Sometimes people still ask us, "Opera Chic, why you still h8in on poor Alagna?", and our standard answer is, "'cause hes so lame, y'alls". No, seriously, Opera Chic used to be in the pro-Alagna camp back when he was a normal person and a good tenor -- we still like his 1992 Traviata with Fabbricini and Muti, his Don Carlos with Pappano is another winner -- and we still consider him to be the nicer/cooler part of the Angelagna couple.
And frankly, given all the crap Roberto took for his Celeste Aida last December, we decided to dig up from the Opera Chic archives a mp3 clip of the same aria sung by the prince of all Verdi tenors, our dearest Maestro, the genius that is Carlo Bergonzi.
Even Bergonzi, the best ever, who's Joe Louis + Muhammad Ali + Pelé + Babe Ruth + Joe Di Maggio all wrapped into one...well, even Bergonzi could seriously screw things up.
Here's a truly appalling example, his "Celeste Aida" at La Scala in 1976, conducted by Thomas Schippers.
You can download the file here.
Frankly, had Roberto butchered that finale the way Bergonzi did, he'd have been hunted down to his Principe di Savoia suite and executed on the spot by a mob of angry loggionisti. fo'reals.
Instead, Bergonzi got a few chuckles, and some rumblings here and there.
It really was the suxx0r for Roberto that fateful evening in December. Although we still get a kick out of his doomsday, paranoid, feverish karate-chopping theories of sabotage.