Donizetti: Anna Bolena. (Opera And Oratorio).(Review)

[] Theodossiou, Ganassi, Prina; Sartori, Papi; Orchestra I Pomeriggi Musicali di Milano, Severini. Italian/English libretto. Dynamic CDS 370-1-3 (Qualiton, dist.)

Recorded at the Teatro Donizetti in Bergamo in the fall of 2000, this Anna Bolena offers a first-rate protagonist in Dimitra Theodossiou and a strong supporting cast, and the Orchestra I Pomeriggi Musicali di Milano plays with sweep and buoyant accuracy under the sensitive conducting of Tiziano Severini.

Donizetti used for his 1830 Tudor tragedy a libretto by Felice Romani, author of the text for Bellini's Norma. Like Norma, Anna Bolena is a libretto of high gravity, divided almost equally between blank verse for the recitatives and lyrical verse for the arias and ensembles. After the opera's opening court scene, apart from an Act II effort by the queen's ladies-in-waiting to cheer her up, Anna Bolena consists of deadly serious confrontations, with the only true full soliloquy given to Anna's admirer, the musician Smeaton (wonderfully performed here by Sonia Prina).

It is a precarious structure in which to develop character, but the singers here conquer the opera's difficulties. Theodossiou, leading the assault as Anna, has a beautiful, dark sound topped with some brass and silver, perfect for this genre. Her pianissimo singing is generous almost to the point of exhaustion, but she rises to all the climaxes, ending the opera with a full, show-stopping high E-flat. Her cries of "Giudici" in the confrontation scene with Henry are bloodcurdling in their intensity. That said, it is her tenderly voiced cavatinas that pull the heart-strings most: her interruption after Smeaton reveals the stolen portrait ("In quegli sguardi impresso"); the prayer at the top of Act II ("Dio, che mi vedi in core"); and the famous mad scene "Al ...