Search - Verdi, Mancini, Gatti :: Nabucco

Silveri and Mancini in red-blooded Nabucco

L. E. Cantrell | Vancouver, British Columbia Canada | 06/13/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Source: RAI broadcast from Rome on January 16, 1951.



Sound quality: Fairly good mono. Some background hiss comes and goes, presumably reflecting the qualities of the original matrices. Voices are clearly caught and generally given predominance over the orchestra. At times, individual voices, particularly that of Silveri, seem to be located in an overly resonant space.



Documentation: Libretto in Italian. Timed track listings. Graphics in the booklet include portraits of Verdi, Giuseppina Strepponi, the first Abigaille who many years later became Verdi's second wife and of the librettist, Temistocle Solera, a Frasier Crane lookalike, who was rumored to have seduced a queen of Spain. Plot summary by act. While there is nothing on the circumstances of the recording and nothing on the performers, there is an odd little essay in both Italian and English about a lost monument to Verdi at the Parma train station. The English translator, one Nigel Jamieson, has a rather better grasp of Italian than of English style.



This recording is a fine sample of full-blooded Italian opera, a bit rough, more than a bit raw, but exciting from beginning to end.



Paolo Silveri, the Nabucco, was one of those excellent baritones whom we took for granted in the sixties. He began his career as a bass, but at the prompting of Gigli, he moved up to the baritone range. In 1959, he even managed to soar into the stratosphere by attempting the lead role in Verdi's Otello. While he does not match the incomparable Gobbi as Nabucco, he provides a well-sung, vigorous and even insightful version of the mad Babylonian king.



Caterina Mancini, whose career extended to 1964, was pretty much the last of the overwhelming, larger-than-life Italian sopranos of the Caniglia-Cerquetti-Tebaldi type. Her big, big voice is thrilling to hear. And if she comes slightly unhinged from time to time, remember that Abigaille is one of the most unhinged characters ever created by Verdi. The role of Abigaille is notorious as a voice killer. Listening to Mancini, one can tell exactly why that is so--and also why some sopranos feel the need to risk its dangers.



Antonio Cassinelli is fairly good as the priest, Zeccaria, but he is probably the weakest member of the cast. His bass voice thins to just a whisper on the lowest notes, but his flaming denunciations are generally not at such subterranean depths and he makes the most of them.



Gabriella Gatti in the small part of the good girl, Fenena, is unexpectedly powerful. Her singing is enough to lead one to think that she might be a match for her evil sister, Abigaille, in an all-out hair-pulling match.



Mario Binci, whose heyday was in the 1940s and 50s, sang such things as Faust in "Mephistofele" and Walter von Stolzing in "I maestri cantori di Norimberga". His powerful, not very elegant voice is something of a surprise in role often treated as a throwaway or given as a bone to the house tenor. For once, Ismaele sounds like a man who might be of interest to a woman with the black widow-ish tastes of Abigaille.



Fernando Previtali holds everything together in a propulsive and workmanlike way that does not overlook the inherent lyricism of this very tuneful score. The orchestra and chorus are adequate for their tasks, if not especially memorable.



In listening to "Nabucco" I was reminded how much Verdi got right in this, his third opera. If Verdi's work is still raw, it is full of grand melodies and undeniable passion. Not until "Macbeth" would he begin to scale such heights again.



Five stars for the sheer exhilaration of it all!"