An Observation about Norma

I have seen Norma a number of times in several productions from very conservative to WWII style.  There is one thing I have never seen.  Norma is a priestess who during the opera conducts two different religious ceremonies.  What usually changes when one transitions from normal life to a religious ceremony and back again?  One usually appears first in street clothes, followed by vestments, followed again by street clothes.  Have I ever seen Norma appear in what would appear to be a ceremonial garment of any kind?  No.  This is why the actions always feel wrong.  We need more than you telling us she is a priestess.  We need to see it, too.

Norma in HD

 👍🏻 
Conductor...............Carlo Rizzi
Production..............David McVicar

Norma...................Sondra Radvanovsky
Pollione................Joseph Calleja
Adalgisa................Joyce DiDonato
Oroveso.................Matthew Rose
Clotilde................Michelle Bradley

Above is the staging for "Casta diva" from Bellini's Norma live in HD from the Metropolitan opera. The goddess to whom she prays is the moon, so the scene must appear to be moonlit.  This is the greatest complaint about this production, that the sets are too dark.  Our screen was quite large and generally easy to see, except for the very beginning, before the moon-rise, which was almost black.

My Normas have been Joan Sutherland, Montserrat Caballe, Cecilia Bartoli and Sondra Radvanovsky, whom I heard first in San Francisco.  For me this version was best of all for the acting. I loved Cecilia's Norma for this quality, but here it balances across the cast.

We know we are at war by the presence of bodies.  What is to be their position toward the Romans?  Norma recommends reaching a peace with them, but we know that her motives are suspicious.  She probably recommends peace because of her relationship to Pollione, the Roman proconsul.  In the first act religious ceremony Adalgisa assists Norma in the rite.

In Norma's house Adalgisa reveals that she is in love with Pollione and has promised to go with him to Rome.  Norma does not reveal to Adalgisa until later that she has two children by Pollione. The increase in the significance of Adalgisa and the increased strength of her tie to Norma changes the emotional dynamic of the opera. 

So when Norma calls her followers together again, she recommends war.   We see Norma's range of emotions, especially her rage against Pollione.  She knows someone must die, but is not sure who should be killed.  She finally arrives at herself as the person at fault.  Adalgisa appears at the end to watch her lover and her friend walk off together to their deaths.

Sondra was magnificent, a giant, intense performance still wonderfully sung.  Joyce was also magnificent in both singing and acting.  I even liked Calleja.  When watching the old timers long ago, one hardly knew there was a plot.  Here we get the best of both worlds--a traditional staging with a lot of emotional interaction and magnificent singing.
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Norma at Salzburg

Cecilia's Norma which originally played at the Salzburg Festival in 2013 is creating a sensation in its revival this season.  My review here.

Tommasini reported for the New York Times.

An Austrian newspaper called it Wunder-Norma.

It seems to be universally regarded as a triumph.  It's good to see everyone on board.

Game of Thrones Norma

Conductor Nicola Luisotti
Director Kevin Newbury
Set designer David Korins

Oroveso:  Christian Van Horn*
Pollione:  Russell Thomas*
Norma:  Sondra Radvanovsky
Adalgisa:   Jamie Barton
*Role debut

PLACE AND TIME: Gaul, during the Roman occupation in 50 BC.  Attributing it to the mythical time/place of Game of Thrones came from the program.  I think it fits.  This is a new production, I think.  In the grand tradition of the San Francisco Opera they never say "Production xyz."  They name a director, a set designer, a costume designer, etc., but not a producer.  We know, for instance, that Show Boat was done in a production by Francesca Zambello, but nothing in the credits tells us that.  The director is the person who moves the actors about the stage, not the production designer.

Enough complaining.

Adalgisa and Norma

Please note tattoos on the foreheads of Jamie and Sondra above.  I think originally there were more.  There is nothing of ancient Gaul or Rome in the sets or costumes of this new production.  We are in a mythical time or place.  The dialog is followed precisely.  If it says she ceremonially cuts mistletoe, she ceremonially cuts mistletoe. 

Throughout the opera we had been seeing bits and pieces of this statue, including miniatures of it.  Shrug.  I didn't mind it.

