[Met Performance] CID:300140



Il Trovatore
Metropolitan Opera House, Fri, April 27, 1990

Debut : Sharon Sweet




Il Trovatore (535)
Giuseppe Verdi | Salvatore Cammarano
Manrico
Franco Bonisolli

Leonora
Sharon Sweet [Debut]

Count Di Luna
Lajos Miller

Azucena
Shirley Verrett

Ferrando
Terry Cook

Ines
Loretta Di Franco

Ruiz
Charles Anthony

Messenger
John Bills

Gypsy
Ray Morrison


Conductor
Michelangelo Veltri







Review 1:

Review of Bill Zakariasen in the Daily News

Met stars, ascending and resplendent

Last Friday, barely a week before the Metropolitan Opera was scheduled to end its season, the company's most important debut of the year occurred. Sharon Sweet, a young New York-born soprano, first stepped on the Met stage as Leonora in "II Trovatore," and she was a singular sensation. From the [very first] measures of "Tacea la notte," she proved she was a Verdi soprano to the manner born, prompting comparisons to Zinka Milanov. Not so farfetched - Sweet's wide-ranging voice is big, beautiful, impeccably schooled and effortlessly, naturally produced from top to bottom. Most important, she knows how to deliver the grand Verdian line with absolute authority. This is truly a major singer and she'll repeat her Leonora at the Met tonight and the Saturday [afternoon performance].

There was also good news in the superb Azucena of Shirley Verrett, who was in markedly better vocal shape than she was earlier this season. But the Manrico of Franco Bonisolli was merely a joke, despite a good high C. Bad taste ruled the stage when he was on it and, despite his wearing Errol Flynn's "Sea Hawk" boots, the only swashbuckling he offered was the off-and-on duel he had with conductor Michelangelo Veltri.



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