Search - Verdi, Orch Sinfonica Nazionale Della Rai, José Cura :: Verdi: La Traviata a Paris (Highlights from the Opera)

This recording presents highlights from the "real time" Traviata presented on European television in June 2000. The idea was to heighten the drama by placing the opera in Parisian locations which still reflected the 1850s setting, and then having the soloists sing as plausibly as possible to a recorded soundtrack. The effect was somewhat bizarre--especially when it appeared that Violetta's cramped, little Act IV apartment had a mysteriously grand concert-hall acoustic. The recording allows one to judge the performance on its musical--instead of its televisual--merits, however, and on the whole it comes off rather well. Dreamboat tenor José Cura makes a passionate and convincing Alfredo, and Eteri Gvazava captures the pathos, if not the sparkle, of Violetta. She excels in the dramatic deathbed music of Act IV, but is less happy in the spinto (and fiendishly difficult) scales and leaps of "Sempre libera" in Act I. The warm orchestral accompaniment is sensitive to the singers, but only occasionally lacks power. All in all, this is a good introduction to the opera and a neat tie-in to the TV production. --Warwick Thompson