LEAD: Montserrat Caballe sang the music
of 11 composers from 4 centuries in 4 languages at her Avery Fisher Hall
recital Friday night. But it really didn't matter. Miss Caballe has her own way
of singing just about everything, so that Handel, Pacini, Debussy and Massenet
passed through her sensibilities and came out sounding remarkably alike.
Montserrat Caballe sang the music of 11
composers from 4 centuries in 4 languages at her Avery Fisher Hall recital
Friday night. But it really didn't matter. Miss Caballe has her own way of
singing just about everything, so that Handel, Pacini, Debussy and Massenet
passed through her sensibilities and came out sounding remarkably alike. The
Handel arias from ''Semele'' and ''Rinaldo'' had a Bellinian languor, while a
little later Miss Caballe's drawling, hesitational delivery in Debussy's ''Beau
Soir'' might just as well have been Puccini. Indeed, her rolling elisions,
bright sforzato attacks and scooping accents discriminated against no one and
were democratically applied.
In the arias by Pucitta and Pacini, bel
canto style and Miss Caballe conveniently coincided. One also admired her light
touch in ''Oh, Had I Jubal's Lyre'' from Handel's ''Joshua'' and the
straightforward ardor of Turina's ''Cancion de cuna'' toward the end. In its
way, this remains an imperious soprano voice, full of easy power and clarion
timbre.
Miguel Zanetti at the piano played with
a Romantic floridity that seconded Miss Caballe's one-size-fits-all approach to
style. When his technique was not severely challenged, Mr. Zanetti played
gracefully, especially in the Albeniz and Turina accompaniments.
LEAD: MONTSERRAT CABALLE'S peculiar
recital format, of which the great soprano gave her annual specimen on Friday
night in Carnegie Hall, asks a good deal of her public's patience, but rewards
it with something they are not likely to get in any other way. The first half
is a placid read-through of little-known bel canto arias, punctuated (as
intermission approaches) by a moment or two of vocal exertion.
MONTSERRAT CABALLE'S peculiar recital
format, of which the great soprano gave her annual specimen on Friday night in
Carnegie Hall, asks a good deal of her public's patience, but rewards it with
something they are not likely to get in any other way. The first half is a
placid read-through of little-known bel canto arias, punctuated (as
intermission approaches) by a moment or two of vocal exertion. The scores on
her music stand this time around were by Vivaldi and Spontini. The second half
brings songs, mostly Spanish, and a rising level of involvement, attaining, by
the end, the level of whimsical charm.
Then come the encores - six on Friday
night, of which four were big operatic arias - and by now, she is bantering
with the audience, taking requests, flirting, giving of her best and winning
urgent tears and standing ovations. The wait is long, but worth it.
Even when she is ''on,'' Miss Caballe can
be a wayward and diffident singer. But she can sing, and she was in fabulous
voice, just fabulous, on Friday night. For such quality of tone, poise of
attack and release, control of long phrases and unity of voice (top to bottom,
loud to soft), one otherwise has to listen to old records. Even the sometimes
problematic high notes were good - perhaps a little hard toned, but big,
ringing and unwobbly right up to B-natural.
The songs included new works by Salvador
Pueyo and Lorenzo Martinez Palomo. Both place themselves in the 20th-century
Spanish tradition of folk-oriented, vocally attractive melody spiced by some
dissonance in the accompaniment. Mr. Martinez Palomo's four ''recuerdos de
juventud'' were especially flavorful, and Miss Caballe sang both groups
gorgeously.
06
06.07.1986
Verona
Arena
Giordano
/ Andrea Chénier
Verona – Juli 1986
Verona
– Juli 1986
Unter azurblauem
Himmel
Opernfestspiele
in Italien: Impressionen aus Verona
Von
Anfang Juli bis Mitte September ziehen die italienischen Opernveranstalter
unters freie Sternenzelt. In den Thermen von Caracalla in Rom, in den griechischen
Theatern von Syrakus und Taormina, in der mittelalterlichen Festung von
Ravenna, in der Arena Sferisterio von Macerata, auf der Freilichtbühne von
Torre del Lago, dem einstigen Sommersitz von Puccini, sowie dieses Jahr zum
ersten Mal auch auf dem Marktplatz von Busserto, der Geburtsstadt von Giuseppe
Verdi, wird Oper gespielt.
