The libretto of the opera by Gaetano Rossi is based on Voltaire’s play Tancrede. The story progresses slowly and the plot is quite holey, which is typical of opera seria. These are dramatic pieces with songs that express the character’s specific thought (stopping the forward movement of the story) connected by forte-piano accompanied recitative (sung speech...boring to hear but this is where the story actually moves forward). But then this is also bel canto, mates! The main attraction is splendid virtuoso vocal writing that shows off the voices.
The music here is marvelously dramatic. It opens with a typical Rossini crescendo overture. It starts boomingly, then grows subdue in the middle with gradual increase in volume and dramatic beat to a rousing finish... giving way to the chorus opening Act I. A Rossini orchestra is made of about 45 instrument (compared to 90+ pieces orchestra for a Richard Wagner or a Richard Strauss opera), so their function is to paint a background and to highlight the singing voice.... not to drown them. If you have heard more than 1 Rossini opera you will find many of the same music in various works. Rossini was famous for his penchant in recycling his own favorite tunes (it was probably something amusing to him, but it is his most annoying habit to me especially since my favorite composer is Mozart... who always composed new music for each of his work!)... So yeah, it’s a bit weird that the music for the Act I ensemble finale in this dramatic opera is almost identical to the Act I ensemble finale of his comic opera The Barber of Seville. Not the whole thing is recycled, though, and this piece features wonderful pure bel canto arias for Tancredi and Amenaide, and 3 of the greatest duets in all of opera.
The young knight Tancredi (sung by a coloratura mezzo or contralto) was exiled from Syracuse during a power struggle (The title character was based on a Norman knight called Tancred of Hauteville and not the Tancredi of Lecce whose star-crossed battle with Clorinda appears in Monteverdi's 1624 madrigal). His coloratura soprano lover Amenaide (daughter of Argirio, a lyric tenor, who heads the council that governs Syracuse) dispatches a letter to Tancredi via a confidant asking him to return to save the city and to claim her as his wife, but she doesn't address the letter to him for fear of it being intercepted. It is intercepted (what else from an opera?) by the mean basso Orbazzano the power hungry knight who wanted to marry Amanaide himself.
Everyone thinks the letter was addressed to Solamir (who doesn’t actually appear in the opera at all), the leader of the Saracenian besiegers of the city, and Amenaide is given a death sentence just as Tancredi and his page Roggiero (a coloratura soprano) returns on his own will (after all, Voltaire was pretty fond of ironies) and learns of the letter. He believes Amenaide had betrayed him and the city, but still takes it upon himself to challenge Orbazzano to a duel to defend her life... to the relief of Amenaide’s maid, Isaura (a coloratura mezzo/contralto). After having successfully done Orbazzano in (about the only scene that moves quickly in this opera because there is no scene at all! The dude is slain off-stage), he leads the Syracusians to war against the Saracenians.
There are 2 alternate endings to this opera. The original Venezia 'happy' ending where he wins the war and comes back alive to marry Amenaide, and the Ferrara 'tragic' ending where he wins the war but comes back dead. In both ending he does learn during the battle that Amenaide didn't betray him with that letter after all.
To date, there are 3 great recordings of Tancredi to be had: SONY (M Horne) set, Naxos (E Podles) se and RCA (V Kasarova) set.
Musically the RCA set is my favorite. The Bulgarian mezzo Vesselina Kasarova's big break to stardom was her stellar performance of this role on a 2 weeks notice for Marilyn Horne at the Salzburg Festival in 1992 (very impressive as this is one of the toughest music around for a mezzo both for its technicality and length). She had never seen the score before and was preparing to sing Annio in the same festival's production of La clemenza di Tito!). The gal is a risk-taker (and it shows in her singing).
Frau Kasarova offers an introspective and psychological portrayal of the character who doesn't really have that many layers on paper. This Tancredi is not a legendary hero who can only exist in one's imagination, but a flesh and blood romantically heroic young man who has seen much trials and tribulations for his age. Her voice is quite dark, intriguingly androgenic, very Slavic with wonderful clarinet-like quality, and full bodied (plump mahogany or good port wine of many colors), tho not completely even (the top notes and the bottom notes can sound quite different). It is one of the most distinguishable voices around (you can always tell her apart from other singers). The range is impressively wide and the voice is extremely agile and expressive. She has a lighter touch (tho a more dramatic voice) than Cecilia Bartoli but is just as virtuosic and accurate in her coloratura runs.
This singer uses many different techniques simultaneously to bring out nuances in the music not heard in the other sets, and still has this knack for always sounding spontaneous. Her 2 big arias (Oh patria/di tanti palpiti are hauntingly beautifully sung and engaging. She always sounds like she is expressing what she is really feeling at the moment rather than like she is trying to sound a certain way. Her exciting enthusiasm is very infectious to me, and that more than makes up for the few vocal perculiarities.
The Italian soprano Eva Mei is a very fine Amenaide (tho a bit shrill at the top). Her voice blends beautifully with Kasarova's in their duets, but she is less expressive and the contrast is obvious when they sing together. Somehow it works. I wish they had broken the tracks a bit finer to isolate each aria and duet. The 2 duets between Tancredi and Amenaide are drop dead gorgeous.
The Mexican tenor Ramon Vargas has a gloriously clear lyric tenor voice with a real ping at the top (and absolutely even through out the range), though he sounds a bit young for Argirio (Amenaide's dad). His is a thankless and extremely difficult role, but he is more than equal to the task. He does a ringing and grandiose read of his big aria 'Pensa che sei mia figlia'. His Act II duet with Kasarova, M'abbraccia, Argirio is lavishing as well. This is indeed one of the best Argirio on record.
The supporting roles are all very well sung also.
Maestro Roberto Abbado is WAY underrated. He sets slower and more expansive tempi than in other recordings, and successfully creates realistic and lyrical musical backdrop for the performance. A good case in point is in the orchestral introduction to the show's best known aria, 'Oh patria!/ di tanti palpiti'.
In all other performances of this work that I've heard (especially on the Naxos set conducted by Maestro Zedda), this orchestral intro is set at a much faster tempo and treated as if it's a nuissance that is to be spanned as soon as possible even if that compromises the music's descriptive quality). Not so here. With Abbado's expansive reading all of the sudden this intro is a mesmerizing mood setter that vividly paints the backdrop of Tancredi's arrival by sea to Syracuse.
The slower tempo is consistent with that of a ship sailing into port from a long voyage. The short spurts of violin and English horn phrases mimicking sea swallows flying by over the vessel. The final passage of the intro even eases off gently as the ship has beached and now we hear the waves washing gently over the sand as Tancredi steps onto the shore he had wanted for years to return to before launching into his aria. The same sensibility and subtlety is heard through out this performance. A masterly reading that should do Rossini proud.
All in all, this is a mesmerizing treatment of Rossini's rarely performed masterpiece (all 3 leads are so difficult to sing it's hard to cast 3 singers good enough to do the work justice at the same time). If you only want 1 version of this work, I highly recommend this set without reservation.
Review of other Rossini opera:
The Barber of Seville : https://hive.blog/hive-174578/@devoran/gioacchino-rossini-s-il-barbiere-di-siviglia-the-barber-of-seville
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