Above: Sondra Radvanovsky as Tosca
~ Author: Oberon
Saturday November 17th, 2018 - In an age when few voices can truly be called distinctive, Sondra Radvanovsky's performances are always red-letter dates on my calendar. Like all the greatest divas down thru the centuries, Sondra's voice is not to all tastes: she has her enthusiastic admirers and her detractors. Through it all, she moves from opera house to opera house, garnering big ovations, and making my continued devotion to the art form worthwhile.
This afternoon, my fellow "Rad-Fan", Craig Salstein and I settled into a balcony box to watch our prima donna playing a prima donna - Floria Tosca - in an opera once described as a 'shabby little shocker'. TOSCA hardly shocks us nowadays, inured as we are to genuine, disturbing shocks in the daily headlines. But it can still be an absorbing story to watch unfold in The Met's traditional and mostly attractive production.
It's a production designed for patrons sitting in the middle of the house. If you like a side box, you lose sight of 1/3 of the action. In Act I, for instance, you can either forego the sight of Cavaradossi's painting of Mary Magdalene, or you can miss the religious procession that closes Act I (during which the Marchesa D'Attavanti makes an unexpected appearance). We chose house-right, the better to savour Sondra's "Vissi d'arte".
All afternoon, people around us chatted blithely throughout the show; two women in the box below us simply had to discuss something during the tenor's "Vittoria!" And there was a round of laughter after each line of the lovers' Act I banter about the eye colour of Mary Magdalene. It's not all that funny, really.
Carlo Rizzi was on the podium. A routinier, Rizzi was absent from the Met from 2007 to 2016, and as far as I know, no one missed him. The orchestra played superbly today - it's still basically "Levine's orchestra" - but Rizzi's taffy-pull tempi, and occasional covering of the singers didn't do Puccini any favors.
Brenton Ryan was a clear-toned, incisive Spoletta; a bouquet was thrown to him over the footlights during the curtain calls - and he charmingly retrieved it. Oren Gradus was strong of voice as Angelotti, and Patrick Carfizzi really sings the Sacristan's music, with a robust bass-baritone (though I could do without his muttering remarks during his entrance music....the director's idea, I suppose...)
A very tall, slender Italian baritone named Claudio Sgura took over most of the Scarpias this season when Wolfgang Koch withdrew from the role. Mr. Sgura was severely over-parted in the Big House during most of Act I. In Act II, once he and Ms. Radvanovsky were left alone onstage, things improved and the atmosphere was ramped up as their cat-and-mouse game developed. But even so, Mr. Sgura's voice doesn't really seem to be of Met quality.
In past seasons, Joseph Calleja has done some outstanding singing in such essentially lyrical roles as the Duke in RIGOLETTO, Rodolfo in BOHEME, Nemorino in ELISIR, and Gabriele Adorno in SIMON BOCCANEGRA. He is moving into heavier repertory now (Don Jose, Rodolfo in LUISA MILLER, and Pollione), and today as Mario Cavaradossi he often sounded at full-stretch. There are still many attractive elements in his singing - the soft, sustained final note of "Recondita armonia" and some heavenly, heady piano singing in Act III - but we're used to more bloom on the top - and more heft in general - in this music.
In such surroundings, it would take an epic performance of the title-role to make the afternoon worthwhile. And that's what Ms. Radvanovsky gave us.
With her blazing high notes, her marvelously modulated dynamics - down to a thread of tone - and her passionate commitment to the music, Ms. Radvanovsky's vocalism was so generous and thrilling; from first note to last, she carried the opera to the heights.
While her choice to sing lines like "Tu non l'avrai stasera...giuro!" and "Assassino!" in a high-pitched sort of shriek makes them irritating rather than chilling, Sondra's dark, chesty resonance at "E Morto ! Or gli perdono!" was much, much more to my liking. At the other end of the range, her uncannily sustained high-C as her lover is dragged off to his fate in Act II was thrillingly connected to her ensuing cries of "Mario! Mario!!"
What I will always remember about this performance is Sondra's singing of the "Vissi d'arte" which was the greatest rendering of that thrice-familiar aria in my experience. Over the decades, I've heard this iconic piece sung - on recordings and in live performances - by everyone from Giannina Arangi-Lombardi to Anna Netrebko. Today I heard it phrased the way I've always wished to hear it, the singing emotion-drenched but utterly musical. A hall-filling, rapturous high B-flat and a gorgeously sustained finish left me deeply moved and gratified. Craig said his heart was racing.
Metropolitan Opera House
November 17th, 2018 matinee
TOSCA
Giacomo Puccini
Tosca...................Sondra Radvanovsky
Cavaradossi.............Joseph Calleja
Scarpia.................Claudio Sgura
Sacristan...............Patrick Carfizzi
Spoletta................Brenton Ryan
Angelotti...............Oren Gradus
Sciarrone...............Christopher Job
Shepherd................Davida Dayle
Jailer..................Paul Corona
Conductor...............Carlo Rizzi
~ Oberon