Aus
dieser Opernlandschaft ragen die Festspiele in Verona heraus. In der
diesjährigen Spielzeit vom 4. Juli bis 31. August standen „Andrea Chénier“,
„Das Mädchen aus dem goldenen Westen“, die obligate „Aida“ und „Maskenball“ mit
insgesamt 43 Aufführungen auf dem Programm. Dazu kam noch ein Konzert des
London Philharmonic Orchestras unter Giuseppe Sinopoli, eine konzertante
Aufführung von Beethovens „Fidelio“ mit der Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz
sowie ein Verdi-Requiem unter Daniel Oren.
Im
Juli war überraschenderweise außer „Aida“ keine Vorstellung ausverkauft, und
noch nie habe ich in der Arenea so viele freie Plätze gesehen wie bei dem sonst
so beliebten Puccini. Auch bei „Andrea Chénier“, der hier seit 30 Jahren nicht
mehr gespielten Oper, waren trotz der glänzenden Besetzung noch Karten zu
haben. Waren es die fehlenden amerikanischen Touristen, die unsichere
Wetterlage im Juli – die „Aida“-Premiere fiel regelrecht ins Wasser und so auch
die vierte „Chénier“-Vorstellung -, war es die Wahl der beiden weniger
populären Opern, oder beginnt sich eine Arenamüdigkeit abzuzeichnen?
Giordanos „Andrea
Chénier“
Giordanos
Oper über das Leben des Dichters Andrea Chénier wurde in Verona bisher nur in
vier Spielzeiten gegeben. 1924 in einer Inszenierung des berühmten
Bühnenbildners Ettore Faggiulo, der auch 1913 die erste „Aida“-Inszenierung
schuf, dann 1934, 1951 und 1967. 1934 wurde der Dichter von Benjamino Gigli
verkörpert und 1951 lieh ihm Mario del Monaco seine strahlende Stimme. Der
Andrea Chénier der achziger Jahre heißt zweifellos José Carreras, und so hatte
sich die Arena rechtzeitig bemüht, den spanischen Tenor für die
Julivorstellungen zu engagieren. Die Neuinszenierung hatte man dem
Arena-erfahrenen Attilio Colonnello anvertraut. Maddalena di Coigny war
Montserrat Caballé und Renato Bruson debütierte als Gérard.
Kaum
war der Schein von tausenden Wachskerzen erloschen, die traditionsgemäß zu
Beginn der Vorstellung wie bei einem Ritual abgebrannt werden, als der Dichter
Chénier im Palais der Gräfin Coigny zu seiner berühmten Romanze „Un di
all’azzurro spazio…“ ansetzte. Der erste Arenabeifall brauste auf und bestimmte
den Verlauf des Abends. Carreras bringt für die Rolle romantische Ausstrahlung,
leidenschaftlich dramatisches Engagement, edles Timbre, perfekte Phrasierung
und Linienführung, sowie strahlende Höhe mit.
Renato
Bruson, der nobelste aller italienischen Baritone, konnte das Arena-Publikum
hingegen nicht befriedigen. Zwar ist er ein bravourös spielender Gérard, seine
Stimme kann jedoch nicht die dramatisch packenden, veristischen Akzente, die so
nötig für diese Rolle sind setzen. Montserrat Caballé gestaltete die Partie der
opferbereiten Maddalena, die ihrem geliebten Dichter zur Guillotine folgt, mit
Stil und Würde. Ihre immer noch makellos reine, betörend schöne Stimme
fasziniert. Luigi Roni sang einen überzeugenden Roucher, Joni Jori war eine
glaubhafte Madelon, Laura Zannini setzte ihre wohlklingende Mezzostimme als
Berci gekonnt ein, Mirella Caponetti war eine rollendeckende Gräfin Coigny und
Giuseppe Riva als Fléville, Gianni Brunelli als Fouquier Tinville, Oslavio di
Credico als „Incredibile“ vervollständigten die Besetung sehr gut.
Weniger
Erfreuliches läßt sich über das Orchester sagen. Gianluigi Gelmetti, den ich
bisher als ausgezeichneten Dirigenten kannte, schien entweder wenig Beziehung
zur veristischen Musik Giordanos oder ungenügend geprobt zu haben. Er
dirigierte teils mit langsamen Tempi, und der Orchesterklang war ohne glühende
Intensität. Es fehlte einfach an dramatischer Leuchtkraft.
