"Simon Boccanegra," which returned to the Lyric Opera repertory Monday night after an absence of 17 years, is a shadowy tragedy many opera goers respect but few really love, except perhaps for card-carrying Verdi connoisseurs.
Even the composer considered the work too gloomy, too consistently dark in color, with its preponderance of low male voices. His misgivings led him to return to the opera a quarter-century after its premiere, resulting in a thorough overhaul. These 1881 revisions did much to improve the overall quality, although the bleak morality tale and the absence of really memorable arias remain an obstacle for the average listener.
The best advice for subscribers heading to the Civic Opera House between now and Nov. 9 is to ignore "Boccanegra's" flaws and simply give themselves over to the magnificence of the work's greatest scenes (which contain some of the mature Verdi's finest dramatic music), along with the strong singing to be heard in Lyric's revival of Elijah Moshinsky's production.
Lyric has always harbored an unusual fondness for the work, having presented it on six separate occasions over its 58-year history, during which Tito Gobbi, Piero Cappuccilli and Sherrill Milnes have set their stamp on the troubled Doge of Genoa.
In the latest revival, the vocal strengths are well distributed from top to bottom of a cast that includes American baritone Thomas Hampson as Boccanegra, the superb Italian bass Ferruccio Furlanetto as his rival, Jacopo Fiesco, and the exciting Bulgarian soprano Krassimira Stoyanova as his daughter, Amelia Grimaldi, in her Lyric debut.
"Boccanegra" is an opera in which you are not always sure what is going on even after you think you've sorted out the convoluted plot, set against the conflict between plebeians and aristocrats in the politically incendiary atmosphere of 14th century Genoa.
At its center is Boccanegra, a pirate who is elected Doge against his will. Having fathered an illegitimate daughter before the opera begins, he must face the consequences of his indiscretion while later trying to restore peace between warring factions as a benevolent ruler. A tall order, given the number of characters who hold grudges against him, seek payback on political debt, or both.
The conflicts reach a dramatic apex in the great Council Chamber scene, a section almost totally rewritten for the 1881 revised version. Here the Doge, having been reunited with his long-lost daughter (known as Amelia), and facing an uprising raging just outside the palace, implores all who love Genoa to throw down their weapons and make peace.
The scene crackled with vitality on Monday, not least because of Hampson's dramatic authority and his musicianly attention to words and music. He made much of Boccanegra's two great scenes – the recognition duet in which he learns his daughter's true identity, and the final ensemble in which the dying Doge blesses the union of his daughter and his former political enemy, Gabriele Adorno, and urges his senators to elect Adorno as their next ruler.
At times Hampson had to push the sound to compensate for a lack of tonal heft and openness at the top. But at a time when true Verdi baritones are a rare commodity, he gave an impressive and deeply considered performance in this touchstone Verdi role, whose soft passages he sustained with wonderfully nuanced lyricism.
Chicago first discovered Stoyanova's prowess as a Verdi soprano about a year and a half ago when she sang a lustrous Desdemona in Riccardo Muti's Chicago Symphony Orchestra concert performances of "Otello." She strayed a bit from exact pitch in her first aria but her singing was exemplary from then on: clear, radiant and beautiful of tone, with a limpid trill at the end of the great ensemble in the Council Chamber scene. Let's have her back.
The most powerful performance came from Furlanetto, today's reigning Fiesco. As Amelia's grandfather and Boccanegra's political nemesis, he held the stage with his big, imposing bass – rock-sold down to the low F sharp in his aria "Il lacerato spirito" – and a portrayal that balanced dignity with an implacable thirst for vengeance.
Tenor Frank Lopardo appeared to be battling a slight head cold – not to mention an ugly wig – but he did not sound indisposed, so smoothly did he negotiate the stentorian climaxes and difficult melodic leaps of Adorno's music.
As the patrician Paolo Albiani, who helps elevate Boccanegra to the throne but later turns on him, Quinn Kelsey invested his villainous platitudes with a rather gruff and tight baritone. Ryan Opera Center tenor Bernard Holcomb scored a mellifluous-sounding cameo as the captain of the crossbowmen. Other center members taking supporting roles were Evan Boyer as Paolo's henchman, Pietro, and J'nai Bridges as Amelia's maidservant.
Music director Andrew Davis presented the score without cuts. His conducting was alive to Verdi's palette of subtly evocative orchestral colors as well as the quickening pace of the drama, notably in its many conversational pages. He drew firm orchestral playing and good choral singing, the latter prepared by Martin Wright, Lyric's new chorus master.
Moshinsky set forth the dark, complicated story with commendable directness and restraint, honoring Verdi's dramatic purposes. The production, borrowed from London's Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, may be decades old, but the grand alabaster columns and writing-covered walls of Michael Yeargan's sets (lit by lighting designer Duane Schuler) looked as if they had been recently refurbished, along with Peter J. Hall's richly textured period costumes.
Lyric Opera's production of Verdi's "Simon Boccanegra" plays through Nov. 9 at the Civic Opera House, 20 N. Wacker Drive; $32-$239; 312-332-2244, ext. 5600; lyricopera.org.
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