Bellini's music is youthful, simple, tuneful as folk songs of the early romantic period. He died so young and was getting better and better with each opera; as with Schubert, what he might have done if he had lived longer!
I think "tuneful" is the right word. Where Bellini shined when his music as "tuneful," and it certainly was an aspect of his which seemed to grow as he evolved as a composer. I find, for example, I Capuleti e i Montecchi a remarkably uninteresting piece, save a few sections (the duet with Romeo and Tebaldo as they are dueling is somehow appealing). Some of Bellini's early works really felt like Rossini derivatives, minus the flare that Rossini had for orchestration, harmony, and light melodic construction. (I will except the overture to Il Pirata, which I actually did like a good deal.) Bellini definitely seemed to have hit his stride by, say, Norma, and was only getting better by the time he wrote I Puritani. We can only specualte where he might have beeen had he lived even 10 years longer.
I wouldn’t expect so much of Schubert as of Bellini. Schubert was rather introverted, brooding or at best pensive. Bellini to the opposite had an innate instinct for elegance even Grandezza together with great dramatic effects, if Norma is any indication he would have developed in the direction of Verdian drama yet probably still with much higher melodic quality and less of Verdi‘s ‚tricks‘ and mechanisms
@@rogerpropes7129 links would be to his operas, all of them are very calculated to get the desired effects. Certainly Bellini thought of the effects he wanted to cause, but for Verdi this was front and center. This doesn’t mean at all his work had been inferior. A very good example is Aida, which is perfectly composed in its entirety and in any aspect to meet the moment of its first staging the opening of the Suez Canal, this is perfect design and application and it is a great opera. In comparison Bellini was a romantic and even naive. But nevertheless Norma is immortal, but many of Verdi‘s operas are immortal in their own way too. Perhaps a more mature Bellini could have hold on to his long melodic lines and combine this with the kind of Verdi‘s instinct for dramatic choreographic effects
I didn't know there are people who do not like bellini's music. It's so pure, simple, beautiful, sometimes dramatic, sometimes poetic or deep sad, but allways verry, verry exciting.
Here, Caballe is in a form like Toti Dalmonte. Ich beurteile Bellini nicht nach den Libretti,nicht nach Inhalt logik und Sinn der Handlungen, sondern nur nach seiner wunderbaren Melodik, die sich leider ja sehr oft wiederholt, indem er immer eine Melodie, scheinbar sein Lieblingsmotiv, mutiert, phrasiert, wiederholt. Diese Melodie ist aber wirklich einmalig, sie ist daher die Wiederholung wert !
@Klassizismus I thought her husband was quite good in the role,he sang with wonderful diction and passion,and fabulous high notes.Caballe of course was a 10/10 !
I agree that the greats of yesteryear have no rivals today, but you are using a whole century to cull the best. Ponselle goes back to WWI. Please add a little lady (literally) who had one of the greatest coloratura voices I ever heard: Lily Pons.
Ese Re no esta en la partitura original, fue la gran Callas la que lo interpoló. Ella ha dado Re bemoles y naturales. Escucha su Anna Bolena en vivo desde La Scala durante el concertante final del Acto 2; en una de sus muchas Maria Stuardo, con Bianca Berini como la reina, concluye la escena del enfrentamiento con un solido RE natural sobreagudo. Estas notas no eran su gloria por eso se cuidaba mucho. Ella era una soprano lirico spinto de tamaño mediano (como Antonietta Stella) pero con una coloratura espectacular. En Arrigo Parla ancore de las Visperas Sicilianas, ella sube hasta un RE bemol en pianisimo. Que conste que no era mi favorita pero sin duda una diva de divas, Que EPD.
