100 Great Operas and Their Stories

by Henry W. Simon

  Quickly, then, she washes her bloodstained hands, takes the safe-conducts from Scarpia’s lifeless fingers, places a lighted candle on either side of his head and a crucifix on his breast, and sweeps from the room as the curtain falls.

  ACT III

  The final act begins peacefully enough with the very early morning song of a shepherd boy heard off-stage. The scene of the act is the roof of the Castle of Sant’Angelo in Rome, where Cavaradossi has been brought for execution. He is allowed a short time to prepare for death. This he uses to write a farewell to his beloved Tosca, and he sings the heartbreaking aria E lucevan le stelle—“The stars were shining brightly.” Soon Tosca herself enters. She shows him the safe-conducts she secured from Scarpia; she tells him how she has killed the wicked police chief; and the two lovers sing a passionate duet, anticipating their happy future. Finally, Tosca explains that Cavaradossi still must go through the farce of a mock execution, after which they will fly together.

  The execution squad now enters, led by Spoletta. Mario stands up before them; they fire; he falls; the soldiers depart; and Tosca rushes over to the fallen body of her lover. It is only then that she discovers how Scarpia had fooled her. For the bullets used were real, and Cavaradossi lies dead. Even as she gives vent to her grief, the soldiers return, having discovered the murder of Scarpia. Spoletta attempts to seize Tosca but she wrenches herself free, climbs high on the parapet, and flings herself over to certain death. As the orchestra thunders out Mario’s farewell, the soldiers stand helpless and horror-struck.

  LA TRAVIATA

  Opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi with

  libretto in Italian by Francesco Maria Piave

  based on a play by the younger Alexandre

  Dumas entitled La dame aux camélias (usually

  called Camille in English), which is in turnvbased on his semi-autobiographical novel

  VIOLETTA VALERY, a courtesan Soprano

  FLORA BERVOIX, another Mezzo-soprano

  ALFREDO GERMONT, young man from Provence Tenor

  GIORGIO GERMONT, his father Baritone

  BARON DOUPHOL. a protector of Violetta’s Baritone

  DR. GRENVIL Bass

  ANNINA, Violetta’s maid Soprano

  Time: 1846

  Place: Paris and the suburb Auteuil

  First performance at Venice, March 6, 1853

  When La traviata was first performed on March 6, 1853, at Venice, it was an instant failure. Neither the critics nor the public liked it. One trouble was the singers: there was a too healthy heroine dying of consumption, and everyone thought that was funny. Another trouble was costumes: it was played in modern clothes (that is, of course, modern for 1853), and no one was used to grand opera in modern clothes.

  At a later performance all this was changed, and the opera was from then on successful in Italy. The public also liked it—right from the start—in England and America. But not the critics. They thought the story “foul, hideous, and immoral.” But critics are sometimes wrong at first, and the public is usually right. Today, over a century old, it is one of the most popular of all operas and one finds the story told in books of opera plots intended for children. So much for the morals of critics.

  PRELUDE

  The story, of course, has to do with disease and love. That doesn’t sound, offhand, like an attractive combination. Still, when one realizes that the first theme in the famous prelude is related to the heroine’s illness and the second to her love, there should be in it a lesson in how beautifully composers can project some rather unbeautiful concepts.

  ACT I

  Act I takes place during a late evening party at the home of Violetta Valery. Violetta is a delightful young lady of somewhat dubious reputation. (As a matter of fact, the younger Alexandre Dumas, who wrote the original story, based her character on that of a real courtesan he knew and loved in the Paris of the 1840’s. Her original name was Alphonsine Plessis, but she changed to Marie Duplessis in order to sound more high-toned.) It’s a very gay party, as the opening music attests. Pretty soon Violetta is introduced to a young fellow from the country—Alfredo Germont—an attractive, slightly naïve boy with an excellent tenor voice. He shows it off in the Brindisi, or drinking song. Violetta—and later everyone else—joins in the quick-waltz rhythms of the tune. When all the guests go into the next room to dance, Violetta remains behind. She is not feeling well, and she is briefly overcome with a fit of coughing. Alfredo, who has quietly remained in the room, begins to tell her quite seriously how much he loves her, even though he had only seen her from a distance before. His accents are so sincere—so passionate—that Violetta is both moved and embarrassed. In light, laughing phrases she advises him to forget her. She knows that she is not the sort of girl for this earnest type of young man. Their voices join in a sort of expressive coloratura at the end of this duet, and just before the guests return, she promises to see him again the next day.