Attilio
Colonnello verwirrte das Auge mit einer Ausstattungsrevue opulentester Art, die
in gewissen Momenten das Drama im Überflüssigen erstickte: Die vielen Gärtner im
ersten Akt z.B., die sich unermüdlich im Schlossgarten ergehen und die
Buchsbaumhecken beschneiden, oder das im letzten Akt rot gefärbte sprühende
Wasser der riesigen Fontänen. Zu plakativ machte er das Blutbad der Revolution
deutlich. Solche Gags heizen natürlich die volksfestartige Stimmung in der
Arena an, sind aber vollkomen überflüssig.
Christina
Mai – Opernwelt – Sept. 1986
23
23.09.1985
New York
Metropolitan
Opera
Puccini
/ Tosca
26.09.1985
New York
Metropolitan
Opera
Puccini
/ Tosca
01.10.1985
New York
Metropolitan
Opera
Puccini
/ Tosca
04.10..1985
New York
Metropolitan
Opera
Puccini
/ Tosca
07.10.1985
New York
Metropolitan
Opera
Puccini
/ Tosca
10.10.1985
New York
Metropolitan
Opera
Puccini
/ Tosca
Puccini / Tosca – Sept
Puccini / Tosca – Sept./Okt. 1985 – MET New York
Und
nun noch ein paar Worte zu der saisoneröffnenden „Tosca“, der Zeffirelli-Produktion
der letzten Saison. Statt Behrens hatten wir jetzt Caballé, Statt Domingo
Pavarotti. Wem immer an „schönem“ (nicht nur „gutem“) Singen gelegen ist, kam
auf seine Kosten. Über beiden Sängern glänzt, sozusagen, die Nachmittagssonne:
Sie haben den Höchstpunkt hinter sich, was sie in Stimmschonung hineinzwingt:
Pavarotti hält mit seinen Fortissimi zurück, und Caballé gibt ihr Bestes im
Mezzoforte und Piano – ihr Allerbestes im Pianissimo. Das Resultat war eine
wundervoll zivilisierte, geschmacklich tief befriedigende Doppelleistung. Carlo
Felice Cillario war gut am Pult, und Cornell MacNeil ein hinreichend
dämonischer Scarpia.
Die
Caballé-Pavarotti-Kombination gab der Kritik Anlass zu einigen Witzeleien zum
Thema „Raumverdrängung“ und „sie konnten zueinander nicht kommen“ – Mario konnte
nicht auf dem ihm von Zeffirelli so kunstvoll zubereiteten Malgerüst stehen,
und Tosca konnte sich am Schluss der Oper nicht von der Mauer stürzen, sondern
zog majestätisch in die Seitenkulisse ab, was Anlass zu einigem Gelächter gab.
Die Inszenierung rief mir Carl Hillers Bemerkung (in seinem Buch „100 Jahre MET
1983“), dass MET-Inszenierungen vor allem „schön“ zu sein haben, ins
Gedächtnis. Zeffirellis Inszenierung ist in der Tat „schön“, aber sie ist
gleichzeitig auch imposant, und ein Reflex davon fällt auf die Oper selbst.
Einige Schrulligkeiten der Inszenierung wurden berichtigt: Am Anfang sieht man
keine Touristen mehr in der Kirche, sondern Mönche. Und weiß man, was einem
bevorsteht, findet man sich mit der ungeheuren Menschenmenge im Finale des
ersten Aktes ab.
Kurt Oppens („Opernwelt“ – Jan. 1986)
Puccini „Tosca“
Dirigent:
Carlo Felice Cillario
Regie:
Franco Zeffirelli
Bühnenbild:
Zeffirelli
Kostüme:
Peter J. Hall
James Courtney – Angelotti
Luciano Pavarotti – Cavaradossi
Montserrat Caballé – Tosca
Cornell MacNeil – Scarpia
Andrea Velis – Spoletta
Russell Christopher – Sciarrone
Italo Tajo – Mesner
u.a.
07
07.10.1984
New York
Avery
Fisher hall
Konzert,
mit JOSÉ CARRERAS
10/10/1984 – THE NEW YORK TIMES
10/10/1984 – THE NEW YORK TIMES
RECITAL: CABALLE AND CARRERAS AT MET
By WILL CRUTCHFIELD
It occasionally happens that a much-loved
prima donna in the later phases of her career will
present something of a caricature of her
youthful self, the admired nuances now on constant and exaggerated display, the
old occasional faults now fixed traits. They say Catalani did it in the last
century, as Lily Pons did in ours. (Nor are men exempt; witness Rubini and
Gigli.) Montserrat Caballe can veer in that direction when the mood takes her,
as it seemed to at her concert Sunday evening with Jose Carreras at the
Metropolitan Opera.
