Opera Orchestra of New York
Roberto Alagna as Andrea Chenier
By: Susan Hall - Jan 07, 2013
Andrea Chenier
By Umberto Giordano
Libretto by Luigi Illica
Conducted by Alberto Veronesi
Roberto Alagna, Kristin Lewis, George Petean, Renata Lamanda, Rosalind Elias, Ronald Naldi, David Perschal.
The New York Choral Ensemble prepared by Italo Marchini.
Opera Orchestra of New York
Avery Fisher Hall
New York, New York
January 6, 2012
event photos Stephanie Berger courtesy OONY
Andrea Chenier is, among its many virtues, a display case for tenors. Roberto Alagna made his debut in the role in the Opera Orchestra of New York’s concert version. The role is not ideally suited to his fabulous lyric voice, but Alagna is always a pleasure to watch on stage, a consummate artist and an audience friendly singer.
Early on in the concert, he decided to add excitement to the improvisation of Andrea’s ode, singing in a different key from the orchestra. The conductor Alberto Veronesi apparently didn’t agree with the choice. The music stopped. After a brief discussion, the improvisation started again. This time orchestra and singer were in the same key.
In the second act, Alagna failed to make an entrance, but this being a concert performance, the show went on without him. He was missed, however.
Eve Queler, founder of the OONY, has always provided an interesting array of singers. With Alagna is star, she introduced a fabulous Roumanian baritone, George Petean, in the role of the footman Carlo Gerard, an ardent revolutionary and also the besotted lover of Maddalena who loves Andrea. This being opera, and in an aria that brought down the house, Petean offers to free Andrea from the guillotine. Petean’s voice is naturally huge, and ranges easily, in richly textured dynamics.
Mezzo Renata Lamanda, in her debut with the OONY, made a delicious Bersi. It was too bad an aria Illica wrote for the role was cut after the composer held a pistol to Illica’s breast to force a text-guillotine. Kristin Lewis has a big voice which settles beautifully at its center. Jennifer Feinstein, Ronald Naldi, David Perschal added to the musical pleasure.
Although La Vecchia Madelon is a contralto role which Rosalind Elias has not sung before, she was a welcome and warmly greeted presence on the stage.
The opera is gorgeous, giving us a prelude of the Verdi to come and some of the perfume of French music in the moments of moonlit romance. The New York Choral Ensemble was billed as courtesans, dandies, revolutionaries, judges. They sang, clapped, jeered and begged for blood with enthusiasm.
The opera’s first performance almost didn’t happen. Giordano sought out the composer of Cavalieria for support. He caught Mascagni about to board a new tram, and so engaged him in his plight that Mascagni didn’t board the tram, which immediately crashed into a wall, killing several people. Mascagni was so grateful to Giordano that he went directly to La Scala and insisted that Andrea Chenier be mounted. It was. Over the years Jon Vickers, Renata Tebaldi and so many others, including the cast today, have provided pleasure. Tebaldi always cried out "Andrea" when she sees the poet in prison, in a small, yearning, passionate voice.
In the end, Andrea and Maddalena go off to death together, the second best thing to living happily ever after. That Andrea Chenier the opera continues in the repertoire is a special treat for opera lovers. The Opera Orchestra of New York under conductor Veronesi painted the dying gavotte, the revolution full of drumbeats and even the "Marseillaise," with the added perfume of Parisian love. A wonderful, warm afternoon.
Note: Thanks so a comment by a reader and also the review of Eli Jacobson, a first rate critic. I note the consensus that the orchestra stopped because the conductor was racing. Proceedings started up again in like tempi.