You can tune an orchestra, but you can’t tun-a fish. This Sunday night on “The Lost Chord,” we put the “cat” in Catalan music with selections from Xavier Montsalvatge’s one-act opera “Puss in Boots.”
“Puss in Boots,” Montsalvatge’s first opera, was composed in 1947. We all know the story. The tale, in its best-known guise, was published by Charles Perrault in 1695 as one of the “Tales of Mother Goose.”
A poor miller laments his inheritance. Most of the family property – the mill and the mules – goes to his elder brothers, and all that’s left for him is an unprepossessing cat. He wonders of what use to him a cat could possibly be. He contemplates eating it, perhaps using the skin to make a hat. The cat, however, promptly endears himself, and offers to gain his master a fortune, a kingdom, and the hand of a beautiful princess. All he asks in exchange is a pair of boots, to spare his feet, a stylish hat with a plume, a cape, and a sword fashioned out of bone.
Since the cat presents him with a ring from the hand of the princess, the Miller considers it a fair deal, and sets about getting, by hook or by crook, whatever the cat desires.
Throughout the course of the story, with his cunning and superior wits, the cat is able to deliver on everything he promises.
We’ll heard selections from a 2004 recording, on the Columna Musica label, with Argentine mezzo-soprano Marisa Martins as Puss (an unusual take on the traditional “trouser role”), and tenor Antonio Comas as the Miller. The Symphony Orchestra of the Gran Teatre del Liceu is conducted by Antoni Ros Marba.
Listen for the charming cat-like touches in the string-writing and the use of a piano throughout the opera to evoke the style of decorative 18th century recitative.
That’s “Fur Love and Valor” – highlights from Xavier Montsalvatge’s “Puss in Boots” – this Sunday night at 10:00 EST, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.