Bellini – I Capuleti e i Montecchi
Christof Loy; Joyce DiDonato; Olga Kulchynska; Opernhaus Zurich; Fabio Luisi
Accentus Music ACC20353
I Capuleti e i Montecchi gives us the story that we know as Romeo and Juliet. The libretto was written by Felice Romani for a musical setting by Nicola Vaccai in 1825. Bellini took over that libretto for his opera in 1830. There are a number of points where Romani’s libretto differs from Shakespeare’s play. Tybalt (Tebaldo) is not Juliet’s cousin but her would-be lover. This has useful implications for the opera since it needs a tenor. That cannot be Romeo, since his part is sung by a mezzo. Romani also linked the family feuds in Verona to the historical warfare between the Guelfs (the Capulets) and the Ghibellines (the Montagues). The Zürich production adds a social dimension: the Capulets are posh in their dinner jackets; the Montagues are working-class yobs with cloth caps.
But the most striking difference lies in the sequence of events in the final scenes of the two works. In Shakespeare’s play, Romeo travels back from Mantua to Verona, gains access to Juliet’s tomb where she lies in a drugged sleep and, thinking that she is dead, takes poison and dies. Juliet wakes up and finds Romeo dead besides her. But in the Romani libretto Romeo is dying but not yet dead when Juliet wakes up. This allowed Bellini to compose a heart-rending duet, surely the finest part of the opera.
Joyce DiDonato is spectacular as Romeo and there are fine performances from the young Ukrainian soprano Olga Kulchynska as Giulietta and the French tenor Benjamin Bernheim as Tebaldo.
