Gioachino Rossini (1792-1868)
Adina, Opera in one act (1818/1826 premiere)
Il Califo – Emmanuel Franco (baritone)
Adina – Sara Blanch (soprano)
Selimo – César Arrieta (tenor)
Alì – Aaron Godfrey-Mayes (tenor)
Mustafà – Shi Zhong (bass)
Kraków Philharmonic Chorus and Orchestra/Luciano Acocella
rec. live, 22, 24, July 2022, Königliches Kurtheater Bad Wildbad
Includes booklet with notes in English and German
Naxos 8.660606 [87]
Adina has been among the most infrequently performed works of Rossini’s operatic output. At present, it seems to be experiencing something of a discovery moment. Last year there was a DVD and Blu-ray release of a performance from the Rossini Festival in Pesaro (review). Now here is a CD from the Rossini in Wildbad Festival which Naxos has generously added to its ongoing series of bel canto operas from that venue.
Rossini wrote the opera in the midst of preparing Mosè in Egitto for its first performances in Naples in 1819. Adina came as a private commission for a much admired soprano in Lisbon; both the singer and the admirer who commissioned the opera remain lost to history. Although the opera was completed in the same year, for some unknown reason it did not receive its first production until 1826. Later, when the score was being prepared for its publication in the 1860s, the problem arose of a missing trio which Rossini never got around to composing. The trio covers a crucial plot development and was solved by the suggestion of performing a similar trio from Giovanni Pacini’s 1820 comic opera La schiava di Bagdad. Pacini’s opera is actually another setting of the same libretto, so the solution is a good compromise. This CD marks the first time that option has been included on a recording, also the first time any of the Pacini work has been recorded. The trio is different enough in style from Rossini that it stands out slightly from the rest of the opera, but the lively quality of its music is fully equal to Rossini’s. Indeed it is about eight minutes of sheer delight, which makes one long for Pacini’s youthful work to receive a recording of its own. Perhaps the Opera Rara organization could step in here and supply one, as a break from their recent intense focus on the lesser-known verismo repertoire.
As usual with the Naxos series from Bad Wildbad the singers employed are young and mostly unknown. This recording turns out to be populated by a very strong and capable cast, much like the recent Ermione, which became one of my ROTY choices for 2024 (review).
The revelation here is the scintillating performance of Sara Blanch in the title role. This exciting young singer provides a perfectly poised assumption of the slave girl Adina. Her crystalline tone has a quality of brightness which allows her to cope with the ever present difficulty of Rossinian agility with true savoir faire. In the above mentioned DVD, Lisette Oropesa displays the full confidence of a coloratura assolutta, also giving an impressive performance of this difficult music. However, Blanch is better at conveying the softness and vulnerability of the character while conceding nothing to Oropesa in the vocal fireworks department.
Adina’s love interest is Selimo, sung with charm on this set by César Arrieta. He has an elegant, if light-bodied timbre which harkens back to the great Mediterranean singers of the past, such as Alessandro Bonci and Miguel Fleta. His handling of his aria, (which has an unusual fully-accompanied opening recitative) is especially noteworthy for the gentle way he caresses the vocal line yet still delineates the fioratura with ease. The cabaletta section holds no fears for this pleasing singer, although at one point, on an exposed note, he emerges a touch on the flat side.
Emmanuel Franco is somewhat outclassed by the elaborate demands of Rossini but his warmly resonant baritone makes a hugely enjoyable contribution nonetheless. He is most convincing in his anger and surprise in the latter part of the opera. As the gardener Mustafà, Shi Zhong hits just the right supporting note, with enough sappy tone to avoid fading into the background.
One is grateful to Maestro Luciano Acocella for not adhering to the Formula One School which trendily advocates racing through Rossini scores at breakneck speed. Acocella allows the music to breathe at a natural flowing pace, yet when required, he presses forward, strikingly so in the final quartet, which he energises with a definite propulsive lift.
The sound has a few odd balances at times but is for the most part atmospheric rather than analytical. There are the occasional bumps and thuds from the staging but they are more noticeable in the recitatives rather than the main musical numbers. A minimum of applause is included. The accompaniment of the recitatives is engagingly done from the fortepiano by Gianluca Ascheri. Its placement sounds a bit too recessed to me at times but this has the benefit of never overwhelming the voices.
As usual for Naxos one must download the Italian only libretto from an external website. Apart from the above mentioned video release, there has only been one other recording of Adina that I can recall which was also a live recording, on the Arte Nova label, from another small German music festival (The Putbus Festival), with a generally anonymous cast of singers. It also extended over two CDs because of the addition of an overture, taken from L’Italiana in Algeri. It has in any case long been unavailable. No; this Naxos release is definitely the first choice for this delightful opera which should be taken out and aired more often, possibly on a double-bill with Rossini’s 1816 celebratory Masque Le nozze di Teti e di Peleo (review), yet one more delightful Rossini work which deserves an outing.
Mike Parr
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