Viva Verdi, May Festival

   Music director James Conlon brought Italian opera back to the May Festival with a vengeance Saturday night at Music Hall.
   The occasion was a concert performance of Verdi’s “Il Travatore,” an opera which is all about vengeance. It’s been nearly 20 years since the last complete Italian opera was heard on a May Festival program (Verdi’s lesser known “Luisa Miller” in 1988) and, as the saying goes, the crowd went wild.
   They did so at Conlon’s invitation. “Make some noise,” he said in genial remarks from the podium before the opera began. And sure enough, hardly an aria went by without cheers and applause. It continued so long after soprano Sondra Radvanovsky’s powerfully emotive scene outside Manrico’s cell (act IV) that she waved cheerfully for the audience to desist so the opera could continue.
   “Trovatore” triumphed by fulfilling the Caruso dictum (noted by Conlon): “All you need for ‘Il Trovatore’ is the four greatest singers in the world.”
There were five of the greatest singers in the world onstage Saturday: tenor Franco Farina as Manrico (May Festival debut), soprano Radvanovsky as Leonora (May Festival debut), mezzo-soprano Marianne Cornetti as Azucena, baritone Donnie Ray Albert as Count Di Luna and bass Morris Robinson as Ferrando.
   Farina is already one of the world’s leading tenors and the clarity and brilliance he brought to the ill-fated Manrico – pinpoint high C in his aria “Di quella pira” – set the bar high indeed. Radvanovsky’s youth, good looks and creamy, flexible voice with its mezzo-like heft, mark her as a dawning diva.
Cornetti’s opulent voice and compelling stage presence made her a natural for the gypsy Azucena. Albert’s Di Luna was as sensitively sung and acted as any I have ever experienced, and Robinson as Ferrando – the captain of the guard who must tell the entire pre-story of the opera in act I was pure luxury casting.
The May Festival Chorus played their various roles – gypsies, soldiers, cloistered nuns – as co-equal partners with the soloists, who also included mezzo-soprano Michele Losier as Leonora’s confidante Inez and tenor Anthony Zoeller as the soldier Ruiz, both very effective in their roles.
   Conlon, one of the world’s foremost opera conductors, led the company and the Cincinnati Symphony with authority and zest, relishing the opportunity to focus on the music of “Il Trovatore” and its vocal riches without the added layers of staging, sets and costumes.
   The festival moved to Covington Sunday evening for the annual, non-subscription concert at the Cathedral Basilica of the Assumption. It was an exquisite program of Renaissance and baroque music featuring the May Festival Chorus and Youth Chorus led by their directors Robert Porco and James Bagwell, respectively.
   The cathedral was inviting and full, with dogwood and magnolia in bloom outside. Bagwell’s 60-voice chorus (ages 14-18) exhibited pure diction and clean ensemble in three a capella works of the 15th and 16th centuries. “Ecce quomodo moritur justus” (“Behold how the righteous die”) by Slovenian Jacobus Gallus (Jacob Handl) was soft-breathed and serious, a lovely reverie for Holy Week.
   German Hans Leo Hassler’s brief “Cantate Domine Canticum Novum” (“Sing to the Lord a New Song”) was bright and peppy, by contrast. Flemish born Heinrich Isaac’s lovely “Innsbruck, ich muss dich lassen” (“Innsbruck, I must leave you”) concluded with a long-held M.
   Porco and a reduced May Festival Chorus (about 50 singers) opened with a lively, evenly blended performance of J.S. Bach’s motet “Lobet den Herrn, alle Heiden” (“Praise the Lord, All Ye Nations”). Centerpiece was Bach’s Cantata No. 182, “Himmelskönig sei willkommen” (“King of heaven, be welcome”). Joining Porco and the chorus were Losier, tenor John Aler, bass David Pittsinger and a small instrumental ensemble comprising strings (violin solos by Rebecca Culnan), alto recorder (Michael Lynn) and continuo (organist Heather MacPhail, bassist James Lambert and cellist Norman Johns).
   Each soloist had an aria, Pittsinger’s an authoritative statement of divine love, Losier’s gentle and tender, Aler’s elaborate and fast-moving. All were done in light, balanced baroque style.
   The final chorus of rejoicing took on added spark with Lynn on recorder.
   The May Festival continues at 8 p.m. Friday with Berlioz’ “L’enfance du Christ,” accompanied by projections of art works of the nativity, and 8 p.m. Saturday with Gluck’s opera “Orpheus and Eurydice” (acts two and three) and Rossini’s “Stabat Mater.” Both concerts feature English supertitles and are at Music Hall. For tickets, call (513) 381-3300 or visit www.mayfestival.com.
(first published in The Cincinnati Post May 21, 2007)