A successful, modern production and a superb performance
This production opened the Verdi Festival in Parma in 2007. It was a huge success and marked a high point in the history of the Verdi Festival. Director Denis Krief, who also designed the sets, costumes and lighting, updated the action to the 1930's. There is a clear demarcation between the two social classes that clash here, the nobility and the peasantry. The aristocrats are clad in black and white and inhabit sets with the formal frost of huge aseptic geometric shapes, that represent the rigid order of their sheltered world and the emptiness of their souls. Wurm and the Count's hunters are dressed like fascist goons. Duchess Federica is dressed in blazing red and the chorus in her reception in goofy white formal suits, as if she occupies some kind of fantasy world. The villagers are in simple, warm and attractive earth and wood colors; Miller's house is outlined by bare wood walls and a simple table. The rustic setting is represented by striking projections of leafy trees blowing...
Near perfectly Done
Back in the day, Verdi scholars like Charles Osborne (The Complete Operas of Verdi) and Julian Budden (The Operas of Verdi) regarded Luisa Miller as a transitional opera, with the last act showing Verdi's "mature" style while the first two were regarded as more of that "oom-pah-pah" Bel Canto stuff. Fortunately for opera fans in general, and Verdi fans in particular, that old school attitude is going, going, but not quite gone (Budden's three volume work was copyrighted in 1973, Osborne's in 1969). With the bicentennial of the Maestro's birth being celebrated this year, the issuence of DVDs of all his works enable us to formulate opinions independant of the academic set.
Luisa Miller is, of course, loosely based on Shiller's Kabale und Liebe (Intrigue and Love). In it, Verdi is seen moving from the more histionic works toward a more studied treatment of the human condition. The drama is far more focused than in earlier works while the music is rich and melodic. This near...
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I HAVE NEVER SEEN THIS OPERA,BUT WAS IMPRESSED WITH IT. I HAVE TWO CD RECORDINGS.ONE WITH CABALLE,PAVAROTTI,MILNES AND ONE WITH KELSTON,LAURI-VOLPI WHICH WAS A LIVE BROADCAST,ROME,FEB.1951. I ENJOYED THIS DVD.MARCELLO ALVAREZ IS AMOUNG THE GREATEST TENORS I HAVE HEARD AND I CAN MENTION MANY.FIORENZA CEDOLINS IS A DELIGHT TO WATCH AND LISTEN TO.I FIRST SAW HER IN TOSCA WITH ALVAREZ WHICH WAS FANTASTIC. LEO NUCCI NEVER SEEMS TO GET OLDER AND HE IS ONE OF THE GREAT VERDIAN BARITONES. HOWEVER,I MUST SHOW MY BIAS.I AM OF THE OLD SCHOOL OF OPERA AND WHEN IT COMES TO BARITONES (AND OTHER VOICES,MALE AND FEMALES) THE GREAT ONES OF THE PAST CANNOT BE COMPARED-SUCH AS ROBERT MERRILL AND LEONARD WARREN.NEVERTHELESS,I THOROUGHLY ENJOYED THIS PRODUCTION VERY MUCH.
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