  It is now late. The guests take their leave, and Violetta is left alone for her great scene. She sings the aria Ah, fors’ è lui, wondering whether this young man from the country can really represent true love in her life of light loves. She takes up the passionate tune he had sung a little earlier, but then (in the so-called cabaletta to the aria), she cries, in effect, “Nonsense, nonsense.” Sempre libera—“Ever free”—she sings. Hers must be a free life. For a moment she is silent, as outside her window she hears the voice of Alfredo repeating his love music, but she only grows more feverish and wilder as her voice mounts, in coloratura runs. Almost all sopranos take these runs up to an E-flat above high C, even though Verdi did not write it that way. As the act ends, we know that, despite her protests, the lady is for burning.

  ACT II

  Scene 1 takes place three months later. The love affair begun at Violetta’s party has developed, and now she and Alfredo are comfortably ensconced in a suburban cottage outside Paris. Alfredo, in his opening aria, De’ miei bollenti spiriti, tells us how good she is for him, and also how wild she is about him. But it is Violetta who is paying all the bills for the establishment; and by questioning the maid, Annina, Alfredo finds out that she is even selling her personal belongings. The hotheaded young fellow thereupon dashes off to Paris himself to raise the necessary thousand louis. And so when Alfredo’s father, a few minutes later, calls on Violetta, he finds the lady alone.

  A long and eloquent duet follows. At first he demands that she give Alfredo up. Slowly he realizes that there is real nobility in Violetta, and then he pleads with her. Alfredo’s sister, he says, will never be able to marry well while her brother maintains so disreputable a connection. He utters this rather caddish sentiment in more tactful terms—and very mellifluously, too; yet that is what it amounts to. And strangely, Violetta is impressed. Before his rather lengthy farewell-taking, she has promised to give up the love of her life and not even to let him know why. Quickly she pens a farewell note to Alfredo, and also accepts an invitation to a party from Flora Bervoix, one of the old gay crowd.

  Before she is finished, Alfredo returns. He is full of confidence, sure that his father will love her as soon as he sees her. Her heart breaking, Violetta begs him always to love her and then secretly leaves for Paris. A moment later a servant brings him the farewell letter. Greatly distraught, he is about to run after her, when his father appears and stops him. Now old Germont has his great aria Di Provenza it mar, in which he reminds his son of their home in Provence, and begs him to return. Alfredo’s answer is to find Flora’s invitation, to decide that that is why she has left, and to dash off (as he says) to avenge the insult.

  Scene 2 takes us to a party like the one that opened the opera. This time the hostess is Flora Bervoix, and she has provided sumptuous entertainment for her guests. Gypsy dancers and singers are performing as the scene opens, and pretty soon Alfredo puts in an appearance. Everyone is surprised to see him without Violetta, but he makes it clear that he does not much care what has happened to her. That lady herself arrives shortly aft
er, on the arm of Baron Douphol, one of her friends of the bad old days. The Baron and Alfredo take an almost instant dislike to one another, and they start gambling for pretty high stakes. Alfredo wins repeatedly; and as the orchestra plays a nervous little theme, Violetta sits on one side praying that the men will not come to blows. Fortunately, just when Alfredo has all but wiped out his older opponent, supper is announced. Violetta calls Alfredo to her side and begs him to leave. She fears, otherwise, that there may be fighting. Alfredo says he will leave—but only with her, and then he demands to know whether or not she loves the Baron. Remembering her promise to old Germont, Violetta tells a lie: yes, she says, she loves the Baron. Thereupon Alfredo summons the entire company, dramatically denounces Violetta, and hurls all his winnings directly at her. It is shocking behavior—even for a hot-blooded young Frenchman of the 1840’s. No one is more shocked than Alfredo’s own father, who arrives on the scene just in time to denounce him. Even Alfredo is ashamed—ashamed of himself—and the scene ends with a great ensemble number, as the Baron challenges Alfredo to a duel.