In the line to the ladies room it was said that Marco Berti, who played Pollione in the first 2 performances, was fired.  I have no personal knowledge one way or the other.  The last time he appeared in San Francisco I gave him advice, and I wanted to know if he had taken any of it.  The ticket taker and elevator operator both said that Russell Thomas was better.

Sondra Radvanovsky has the weight and significance as an artist to convince us that she is the exalted priestess of the Druids.  She is very fine in this role, conquering it in spite the monotonously slow tempos that dragged every phrase.  Is this the official Bellini tempo?  Apologies.  CB's Norma has not yet passed out of my consciousness.

Jamie Barton.  Welcome to San Francisco.  We loved you.  Please come back as often as possible. 

This very difficult opera very much impressed.

Norma Teaser

This is the teaser for Norma which opens the San Francisco Opera this evening. I'm very annoyed that Jamie Barton isn't on my performance.  It's the old traditional Norma.  Sigh.  I promise you will love Sondra Radvanovsky.

The biggest contrast lies in the "Guerra."  Salzburg and recording are absolutely hair raising.

Norma Viene

I came for this, of course. I wanted to experience the Norma at Salzburg for myself. Now Cecilia Bartoli is talking about taking it on the road, so look for it in a theater near you.

I saw Norma once with Sutherland and Horne in San Francisco. They mostly just stood around and sang. It was very beautiful, mind you, but it could have been a concert. Cecilia's Norma--what else can you call it?--is sort of the opposite. Norma is the leader, the sacred object, the chaste priestess, the leader of men, the leader for peace in a crowd of people who want war.

This is a modern dress production. My theory of modern dress holds here. Dressing the actors like people we know makes them feel to us like people we know, makes their loves and hates feel like our own.

Then their leader whom even her father loves and follows, turns out to have been living a lie. Instead of chastity, she reveals first to Adalgisa and later to everyone else that she has been the lover of the proconsul and has had two children by him. Once she knows that Norma has been with Pollione, Adalgisa wants nothing more to do with him and fades from the story. She's there mainly for duets.

In this production all the cuts are restored. The opera doesn't seem that long to me so it's hard to see why cuts were necessary. Orchestrally the bel canto was a period of transition. New instruments were invented and moved gradually into general use. Cecilia has chosen to move unambiguously back to an antique instrument ensemble.

Once she has found out the ugly truth about Adalgisa and Pollione, Norma considers killing everyone by turns--

first her children,

then the entire Roman army,

then Pollione whom her partisans have captured trying to kidnap Adalgisa,

and then finally herself. 

She confesses. It is a role waiting to be discovered.

I felt that this production by Mosche Leiser and Patrice Caurier completely worked. Every concept was theatrically viable, involving, even jolting. "Guerra" shouted at us from the front of the stage was particularly thrilling.

Michele Pertusi as Norma's father Oroveso has sung with Cecilia since her early Cenerentola recording. He is always strong vocally and theatrically. Liliana Nikiteanu is another long time colleague of Cecilia's from the Zurich Opera. John Osborn appeared with her in Rossini's Otello. Only Rebeca Olvera is new. She is a member of the Zurich ensemble.  They are a strong cast.

But this is Cecilia Bartoli's production, and it rises and falls with her. This marvelous theatrical concept requires Cecilia Bartoli to bring to success. She is attempting nothing less than the complete recreation of Anna Magnani, the passionate Italian actress. The result is more like Broadway than opera, because the emphasis shifts to the action, and no one sings dramatic recitative better than Cecilia. The strength of characterization is powerful well beyond the normal confines of opera, but vocally it is less than a perfect fit for her.

The character of Norma disintegrates into drunkenness at one point. At the end Pollione calls her a "sublime woman." Yes.  I can say nothing more.

Things I Notice about Norma

In Sumi Jo Cecilia Bartoli has chosen a partner in the famous duets who shares her leggiero technique. The effect is pleasing. The duet singing is quite romantic and not at all the showing off that normally characterizes just about everything in this opera. Sumi Jo as Adalgisa also restores the traditional voicing of opera: the older woman, Norma, has the darker voice.

