Fedora Barbieri

[atm711]

A query for Ed Waffle---I heard today that an opera singer named Fedora Barbieri died today---she was in her 80's. It was said that she was famous for her performance as Azucena. In the 1940's I saw an Italian movie of "Il Trovatore" and in it there was a mezzo named Barbieri who sang and beautifully acted Azucena. Is this the same Barbieri who later performed at the Met? Have you seen the film I mentioned?

[dirac]

I think I can answer part of the question -- Barbieri did indeed perform at the Met.

[Ed Waffle]

Point your browser to

http://us.imdb.com/Details?0041991

Ignore the cast list--I have no idea who they are, but may be stage names of the singers because it was a film. The names of the singers are shown on the copy of the video box. Bastianni, Gencer, Del Monaco and Barbieri are among the royalty of Italian opera from the middle of the last century. Gencer was Turkish, but her career was mainly in Italy.

Note also that the assistant director is Sergio Leone, who later became famous as director of the "spaghetti westerns", those over the top movies like "Fist Full of Dollars". But none of them were as over the top as Trovatore of course.

I have seen it and recommend it, but with lots of reservations. The lighting is murky, there are on and off problems with sychronization and the acting is straight out of Opera Acting 101. The copy I have seen also lacks subtitles, so the viewer should be somewhat familiar with Trovatore.

atm, if you saw it at the cinema, it probably looked and sounded a lot better than the tape that is currently circulating.

All that said, it is still a peformance for the ages, with all four of the principals in their prime. Leyla Gencer had only about five really good years before her voice began its decline due to too many heavy Verdi roles (like the Leonora here) always done a full throttle.

If you like Verdi singing from the so called Golden Age (which I do) and you can deal with the issues I raise above, it is worth seeing and, especially, hearing.

Enrico Caruso famously said that all you need for a production of Trovatore was the four best singers in the world. These four may have been the best or at least tied for first place among the Italian singers of the day.

[atm711]

Thanks, so much Ed---However I can see I was mistaken about Barbieri---the film Azucena was Gianna Pederzini---and her performance stayed with me all these years. Later in the day I did hear a recording of Barbieri as Azucena on our only NYC classical music station--and to my non-educated ear, she was fabulous.

[richard53dog]

Thanks, so much Ed---However I can see I was mistaken about Barbieri---the film Azucena was Gianna Pederzini---and her performance stayed with me all these years. Later in the day I did hear a recording of Barbieri as Azucena on our only NYC classical music station--and to my non-educated ear, she was fabulous.

I was doing a search today and this old thread popped up. I noted the name Fedora Barbieri and thought, hmmm, let me read it.

I think the discussion just a bit confused because there were actually two different films of Il Trovatore being discussed as if they were one!

There was a film made for Italian RAI in the late 50s that used the cast of Gencer, Del Monaco, Barbieri (as Azucena), and BAstianini. It's one in a long series of opera films that RAI made. I love this one, the singing is very, very good. The film itself is lipsynched which is a bit of a problem as it always is to me but , oh well.

The singers' acting is very old fashioned, very clutch your breast, but the singers execute this very traditional type of acting with great conviction, so that helps a bit.

The film that Ed waffle pointed out is another one, made about ten years earlier with a mix of singers in the film itself and a couple of actors lipsynching to singers' voices.

I've never seen this one but Gianna Pederzini (again, Azucena) was a great star in the era a generation earlier than the group mentioned above.

There were other films made in Italy like this with a mix of singers in the film and actors providing the visuals for other singers. The most famous perhaps is the Aida, which has a gorgeous Sophia Loren acting Aida with the voice of Renata Tebaldi coming out of her mouth.

When RAI started making their opera films in the mid 50s (and they made dozens of them!) they went for the opera singers themselves in the visual part, a more workable option in my view (In the Aida film with Loren/Tebaldi, there is a rather bizarre set up; a fairly glamorous actress named Lois Maxwell "acts" Amneris with the voice of Ebe Stignani coming out of her mouth. It's very jarring, Stignani sounded very fruity and matronly at that point and Maxell was decidedly NOT matronly)

Of the RAI films, I'll mention a favorite and then I'll pull the plug on this rather long-winded post. A favorite , available in VHS only, alas, is this one:

http://www.belcantosociety.org/store/advanced_search_result.php?search_in_artists=1&keywords=otello+del+monaco&x=0&y=0

It's Verdi's Otello and it's a wonderful performance, Mario Del Monaco is far more nuanced and expressive than he is in his studio recordings of Otello for LP/CD. Rosanna Carteri is exquisite as Desdemona, sings beautifully, and captures Desdemona's fear and confusion SO vulnerably . But for me the revelation is Renato Capecchi as Iago. He normally sang buffo roles so it's odd to find him as Iago. But he does Iago in a tradition earlier than the often hammy, stage chewing baritones that have sung the role for the last 50 years. He doesn't play the part in a "showy" way, after all, Otello(and Othello) is the flamboyant, exotic character.

Capecchi does Iago as the dweeby guy all the girls ignore. He's got a sort of open, dopey face, with a bad haircut , the kind of guy that everyone passes over. So when he is alone, and the malevolence in him starts to pour out, the transformation is really chilling. We aren't left wondering why Otello and Desdomona are so dense that they miss the danger of this evil character that oozes hatred from his first entrance. Capecchi hides the hateful side of his performance until act 3 when it is too late for Otello to spot it.

Well recommended! And maybe it will come out on DVD. The RAI films are slowly making their way to DVD.

[dirac]

Not long-winded at all. Thank you for the details, and bringing back this old thread.

The singers' acting is very old fashioned, very clutch your breast, but the singers execute this very traditional type of acting with great conviction, so that helps a bit.

I often miss the old style. It doesn't bother me and sometimes tastefully restrained acting can be frightfully bland.