Celeste Aida: Singing at the Met
Opera reviews these days concentrate heavily on the magnificent scope of the production rather than the music – but with Angela Brown flowing flawlessly from delicately high notes down to low, chest-thrusting tones, the music in Verdi’s Aida is a bit hard to overlook.
Aida is the timeless tale of forbidden love between the beautiful Ethiopian princess, Aida, and the Egyptian leader, Radamés. The drama focuses on three main conflicts – the love triangle between Aida, Radamés, and the pharaoh’s daughter, Amneris, the war between Ethiopia and Egypt, and most captivating of all, Aida’s internal struggle to either remain loyal to her father and her country, or live happily with the love of her life. The play ends tragically, as Aida chooses to suffocate in an underground tomb with her lover.
The Metropolitan Opera recreates ancient Egypt to bring Aida’s story to life. Whether it’s the fiercely lit Triumphal March of Act II, complete with live horses, onstage trumpets, flashy slave dancers, and bounded prisoners, or the moon lit banks of the Nile in Act III, the Met goes above and beyond. The cast might have had a hard time measuring up to the larger-than-life set if it were not for their equally rich voices.
Franco Farina’s tenor role of Radamés plays a cat and mouse game with Brown’s soprano, especially during back to back performances of his “Celeste Aida” and her “Ritorna vincitor.” Lunciana D’Intino, who plays the mezzo-soprano role of Amneris, pulls off her character quite nicely – the anguish in Intino’s voice is unnerving in the judgment scene of Act IV. Amneris’ pleas with one and only love, Radamés, to renounce Aida and plead innocence are too convincing. Perhaps most impressive though, is when everything comes together in harmony – the instances of solo voice pitted unswervingly against intricate ensembles and vast choruses, specifically the tenor in the great Triumphal Scene in Act II, are what make Aida memorable.