The entire opera seems to be about the opera. This is why I want to see it for myself in Salzburg. The plot of Norma is very intense and emotional, but this intensity is always blunted by the almost absolute focus on vocal technique that it usually receives. With the heavy orchestra and focus on divas Norma is just too hard.

I like the thin blunt sound of the orchestra. The emotions come through with so much clarity.  If I were to pick something for this sound to resemble, I would have to say Rossini.

The Bartoli colors are present in abundance. Even after all these years she never ceases to surprise and amaze. This is her Norma, the one she wanted, a joy from start to finish. Critics of her "Casta diva" complain that she doesn't find the long phrase. The problem with her long phrase is that it covers the entire song. Listen again.

It is simply a complete reimagining of the opera.
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Norma Fascination

I confess I have been following Cecilia Bartoli's foray into Bellini's Norma like a deer caught in the headlights.  Even the very idea of it is fascinating.

I read everything in the English and German press, the vast majority positive, about both the new recording and the performances in Salzburg.

We know that Cecilia is self-identified with the greatest of all divas--Maria Malibran, a woman whose legend was amplified out of all human proportion by her early death.

She also carries another less positive obsession with another transcendent diva--Maria Callas.  In Cecilia's native Italy time seems to have stopped with Callas.  The style of performance most represented by Callas is the only one the average opera-devoted Italian cares to hear.  Cecilia's countrymen are to this day completely fascinated with Callas and care not at all for her.  When Cecilia sings at La Scala, they boo.

Both of Cecilia's obsession divas scored triumphs in the role of Norma.  Callas was particularly known for her portrayal, recording it 5 times.  I am personally astounded that La Bartoli would take this on, but should I be?  It begins to seem inevitable.

Cecilia Bartoli is an awesome individual.  (If there were any way to invest in her, I would.  Could she please incorporate herself.)  You only imagined that she doesn't have the right voice for Norma.  She bends reality to her will.  This performance must be considered an historic event.  I can't stop watching.  And listening.

Appendix:

New York Times

Salzburg Times

Limelight

The Jerusalem Post

Euronews The new/old Norma

We must change our lives -- Interview with Cecilia Bartoli

[Dr. B: This is my translation of an interview from DIE ZEIT, on May 7, 2013 by Christine Lemke-Matwey. Thanks to the Forum. The interviewer has a somewhat literary style that is a bit beyond my capabilities, but I will do what I can.]

Cecilia Bartoli is the prima donna assoluta of our time. In Salzburg she sings for the first time in Vincenzo Bellini's opera Norma. [She actually debuted this role in Dortmund in 2010.] A conversation about tragic female characters, matching shoes and Italian politics

The Italian mezzo-soprano Cecilia Bartoli Salzburg, in April, to any halfway post card enabled corner is cut, milled, dug and built at the station anyway and still, the 470 years old Sternbräu they even have quite plucked away (the traditional restaurant needs a "facelift", it's called). Just there Cecilia Bartoli struggles towards the festival building, packed over hill and dale with several bags. It's a pretty picture, as the artist, dressed in black, passes an election poster of incumbent Governor Gabi Burgstaller on ("Who is the man in the word does not run away from it") on the Social Democrat to the red Snow-mouth wearing a yellow "pay attention" jacket.

The Bartoli guided Whitsun Festival held this year little fits the motto of "Opfer" [victim or sacrifice-her theme for the Pfingstfestpiele]. She herself on May 17 in the House for Mozart will debut as Vincenzo Bellini's Norma - a role that hardly anyone would have believed of her. [I have translated this paragraph very badly. Salzburg is getting a facelift. Cecilia is trudging through construction obstacles with a lot of baggage, passing political posters for an upcoming election.]

Cecilia Bartoli: Buon giorno, we are sitting in the audience, yes? You can see there some of our Norma stage set.

DIE ZEIT: Signora Bartoli, hasn't the Salzburg public who you know like to interfere in artistic matters, not complained about your festival motto? Among young people in Germany is "Opfer" [victim] a dirty word, no one would like to be a victim.

