# OH 20.6.2015 - Andrea Chenier



## Celloman (Sep 30, 2006)

Opera Hour #6:

Andrea Chenier - Umberto Giordano

A little background:

_Instant success and posterity have about the same capricious relationship to one another as the Met Office to weather. Sometimes they get it right. Mostly it's more complicated. Andrea Chénier was a triumph at its premiere in 1896: 20 curtain calls and rave reviews. The 29-year-old Italian composer Umberto Giordano (1867-1948) could afford to leave his dubious lodgings - the storeroom of an undertaker's - and marry his fiancee.

Today Chénier is a rarity, Giordano almost forgotten despite 14 operas in all, including Fedora, she of the hat. Whether for reasons of taste, scale or the requirement of a megastar tenor in the title role, Chénier may have slipped down the ratings but has always had its devotees. Little wonder. Love, liberty, revolution, together with rip-roaring choruses, fluorescent emotions and endlessly changing melodies: who could ask for anything more?_

-Ines de Castro; The Guardian (theguardian.com)

_La mamma morta_ - Act 3


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## Balthazar (Aug 30, 2014)

The excellent 2010 production (by Mario del Monaco's son) at the Opéra National de Paris with Marcelo Alvarez in the title role can be found here in its entirety (with French subtitles):


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## sospiro (Apr 3, 2010)

Don't know it well enough to take part.


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## Cesare Impalatore (Apr 16, 2015)

Balthazar said:


> The excellent 2010 production (by Mario del Monaco's son) at the Opéra National de Paris with Marcelo Alvarez in the title role can be found here in its entirety (with French subtitles):


It's quite fitting that the son of whom Giordano called _il mio Andrea Chénier_ managed to produce this worthy modern representation of Chénier. I'm rather optimistic about my favourite opera's longevity, especially now that the tragic french poet was successfully revived by contemporary tenor icon Jonas Kaufmann.


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## Celloman (Sep 30, 2006)

I'm going to listen to my only recording of this work. I have not heard it yet and this will be my first time with this opera.

(Yeah, I know, it's somewhat embarrassing to own a recording of a work you've never heard, but that can quickly be remedied!)










Oliviero de Fabritiis; La Scala

Beniamino Gigli, Maria Caniglia


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## graziesignore (Mar 13, 2015)

Covent Garden 1985, which I think is the last time ROyal Opera produced it before the recent one






I don't really understand the dismissiveness toward this opera. Sure it's low-rent Puccini but has some 
very nice arias, and for once it's a historical time period which I don't need a pre-briefing on...


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