Metropolitan Opera Archives

Seeing "La Traviata" nowadays is like looking at those faded old daguerreotypes of a century or so ago that one occasionally sees in the photographer's windows. Can it really be, we ask ourselves, that there were ever people who looked like that and dressed like that, who wore such hoops and such ringlets, such waistcoats and such whiskers? And then we catch some expression in the almost vanished old eye or half obliterated lip that assures that these were really human beings like ourselves. We do our best, all through the first act of "La Traviata," to keep up a condescending smile; and then, to our eternal surprise we find ourselves in the second act, genuinely interested in these puppets, that are no longer quaint, but quite pathetic. The music is sentimental, if you like, and undeniably old-fashioned; but with Verdi's genius at the back of it you are bound to believe in it for the time being.

This old Italian music, however, calls for pure old Italian singing, and of this it had little last night. There were, especially in the second act, some exquisite inflections now and then in Mme. Galli-Curci's voice; but she sang so persistently below the pitch that the general effect was distressing. Mr. Lauri-Volpi, as Alfredo, did nothing to compensate us for his partner's unkindness to our ears; his own singing was of the kind that cannot be content with the robust, but must always be breaking into the robustious. The one really enjoyable thing of the evening, apart from the ballet, was the Germont of Mr. De Luca. His voice had not all its usual resonance, but the smoothness and quiet ease of it, the grace of his phrasing, and the naturalness of his inflections made the character thoroughly sympathetic.

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