  ACT III

  The last act begins with a very beautiful and very sad prelude. It suggests the sickness that is slowly bringing Violetta’s life to a close, and when the curtain rises, the opening strains of the prelude are repeated. The poor girl has retired to a shabby flat in Paris. She is lying, desperately weak, in bed, attended by the faithful Annina. Dr. Grenvil calls to give his patient some professional bedside-manner cheer; but Violetta is not fooled, and a moment later the doctor whispers to Annina that it is now only a matter of hours. Violetta sends the maid out to give half her remaining fortune of twenty louis to the poor and then pulls out a letter to reread. It is from the elder Germont; it had arrived several weeks ago, and it says that Alfredo wounded the Baron in the duel, that he left the country, but that he now knows of Violetta’s sacrifice and will come to her. So, too, says Germont, will he come himself. Violetta knows that it is a little late for these fine gentlemen to begin appreciating her merits, and she sings the pathetic aria Addio del passato—“Farewell to the past, farewell to smiling dreams.” At its close, merrymakers are heard outside her window, for it is carnival time in Paris—a time to which Violetta has just bidden her last farewell.

  Suddenly Annina returns, breathless, to announce the arrival of the beloved Alfredo. He rushes in, and the lovers sing their touching duet Parigi, o cara. In it they plan to leave the city to revive her strength, to live happily ever after. Feverishly Violetta calls for a dress—but she has not even the strength to get into it. Annina rushes off for the doctor, and Germont enters the room in time to see Violetta make her last, sad sacrifice. She gives Alfredo a miniature portrait of herself and charges that he should give it to his future bride. Let her know that there is an angel praying for them both. Then, for a wild moment, Violetta imagines herself better, and the love music of Act I is heard trembling high in the orchestra. But it is only the euphoria that so often precedes death, and the doctor is on hand to pronounce the fateful È spenta! as Violetta falls back into her remorseful lover’s arms.

  Postscript for the historically curious: In the cemetery of Montmartre, directly below the white church of the Sacre Coeur, tourists still visit the grave of Marie Duplessis, the original traviata (or misguided girl). She died February 2, 1846, just nineteen days after achieving her twenty-second birthday. Among her numerous lovers during her last year had been Alexandre Dumas fils and Franz Liszt.

  TRISTAN UND ISOLDE

  Opera in three acts by Richard Wagner with

  libretto in German by the composer, based on

  old legends

  KING MARKE OF CORNWALL Bass

  TRISTAN, his nephew Tenor

  KURWENAL, Tristan’s faithful follower Baritone

  ISOLDE, an Irish princess Soprano

  BRANGAENE, Isolde’s attendant Mezzo-soprano

  MELOT, a Cornish courtier Tenor

  A YOUNG SAILOR Tenor

  A HELMSMAN Baritone

  A SHEPHERD Tenor

  Time: the legendary days of King Arthur

  Place: Cornwall, Brittany, and the sea

  First performance at Munich, June 10, 1865

  Tristan und Isolde is generally rated—and with very good reason—the greatest paean to pure erotic love ever composed. Its history is intimately bound up with this passion. During much of its composition Wagner was living with a wealthy silk merchant of Zurich, one Otto Wesendonck, and the composer was in love with his host’s attractive young wife, Mathilde. Later, when the opera was completed, it was given no fewer than fifty-four rehearsals at the Court Opera in Vienna-only to be withdrawn. The reason may have been that it was too difficult and new in style for the company—at least that was the published reason. But love and politics (two great motives in Wagner’s life) also had much to do with the withdrawal. For there were pro-Wagner and anti-Wagner camps in the company, the former led by the soprano scheduled to sing the role of Isolde, Luise Dustmann-Meyer. She, however, withdrew her support when she found the composer carrying on a love affair with her younger sister.

