I’ve frequently wondered what went down to Italian opera after Puccini because nothing much has ever come my way. That's until today when I received my on the job a DVD of Pizzetti’s 1958 piece, Assassinio nella Cattedrale that is carefully in line with the Eliot play. Murder within the Cathedral is, when one considers it and just how Eliot uses the chorus, an excellent grounds for an opera libretto. The libretto sticks pretty near to the play and Pizzetti supplies a tense, dramatic score that can bring the underlying fear and tension within the Eliot. Just from time to time, and incredibly effectively, he gets to be more freely lyrical, as with Becket’s acceptance of his impending martyrdom, but mostly it’s pretty high energy. That stated, Pizzetti appears to become a significant conservative composer and also the music is basically tonal and simple to understand. One curiosity I noted is the fact that within the run up to Becket’s dying he interweaves the boys’s chorus singing the Dies Irae using the forebodings from the women’s chorus and also the setting from the Dies Irae he makes use of is equivalent to in Bergman’s Seventh Seal which arrived on the scene the prior year.
The DVD is definitely an interesting affair. It’s mainly a filming of the 2007 stage performance within the St. Nicholas Basilica in Bari however it has several short scenes reduce it (visuals only) the Kent shore, Thomas’ chamber, the knights coming in the cathedral, etc. Usually I personally don't like this sort of factor but here It is sensible because, to become frank, its all a little static and viewing cathedral audience should have been pretty poor as the majority of the experience happens while watching altar and also the orchestra is between your audience and also the &"stage&". Within the finish, the mixture of Daniele D’Onoforio’s stage direction and Tiziano Mancini’s video direction creates a really satisfying experience on DVD.
Ruggero Raimondi as Becket dominates the piece. He’s just magnificent being an actor along with a singer. There’s likely noone you’ve ever encountered within the supporting cast but they're all, at the very least, excellent and Paoletta Marrocu because the First Women is way better than excellent. She really captures the essence of Eliot’s writing for that women. There’s an enormous component of chorus within this piece and also the Coro ATER supplemented through the kids of the Bari Children’s Conservatory are fantastic, out of the box the Orchestra Sinfonica della Provincia di Bari. Piergiorgio Morandi will a fine job of keeping everything together within the tricky acoustic from the Basilica.
The DVD is technically excellent. The DTS 5.1 seem captures the cathedral acoustic in an exceedingly vivid and atmospheric way and also the picture appears to be although it was filmed in hi-def. It’s about just like DVD will get at any event. You will find British, French, German, Italian and Spanish subtitles and LPCM stereo being an option aside from the DTS seem. There's no bonus material and also the documentation didn't have from the library copy in order to’t discuss that.