Bartoli: I love the German word "Opfer"! It shimmers, it has very different meanings depending on the perspective from which you look at it. The English know for "Opfer" two concepts: sacrifice and victim, so also "Opfer bringen" [bring sacrifice] and even "Opfer sein" [be a victim], ​​victims of oppression, victims of hate and violence, victims of their own overconfidence. However, as an Italian woman, I think also of the Latin, offere, to the "Offertory" in the Catholic Mass ...

DIE ZEIT: And after this little etymological excursion, Governor Burgstaller was reassured?

Bartoli: To me no one has complained. And it would be no bad thing if the politicians would take the art so seriously that they could be provoked by an opera from 1831!  By a woman like Bellini's Norma, who comes to us as a very human example of someone who in a conflict situation sacrifices: her children, her love and her life. Norma has the power to overcome her emotions. Who today is still able to do this?

In the audience, there is dim light for a rehearsal break. The stage set can be seen to some extent, the notes and notes of the reporter are not. So be it. Cecilia Bartoli speaks in a low voice, almost beseechingly, her eyes flashing. Her latest personal excavation lies close to her heart, one sees.

Bartoli: What do you see on stage?

ZEIT: Mattresses on the floor, a bicycle on the wall, tables, chairs ... a building from the thirties or forties of the 20th Century, I would say maybe a school that has been misused and now serves as a storage building?

Bartoli: Not bad! When Norma was premiered in 1831 in Milan, Italy was occupied ...

ZEIT: By Austria.

Bartoli: Yes, dear Salzburger, by Austria! And Bellini's librettist Felice Romani saw himself naturally confronted by the censorship of the occupiers, that is, he must tell the story he wanted to tell by making it as innocuous as possible, putting in some exotic costumes. He did that. The Italians are the Gauls, the Austrians are the Romans, and the whole thing takes place in the first Century before Christ. Norma is a rebellious, highly political piece, it's about rebellion, about the struggle of the oppressed against their oppressors. The Austrians were able to easily misunderstand. On the other hand Norma is about love and passion, and about a larger than life conflict: Norma, the Gallic Druid priestess who loves the Roman Pollione, she loves her greatest enemy and even has two children with him. How will she ever explain this to her people?

ZEIT: Anything that has to do with love, one takes easily from Italian opera. The political, however, one likes to see and hear far away.

Bartoli This is why we build two bridges in Salzburg: a musical one that tackles the bel canto and has been meticulously researched, with which singers, vocal subjects which Bellini had in 1831. I tell you what Maurizio Biondi and Riccardo Minasi ...

ZEIT: ... the two editors of the first critical edition of Norma ...

Bartoli: ... have it all figured out, this is the purest detective story! As the autograph of the score speaks to one, that gives me goosebumps to this day, this wealth of information! One has only to read it correctly. And we also build a scenic bridge, one that puts the action in the Second World War, when the Fascists in Italy reigned and the people were oppressed in other ways. Norma is now a partisan, a woman, as we know from the movies of Italian neorealism, Roberto Rossellini's Rome, Open City and other films. If you like, the Salzburg Norma is not least a tribute to Anna Magnani, the great Italian actress, and I have the honor in this production to look a bit like her.

ZEIT: The Magnani was also only 1.60 meters tall.

Bartoli: Thanks for the compliment. Maria Malibran, after Giuditta Pasta one of the most famous Normas of all, should even have been five centimeters shorter!

ZEIT: Do we have today, in the era of quotas and post-gender debates, a problem with towering women, with priestesses and prima donnas? Why on the stage do they always bow down to "normal" people.

Bartoli: Because Superior is not in flowing robes or the base on which these women were asked, but in the personality, the charisma! This must be visible. But maybe we distrust such personalities also stronger than before, because we ourselves produce hardly any. That goes especially for the music: We have never seen so many well-trained singers like today - and so few exciting performers, so few artists who follow their inner vision and don't allow themselves to be irritated by any market and any fashion. Another example: What is beauty? The nose is like this, the lips like this, the makeup like this, between New York and Salzburg everything looks the same. And the one who deviates from the norm is considered controversial. We have no more desire to be different.

ZEIT: Maria Callas was also like this in the fifties, otherwise why would she have starved away 30 kilos in just one season?

