Interview with FRANCESCO IZZO scientific director of the Verdi Festival - by William Fratti - The scientific activity of the Teatro Regio di Parma in search of the composer's original will.
The Verdi Festival is not just entertainment. For some years the activity of the Teatro Regio of Parma has been firmly linked to the scientific activity aimed at researching the composer's original will, in order to clean up his work as much as possible, highly popular and all too saturated with the tradition of the twentieth century .
“There are three critical editions scheduled for this year at the Verdi Festival – explained the scientific director Francesco Izzo – some available for some time, others more recent. Nabucco, edited by Roger Parker and published in 1987, was among the first to appear in the series of which I am now director. And Luisa Miller, edited by Jeffrey Kallberg, was published in 1991. I due Foscari, on the other hand, edited by Andreas Giger, is much more recent and came out in print in 2017. First of all, as usual and as that's right, from Verdi's handwritten score, still preserved today in the Ricordi Historical Archive in Milan. On the basis of a meticulous reading of that source, numerous marks of articulation and phrasing have been corrected or introduced, and details relating to the poetic text have been changed. We must remember that before the unification of Italy, the activities of the theaters for which Verdi composed his works were strictly controlled by the censorship of the various Italian states. Verdi's autographs often bear traces of the censors' interventions, with single words or sometimes even quite extensive passages being erased and rewritten. Fortunately for us, the original versions are often still legible, and we can therefore give them back to the performers and the audience as Verdi intended them. A fascinating example is in the first number sung by the Doge, the romance in Act I. The recitative, as we have often heard it, ended with the words “Padre e prence qui sono sventurato”, but the original text, which law in the critical edition and which we will therefore hear in Parma, is much more dramatic and derogatory towards political authority: "A slave here I am crowned". Elsewhere, the word "cursed" had been disliked by the censors of the Papal States and therefore altered to "scellerato" or in other ways; for example in the second act Jacopo will now sing, as Verdi intended, "Maledetto chi mi leva", not "Pera l'empio che mi leva". “Sul campo di lui piombi Iddio”, a highly dramatic expression, had been changed to “Sien vendetta al dolor mio” and we restored the uncensored version. And so on. Although the critical edition of I due Foscari was already performed a few years ago, precisely in Parma on the occasion of the 2009 Festival, it was then a preliminary version. The careful study of a manuscript preserved in the library of the Naples Conservatory has allowed us to identify annotations by Verdi's hand, which have led us to modify some details in the critical edition that we now consider definitive. Therefore, let's not be surprised if we notice some small differences compared to what we have previously heard! Finally, we must remember that any critical edition, scrupulously prepared and with a very careful study of all the available sources, informs the interpreter of the various possibilities and alternatives available, providing footnotes and a detailed critical commentary which allow him to choose between different lessons . We recall that, especially in the first part of his career, Verdi worked in close contact with his interpreters, and sometimes composed modified or even completely new versions of some passages of his works. In I due Foscari for example, on the occasion of the Paris première at the Théâtre Italian where the role of Jacopo was played by the famous tenor Mario (Giovanni Matteo De Candia, ed), a great bel canto player gifted with extreme ease in acute notes, Verdi wrote a new cabaletta for this artist, "Yes, I hear it, God is calling me". This cabaletta, sometimes already heard in the recordings of great tenors of our time, is included in the critical edition and the performers can decide to use it instead of the commonly heard one, "Odio solo, ed odio atroce". This will not happen in Parma this year, but it is a possibility. Similarly, the critical edition of Nabucco provides a dotted version, i.e. with the texture shifted upwards, of Fenena's prayer, specially prepared by Verdi for a certain Amalia Zecchini, who sang the part in a revival of the opera at La Scala in autumn of 1842. If we have a voice that is comfortable with this version, we should not hesitate to use it. From my few observations regarding I due Foscari, it is already clear that a critical edition, when dealing with a Verdi opera, in most cases does not distort the text we already know, but cleans it up, so to speak, and makes it more accurate and more vivid, just like when restoring a painting or sculpture. Traces of time are removed, corrections or additions made hastily, arbitrarily, or for reasons of decorum, for example by hiding anatomical details that were considered offensive. In the 19th century, in addition to the interventions of the censors, there were copyists and employees of publishing houses who often worked to very tight deadlines. The work of the curator is just like that of the restorer; everything must be done with extreme caution, and meticulously checking every source, every detail; and that is why we spend more time preparing a critical edition than Verdi did to compose a new opera!”.
