("Gentle be the breeze")
FIORDILIGI, DORABELLA, and DON ALFONSO:
Gentle be the breeze,
calm be the waves,
and every element
smile in favor
on their wish.
Margaret Price (s), Fiordiligi; Yvonne Minton (ms), Dorabella; Hans Sotin (bs), Don Alfonso; New Philharmonia Orchestra, Otto Klemperer, cond. EMI, recorded Jan. 25-Feb. 18, 1971
Irmgard Seefried (s), Fiordiligi; Nan Merriman (ms), Dorabella; Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (b), Don Alfonso; Berlin Philharmonic, Eugen Jochum, cond. DG, recorded December 1962
[in English] Elizabeth Harwood (s), Fiordiligi; Janet Baker (ms), Dorabella; John Shirley-Quirk (bs-b), Don Alfonso; Scottish National Opera Orchestra, Alexander Gibson, cond. Live performance, May 1969
by Ken
Okay, I know we've heard "Soave sia il vento" bunches of times before. And it seems likely that we'll hear it bunches of times again, maybe even in this post. (It could be that I know something, but I'm not telling.) It goes like this: We have occasion to listen to it this week, and if you think we're going to bypass a gimme like this, you're wrong.
Last week's post was called "Ariadne and Fiordiligi: Real people and feelings vs. ideas about people and feelings," and you may have noticed that I didn't particularly pursue the theme announced in the title. Mostly I presented Fiordiligi's two stupendous showpiece arias from Mozart and da Ponte's Così fan tutte. Both show Mozart deploying all his craft and a good measure of his genius toward creating a show-stopper of an aria. But there's a world of difference between Fiordiligi's Act I declaration of rock-like fidelity and the heart-rending state of confusion she's reduced to in her Act II rondo as she finds herself prepared to betray her beloved.
The men whom Fiordiligi and her sister Dorabella love -- or at least think they love in Act I -- aren't drawn in anything like the depth of the women, but their music reflects the same schism: trafficking in Act I with unthinking, abstract images of people, and then in Act II coming up against feal feelings as they find themselves dealing with their fiancées as real people. Here, for example, is how it all starts.
Well, not quite how it all starts. It all starts with a sparkling Overture, and long-time visitors to Sunday Classics know that we often like to start at the start. So here's the actual start. (We've heard all these performances before, but let me just say a couple of things again. The Jochum and Klemperer are from complete recordings of the opera, and the Jochum Così, which I've been living with now for 50-plus years, still seems to me a wonder -- perhaps more of a wonder than ever. The Klemperer Così remains indispensable if only for the almost-superhuman Fiordiligi of Margaret Price. The Colin Davis performance comes from a wonderful early Davis LP of Mozart overtures which is still the way I would wish to remember him.)
MOZART: Così fan tutte, K. 588: Overture
Berlin Philharmonic, Eugen Jochum, cond. DG, recorded December 1962
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Colin Davis, cond. EMI, recorded c1961
New Philharmonia Orchestra, Otto Klemperer, cond. EMI, recorded Jan.-Feb. 1971
Now here's the start of the opera proper -- what we hear as the curtain rises on Act I of Così. This is how the whole crazy plot is set in motion: with the love-struck young Ferrando and Guglielmo mouthing off to their friend the elderly philosopher Don Alfonso in a café about the supreme, unimpeachable constancy of their beloveds, which prompts the irritated Alfonso to challenge them to a bet to prove it.
