[Met Tour] CID:139460



Il Trovatore
Boston Opera House, Boston, Massachusetts, Sat, April 7, 1945




Il Trovatore (227)
Giuseppe Verdi | Salvatore Cammarano
Manrico
Kurt Baum

Leonora
Stella Roman

Count Di Luna
Frank Valentino

Azucena
Margaret Harshaw

Ferrando
Virgilio Lazzari

Ines
Maxine Stellman

Ruiz
Lodovico Oliviero

Gypsy
John Baker


Conductor
Pietro Cimara







Review 1:

Review signed L. L. in the Boston Globe

BOSTON OPERA HOUSE

'Il Trovatore'

To dispense with the one factor which militated most against perfection in last night's "Il Trovatore" Kurt Baum was an awful Manrico. His voice is wooden and his stage deportment descends to mere calisthenics. And he sang through his teeth.

Otherwise, there were few shades of gray. Pietro Cimara led his forces with a determined hand, and the orchestra played well.

Principal vocal credit goes to the distaff side of the cast. Azucena, as set forth by Margaret Harshaw, was properly ominous. "Stride la vampa" seldom has been heard with so much fierceness. And the whole scene with the vagabonds in the encampment was offered with conviction, aside from the stupid antics of many stage-struck supers.

Stella Roman, the Leonora, was excellent in all departments. One might suggest, however, that her naturally lovely voice should more often be subject to scale practice. Not that she was insufficient, by any means. But rather that there is a certain roughness discerned in her vocalizing which only exercise can overcome.

The role of Inez, so often delegated to a minor singer, was nicely delineated by Maxine Stellman.

Francesco Valentino, the perfidious di Luna, contributed the best acting and much first-rate singing. Some, too, that was inferior. Given his head, as in the little air before the convent, he could be richly satisfying, but with the ensembles, especially when confronted by the ladies, he came to grief.

The Fernando was competently dispatched by dependable Virgilio Lazzari. In fairness, it must be added that Baum, singing off stage or from within the prison walls sounded almost professional at times.



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