~ Author: Oberon
By chance, I came upon this lovely Louis Melançon photo (above) of Anna Moffo and Robert Merrill in Verdi's LA TRAVIATA in the Met's 1966 Cecil Beaton production of the Verdi classic, which evoked in me memories of their partnership in this opera. From Moffo''s debut in 1959 til her final Met appearance in a staged opera there in 1976, they sang these roles together 50 times with the Company, in New York and on tour. They also made a beautiful recording of the opera together for RCA. Listen to a portion of their Act II duet here.
Moffo's 1959 Met debut came at The Old Met in the Tyrone Guthrie production. On September 24th, 1966, during the second week at the New Met, Cecil Beaton's lavish production opened with Moffo, Merrill, and tenor Bruno Prevedi in the leading roles. Georges Prêtre was on the podium. I saw the Moffo Violetta four times, twice with Merrill as Germont, and twice with Mario Sereni, who was very good in the role, and a less 'wooden' actor than Merrill.
Above: Moffo as Violetta in the scene at Flora's party
Anna Moffo had two Saturday matinee broadcasts of TRAVIATA in the Beaton production, nine months apart. For me, they offered tell-tale signs of what would be the diva's eventual vocal decline. In the first broadcast, on March 25th, 1967, she sounded fantastic: the voice lyrical and free-flowing, the top gorgeous, the drama expressed thru colour rather than force: in sum, one of her great performances.
During June, 1967, I saw two more Moffo Violettas (one with Merrill, the second with Sereni) and she was very impressive indeed, receiving huge ovations. I met her at the stage door; she was extremely beautiful in person, and very kind.
On December 30, 1967, Moffo had her second matinee broadcast in the Beaton production. I was very excited to be seeing her onstage again, but from her very first line - "Flora, amici, la notte che resta..." - something had changed. On "...che resta.." she really leaned heavily on the low notes, sounding almost chesty. I was still a novice opera-lover at that time, but alarm bells went off. Moffo continued to pressurize her lower notes throughout the first act, but the coloratura and high notes of "Sempre libera" seemed fine.
During the intermission, I asked a fellow Moffo fan if her vocalism that day was worrisome to him; he felt she was making an effort to sound more 'dramatic', and he didn't feel panicky about it. The soprano continued singing in this manner for the rest of the opera, and - since the drama gets increasingly intense as the story unfolds - we heard these big, juicy lower notes from Moffo throughout the afternoon.
As it turned out, I never saw Anna Moffo on The Met stage again after that, though she continued singing there for nearly a decade. On February 1, 1969, came the disastrous LUCIA DI LAMMERMOOR broadcast, which I listened to in disbelief, which gave way to despair. The voice was wildly unpredictable: woozy in the middle, over-ripe in the lower range, and screamy at the top. Awkwardly, I ran into her in the Met lobby a couple of weeks afterward and she recognized me; she asked if I had heard the LUCIA broadcast, and I gave a neutral response. She said she had been ill that day, but that now things were back to normal.
I cannot say for certain whether she ever regained peak form again, but from reports from friends, she was not singing with the lustre and ease we'd come to expect from her. Her later recordings are so sad...I cannot listen to them.
In 1975, TJ and I - living in Hartford - tuned in for her broadcast of Nedda in PAGLIACCI. Moffo sounded dreadful, the voice unsupported. "What is she thinking?" I asked TJ. "I guess she feels she still has something to offer," he replied.
In 1979, I was still living in Hartford (but no longer with TJ) when Moffo came to The Bushnell to sing MERRY WIDOW in English. I decided to go, and always regretted it afterwards.
Anna Moffo and Robert Merrill reunited on the Met stage one last time for the Met's 100th Anniversary Gala on October 22, 1983. They sang the duet "Sweethearts" from Sigmund Romberg's MAYTIME. The audience greeted them affectionately, and they managed to get thru their duet without mishap.
I hadn't intended to delve into the story of Moffo's decline when I posted the photo at the top of the article; I prefer simply to remember her lovely performances from the first decade of her Met career. But one thing led to another once I started writing.
One of the most moving passages in her performances as Violetta was her farewell to Alfredo in Act II, when she thinks she will never see him again. In the Beaton production, this was staged so that Violetta came downstage while sustaining the top B-flat and sank to her knees, clasping Alfredo's hand. Here is the phrase - "Amami, Alfredo...!" as Ms. Moffo sang it at La Scala in 1964:
Anna Moffo - Amami Alfredo! ~ TRAVIATA (Live)
And here is Moffo at her best, from a commercial arias compilation, conducted by Sir Colin Davis:
Anna Moffo - TRAVIATA ~ Act I scena (commercial recording)
~ Oberon