MOZART: Così fan tutte, K. 588: Act I, Trio, Ferrando, Guglielmo, and Don Alfonso, "La mia Dorabella capace non è" ("My Dorabella couldn't")
-- English translation by William Weaver
George Shirley (t), Ferrando; Sherrill Milnes (b), Guglielmo; Ezio Flagello (bs), Don Alfonso; New Philharmonia Orchestra, Erich Leinsdorf, cond. RCA-BMG, recorded Aug.-Sept. 1967
Ernst Häfliger (t), Ferrando; Hermann Prey (b), Guglielmo; Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (b), Don Alfonso; Berlin Philharmonic, Eugen Jochum, cond. DG, recorded December 1962
Kurt Streit (t), Ferrando; Ferruccio Furlanetto (bs), Guglielmo; John Tomlinson (bs), Don Alfonso; Berlin Philharmonic, Daniel Barenboim, cond. Erato, recorded February 1989
Pretty sentiments, surely, but it's not hard to understand why Don Alfonso is so peeved; the pretty sentiments don't have much to do with actual people. Obviously this is just as much the case when the gentlemen are reintroduced to the ladies' household disguised as lovelorn Albanians, after they have been led to believe that they are seeing their fiancés off to war in the trio "Soave sia il vento," which we've heard a bunch of times, and heard again at the top of this post, and are now going to hear again, because we can -- if this isn't the most beautiful piece of music ever written, it's certainly locked in a tie for the honors. As it happens, we have a couple of other performances in the Sunday Classics archive, and another that I'm surprised we don't seem ever to have heard. Naturally I can't resist. (Tne "new" one to us is the Price-Troyanos-Flagello-Leinsdorf.)
MOZART: Così fan tutte, K. 588: Act I, Trio, Fiordiligi, Dorabella, and Don Alfonso, "Soave sia il vento" ("Gentle be the breeze")
Gentle be the breeze,
calm be the waves,
and every element
smile in favor
on their wish.
Leontyne Price (s), Fiordiligi; Tatiana Troyanos (ms), Dorabella; Ezio Flagello (bs), Don Alfonso; New Philharmonia Orchestra, Erich Leinsdorf, cond. RCA-BMG, recorded Aug.-Sept. 1967
Pilar Lorengar (s), Fiordiligi; Teresa Berganza (ms), Dorabella; Gabriel Bacquier (b), Don Alfonso; London Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Georg Solti, cond. Decca, recorded 1973-74
Elisabeth Schwarzkopf (s), Fiordiligi; Christa Ludwig (ms), Dorabella; Walter Berry (bs-b), Don Alfonso; Philharmonia Orchestra, Karl Böhm, cond. EMI, recorded September 1962
OKAY, SO THE MEN OF COSÌ HAVE BEGUN THEIR
WOOING. HERE'S FIORDILIGI'S ACT I RESPONSE --
MOZART: Così fan tutte, K. 588: Act I, Recitative and aria, Fiordiligi, "Temerari, sortite" ("Bold creatures! Begone!") . . . "Come scoglio immoto resta" ("Like a rock standing impervious")
Accompanied recitative
Bold creatures! Begone!
Flee from this place!
And with the unwelcome breath of base words
do not profane our hearts,
our ears, and our affections!
In vain do you or others seek to seduce
our souls; the unsullied faith that
we plighted to our dear lovers
we shall know how to preserve for them
until death, despite the world and fate.
Aria
Like a rock standing impervious
to winds and tempest,
so stands my heart ever strong
in faith and love.
Between us we have kindled
a flame that warms
and consoles us,
and death alone could
change my heart's devotion.
Respect this example
of constancy,
you abject creatures,
and do not let a base hope
make you so rash again!
-- English translation mostly by Lionel Salter
Margaret Price (s), Fiordiligi; New Philharmonia Orchestra, Otto Klemperer, cond. EMI, recorded Jan.-Feb. 1971
Renée Fleming (s), Fiordiligi; Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Sir Georg Solti, cond. Decca, from concert performances in the Royal Festival Hall (London), May 3 and 5, 1994
Ina Souez (s), Fiordiligi; Glyndebourne Festival Orchestra, Fritz Busch, cond. EMI, recorded June 25-28, 1935
NOW IN ACT II GUGLIELMO'S FIORDILIGI -- WOOED
BY THE DISGUISED FERRANDO -- HAS WEAKENED
MOZART: Così fan tutte, K. 588: Act II, Recitative and rondo, Fiordiligi, "Ei parte" ("He's left") . . . "Per pietà, ben mio, perdona" ("In pity's name, my dearest, forgive")
Accompanied recitative
He's left, listen, ah no! Let him go.
