If opera will not come to the middle of the mountain, the middle of the mountain will come to opera!

Today marks the 150th anniversary of the birth of Italo Montemezzi (Montemezzi, if I am not mistaken, literally translating as “half-mountain”).

A representative of that vast artistic lineage of one-hit wonders, Montemezzi is pretty much known for his opera “L’amore dei tre re” (“The Love of Three Kings”), which one might assume from the title to be a heartwarming Christmas piece about the three Magi, along the lines of Gian Carlo Menotti’s “Amahl of the Night Visitors.” If so, one would be mistaken.

“L’amore dei tre re” is an overheated historical tragedy, centering around a love triangle – perhaps even a ménage à quatre – in which everyone winds up dead or inconsolable. Another great night at the theater! Only in opera does one set foolish, deadly traps to ensnare the guilty, only to have the scheme backfire horribly.

“L’amore dei tre re” opened at La Scala in 1913 to mixed reviews. But what do the Italians know about opera? When it made its way abroad, it became an international success. In the U.S., it was hailed as “the best operatic work coming from Italy since Verdi’s ‘Falstaff.’” In 1918, it was sung at New York’s Metropolitan Opera by Enrico Caruso, Claudia Muzio, and Pasquale Amato.

Alas, the mania for “The Love of Three Kings” proved to be but a flare. The opera had its moment, but after World War II, frequency of performances declined to the point where now, if it’s ever done at all, it’s an event.

Unabashedly decadent, coyly erotic, dramatic, and dreamlike, “Three Kings” may be Italian, but it was written by a composer who had assimilated broader musical influences. The score cranks up the heat, in kind of a mélange of Wagner, Strauss, and Debussy.

It won’t turn up very often at your friendly neighborhood opera house. Happily, there’s a fine recording of the work in modern sound (i.e. stereo), featuring Anna Moffo, Placido Domingo, and Cesare Siepi.

That said, here’s an interesting document from the Met in 1941, with the composer conducting on a broadcast introduced by Milton Cross!

In 1948, the New York Times described “L’amore dei tre re” as “a tone poem for voices and orchestra,” lauding it as “the most poetic and aristocratic of Italian operas” and declaring of its composer, “He never descends beyond the loftiest level.”

Not bad! Where is it now?

We’ll keep a candle in the window for you on your sesquicentenary, Italo Montemezzi.