The Capulets and the Montagues

by Vincenzo Bellini
Opera Orchestra of New York
Eve Queler, conductor
Performers listed below

When Vincenzo Bellini came along, Italian opera was in a sort of Marshall McLuhan, "the medium is the message" phase. Back then, the creative philosophy was, "the singing is the drama." They called that prevailing operatic fashion bel canto - "beautiful song." There was a whole lot of spectacular and gorgeous singing around. But as a result, frilly, limpid vocal lines were often prized above the story they were written to convey. It led to a style that often, for today's audiences, just doesn't work. To many of us, with our "modern ears," bel canto singing is far from being "the message" alone. At times, it actually seems to obscure the message - the story - or at least to have very little connection to what the characters are actually doing and saying.

Bellini catered to that aging style - but only to a point. For example, there's the opera we'll hear this week, his 1830 version of the Romeo and Juliet story, The Capulets and the Montagues. When it first came out, it was condemned as old-fashioned. It even featured an operatic staple from the previous century, the "trouser role" - Bellini's dashing Romeo is played by...a mezzo-soprano - at a time when the artificial creation of male mezzo-soprano was, fortunately, on a downturn.

But, in other ways, Bellini himself seems to have had "modern ears." In some respects, his bel canto "Romeo and Juliet" is a trendsetter. He was certainly no slouch at virtuoso vocal writing - the "thrills and chills" part of bel canto. But he also had a genius for music combining that virtuosity with purity of expression, not to mention a flare for the dramatic. In The Capulets and the Montagues, Bellini exploited that gift in music that paved the way for his later works: passionate, truly Romantic dramas like Norma, that were among the finest operas of their time.

This week, on NPR World of Opera with Steve Curwood, we'll hear Bellini's "progressive" bel canto masterpiece in a performance by one of the genre's most esteemed intrepreters, conductor Eve Queler, with Opera Orchestra of New York. And for more on the puzzles and rewards of bel canto, tune in NPR's At the Opera, with Lou Santacroce, 30 minutes before curtain.



Performers:
Vesselina Kasarova (Romeo); Annick Massis (Giulietta); Gregory Kunde (Tebaldo); Phil Cokorinos (Capellio); Patrick Carfizzi (Lorenzo)


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