Bartoli: In her roles she was different, and that's the difference. Today, globalization is sitting in the middle of the stage. Maria Callas was not just the sad jet set icon and rival of Jackie Kennedy, she was primarily an outstanding artist! What Norma recording do you have at home?

ZEIT: The classic is probably the one with Callas, Christa Ludwig, Franco Corelli and Tullio Serafin from 1960. You know the legendary photo that shows Callas and Ludwig in the studio, singing the duet "Si, fino all'ore estreme" in the second act? Callas is with wasp waist and high heels on the front of the microphone, Ludwig is a meter behind, her stockings on, she has her worn out shoes next to her.

Bartoli: This photo is a wonderful metaphor for what happens when the performance practice is more important than all the manuscripts and historical sources. In the 20th Century no one thought that Bellini was a contemporary of Schubert, a composer on the cusp of early romantic! They saw only the great prima donnas with their great voices and wondered how you could satisfy them. They cobbled them to foreign title roles and changed the voice classifications and keys, let the dynamics be dynamic, tempi tempi and retouched sometimes this way and sometimes that. What barbaric acts! Giuditta Pasta, the Norma of the Milan premiere, must, according to all that we know, have been a mezzo-soprano, while the first Adalgisa, Giulia Grisi, was a lyric soprano - exactly the other way around from Callas and Ludwig, or Sutherland and Marilyn Horne! Isn't that crazy?

ZEIT: Maria Callas did everything wrong?

Bartoli: That's not the point. It's about freeing a piece like Norma of the patina to make it easier to understand. Take Norma's famous Cavatina "Casta diva" in the first act: There is an enormous difference if the introduction is played with a wooden flute or a modern instrument made of metal, and if I vocally regard the whole thing as a prayer and consequently sing piano, pianissimo, or I regard it as a display piece, with a fully loaded Opera House waiting. Callas was a child of her time, and I am too. Speaking of Callas ... (Cecilia Bartoli digs in one of her bags and brings out a pair of flat, worn out boots.) These will be my Norma shoes! Something more comfortable than high heels, don't you think? Norma is our partisan, as I said, she has to be fast and good on her feet.

ZEIT: Evil tongues say that through your archaeological research and discoveries you would find for yourself as it were a side entrance into a repertoire for which you do not have the voice under conventional conditions.

Bartoli: I never wanted to sing Norma, how would I ever have come to such an absurd idea? It was only when I was studying Maria Malibran, the great bel canto singer, with her repertoire, it was not until I saw: Ah, she sings many of my roles, but she also sings Norma, I asked myself: How can that be? No, no, the shoe is the other way around (she stretches the Norma-boots in the air and laughs): The modern orchestra does not love the singer.  Between pit and stage is not communicated, but roared. Below the instruments roar, above the singers roar, and now guess who wins in the end. That's why I much prefer working with specialist ensembles.

ZEIT: Will you expand your circles of the early Romantic period wider to Verdi or Puccini?

Bartoli: But yes, only with Wagner I'll wait a bit! Seriously, Wagner has opened my eyes and ears. I was very young when I heard Die Walküre at the New York Met.   4,000 seats, a huge room, a huge orchestra, huge voices. Mamma mia, I thought, if Wagner here already sounds like this, how did he first sound in Germany, in Bayreuth? The next summer, Jimmy Levine invited me to Bayreuth, and again I heard Die Walküre - and I sat there and was thunderstruck! 1,000 seats, a cover over the orchestra pit, all very small, very intimate. That was what Wagner wanted! How can we have just misunderstand him so?

ZEIT: Wagner was a passionate advocate of Italian bel canto, he adored Bellini. What can the Germans today learn from the Italians?

Bartoli: Not much, I fear. If you believe our politicians and you can see how the culture budget is cut and slashed everywhere, the opera plays almost no more role. This does not mean that there is no audience for it, but it is, and I think this is fatal, that the musical life is limited to a few large houses and that there only are played La Traviata, La Boheme, Madame Butterfly and Turandot. Verismo, verismo, verismo, the purest dictatorship! What an impoverishment! Where are Monteverdi, Pergolesi, Vivaldi, Rossini, Caldara? What a rich opera nation we were!

ZEIT: Couldn't politics benefit from opera? If you closed the Roman Parliament in a Salzburg Norma performance, sent ...

