My favorite soprano May 8, 2007
Posted by Jeff in Giuseppe Verdi, Italian, Opera, Renata Scotto, Theater.trackback
My favorite soprano (of those I have heard live) is a housewife from New Rochelle, N. Y., short and not entirely svelte (although considerably skinnier than when she was younger). When she married Lorenzo Anselmi in 1960, she decided to eschew the life of an international opera star, and she signed a long-term contract with the Met. So, when I got the opera bug in college, I got to see a lot more of her than I might have if she had lived a more transient life.
I guess I have heard better voices, but I’m not sure I’ve seen better acting, either in opera or anywhere on stage. I never saw Callas, but I’m content to say that I have seen Renata Scotto.
Here she is with one of my all-time favorite tenors, Jon Vickers, in the love duet from Verdi’s Otello. This from a 1981 United Nations Day concert. I think the conductor is Lorin Maazel but I’m not swearing to it:
Technorati tags: Renata Scotto, Jon Vickers, Otello, Giuseppe Verdi, Lorin Maazel
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The conductor is Fernando Lozano. He and Maazel look very different: the glasses (which Maazel does not use on the podium), the facial structure, the (amount of) hair…
Noted, thanks.