But (to get to the important question
right away) the great voice itself seems in good shape, better in fact than in
Miss Caballe's last few seasons here, promising well for her scheduled operatic
appearances in New York later in the season.
And anyway, the hint of caricature - one
of a sweet lady who cannot make up her mind whether to sing - is a lovable one.
The diva's admirers were loving it in force Sunday, and well they might;
however capricious, this is one of the great singers of our time.
She has always been a little fuzzy about
the timing of her musical entrances; here, she entered more or less when she
felt like it and went on to the next note when she got tired of the current
one. She has always been famous for her pianissimo; now she retreats into
near-inaudibility for pages at a stretch. She has always dropped the consonants
and homogenized the vowels in high-lying phrases; Sunday, she embraced that
procedure for medium-high ones as well, to the point that perhaps 40 percent of
her music was sung in what Phyllis Curtin, that most vivid pronouncer among
sopranos, calls ''operanto.''
But she sounded good. The potentially
unruly notes around the top of the treble clef sounded poised, fresh and
youthful. She did not scream the loud notes, and she allowed the soft ones to
retain a certain body and fullness, which has not always been the case. (She
served notice in ''Pace, pace'' and ''Tu che le vanit a,'' though, that her
famous pianissimo is no longer in stock on high B flat.)
It was a bit discouraging to hear the
still-young Jose Carreras, who seems bent on proving the dire predictions of
all the critics who have forecast an early doom for his once-gorgeous lyric
voice. There is still a lovely sound to his middle register, and even in his
overstrained state he is better than most of the tenors we hear day in and day
out. The strain is especially in evidence on high notes; they do not sound
horrible - but they do not sound like the ones that got him famous either. His
current habit is now to make a crescendo on just about every sustained note
until it goes out of control, at which point he releases it with a gust of air
that is apparently intended to do stand-in duty for emotion.
Queen Sofia of Spain was in attendance,
and the program was drawn entirely from operas set or composed in her country.
The ''Gala Festival Orchestra'' (mostly the Met's own players on their night
off) played as well as it could under the confused conducting of Jose Collado.
16
16.04.1984
New York
Spanische
Botschaft
Konzert
– Turina+Granados
18/04/1984
18/04/1984
RECITAL; MONSERRAT CABALLE SINGS
By TIM PAGE
The age of the diva is not dead, and
Montserrat Caballe is the living proof. The soprano's Monday evening recital at
Carnegie Hall, sponsored by the Instituto de Cooperacion Ibero- Americana and
the Consulate General of Spain, was a musical event in the grand manner,
combining fine singing, rapturous audience enthusiasm and the quicksilver
operatic glamour that one associates with the careers of such artists as Melba,
Garden, Farrar and Callas. Whether one agrees with everything she does or not,
Miss Caballe is a presence .
This was billed as a program of ''Songs
of Spain and the Americas.'' However, the music Miss Caballe sang - by Alberto
Ginastera, Enrique Granados, Joaquin Turina and Joaquin Rodrigo, as well as
several lesser lights - was almost beside the point, although some of it was
charming. It was Miss Caballe's voice that drew the capacity crowd. One
suspects that her legion of admirers would come to hear her sing anything she
chose.
For the voice is the main event at any
Caballe concert. And what a miraculous voice it is! Miss Caballe's seamless
legato, and her ability to float soft, stratospheric phrases across a concert
hall of any size have rightly attained the status of legend. Although Miss
Caballe was not in her very top form Monday night, she still produced a dulcet,
creamy tone that cannot be matched by any other soprano now before the public.
She bathed the audience in luxuriant sound.
Yet the program was not always
satisfying. Miss Caballe's emphasis on unremitting vocal splendor was sometimes
at odds with the gritty quality of these simple songs. Indeed, as in the past,
she often seemed strangely without temperament, and few of the songs were
characterized as richly as they might have been. Part of this has to do with
her general stage presence; instead of the fiery qualities that we associate
with the tempestuous genus known as the prima donna, Miss Caballe's manner has
a gentle, even passive, vulnerability. As such, she rarely takes command of a
song; instead, she wafts through the music like a ghostly visitor.
But, as was the case with the late tenor
Beniamino Gigli, a voice like this can pardon a multitude of sins. Miss Caballe
has been presenting recitals at Carnegie Hall for almost 20 years, but only
once or twice during Monday's concert was there any sign of diminishing power.
For the most part, the tones were perfectly centered, the breath control all
but incredible, the pianissimos ravishingly beautiful.
