Richard Strauss’ final opera, “Capriccio,” is an extended, if lighthearted debate on the relative merits of words and music. But for Arrigo Boito, the two never really came into conflict.
As one of the great librettists, Boito provided the texts for Verdi’s late masterpieces, “Otello” and “Falstaff.” He also worked up a revision of “Simon Boccanegra” and – under the anagram Tobia Gorrio – provided the libretto for Ponchielli’s “La Gioconda.” That should be enough to guarantee his place in music history, right?
But Boito himself was also a composer of merit, if not a prolific one. Although he destroyed his first opera, “Ero e Leandro,” and his last, “Nerone,” was left incomplete at the time of his death (to be finished by Arturo Toscanini and Vincenzo Tommasini), he totally nailed it with “Mefistofele.”
There may be those who look down their noses at Boito’s take on Goethe’s “Faust,” yet the work stubbornly clings to the outskirts of the standard repertoire. Audiences love it. For me it is much more entertaining than anything in Verdi (I know, them’s fightin’ words), and I personally find the melodic invention much richer than that in the more popular version by master melodist Charles Gounod.
Sure, as narrative it’s a little clunky – it’s as if Boito presents the story as a series of tableaux that are just kind of stitched together – and the most hair-raising set piece, the prologue in Heaven, comes right at the beginning. How could it not be all downhill from there? But the composer has the good sense to bring it all back at the end.
What the opera really demands is a strong personality at its core, someone who, through his magnetic stage presence and sheer force of will, can tow the circus parade of wonders, wagon after wagon, before our astonished eyes and ears.
Feodor Chaliapin, by all accounts, was just such a force. He gained wide notoriety in the title role, for his earthy interpretation and his insistence on playing it half-naked.
In the recent past, Samuel Ramey owned the piece. He too preferred to show a fair amount of skin (though less than Chaliapin) – but really, couldn’t that be said for just about any of Ramey’s roles?
Here’s the stunning – and cheeky – Robert Carson production first presented by San Francisco Opera in 1989, which I belatedly caught up with in New York, unfortunately after Ramey retired. The first 26 minutes will knock your socks off.
Chaliapin in 1927
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVfjMHOeOVA
Happy birthday, Arrigo Boito (1842-1918). Whether in words or in music, you gave the devil his due!
DEVILED HAMS: Feodor Chaliapin (left) and Samuel Ramey