Let my sight be free of the unlucky object
of my weakness. To what a pass
this cruel man has brought me!
This is a just reward for my sins!
Was this the time
for me to heed the sighs
of a new lover, to make sport
of another's sighs? Ah, rightly
you condemn this heart, o just love!
I burn, and my ardour is no longer
the outcome of a virtuous love:
It is madness,
anguish, remorse, repentance,
fickleness, deceit and betrayal!
Rondo
In pity's name, my dearest, forgive
the misdeed of a loving soul;
amid this shade and these plants
forever hidden, oh God, let it be.
My courage, my constancy
will drive away this dishonourable desire
and banish the memory
which fills me with shame and horror.
And who is it whom
this unworthy heart has betrayed?
Dear heart, your trust deserved
a better reward!
Montserrat Caballé (s), Fiordiligi; Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Colin Davis, cond. Philips, recorded c1973
Leontyne Price (s), Fiordiligi; New Philharmonia Orchestra, Erich Leinsdorf, cond. RCA-BMG, recorded Aug.-Sept. 1967
Irmgard Seefried (s), Fiordiligi; Berlin Philharmonic, Eugen Jochum, cond. DG, recorded December 1962
[NOTE: I've picked out three performances each of Fiordiligi's arias. Last week we heard all six of these singers sing both arias -- and maybe a couple of more singers. as well.]
[UPDATE: Sorry about the screw-up, originally posting nothing but "Come scoglio"s! I guess I confused myself because last week the arias were presented in reverse order. Anyway, we should have the three "Per pietà"s in place now!]
NOW HERE'S HOW FERRANDO RESPONDS TO THIS
UNEXPECTED SITUATION -- HE TOO IS IN REAL PAIN
Poor Ferrando discovers that his beloved Dorabella has been moved by Guglielmo's wooing as well. My own theory is that the men, so confident of their fantasy lovers' untouchable fidelity, have waged their war of wooing so resourcefully that they have revealed previously unsuspected human dimension to their previously cartoon-like personalities, and the women have responded accordingly.
MOZART: Così fan tutte, K. 588: Act II, Recitative and cavatina, Ferrando, "In qual fiero contrasto" ("In what fierce conflict") . . . "Tradito, schernito dal perfido cor" ("Betrayed, scorned by that treacherous heart")
-- English translation by William Weaver
George Shirley (t), Ferrando; New Philharmonia Orchestra, Erich Leinsdorf, cond. RCA-BMG, recorded Aug.-Sept. 1967
Ernst Häfliger (t), Ferrando; Berlin Philharmonic, Eugen Jochum, cond. DG, recorded December 1962
Kurt Streit (t), Ferrando; Berlin Philharmonic, Daniel Barenboim, cond. Erato, recorded February 1989
NEXT WEEK, BARRING UNFORESEEN CIRCUMSTANCES --
We finally make the Ariadne connection explicitly, and we listen to Zerbinetta's showpiece aria.
THE ARIADNE POSTS
Sunday Classics snapshots: Meet the composer, Richard Strauss-style (10/11)
Why won't everyone just let poor abandoned Ariadne die in peace? (11/1)
Richard Strauss: "Music is a holy art," sings Strauss's Composer -- plus Two (out of Four) Last Songs, part 1 (11/8)
Richard Strauss: "Music is a holy art," sings Strauss's Composer -- plus Two (out of Four) Last Songs, part 2 (11/15)
Richard Strauss in the twilight (12/6)
Ariadne is "the symbol of human solitude" -- which is "just why she needs company" (says the Dance Master) (12/13)
Ariadne and Fiordiligi: Real people and feelings vs. ideas about people and feelings (12/20)
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