Illustrations by Pierpaolo Gaballo for I due Foscari, Luisa Miller, Nabucco – Festival Value 2019
Very frequently intense debates arise regarding the vocality of the first Verdi. In the works that will be performed at the 2019 Festival – Nabucco, I due Foscari and Luisa Miller – how much of bel canto, how much of his predecessors such as Donizetti, Bellini and Rossini, how much is there already of mature Verdi?
“Great question. We often regard Verdi as radically different from his early 19th-century predecessors. But we must not forget that our perception of Verdi, and above all of his vocality, was formed not so much during the composer's life, but mainly in the twentieth century, taking into consideration, with rare exceptions, the works from Rigoletto onwards. Think of what the New York Metropolitan did for the 2013 bicentenary: seven Verdi operas on the bill and none of them before Rigoletto! More than half of Verdi's works remain outside this framework. Those that often, grossly mistaken, are called the works of the "prison years". Let's be careful, please; if we really want to use this expression, let's remember at least that it was coined by Verdi himself and that it includes, as he wrote, "sixteen years in jail", or from Nabucco to the gestation of Un ballo in maschera. In reality, if we carefully study those sixteen operas that precede Rigoletto, but also the works of the so-called popular trilogy, we find many elements of continuity with the conventions of the early nineteenth century, for example in the frequent use of formal procedures and dramaturgical conventions already defined in era of Rossini. And we find a vocality that is certainly bel canto: Verdi demands from his voices not so much vehemence, but agility, control, and ductility. In Verdi's operas there is singing of agility, there are trills and rushes, there are indications to sing softly or even pianissimo, with two or three or more “p”! And, as we said about Nabucco and I due Foscari, he always writes for and with specific singers, working side by side with them, exploiting and highlighting their talents. This happens not only in the cases I have described of Fenena's prayer and Jacopo Foscari's cabaletta, but in many other circumstances, from I lombardi alla prima crociata and Ernani to the music for Foresto in Attila, showing us that, if the interpreters or the circumstances, even the music can change. In a nutshell, in the relationship between Verdi and the singers we see continuity with an already consolidated creative and productive system, which is then renewed also thanks to Verdi, but gradually and without tears or clear cuts".
In the last twenty years it has become increasingly difficult to listen to singers suitable for Verdi's repertoire, while the level of Rossini and Baroque interpreters has risen enormously, where scientific activity has made great strides. How and to what extent can the work of revision and critical edition influence interpretation?
“I believe that scientific work, also in the light of what I said earlier on vocality, is important because it allows us to get rid of certain stereotypes, or at least to question them. Verdi's singing is not an abstract category, nor is it something totally detached from the bel canto repertoire. We must understand that, even if we can rightly venerate the memory of many great Verdi interpreters of the twentieth century, and even feel a certain nostalgia for certain legendary interpretations that we have been able to hear live or appreciate on recording, many things were done arbitrarily; long passages of music were cut out (for example the repetitions of the cabalettas, which are instead very important, or the second verses of Violetta's arias in La traviata), banal cadences were used, the idea of introducing embellishments and variations was resisted. These are all things that we are now reevaluating and rectifying. Personally I don't think there is a shortage of Verdi performers, but I do believe that today's Verdi singing is changing, and this is nothing to regret. Indeed, we have many already established singers who approached Verdi with great openness and originality (I name one: Lisette Oropesa, who did a splendid job at La Scala in I masnadieri and who next year will be Violetta in various important productions) , and we have young performers who in the years to come, with the right guides, with critical editions at hand, working with well-informed conductors and colleagues, and supported by open-minded audiences, will not only excel as Verdi voices , but to give a creative contribution and let us experience Verdi in an ever new way. This for me is the most important and highest meaning of the expression "viva Verdi!": we are not talking about monuments, immobility and perpetuating stereotypes, but rather, above all, about creativity, imagination, study, discovery and rediscovery, in short, of an art that is truly “alive”.
Are there any news in store for 2020?
“Yes, in 2020 we will have a big news: we will perform for the first time a new critical edition of an important work by early Verdi, a title that is very close to my heart. We will be able to give you more specific news in the autumn!”.
William Fratti
PHOTOS Teatro Regio Parma