It is no secret that one of our favorite barihunks of all-time is Ettore Bastianini. We feature him whenever we have an excuse, but what's better than his birthday. Like the German tenor Fritz Wunderlich, we lost him long before his artistry was fully realized. Bastianini died of throat cancer at the age off 44, long before many baritones celebrate their greatest successes.
Bastianini was considered one of the finest Verdi and verismo voices of his day. He made his recital debut as a bass in Siena in 1945 and his stage debut later that year in Ravenna as Colline in Puccini's "La bohème." He later moved into the baritone range where he voice seemed better suited. His top notes thrilled audiences throughout his career for their ringing splendor.
He was a regular at La Scala between 1954-1963 and the Vienna State Opera between 1958-1964. In the United States, he performed regularly at Metropolitan Opera between 1954-1957 and at the Lyric Opera of Chicago between 1955-1958. His last performance was in 1965 at the Metropolitan Opera.
We've received a few emails about composers who were left off of our Greatest French composers list. Some that we missed were defensible (Lalo and Meyerbeer), but probably not Hector Berlioz, who was one of the titans of French music and historically significant in a number of ways. It only seems fair to highlight some of his music, although much of the great vocal music, outside of "The Damnation of Faust," is for voices other than baritone and bass. We did find a few selections that we thought you'd enjoy.
Hector Berlioz was a French Romantic composer, best known for his compositions Symphonie fantastique and Grande messe des morts (Requiem). Berlioz made significant contributions to the modern orchestra with his Treatise on Instrumentation. He specified huge orchestral forces for some of his works; as a conductor, he performed several concerts with more than 1,000 musicians.[2] He also composed around 50 songs. His influence was critical for the further development of Romanticism, especially in composers like Richard Wagner, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Franz Liszt, Richard Strauss, Gustav Mahler and many others.
His operas include Benvenuto Cellini, Les Troyens, Béatrice et Bénédict and The Damnation of Faust.
Robert Massard sings "Ah, qui pourrait me resister?" from Berlioz's "Benvenuto Cellini":
Ettore Bastianini singing the Italian version of "The Damnation of Faust" from 1964:
René Pape sings "Voici des roses" from "The Damnation of Faust"
We can't be too surprised that Rigoletto is at the top of our poll of your favorite Verdi baritone roles. It's not only a great role for baritones, but one of Verdi's most skillfully developed characters. The hunchback father of Gilda isn't a role that one would normally associate with barihunks, but we've found some great clips with two of our favorite singers, Ettore Bastianini and Dmitri Hvorostovsky.
Here is Hvorostovsky performing "Pari siamo" from Act 1, Scene 2 of Rigoletto. In this aria Rigoletto compares himself to the assassin Sparafucile saying that the killer uses his knife as a weapon, but Rigoletto uses his tongue.
Here is Bastianini performing the Act 2 aria "Cortigiani, vil razza dinnata..." live from Milan in 1957. In this aria Rigoletto's daughter has been abducted by several courtiers and handed over to the Duke of Mantua. When Rigoletto tries to get past them to find his daughter, they deny him passage and he unleashes his fury upon them.
Here are Dmitri Hvorostovsky and Sumi Jo performing the Act 2 duet "Mio padre!...Dio! Mia Gilda...Tutte le feste al tempio." This is another example of a beautiful father-daughter duet from Verdi's canon. Verdi lost two children and his lost love seems to come out in his music between father and daughter, especially in La Traviata (daughter-in-law), Stiffelio, Simon Boccanegra and, of course, Rigoletto. In Rigoletto, the father-daughter relationship is central to the plot line. The relationship between father and daughter also appears in Nabucco, Aida, Luisa Miller, Oberto, La Forza del Destino, I Lombardi and I Vespri Sicilliani.
Just for fun, we thought that we'd add a "Rigoletto cage match" of some of the great interpreters of the role taking the optional high A from the end of the opera. Verdi actually wrote the final line as Fb-Eb-Db, but the optional Ab has become an audience favorite over the years.
Samuel Ramey as Attila and a young Sherrill Milnes
We're going to continue exploring Verdi this week with a look at the Verdi kings. We'll start with Verdi's first major success, Nabucco. This is the story of the Babylonian king Nabucodonosor, who assaults, conquers and drives the Jewish people from their homeland. Despite the story, it contains some of the most dramatically exciting and hair raising music in all of Verdi. The famous chorus "Va pensiero" is universally known and has become the unofficial national anthem of Italy. In a country filled with music, nothing stirs the heart of an Italian like this piece of music.
Not many barihunks have sung the title role of Nabucco, but we found this version of Ettore Bastianini from the San Francisco Opera in 1961.
Just for fun, here is the famous chorus sung by some of the greatest singers who were around in 1985, including Montserrat Caballe, Agnes Baltsa, Gwyneth Jones, Jose Carreras, Giuseppe di Stefano and baritones Christian Boesch, Renato Bruson (a great Nabucco), Sherrill Milnes, Giorgio Zancanaro and Juan Pons.
We now move to Amonasro, the king of the Ethiopians and father of the title character Aida. He plays a key role in the plot line and has been played by some of the greatest baritones in history. Here is the Act 3 duet between Aida and Amonasro "Ciel, mio padre...Rivedrai le foreste imbalsamate" with performances by seven of the greatest baritones and sopranos to ever sing the opera. We have a definitive favorite in this bunch, but we'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments section.
Verdi based his ninth opera on the Solera play "Attila, King of the Huns." Besides the title role, there is a another wonderful role for a more lyric baritone, that of Ezio, who sings the aria "E gettata la mia sorte." You can watch Sherrill Milnes perform the aria below. We've always wondered why more young singers don't audition with this show stopper. It's a sure winner if you can nail the ending.
No one has owned the role of Attila in recent years more than the great Samuel Ramey, who always sang it with barihunk swagger and his chest bared. Here he is singing the great baritone duet with the Ezio of Giorgio Zancanaro, followed by the thrilling aria "Or son libere i miei sensi."
