[Met Performance] CID:187590



Don Giovanni
Metropolitan Opera House, Sat, March 25, 1961




Don Giovanni (226)
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart | Lorenzo Da Ponte
Don Giovanni
George London

Donna Anna
Leontyne Price

Don Ottavio
Charles Anthony

Donna Elvira
Mary Curtis-Verna

Leporello
Ezio Flagello

Zerlina
Laurel Hurley

Masetto
Theodor Uppman

Commendatore
Bonaldo Giaiotti


Conductor
Karl B?hm







Review 1:

Review in TIME magazine of 4/7/61.

Leontyne's Latest

Donna Anna in Mozart's Don Giovanni is a bit of a bore, and audiences can understand why the Don is trying to get away from her. She sings matchlessly beautiful music, but the range of her emotions is narrow: fury at her seducer, with some tenderness for her fianc?. Singing the part for the first time at the Metropolitan Opera last week Soprano Leontyne Price brought to Anna a vitality that she rarely had before, gave as fine a reading of the role as present-day operagoers are likely to hear and see. As in her previous appearances in this triumphant debut season - Leonora in "Il Trovatore," Aida, Cio-Cio-San in "Butterfly" - Soprano Price was setting new standards by which to judge some of opera's classic r?les.

Last weeks production - four seasons old but still one of the handsomest spectacles the Met has to offer - was bolstered by a generally strong cast. But Soprano Price was the undisputed star. Throughout the long evening she demonstrated again her remarkable ability to compel an audience to belief through sheer beauty of tone; from the rage of Act l's "Or sai chi l'onore" to the tenderness of the second act's "Non mi dir," she moved securely and with absolute conviction. Her two great arias stopped the opera cold in two of the most spontaneous ovations of the season.

Later in the week, completing the cycle of new r?les for the season, Soprano Price gave a touching performance of the less demanding part of Li? in "Turandot." If anybody was unhappy about her success it was the Manhattan ticket brokers: obtaining Price tickets these days, they report, is about like wangling a reserved seat beside the first astronaut.



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