There is always a certain carnival
atmosphere to Miss Caballe's live appearances. Some of the members of her audience
seem to attend specifically to shriek ''Brava!'' as loudly, as frequently and
as frenetically as possible. Groups of songs are regularly interrupted by
spontaneous applause, to the detriment of the music. At her Avery Fisher Hall
appearance last year, as part of the Lincoln Center Great Performers series,
two of Miss Caballe's most vociferous fans came close to a fistfight in the
aisles. Monday night's audience was better behaved, but the hysteria quotient
throughout the evening still hovered around fever pitch.
While one may object to this silly cult
of personality, which elevates the performer above the music, Miss Caballe
remains an outstanding artist, and much of the adulation she recieves is well
deserved. Miguel Zanetti, who has served as the soprano's accompanist for many
years, fulfilled his duties with distinction.
05
05.04.1984
New York
Metropolitan
Opera
Verdi
/ Don Carlos
18.04.1984
New York
Metropolitan
Opera
Verdi
/ Don Carlos
21.04.1984
New York
Metropolitan
Opera
Verdi
/ Don Carlos
01/04/1984
01/04/1984
OPERA: VERDI'S 'DON CARLO' AT THE MET
By DONAL HENAHAN
Opera is such a complex enterprise that
it is a wonder anything ever goes quite right. But now and then, just often
enough to keep faith alive, the pieces all fall into place and something
remarkable and almost inexplicable happens. That was how it was Friday night at
the Metropolitan Opera, where the season's first ''Don Carlo'' set off sparks
and flares intermittently all evening and then burst into flames in the Grand
Inquisitor scene, the dramatic and musical crux of this grandest of Verdi
operas.
The capstone of this stupendous scene is
the Princess Eboli's ''O don fatale,'' which Tatiana Troyanos sang with such
fervor and vocal beauty that the following scene had to be delayed for several
minutes while the audience roared and stomped its approval. This was only the
climax of a splendid night for Miss Troyanos, who earlier had brought on an
ovation with an infectiously lilting Moorish Song. Her wide-ranging mezzo,
which can sometimes take on a wide tremolo, has seldom sounded better.
However, ''O don fatale,'' no matter how
gloriously sung, cannot save the Grand Inquisitor scene in an otherwise
mediocre performance. On this night, the drama built thrillingly, paced
expertly by James Levine in the pit.
Paul Plishka as the tortured King Philip
and Jerome Hines as the pitiless Inquisitor made the struggle between state and
church a grim duel in which Philip's defeat, though inevitable, was nonetheless
shattering.
Following that, the king's confrontation
with his reluctant Queen Elizabeth, Monserrat Caballe, brought out the finest
singing that the Spanish soprano delivered all evening. The tension then built
in the magnificent quartet and the duet between Elizabeth and Eboli, until
anything but a stupendous performance of ''O don fatale'' would have sent the
whole scene crashing into anticlimax.
This production, which is sung in
Italian rather than the original French but restores much music traditionally
omitted from ''Don Carlo,'' can stretch out endlessly when the performers are
less than superior. Fortunately, this cast was unusually strong.
One might ask for a more plausibly
alluring Elizabeth than Miss Caballe, who is upholstered along the lines of the
divas of yore, but hers is a major voice and it was exciting to hear one
filling a house where such instruments are not encountered every night. Mr.
Plishka, who always has been able to deliver sonorous, liquid bass tones, dug
into the role of Philip with an intensity and expressive depth that startled a
listener who had often found him bland in former years. This performance may represent
a breakthrough for Mr. Plishka as an artist.
Jorma Hynninen, who made such a deep
impression here last season in ''The Red Line'' during the Finnish Opera's
visit, made a splendid Metropolitan debut as Rodrigo. Mr. Hynninen's baritone,
though a trifle light at the bottom, is a flexible instrument that he uses with
taste and intelligence. He cuts a handsome figure on stage, too. No less
handsome was Giuliano Ciannella, taking on his first Don Carlo at the Met. His
sizable tenor matched the rest of the cast in heft, but the quality coarsened
when he forced, which was most of the time. He also went hoarse or cracked on
several high notes.
Diane Kesling was a bit tentative as the
charming page Tebaldo, but sounded fine. Therese Brandson was a sweet-toned
Celestial Voice.
This production, one of John Dexter's
staging triumphs, is extraordinarily rich in its sets and costumes. Not
everything works. The auto-da-fe scene tries to outdo ''Boris'' and
''A"ida'' in pageantry, marching so many supers around the stage that a
traffic cop might reasonably be added to the cast. The burning of two heretics,
too obviously dummies, is laughably clumsy. And Miss Caballe's serene and
stately movements during Elizabeth's moments of greatest stress do not
contribute much to the drama's persuasiveness.