Bartoli: ... then maybe some would realize that we need to change our lives. We cannot go on like this, it is irresponsible to have a family of five cars and five computers, just because there are five family members. We must learn to do without, and now I'm back at the " Opfer " We have to make sacrifices in order to overcome the crisis that 20 years under Silvio Berlusconi have maneuvered us into. And it is not only an economic crisis, it is also and above all the spirit of the culture. Italia appartene all'italiani [Italy belongs to the Italians], do you understand? (Am I deceived, or does Cecilia Bartoli suddenly have tears in her eyes?) Italy does not belong to the politicians, it's ours. We must realize that we need to take care of our garden. Then we will also be useful for Europe someday.

ZEIT: Norma goes to her death at the end, she dies for her children and for her unfaithful lover. Is not that a typically female solution from a typical male point of view? The woman clears out - and immediately the world is back on track?

Bartoli: Afterward Pollione follows her, so the loads are not distributed very unevenly. But I know what you mean. For me it is important that Norma takes the initiative, because we are not much further than by Bellini. Why are there so few women in leadership positions, why must the Pope still be a man? Imagine, if in March in the Vatican instead of Signor Bergoglio a Signora Bergoglia was announced! It would have been an explosion! We may have no fear. Some want a female Pope, others listen all their lives to Maria Callas, the third group are most likely at home in the kitchen cooking Pasta alla Norma. The main thing, we do what we do voluntarily.

ZEIT: What's the recipe again? [For Pasta alla Norma, we presume.]

Bartoli: eggplant, tomatoes, basil, ricotta salata - a typical dish of the south, Bellini was Sicilian. The eggplant should be crispy on the outside and inside so tender that they melt on the tongue. As with a mature, fulfilling sound.

[More pictures here.]

[Dr. B:  The interviewer is the same woman who did the interview here, different newspaper.  She's very in your face with Cecilia, much more than other interviewers.  My present plans are to attend the final Norma performance in the summer.]

Norma

I haven't much to say except I wish I'd gone to Dortmund to see Cecilia Bartoli in Norma. The preparations for my trip to Florence were a bit overwhelming. All the critics, mostly German, seem to be favorable.

I always think Cecilia is amazing. She does not hesitate to take heroic leaps into the void, and I am pleased to see that this one was a success.

Norma

I bought also the 1978 film of Montserrat Caballe’s Norma from the Bel Canto Society.

The character of Norma is one of the things that keeps this opera at the top of the bel canto repertoire. She is a powerful woman, the head of her Druid religion, but bound in this role to complete chastity. Instead, she has two sons by Pollione, the Roman consul. When she finds he is having an affair with Adalgisa, another priestess, she contemplates murdering his sons, like Medea, but decides instead to send them to her father. The opera ends with Norma and Pollione being burned alive, a particularly gruesome way to die.

The other thing that keeps us listening is the incredible vocal line that Bellini has composed. Phrasing “Casta diva” is one of the great tests for a soprano.

The role is defined for us today by the 1954 and 1962 recordings of Maria Callas. Caballe and Callas performed the same repertoire but were very different singers. The first difference is in the sound of their voices: Callas had a hardness in her tone which made it easy for her to bring intensity and drama into her characterizations, while Caballe with her large, beautiful instrument must work harder to get the right theatrical effect with her voice.

In this video Caballe shifts frequently into a heavy chest voice for effect. Callas in the same music can concentrate on the line and get all the drama she needs from her emotions without deliberately manipulating her tone. Of course, there are the Callas high notes in the later recording. Caballe’s voice is always beautiful throughout its range. I never feel that I mind the sound of Callas’ voice. It expresses what she wants to say.

Is it unfair to compare the two? The “Casta diva” on the Caballe biography video with the white robes blowing in the wind is better than this one, where she works very hard to bring drama into her characterization to the detriment of the overall sound. The sweetness of her character is also at odds with Norma's. The singing in Semiramide and Roberto Devereaux is more spectacular.

That said, Caballe comes as close as anyone has to Callas’ standard. I think if I was to pick just one video of the three for Caballe, it would be Roberto Devereaux, perhaps in the version from the bel canto society.