Here they come, as they always do whenever they smell somebody else's success: the Krankypants who didn't really appreciate Juan Diego Florez's breach of Scala tradition, his Fille du Regiment solo encore that broke a 74-year-long tradition.
In today's (conservative, Silvio Berlusconi-controlled) Il Giornale, a snark snark snarky review of la Scala's show. Here we go, and we quote:
First the bad news or the good? Let's get it over with the bad news first. La Scala did commemorate her great Toscanini without an exhibit, or a reasoned book (ED: yeah, they only had an extraordinary Daniel Barenboim Beethoven in memoriam concert attended even by the President of the Republic!!!wtf???), and the other night they spat in Toscanini's eye by allowing a tenor to deliver an encore after the most circus-like aria of the entire opera.
It was Donizetti's Fille du Regiment, with a bittersweet operetta taste, and the tenor was Juan Diego Florez, a prodigy of elegance and technique, a computer-like applause machine. The piece contains nine high Cs in the sequence, and even in light voices such as Florez's that is a lot of work. That is all. La Scala distinguished herself even in the cult of the composer's art opposed to the singers' old vanity. Toscanini had forbidden encores just for this reason. In recent years only Gavazzeni (with the chorus of I Lombardi) and Muti (Va' Pensiero) had broken that tradition, and these were two choral pieces cosely associated with our tradition. This, instead, was vocal athleticism. Regression, regression.
The good news. The old, loveliest staging with scens and costumes by Zeffirelli that combines the antique earnest drawings by Epinal with the daring color feast is still appreciated.
Is this enough? Not really. The superlame, 1959 cartoonish staging (in yesterday's Corriere della Sera's immortal words, "Today, it looks like a parody of the traditional stagings: and in this sense, it is paradoxically modern"), the one that convinced Natalie Dessay -- as reported in the usual breaking-news fashion by Opera Chic more than 2 months ago -- to ditch her engagement here was very, VERY much appreciated by Il Giornale:
An Opera Chic piece of advice to the haterz out there: Stop chugging that Haterade jug! Dontcha be hatin' on our Giovan Diego!
