TDK’s 2007 sampler Opera, Concert, Ballet 07 offers 22 excerpts, ranging from operatic arias from Vienna, Zurich, Barcelona and Paris, via Roland Petit ballets to complete symphonic movements. The value of this, as with all samplers, is to help you decide which complete product you might want to buy — hence, being promotional in intent, it’s offered at a special low price, around NT$300.
When I first saw Riccardo Muti’s version of Verdi’s Falstaff I wasn’t entirely convinced by it, but I’ve warmed to it since. It was filmed in the tiny opera house in Verdi’s hometown of Busseto, using the La Scala, Milan orchestra, but reduced in size. The sets and costumes mirror those of a production in 1913 in the same theater when Toscanini conducted what he always said was the master’s finest opera to mark what would have been Verdi’s 100th birthday.
A feature of this 2001 version (DVD release 2007) is that it gets better and better as it proceeds. Thus the fifth scene, in which Falstaff is persuaded to risk a second meeting with Alice and Meg, is a delightful chamber-music-like ensemble piece, with Quickly and Falstaff downstage and the others overhearing, and commenting, from behind. It’s simultaneously powerful and delicate — Verdi never wrote anything more enchanting.
Vocally, Juan Diego Flores is outstanding as Fenton, Barbara Fritolli makes a predictably strong Alice, and Ambrosio Maestri proves excellent in the title role. You do, though, have to wonder at the wisdom of the costumier’s choice when it comes to Falstaff’s bizarre hairpiece!
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