“You know what the fellow said – in Italy, for thirty years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love, they had five hundred years of democracy and peace – and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.”—The Third Man
In coming up with a name for her first, all-Bach, Sony recording, pianist Simone Dinnerstein turned to the Francis Bacon chestnut that “there is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion.” Bach is for sure a strange beauty. But last night at Caramoor, I couldn’t help but think that the same contention exemplifies the ending of Rossini’s Guillaume Tell—a premonition of Wagner’s Rheingold finale, if not the fertile grounds for ripping off: Philip Gossett’s illuminating program notes reveal an exchange between Wagner and Rossini in which Wagner describes Tell’s aria, “Sois immobile,” as a work that “accentuating each word and sustained by the breathing strokes of the violoncellos, reached the highest summits of lyric expression.” Rossini replied, “So I made music of the future without knowing it,” to which Wagner responded, “There, Maestro, you made music for all time. And that is the best.”
Baritone Daniel Mobbs, a longtime stalwart of the Caramoor/City Opera scene, gave a star turn in the title role of Tell. Stylish and virile, he was a riveting and dedicated presence for nearly the full four hours it takes to get from iconic overture to luscious finale. Mobbs’s website is a treasure trove of audio samples, including this galvanizing account of “Normal, il predisse, o Druidi” from Norma, which should be required listening for every Saturday morning coffee.
Even with a few hiccoughs throughout the evening (owing in part, one can only assume, to the oddly dry air in Katonah last night), there was no weak link in the cast. Like Mobbs, soprano Julianna Di Giacomo commanded the stage, leaving the audience breathless after her Act II entrance aria “Sombre forêt,” and forming one third of the triumvirate in Act IV’s gleaming trio, alongside the earth-shaking mezzo Vanessa Cariddi as Tell’s Swiss miss(us) and Olympian soprano Talise Trevigne as their son, Jemmy. Michael Spyres continues to gain ground in the States for his sweetly lyrical tenor (though, as my colleague Steve Smith noted in his Times review, seemed stiff in comparison to his fellow castmates). All credit, too, goes to Will Crutchfield, the Orchestra of St. Luke’s and Caramoor’s chorus, who tirelessly sailed through the killer score with an archer’s precision.
One question remains: Per last night’s libretto and supertitles, Jemmy alerts his compatriots to battle by SETTING HIS PARENTS’ HOUSE ON FIRE. I mean, it’s all well and good that a new era dawns for the unoppressed Swiss and that Tell survives his death sentence and the tenor and soprano get to reunite (I guess? That wasn’t really addressed, but Grove tells me it is so). But it kind of sucks that after such a crazy day Tell can’t go back to his house, kick up his feet and lay into some fondue and chocolates. The Borgias would never have burned their own house down.
