This air from La Rondine by Puccini was playing on CBC radio 2 as I drove back to our home on another bright sunny but cold day in Ottawa. Renée Fleming was singing, the first word CHI which in Italian is pronounced KI, the ch letters together make a hard K sound, it is difficult to start this way for any singer. Reviewing it, I noticed that many singers jump the chi and start at the IL instead, it can be difficult to get it right.
Here is a recording by Montserrat Caballé, one of the great divas of another age, they do not make them like this anymore singing Chi il bel sogno di Doretta from La Rondine by Puccini.
Of course you guess it, I am thinking of Rome and the Teatro del'Opera di Roma where we went at least once a month for years. The staff knew us and greeted us each time, what a wonderful place it was, then walking back home after the show through Piazza Repubblica and Porta Pia. Even after the show walking through Rome at night was so romantic and beautiful, everywhere greeted by magnificent monuments of ages past. It is so true when Puccini said:
Tu non vedrai nessuna cosa al mondo maggior di Roma. (You will never see in the world anything as great as Rome).
Here is a recording by Montserrat Caballé, one of the great divas of another age, they do not make them like this anymore singing Chi il bel sogno di Doretta from La Rondine by Puccini.
Of course you guess it, I am thinking of Rome and the Teatro del'Opera di Roma where we went at least once a month for years. The staff knew us and greeted us each time, what a wonderful place it was, then walking back home after the show through Piazza Repubblica and Porta Pia. Even after the show walking through Rome at night was so romantic and beautiful, everywhere greeted by magnificent monuments of ages past. It is so true when Puccini said:
Tu non vedrai nessuna cosa al mondo maggior di Roma. (You will never see in the world anything as great as Rome).
I first heard this in a film, as a boy goes to kiss a girl in a field. It brings up lovely memories, this aria.
ReplyDeletePuccini was right! What a gorgeous aria that is - in fact, what a delicious opera. Gheorghiu and Alagna were sheer delight in it ar Covent Garden.
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