I admit, it took me some time to warm to
Fanciulla. When I first found the
Tebaldi/Del Monaco recording
, in college, my sophomore self just couldn't get past California miners shouting "Hello! Hello!" and singing rousing choruses of "Doodah doodah day" in a Puccini opera. The lexicon of John Wayne films meeting Puccini (and exciting, experimental Puccini at that) threw me for a loop. But I kept listening (finding
Corelli, Frazzoni, and Gobbi
along the way,) and I'm glad I did; I love the sweep of the music and its rich harmonies, and the drama keeps revealing more details. So I was thrilled to have my first live
Fanciulla one hundred years to the day from its premiere at the Met. (There's a
nifty website in honor of the occasion with all sorts of goodies--interviews, pictures, scholarly articles!--which I just discovered this week.) I had some quibbles with the production, but Nicola Luisotti cherished the details of the score, the Met chorus made a great camp of miners, Marcello Giordani was a very sympathetic bandit, and perhaps most importantly, Deborah Voigt sang and acted Minnie with a commitment which made it clear that she loves Minnie, and believes passionately in her courage and its significance.