However, no more caviling. Until a finer
example of the Metropolitan at its grand-opera best comes along, this ''Don
Carlo'' will certainly do.
30
30.10.1983
New York
Avery
Fisher Hall
Recital;
Piano: MIGUEL ZANETTI
01/11/1983 – THE NEW YORK TIMES
01/11/1983 – THE NEW YORK TIMES
RECITAL: MISS CABALLE
By TIM PAGE
Those who attended the soprano
Montserrat Caballe's Sunday evening recital at Avery Fisher Hall were rewarded
by two hours of virtuoso singing of the highest order. Miss Caballe was in
splendid voice, and the lax mannerisms that have occasionally marred her
performances were nowhere in evidence.
On the contrary, Miss Caballe spun one
lustrous, unfailingly musical legato line after another.
The voice is always the main event at a
Caballe recital. Nobody can claim that the bel canto melodies of Francesco
Gasparini, Giuseppe Giordani and Giovanni Pacini are great masterpieces; even
less so the evocative Iberian sketches of Federico Mompou, Eduardo Toldra and
Amadeo Vives. But Miss Caballe transforms such material with the powers of a
musical alchemist. And when she has a great melody to work with - such as two
arias by Cherubini and Bellini - the results are magical.
A small but vociferous minority of the
audience provided an unpleasant sideshow, however, with frantic shrieks of
''Brava'' that interrupted an aria from Pacini's ''Temistocle'' in midstream,
and nearly led to a fistfight in the aisles. Miss Caballe was ably accompanied by
Miguel Zanetti.
16
16.12.1981
New York
Avery
Fisher Hall
Konzert,
mit JOSÉ CARRERAS
20/12/1981 – THE NEW YORK TIMES
20/12/1981 – THE NEW YORK TIMES
MONTSERRAT CABALLE AND JOSE CARRERAS
SING DUETS
By EDWARD ROTHSTEIN
A singer gets more credit for owning a
great voice than a fiddler does for owning a Stradivarius - as it should be. And
Wednesday night in Avery Fisher Hall, the audience gave Montserrat Caballe and
Jose Carreras in their joint recital the sort of plaudits that great voices can
inspire.
On this occasion, though, Mr. Carreras
demonstrated little aside from the force of his instrument. Miss Caballe
demonstrated a lot more, even if it wasn't convincing.
Mr. Carreras owns an extravagant
instrument; he projected and sustained its middle-register intensity with
masculine bravura. But shadings and coloration were limited; dramatic impulses
were artificially created, as if proving a point in a weighty selection of
impassioned arias.
Miss Caballe has lived with her voice a
longer time; she treated it as an instrument she knows intimately. Even as it
becomes a bit thicker and less flexible, it has remained supple, shifting
registers and dynamics with ease, shaping tones so identical pitches emerged
with different shapes.
But unfortunately, neither Mr.
Carreras's young, burnished instrument nor Miss Caballe's mature and schooled
one was used to great musical ends in the arias by Verdi, Halevy, Charpentier,
Massenet, Giordano and Boito. The tenor seemed to gesticulate with an open
throat, beginning phrases with exclamations and exaggerating their proportions
in attempts to create drama. Miss Caballe established more intriguing dramatic
gestures, even when spinning out a transparent thread of sound. But aside from
the delicacy and ease in a Spanish zarzuela, she used such gestures willfully;
Boito's ''L'altra notte,'' for example, became almost Rococo in its
architecture.
Neither singer was helped much by the
orchestra. Garcia Navarro conducted with such extroverted zeal and rhythmic
abruptness that it seemed he wanted to be congratulated for just controlling
the instruments - not for the music that could have been made with them.
05
05.10.1981
New York
Avery
Fisher Hall
Konzert;
Cond.: ZUBIN MEHTA
06/10/1981 – THE NEW YORK TIMES
06/10/1981 – THE NEW YORK TIMES
PHILHARMONIC: MONTSERRAT CABALLE,
INSTRUMENTALIST
By DONAL HENAHAN
Great singing is such a complex weave of
pure sound and profound emotional communication that we should not be surprised
to find so little of it at any moment in history. Every singer - in fact, every
musician - leans at least somewhat in one direction or the other, but it is safe
to say that the desire to make beautiful sounds comes first, and is perhaps the
truest indication of musical talent. For that reason, the program of arias that
Montserrat Caballe offered last night with the New York Philharmonic raised
quite a storm of applause and cheers, and rightly so. The Spanish soprano is
one of the virtuoso instrumentalists of our day, no less so because her
instrument is the voice.
