William Charlton-Perkins writes a regular feature for the
media titled Classical Notes.
This one is titled Il proscritto Unveiled.
Opera Rara has struck gold with its latest bel canto restoration - Mercadante's Il proscritto, a gem that lay buried for 180 years, following its barely sustained premiere at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples in 1842.
When the world was put on lock down in March 2020, artists around the globe faced the bleak prospect of interrupted careers. Many chose to use the occasion proactively. Among them was Carlo Rizzi, Opera Rara's artistic director.
In 2019, the conductor had discovered the original manuscript score of Il proscritto (The Outlaw) by Saverio Mercadante (1795 - 1870) while searching online for buried treasures in the Naples Conservatoire Archive library. Rizzi's discovery proved a revelation, an eminently worthy contender for Opera Rara's ongoing excavation initiative.
As its rare qualities sprang off its faded pages, Rizzi swiftly realised that Mercadante's opera would offer listeners a fascinating and dramatically engrossing experience. Its wealth of melodic inventiveness and fascinating orchestral textures, married to a powerfully evocative text, conjured up a unique sound world.
(Right: Ramón Vargas)
Struck by the score's arresting choral opening, with its off-stage band, the conductor was further impressed by its elaborate finales to Acts I and II, which ranked among the grandest in Italian opera. These were offset by its lyrical and rousing arias; a spectacular series of confrontational duets; and intensely dramatic linking scenes, characterised by nuanced orchestral writing that often carried the narrative in a way that was unusual to contemporary Italian operas of the period.
Taking advantage of the pandemic's two-year hiatus, the conductor set wheels in motion, collaborating with Opera Rara's dramaturge, Roger Parker, and Ian Schofield, a fellow musicologist, to create a critical edition for Opera Rara to launch when the world came out of lockdown.
The newly restored work debuted at the Barbican in London in June 2022, following this recording, made in the Henry Wood Hall. Its creative team could scarcely be bettered, with maestro Rizzi at the helm of the Britten Sinfonia, imparting his passion to a roster of young soloists, headed by mezzo sopranos Irene Roberts and Elizabeth DeShong, and tenors Ramón Vargas and Iván Ayón-Rivas. With the Opera Rara Chorus in fine form, the rest of the cast, including Sally Matthews, Goderdzi Janelidze, Susana Gaspar and Niall Anderson turn in impeccable support.
Salvadore Cammarano's libretto, set near Edinburgh during the mid-17th century reign of Oliver Cromwell, sees royalist Giorgio Argyll (Ramón Vargas), long presumed drowned at sea, returning home to find his 'widow', Malvina Douglas (Irene Roberts), supported by her brother Odoardo (Elizabeth DeShong), about marry Cromwellian Arturo Murray (Iván Ayón-Rivas).
As ever in these Opera Rara restoration projects, picking highlights poses a severe challenge, to the point of submitting that the entire Act I is an uninterrupted flow of inspired writing.
The imposing choral opening mentioned above, with its fanfares of horns and trumpets [CD 1 track 1, 2] is closely followed by Arturo's cavatina and cabaletta [CD 1 track 4 - 6].
Peruvian lyric tenor Iván Ayón-Rivas' plangent tones and stylistic elegance proclaim his proud heritage, passed down by his illustrious compatriots, Luigi Alva, Ernesto Palacio, and Juan Diego Flórez.
Mercadante ratchets up the emotional temperature with the gorgeous duet for Malvina and Odoardo [CD 1 tracks 7 - 10], consummately sang by the American mezzo sopranos, Irene Roberts, and Elizabeth DeShong. The divas dispatch their roulades with electrifying precision and seeming abandon, honouring iconic precedents found, for instance, in Rossini's Semiramide and Bellini's Norma.
A brief clarinet prelude ushers in Giorgio's sumptuously sung scena e romanza, with its surging melodic line and choral interjections. Ramón Vargas rises exultantly over the ensemble before the score leads into the grand finale to Act I. [Tracks 11 - 16], the gleaming patina of his voice in midcareer testifying to his magnificent technique. I reprised the scene three times, before moving onto the first act finale, with exhilarating tuttis dominated by its high flung vocal lines.
Acts II and III are equally enthralling. It is virtually impossible
to interrupt proceedings as the second act opens with the high voltage duet for
Giorgio and Arturo, spearheading Messrs Vargas, and Ayón-Rivas into a bravura
joust of tenor testosterone that constitutes the very stuff of Italian opera. [CD 11 Tracks 17 - 21].
A radical change of scene follows with the haunting 'Chorus of Exiles' - a close cousin of Verdi's 'Slaves Chorus' from Nabucco. Elizabeth DeShong then takes centre stage for Odoardo's great scena, unleashing a vocal arsenal matched by few singers of our day. Deploying her three-octave compass, from its profundo chest register to a sustained high C, Ms DeShong dispatches Mercadante's formidable obstacle course with razor sharp precision and sheer abandon, displaying "contralto opulence with blazing top notes and some of the most staggering coloratura you will ever hear" (The Guardian). [CD II Tracks 22 - 26].
In another dramatic juxtaposition of mood, Mercadante then introduces one of the glories of Il proscritto - its ''dream' interlude. Exquisitely scored for harp, flute, and shimmering strings, this gradually brings the imprisoned Giorgio into focus, in mezza voce slumber mode, before being awakened by Malvina in an urgent bid for him to make good the escape she has arranged.
Their duet gradually develops in the elaborately constructed Act II finale, its conflicting emotions briefly punctuated by a mournful, trombone-tinctured andante, before building into a climactic panoply of ensemble singing, even grander than the previous finale [Act II Tracks 27 - 34].
In sharp contrast, Mercadante and Camarena surprise us by curtailing Act III in a daring turnaround from the 'sturm und drang' maelstrom that has overtaken the three protagonists: Giorgio's and Arturo's conflicting love for Malvina drives her to end her own life rather than abandon either swain. Irene Roberts' profound grasp of her final scene renders her self-sacrifice a deeply affecting apotheosis, a release in which heroic selflessness transcends despair. [Act III Tracks 35- 39].
The stroke of genius that brought the curtain down on Il proscritto's premiere may well have been the reason for its short-lived life upon the Neapolitan stage. But it placed the opera in the mainstream of great operatic tradition, a proud companion to works that have stayed the course down the ages, from Purcell to Puccini and beyond.
Opera Rara has once again earned the global gratitude of scholars and music lovers, by entrusting Carlo Rizzi and his team to bring Il proscritto to life.
For more information, and to purchase Opera Rara releases, visit the label's website https://opera-rara.com/shopcatalogue
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