[Met Tour] CID:123580



Aida
Boston Opera House, Boston, Massachusetts, Sat, April 2, 1938




Aida (422)
Giuseppe Verdi | Antonio Ghislanzoni
Aida
Elisabeth Rethberg

Radamès
Giovanni Martinelli

Amneris
Bruna Castagna

Amonasro
Carlo Tagliabue

Ramfis
Ezio Pinza

King
Norman Cordon

Messenger
Angelo Badà

Priestess
Thelma Votipka

Dance
Elise Reiman

Dance
William Dollar


Conductor
Ettore Panizza







Review 1:

Review signed J. E. in the Boston Evening Transcript

Spectacle for Close

The Metropolitan Opera Company wound up its Boston season on Saturday evening with a rousing performance of "Aida," in which nothing was spared to make the most of the grand show which the opera can be at best. Every element of the spectacular, the dramatic was played to the hilt. The truly effective or beautiful elements of the opera were made to predominate over and carry along much of what seems banal and uninteresting, at least to contemporary tastes.

Over and above the production, the singing was of high quality throughout. Mme. Rethberg, as Aida, sang with power and expressiveness. Her purity of tone, variety of style and control of phrasing were remarkable, especially in the aria, "O patria mia" and in the final interminable duet with Radames. That her conception of the role was from the outset rather too mournful may have been due as much to her makeup as to her acting. Her costume, too, was unfortunate, more reminiscent of one of Frank Swinnerton's "Canyon Kiddies" than an Ethiopian princess.

Mr. Martinelli, a conventional, stoical sort of Radames, seemed more bound down by the old-fashioned operatic stage business than did the other members of the cast, and was not in top form. Mr. Pinza was splendid as a forbidding Ramfis, especially in the temple scene at the end of the first act, in "Nume, custode e vindice." Although her stage manner and costume smacked too much of Wagner, Mme. Castagna was excellent as an opulent, hyperemotional Amneris. Carlo Tagliabue's Ethiopian King could have served as an object lesson for Haile Selassie.

Sets, with the exception of the first scene, were tasteful, and the dances, by the American Ballet Ensemble, very well worked out. Except occasionally in the scenes with chorus, Mr. Panizza had the performance well in hand.



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