Hearing Miss Caballe sweep through most
of a taxing concert that was divided between bel canto mad scenes and Wagnerian
excerpts, one was put in mind of such past virtuosos as Mischa Elman, who
needed only to draw an inch of bow to fill the hall with a tone so luxuriant
that it seemed almost sinful to be enjoying it. The bel canto excerpts were the
heroines's death scenes from Donizetti's ''Anna Bolena'' and Bellini's ''Il
Pirata,'' in each of which Miss Caballe spun out the florid lines in exquisite
fashion, as if determined to give all her rivals a demonstration in
old-fashioned Italianate vocalism. Zubin Mehta, at the head of the
Philharmonic, pulled the accompaniment in whatever direction the soprano wished
it to go, in a style probably truer to the bel canto period than modern
musicians might like to believe. The singer actually led the orchestra with her
voice while Mr. Mehta followed with the utmost rhythmic flexibility, like a
ballet conductor. Miss Caballe therefore had all the time she needed for
squeezing in her roulades, delicious high pianissimos and formidably
complicated divisions.
Listened to as beautiful sound alone,
the concert could not be called anythin g but a voluptuous success. Miss
Caballe was in triumphantly sumptuous voice and the concert could be heard as
one long, brillia ntly sung cadenza, with one orchestral break (Rossini's ''The
Silken Ladder'' Overture). It is probably true that characterizat ion was not
nearly so interesting to the public in the early 19th ce ntury period as the
display of vocal technique; in that respect, Miss Caballe must be considered in
the great bel canto tradition. Fr om beginning to end, she stood at a music
stand reading the notes, wh ich detracted somewhat from the dramatic power of
her interpretatio ns. In three Wagner excerpts, she barely lifted her headfrom
the scor e.
Wagner has not been a composer we
associate with Miss Caballe, so the program's second half had built-in
fascination. In two comparatively lightweight samples from the Wagnerian
soprano repertory, Senta's Ballad from ''The Flying Dutchman'' and ''Dich,
teure Halle'' from ''Tannhauser,'' she achieved a mixture of pliant lyricism
and hall-penetrating power that raised hopes for the concert-ending
''Liebestod'' from ''Tristan und Isolde.'' Here, after a somewhat meandering
and pedestrian reading of the Prelude by Mr. Mehta, the soprano sounded a bit
out of her depth. She husbanded her voice shrewdly for the climactic notes, but
the labor showed. There was hardly any sense of the unstoppable outpouring of
vocal lava that great Isoldes have conveyed in this music.
Nevertheless, this was an evening of
great singing of a rare, instrumental sort. The excitement coming from the
stage was vocal, and so the audience responded wildly in the same vein.
19
19.03.1981
New York
Metropolitan Opera
Konzert,
mit JOSÉ CARRERAS, Cond.: LOPEZ-COBOS
21/03/1981
21/03/1981
RECITAL: CABALLE, CARRERAS
By PETER G. DAVIS
Anyone who came to the Metropolitan
Opera House on Thursday night expecting to hear two great voices raised in song
could scarcely have gone away disappointed. Montserrat Caballe, soprano, and
Jose Carreras, tenor, with Martin Katz at the piano, appeared in a joint
recital, and both these popular operatic constellations were in optimum vocal
condition. This inevitably meant a generous amount of glamorous sound from two
of today's most prodigiously endowed singers.
Of course great singing and great voices
do not necessarily go together. Perhaps when presented with two such naturally
beautiful instruments, one's critical standards are automatically raised,
possibly beyond reasonable expectations. At any rate, neither Miss Caballe nor
Mr. Carreras were exactly consistent in matters of style, technique or
interpretive perception. Both are basically instinctive singers who count on
their natural gifts, personal aura and a little bit of luck rather than an
application of musical intellect. Sometimes it all falls into place, and
sometimes not.
Everything meshed in a most seducive
fashion during the second part of the evening devoted to Spanish songs and
zarzuela excerpts. Only the Spanish seem to have the secret to this beguiling
repertory, and here Miss Caballe and Mr. Carreras were completely at home, savoring
the music's sinuous melodies and arched wit. Earlier, in arias, songs and duets
of Rossini, Bellini and Donizetti, the two seemed more stiff and uncertain,
almost as if they were embalming the notes rather than bringing them alive.
