[Met Performance] CID:91320



La Vestale
Metropolitan Opera House, Fri, November 27, 1925


In Italian



La Vestale (2)
Gaspare Spontini | Étienne de Jouy
Giulia
Rosa Ponselle

Licinio
Edward Johnson

High Priestess
Margarete Matzenauer

Cinna
Giuseppe De Luca

Pontifex Maximus
José Mardones

Consul
Paolo Ananian

Dance
Lilyan Ogden

Dance
Florence Rudolph

Dance
Albert Troy


Conductor
Tullio Serafin







Review 1:

Review signed B. B. in Musical America

'La Vestale' Again

Spontini's revived and glorified "La Vestale" had its second performance on Nov. 27 with the same cast that gave distinction to its Metropolitan premiere a fortnight before. The music, so singularly prophetic of Rossini, went its thinly orchestrated way with classical dignity of movement under the guidance of Tullio Serafin, but remained an item subsidiary to the pomp and circumstance of the "mise-en-scène."

In the eventual résumé of the season, "La Vestale" will take its place as a notably beautiful and elaborate spectacle and as the pedestal for Rosa Ponselle's artistry. The young soprano has reached in the lyric-dramatic role of Giulia a point of accomplishment that is a satisfaction to those who have been hopefully watching her progress. Her fine voice is warming with new emotional hues and wields a growing power of appeal. While losing no whit of dramatic strength, she is tempering her tone into lovely refinements of color. The ovation she received at the end of the second act was fully merited.

The best and most effective of Spontini's melodic lines fell to Miss Ponselle. Her colleagues were Edward Johnson as Licinio, Margaret Matzenauer as the High Priestess, Giuseppe de Luca as Cinna, Jose Mardones as the Pontifex Maximus and Paolo Ananian as A Consul.



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