Il Trovatore at the Met

Here are videos from Dmitri's and his colleagues' performance.
This took place at the Metropolitan Opera in New York on the 30th of April 2011.
Dmitri is Count di Luna, Sondra Radvanovsky is Leonora,Marcelo Alvarez is Manrico,Dolora Zajick is Azucena and Stefan Kocan is Ferrando.

All the four singers sang very well. Sondra Radvanovsky is a really remarkable,touching,and emotional  Leonora, her voice is huge and beautiful. She is sweet when needed but she can become a lioness in lines like " M'avrai ma fredda e esanime spoglia!".  

Alvarez has a beautiful instrument but he could use it better,I liked very much the duets with Azucena but when alone like in the aria "Ah si ben mio" and the following cabaletta " Di quella Pira" he was a bit...I'd say unprecise.But his voice never lost the innate latin macho appeal! :)

Dolora Zajick still has a very beautiful voice and her portrait of Azucena was really realistic. When going in the lower zone she didn't lost the precison she put while singing.

Dmitri is the best Count di Luna I had the opportunity to hear. His voice perfectly suits DiLuna's character and his creamy,sweet (ecc ecc) baritone tone is owerwhelmingly beautiful. His looks helped the stage director maybe but his acting was always very correct and never unpleasant,on the contrary! His desperation when he lost Leonora was really convincing! And the struggling aim of the carachter was perfectly portraied!

I found Armiliato's conducting a bit "loud" don't know what happened, maybe he thought he was conducting a Brass Band!  


The Chorus did a good job too even if I think it could be better...I liked the Coustumes and the scenes were suitable to this story of love and revenge.Congratulations to Mr.McVicar who told that he was inspired by Goya for this production's staging. Our Ferrando Stefan Kocan... his voice is powerful and he owns a good technique, nothing to say about his interpretation.                                                                                                                                                                                                                        

Maybe someone could claim that in the past singers were better than this singers but what's the aim in comparing the great singers of the past with nowadays' singers? They are so different in technique and in any case they are not here, so let's enjoy what we have of beautiful now, and this four singers definitely can provide us with something beautiful!