Mr. Carreras at least had memorized his
assignments, singing directly from the heart in his inimitably honest if
somewhat foursquare manner. Miss Caballe is a much more mannered singer, and
frequent coy glances at printed assistance strategically placed on the piano
top did not inspire confidence that she had fully digested the music. No
matter. If the evening had its artistic limitations, the enthusiastic audience
was hardly prepared to complain, given the presence of two such ravishing
voices.
02
02.03.1981
New York
Carnegie
Hall
Konzert;
Cond.: JAMES LEVINE / Piano: MIGUEL ZANETTI
05/03/1981 – THE NEW YORK TIMES
05/03/1981 – THE NEW YORK TIMES
RECITAL: MISS CABALLE
By PETER G. DAVIS
Montserrat Caballé sang a recital in
Carnegie Hall Monday night, which automatically guaranteed that the soprano's
many fans spent two hours basking in a wash of entrancing vocal sound. This has
always been the essence of Miss Caballe's appeal, a sensuously warm spinning
tone, no less beguiling at a pianissimo thread than when unfurled at full
voice.
Her special vocal presence has always
been displayed at its most effective in 19th-century Italian opera and the
Spanish song repertory, which predictably made up Miss Caballe's program at
this concert. An indefatigable explorer of this literature, she devoted the
first half of the evening to Italian rarities by Gordigiani, Mercadante,
Donizetti, Costa and Gomes, while concentrating on no less unfamiliar music by
Mompou, Toldra, Chapi and other Spanish composers after intermission.
Complaining about Miss Caballe's musical
limitations at this point seems rather futile. She is always ''interpreting,''
generously applying a variety of dynamics and shadings to give the impression
that something musically significant is happening, but the results often sound
curiously arbitrary. When the cooing pianissimos or sudden bursts of vocal
energy relate meaningfully to matters of phrasing, line or overall structure,
it almost seems to come about by accident. Still, there is that beautiful sound
- perhaps asking for more is just being greedy. Miguel Zanetti was the obliging piano
accompanist.
Feb
Feb.
1981
New York
Avery
Fisher Hall
Gala-Konzert;
Cond.: ZUBIN MEHTA
20/02/1981 – THE NEW YORK TIMES
20/02/1981 – THE NEW YORK TIMES
MUSIC: MONTSERRAT CABALLE IN
'GOTTERDAMMERUNG' ARIA
By JOHN ROCKWELL
In their separate ways, Zubin Mehta and
Montserrat Caballe have both been stalking Wagner. At the end of Thursday
night's New York Philharmonic concert at Avery Fisher Hall, they joined forces
and caught him - their performance had that kind of animal excitement.
Mr. Mehta has been conducting evolving
''Rings of the Nibelung'' in Florence and Vienna the last few years. Miss
Caballe, too, has moved steadily into heavier repertory, first Italian and now
German, without abandoning the bel canto parts with which she made her American
reputation.
In fact, however, the Spanish soprano
has long had a subspecialty in German roles, as her years-old top-notch
''Salome'' recording and her love for Strauss songs attest. In Brunnhilde's
Immolation Scene from ''Gotterdammerung'' Thursday night, she addressed the
music with a full respect for the score and the language and an intuitively
complete command of the idiom. More surprisingly, she attacked the music with a
reckless intensity fully appropriate for the character and far removed from her
sometimes placid bel canto readings. Even her fairly high-lying voice, lacking
the mezzo warmth of some dramatic sopranos, seemed suitable - indeed, she
sounded very much like Birgit Nilsson. And her skill in disguising her relative
weakness down below was continually impressive.
Mr. Mehta prefaced the Immolation Scene
with the Toscanini concert versions of Dawn and Siegfried's Rhine Journey and
Siegfried's Death and Funeral Music from the same opera. His commitment and
coloristic range were never in doubt, and the orchestra played well for him, a
few exposed bloopers aside. But so far Mr. Mehta lacks the magisterial
assurance as a Wagnerian that he brings to Bruckner, and the passionate clarity
of the inner voices that Toscanini himself brought out was missing, as well.
The concert began with a functional but
indifferent account of the Beethoven Symphony No. 2, and continued with
Beethoven's concert aria ''Ah, perfido!'' Mr. Mehta, using the same reduced
orchestra he had employed for the symphony, accompanied with real skill. And
Miss Caballe, while lapsing occasionally into cooing mannerism, was almost as
impressive in this slighter work as in the Wagner.
