Andrea Chénier

I always have to be a bit nostalgic.  My first Andrea Chénier was in 1965 at the San Francisco opera and starred Richard Tucker and Renata Tebaldi.  I recall she entered from upstage to great applause.  The stage director was Lotfi Mansouri who knew that the great star required an entrance.

I have watched the link on the comment of Andrea Chénier from the ROH.  I didn't mind at all the absence of titles.  They have all made an excellent case for this opera.  This is not a story like Tosca and Butterfly.  They are real people who lived and died in a way much like this.  They have honored the story with real costumes such as they might truly have worn.  I even liked the two Madame Defarge characters knitting in the front row of the tribunal scene.

And for this most real opera they have hired two wonderful singers, Jonas Kaufmann and Eva-Maria Westbroek, who just may be the two most sincere singers today.  For only absolute sincerity will carry the last scene, one of the greatest in all opera.  Lučić was remarkable, too, showing a very wide range of emotions.

For love, for poetry, for art.  Bravi tutti. 

Andrea Chénier, a poet tenor Jonas Kaufmann
Carlo Gérard, a servant baritone Željko Lučić
Maddalena de Coigny soprano Eva-Maria Westbroek
Bersi, her maid mezzo-soprano Denyce Graves
La comtesse di Coigny mezzo-soprano Rosalind Plowright
Pietro Fléville, a novelist bass Peter Coleman-Wright
Mathieu, a sans-culotte buffo or baritone Adrian Clarke
The Abbé, a poet tenor Peter Hoare
The Incredible, a spy tenor Carlo Bosi
Roucher, a friend of Chénier bass or baritone Roland Wood
Schmidt, a jailer at St. Lazare bass or baritone Jeremy White
Madelon, an old woman mezzo-soprano Elena Zilio
Fouquier-Tinville, the Public Prosecutor bass or baritone Eddie Wade
Dumas, Master of the Household bass Yuriy Yurchuk
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