廉価盤ですから歌詞は付いていません。