Aida 1913 at Verona Arena 2014

[ Author Adrian Trasca ] [ From category THE Articles ] [ Subcategory OperaRail 2014 ] [ Subcategory II Arena din Verona ] [ Translator Dana Pavel ] [ Article date: 2014-08-16 ] [ From city Verona ] [ Country Italia ]   I have often been asked why I would choose to go to an opera that I had already seen. My answer is simple: because I like it! This answer is valid in most situations, but there are some cases in which it is only half true. The original enactment of �Aida" (1913) at Verona Arena is one of these cases. Here, the right answer would be: because it`s magical! �Aida" (1913) was the first opera that I saw in Italy, on the last day of August, 2011. A year later, in 2012, I longed to see it again. Although I was in the midst of a series of successive concerts and I should have been sated with opera, I went to see �Aida" again, three times in just a few days. This year, 2014, �Aida" will be memorable for another, more personal reason: for the first time I took a 6-year-old boy to the opera. He was the son of friends and despite the fact that he did not understand much of the concert, he recognized �la principessa". Moreover, he liked the concert and he even applauded it, sometimes while the actors were performing, bothering the viewers around us. Some of them watched him in amusement, others showed their annoyance like� I almost wrote �like Romanians would". (Ever since I have been administrator of the website of the National Opera of Bucharest, I haver made it my custom to invite friends and acquaintances to the opera. Today I`m up to 63 people invited over the years, of which 27 went to the opera for the first time. The boy I was telling you about was my youngest guest). Fortunately, the setting has not changed at all from the previous years. Two Egyptian obelisks on either side of the stage, two equal groups of four Egyptian painted columns supporting a sort of beam that, as the viewer might guess, stand for the Egyptian temple. I remarked a group of horizontal lines on the pillars, painted in the colours of the Romanian flag. It amuses me to think that perhaps Ra`s followers were longing for our national symbol even 4000 years ago. The costumes� were perfect, but hard to describe because there were so many. There were a host of people on the stage, as there usually are, especially in �Aida": singers (members of the choir - actually of the choirs), dancers and ballerinas as well as horses, half in costumes themselves. The horses were again most polite. After playing their role, they gave the traditional bow in front of the viewers. In the third act, the obelisks are in the same place, but on the right side of the stage, one of the groups of four columns is placed obliquely. On the left side, some palm trees interspersed with high bushes stand for a forest. Amneris arrives at the temple from behind these bushes in a wooden boat which remains between the forest and the temple all through the scene. The temple in which Radames is judged is a little too small compared to the rest of the setting. It is composed of three sets of four thick square columns with Egyptian paintings in relief. On top of these columns there is a baseboard which is not used only for decoration: Amneris and other dancers will climb on it later. Amneris and Radames are discussing in front of the pillars at the start. Then the priests come and enter the temple through the pillars in the middle, pushing their way through with their staffs which are not much taller than they are. In the last part, the temple is used as Radames`s tomb as well, something which is disappointing and inappropriate, given the size of the Arena. �La fatal pietra" is missing and, thus, the strong arms of the former Egyptian general have nothing to lift, as the lyrics indicate. I assume this is an error that the organizers did not want to correct since the enactment is a copy of the original of 1913: they probably wanted to keep both its good and bad points. Radames comes out of the tomb in front of the stage, and sings followed then by Aida. On the tomb temple ballerinas dressed in long white clothes are dancing; at the back of the stage, on the stairs, framed by an upside-down V of flaming torches, the Egyptian soldiers are singing hymns to their priests. For various reasons, this time I had a different seat for each act which allowed me to see the opera from four different angles. It was beautiful from each of these angles and even though the friends I was telling you about have moved from Verona, meaning that next year I will not be able to benefit from their kindness, I will still go and see �Aida" again, even if I have to carry my suitcase directly to the train station. Art requires sacrifices. Cast Aida: Monica Zanettin - debut in �Aida" at Verona Arena Radames: Marco Berti Amneris: Anita Rachvelishvili Amonasro: Marco Vratogna Conductor: Daniele Rustioni Director: Gianfranco de Bosio Choreography: Susanna Egri

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