United Kingdom Puccini, La rondine (concert performance): Soloists, London Symphony Chorus and Orchestra / Sir Antonio Pappano (conductor). Barbican Hall, London, 12.12.2024. (JPr)
Cast:
Carolina López Moreno – Magda
Serena Gamberoni – Lisette
Michael Fabiano – Ruggero
Paul Appleby – Prunier
Ashley Riches – Rambaldo
Sarah Dufresne – Yvette / Giorgette
Angela Schisano – Bianca / Gabriele
Marvic Monreal – Suzy / Lolette
Hector Bloggs – Crebillon
Tom McGowan – Perichaud
Sang Eup Son – Gobin
Chorus director – Mariana Rosas
If recent musicals of this generation, M. Butterfly, Miss Saigon and Rent are edgier, updated versions of Puccini’s Madama Butterfly and La bohème, then La rondine is a somewhat anodyne, though ultimately downbeat, early-twentieth century reinvention of Verdi’s La traviata – with added elements from Johann Strauss’s Die Fledermaus – without any tuberculosis, coughing, or death of its heroine! Puccini was originally commissioned to compose a Viennese operetta, but decided on a comic opera, though in the end it is still basically a lyric one. World War I delayed the first performance of La rondine, whilst Puccini’s premature death – only a few days over 100 years ago – never left us a definitive version because he was never entirely satisfied with it.
La rondine had its premiere at the Grand Théâtre de Monte Carlo in 1917 and I suspect this is the version we basically heard rather than either of the subsequent 1920 and 1921 revisions. One of the additions in 1920 was Ruggero’s Act I paean to Paris, ‘Parigi! È la città dei desideri’; and I wonder if it was not in the score tenor Michael Fabiano originally studied because he seemed to have separate sheets of music and struggled through it before a vocal gear-change to an extraordinarily loud climax.
La rondine was new to almost everyone sitting around me, however I have seen and heard it on a few occasions, and for me, it remains an interesting, if perhaps ultimately unsuccessful, late-career experiment by the composer. The story is a slim one, though very familiar from La traviata and even, Puccini’s own Manon Lescaut, whilst the ending is somewhat inconclusive. (In the Barbican Hall, the last sound we heard was Magda’s very long ‘Ahhhhhhhh’ which made my mind wonder to a more conclusive Carmen-like ending to yet another possible completion.)
Magda is the mistress of Rambaldo, a wealthy banker, and is hosting a cocktail party where the poet Prunier is explaining his theories on love and Magda, herself, longs for true love. She believes she later finds it after meeting respectable young Ruggero at Bullier’s nightclub, a slightly upmarket Café Momus. Magda is in disguise so of course (!) Ruggero does not recognise her despite having been at the same party only a few hours earlier. When Rambaldo arrives, Magda declares her love for Ruggero, and they decide to start a new life together. Later penniless but content they are living in a hotel on the Riviera, Prunier her friend from Paris arrives with his lover, Lisette, Magda’s former maid. Prunier reveals how Rambaldo will take her back. Meanwhile Ruggero wants to marry her, but Magda has had a notorious past and is far from the virtuous woman Ruggero’s conservative mother would want for her son or as the mother of her grandchildren. So – like a swallow (rondine) – Magda flies back to Paris.
Sir Antonio Pappano recorded La rondine with the London Symphony Orchestra in 1996 almost a lifetime ago for The Royal Opera’s former music director and now the LSO’s chief conductor. Pappano seemed let of the leash with the forces massed in front of him on the platform rather than in a pit. The pentatonic passages in the music hark back to Madama Butterfly and foreshadows Turandot which was still to come. Pappano conducted Puccini’s irresistible melodies spiritedly and with ebb and flow. It was stylish, often tender and sensuous, though occasionally the volume of sound created overwhelmed the singers. The London Symphony Chorus get their ensemble moment as the customers and staff of Bullier’s in Act II, and they took their chance to shine clearly revelling (!) in making an impressive sound. They were a credit to their chorus director Marina Rosas.
Magda’s main aria ‘Chi il bel sogno di Doretta’ – which she sings with Prunier during the Act I soirée – is dispensed with soon after the start of the opera; and musically La rondine goes rather downhill from there. It is during the final scene of leave-taking – when Puccini was possibly in the grip of ‘composer’s block’ – that inspiration obviously deserted him. Puccini has his Magda and Ruggero mostly internalise their fears, anxiety, anguish and regret for a rather unsatisfactory conclusion. Even though there are three acts it is a relatively short opera and anyway Pappano was successful in glossing over any longueurs in the score. And thanks to the wonderfully committed and expressive performances of most of the singers Puccini’s undercooked final scene failed to diminish the appeal of La rondine on this occasion.
Nadine Sierra was due to sing Magda but dropped out of the two performances of La rondine citing a slow recovery from a medical procedure. Sierra must have got over it rather quicker than she thought she was going to because she sang at Notre-Dame’s opening ceremony only four days previously! Perhaps a star was born in the exceptional performance of her replacement Carolina López Moreno. She was the only singer who didn’t need a score on a music stand having sung the role recently in Turin. Moreno’s opening aria was sung wistfully and her phrasing throughout was exquisite: there was beautiful tone, refined pianissimos, and high notes which floated effortlessly. Later, the requisite vocal heft was much in evidence when required too. Moreno is obviously a wonderful actor and Magda’s character came vividly to life in the giddiness of burgeoning passion, as well as the heart-on-her-sleeve emotional turmoil of the final act.
Michael Fabiano’s voice – after the travails of Act I – was loud, forthright and dark throughout, suggesting it was rather more suited to Verdi than Puccini. However notably in the duets, he was able to reveal a rich palette of vocal colours and all his character’s barely supressed emotion. Unfortunately, Fabiano needed the score in front of him more than most of the singers around him.
Rambaldo is a woefully underwritten part, but Ashley Riches’s resonant bass voice made the best of what Puccini gave him to sing. A well-cast mix of experienced singers (Sarah Dufresne, Angela Schisano, Gabriele Marvic Monreal) and others (Hector Bloggs, Tom McGowan, Sang Eup Son) who were students at the Guildhall School of Music excelled in their even smaller roles. As for the other principal singers, Serena Gamberoni caught the eye and ear in the soubrette role of Lisette and even on the concert platform, the rapport between her and Moreno’s Magda was authentic and very entertaining. Paul Appleby was an outstanding Prunier, and it was possible to believe him when he expressed how the deluded romantic love of his poems could never be achieved in real life. Appleby’s pleasant lyric tenor voice could develop into one capable of upgrading to Ruggero in the future. Prunier fails to make a chanteuse out of Lisette and their Act III moments were genuinely funny. Lisette goes back to being a maid and Magda returns to being a kept woman and all’s well that just … ends!
Jim Pritchard
Featured Image: [front l-r] Michael Fabiano (Ruggero), Carolina López Moreno (Magda), Sir Antonio Pappano, Paul Appleby (Prunier) and Serena Gamberoni (Lisette) © Mark Allan