  Even before Vienna, Wagner had attempted to secure performances at Strasbourg, Karlsruhe, Paris, Weimar, Prague, Hanover, and, of all places, Rio de Janeiro, where it was to have been done in Italian! Mostly for political reasons none of these worked out. It finally achieved its premiere at Munich, six years after the score was completed, under the patronage of Wagner’s great but unbalanced friend, King Ludwig II of Bavaria.

  The conductor of the premiere was Hans von Bülow, a fierce champion of Wagner’s music. Two months before the performance Frau von Bülow had given birth to a daughter, whom she named Isolde. Very probably the conductor did not realize at this time that the composer, in addition to being the godfather, was also little Isolde’s real father. In fact, Cosima von Bülow (an illegitimate daughter of Franz Liszt’s) bore Richard Wagner three children before Hans finally divorced her and she married the composer.

  One need not find in the opera reflection of Wagner’s own series of passions for other men’s wives: the love of Tristan and Isolde is a far more idealized and purer thing throughout than any page of the composer’s shocking life-story. It is basically a very simple tale; and the score, perhaps more than any other Wagner ever composed, carries out his theories of what a music drama (as opposed to a traditional “opera”) should be. Gone are the set pieces of his latest produced opera, Lohengrin; and here, for the first time, the world heard a music drama in which the orchestra plays the unquestioned dominant role, commenting on every psychological and dramatic development with an elaborate system of leitmotivs, pursuing its way with the “endless melodizing” that Wagner had substituted for the arias, duets, quartets, and so forth to which everyone was accustomed. It created a violent war of the critics that is still being waged.

  PRELUDE

  Gone, too, was the security of knowing what key the music is in. I have decided never to be technical in this book; but perhaps I may be permitted to describe just the first two bars of the prelude harmonically. It bears the signature of C-major (or a-minor); it begins with a fragment of melody that might as well be in F-major (or d-minor); and before the second measure is completed, we have reached the dominant seventh chord of A. We have also been given two of the principal motives of the work by this time, melted so intimately into each other that some commentators have called them respectively the Tristan and the Isolde motives.

  I shall leave the technical commentary at that. The Prelude is, as everyone knows, one of the most eloquent, sensuous, and moving tone poems about love ever written.

  ACT I

  Isolde is a princess of Ireland, the daughter of a distinguished witch, and herself entirely at home with poisons, drugs, and the medieval arts of healing. When the curtain rises, we find her on a ship. This is taking her, against her will, to become the bride of King Marke of Cornwall. The man taking her to Cornwall, the captain of the ship, is Tristan, nephew of King Marke. And Isolde, in a
long and angry narrative, explains her anger to her attendant, Brangaene. She had had a fiancé named Morold. Tristan had fought Morold to decide whether or not Cornwall should continue to pay tribute to Ireland, and Tristan had won. But he had been wounded, and, disguised as a harper, he came to Isolde’s castle. Isolde was nursing him back to health, when she found a piece of Morold’s sword blade in Tristan’s head, and in that way she recognized who he was. She was about to kill him with it, when he looked into her eyes—and she fell in love. But now, on orders from his uncle, he is taking her to be married to the old man. No wonder she is angry!

  She sends for Tristan, but, being busy with the ship, he sends his henchman, Kurwenal, instead. Kurwenal is a pretty down-to-earth and rude sort of baritone. He gruffly tells Isolde that Tristan will not come and impolitely sings her a ballad about Tristan’s victory over Morold. This makes Isolde angrier than ever, and she decides to kill Tristan and herself rather than be married to Marke—whom, by the way, she has never met. She tells Brangaene to prepare a poisoned drink and again summons Tristan. This time he comes, for it is almost time to land. Brutally she reminds him that he has killed her betrothed and, to atone, he offers her his sword to kill him. Instead, she suggests a drink. Fully expecting to be poisoned, Tristan accepts the cup. But Brangaene—without telling Isolde—has substituted a love philter for the death philter; and when Tristan has taken half the drink and Isolde the other half, there is an unexpected result. For a very, very long moment (while the orchestra plays music from the prelude) the two look into each other’s eyes. Hastily they embrace, uttering ecstatic phrases of rapture.