The Last of the Opera Buffa Genre

Ah, Rossini! He never wrote a melody that he didn’t use over and over again. A bit of a thieving magpie, he borrowed freely from his own work and anyone else whom he admired. The overture to “The Barber of Seville,” which began its current run on Saturday night at City Opera, had been used at least twice before; the famous trio “Zitti Zitti” comes from Haydn; and, of course, “Una voce poco fa” is stolen from “Citizen Kane.”Rossini is everywhere this year in New York. Beside the “Barber,” City Opera is staging a fabulous “Viaggio a Reims”; Olga Borodina is starring next door in “La Cenerentola”; and, on November 13, Eve Queler will lead “William Tell” at Carnegie Hall.“The Barber” is, in modern parlance, a prequel to Mozart’s “Marriage of Figaro,” which opens November 2 at the Metropolitan Opera. But Rossini’s effort, written just 30 years after “Figaro,” is essentially the end of the line of the entire opera buffa genre, and contains an edginess that makes it disquietingly revolutionary; musicologist Carl Dahlhaus once remarked that “the farcical takes on catastrophic proportions in the frenzy of the music.”Nowhere is this suppressed bloodlust more apparent than in the famous “Largo al factotum”; any review of the piece must pass through this oft-excerpted aria. Unfortunately, baritone Hugh Russell had a deuce of a time with its execution Saturday night. The opening was eventful, with clever staging and an interesting vocal effect. Figaro began to sing while hiding under a blanket, but Mr. Russell’s tentativeness and low volume turned out to be endemic rather than a function of his point of origin. The famous alliterative ending section was simply beyond his reach, even at a somewhat relaxed tempo.Our hero made a nice recovery, however. Once any opening-night nervousness had passed, Mr. Russell was competent, even facile, in the role. John Tessier was a much more acrobatic Almaviva, able to reach his high notes reasonably well, although having to resort to falsetto technique more than once. Oddly, his run-up to these stratospheric tones was sometimes flat even as the note itself was centered.The minor male characters were uniformly fine. Scott Hogsed was a mellifluous Fiorello and Jan Opalach a satisfying and actually quite funny Bartolo. The best voice of the evening belonged to the Don Basilio of debut basso Nikolay Didenko, who stole the show with his seemingly effortless, subterranean voice and highly developed sense of character, portraying the music teacher as the slimy creature that the composer intended but hardly ever receives.In a previous, rather dreadful “Carmen” at the New York State Theater, one of the few bright spots was the Mercedes of Jennifer Rivera. Now given a starring role, she made the most of her opportunity to portray Rosina. Her “Una voce poco fa” might have sounded suspect to aficionados of Rossini circa 1955, as the part by then had been appropriated by many of the natural sopranos of that golden age of recording. But the role was actually written for a contralto, and Ms. Rivera’s lower tones were authentic. Especially adept at the cabaletta, she struck that delicate balance between a voice of substance and a dexterity of lightness.Another star on this evening was director Albert Sherman, who conjured up a world of contrasting movements, from the delicate to the roughshod. This was excellent comedic art, not Queen Anne titters behind a fan, but out-and-out hilarity. Never resorting to the overused slapstick of the contemporary operatic stage, Mr. Sherman had his figures move in stylized, choreographic ways; particularly amusing were his games of pairs involving, for example, Bartolo and Basilio or Figaro and the Count. Ms. Rivera proved herself a genuine comedienne, pantomiming a caricature of Bartolo behind his pontificating back and re flecting the underlying harpsichord continuo that mocks these risible characters throughout.Making his City Opera debut in the pit was New York native Joseph Rescigno, who led a taut and measured performance. Judging the overture as a standalone piece of concert music – which is somewhat difficult because this production pulls the curtain at the first downbeat – the realization was dynamic and subtly fluid, the underlying tension brought to almost aching fruition. This music may have been written in an age of restoration, but it sounded arrestingly sinister and febrile in the right hands. Nothing puts the dagger in the heart more artfully than comedy.Rossini wrote that he only cried three times: Once when his mother died, once when he heard Paganini play, and once when a turkey stuffed with truffles slid overboard on a dinner cruise. What a jolly fellow!October 20, 22, 28 & 30, and November 5, 9 & 11 at the New York State Theater (Lincoln Center, 212-870-5570).

The Last of the Opera Buffa Genre

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