Ernani

SUMPTUOUS SETS REFLECTING MOORISH SPAIN AT ITS MOST MAGNIFICENT! MORE THAN 250 FABULOUS COSTUMES! A RIP-ROARING VICTOR HUGO STORY! AND THE POWER OF VERDI AT FULL THROTTLE!

If you love rousing choruses that pulse with patriotism, full-blooded arias that pin you to the back of your seat, and big stars who create the kind of performance you never forget — then Ernani's a must-see for you.

The Spanish king, a vindictive grandee, and Ernani — a nobleman forced to become an outlaw — are mortal enemies. Yet they're bound together by an ancient code of honor and they're all in love with the same woman!

Salvatore Licitra: "It's spooky how much he sounds like Pavarotti!" Opera News

Sondra Radvanovsky: "Her vocally-hot portrayals remind us that the true Verdian soprano is alive and well." La Stampa, Italy 

TIME: 16^th century

PLACE: Spain and Aix-la-Chapelle

ACT ONE – The Bandit

Scene 1. The mountains of Aragon

Scene 2. The castle of Don Ruy Gomez de Silva (Aragon)

ACT TWO – The Guest

Silva’s castle

ACT THREE – Clemency

The tomb of Charlemagne at Aix-la-Chapelle

ACT FOUR – The Mask

Ernani’s castle at Zaragoza

ACT ONE

Scene 1. In the outlaw Ernani’s camp, he laments to his cohorts that the following day his beloved Elvira will  marry the aged grandee Don Ruy Gomez de Silva (Cavatina: Come rugiada al cespite). Ernani asks his men to help him rescue his beloved, who has sworn to follow him. He looks forward to seeing Elvira again (Cabaletta: O tu che l’alma adora).

Scene 2. Appalled at the thought of marrying Silva, Elvira longs for Ernani to come and take her away (Cavatina: Ernani involami). Her ladies-in-waiting show her numerous wedding gifts, but she dismisses everything that doesn’t remind her of Ernani (Cabaletta: Tutto sprezzo che d’Ernani). Don Carlo, King of Spain, who loves Elvira, attempts to persuade her to forsake both Silva and Ernani, knowing that she prefers the latter. She treats the King coldly (Duet: Da quel dì). Ernani suddenly appears, having come for Elvira, who tries to calm the two hostile rivals  (Trio: Tu se’ Ernani!).

Silva is outraged to find the men in Elvira’s apartments (Aria: Infelice! E tu credevi). Without recognizing the intruders, he challenges them to a duel. When the King’s identity is revealed, Silva asks to be pardoned for his treasonable defiance. Forgiving him, the King dismisses Ernani and requests Silva’s hospitality for the night.

ACT TWO

Guests are celebrating Silva’s upcoming marriage to Elvira. He offers his hospitality to a pilgrim, Ernani in disguise. When the bride appears, Ernani throws off his disguise, offering his head and all the gold the King has offered for it as a wedding present. Replying that his hospitality is sacred, Silva orders his men to guard the castle’s towers.

Once alone with Ernani, Elvira explains that she had heard reports of his death. She shows him the dagger with which she had intended to kill herself at the altar. The lovers are surprised by the enraged Silva. Before he can vent his rage, his servant Jago informs him that the King has arrived. Honor compels Silva to protect Ernani as long as he is under his roof; he hides his guest behind a secret door.

Having noticed armed men at the castle’s towers, Don Carlo commands Silva to prove his loyalty by surrendering Ernani, who has been traced to the castle. Silva’s honor prevents him from complying. Don Carlo issues an ultimatum: either Ernani’s head or Silva’s. The grandee offers his own and surrenders his sword to the King, who orders his men to search for the fugitive Ernani. The King threatens Silva with violent reprisals (Aria: Lo vedremo, veglio audace), but Silva refuses to betray his honor as a host The King’s men cannot find Ernani. As the King is ordering torture to force the secret from the castle’s defenders, Elvira rushes in to beg the King for clemency. The King realizes he has a new advantage: he demands Elvira – Silva’s betrothed – as a hostage for the outlaw and leads her away. .

Silva now opens the door of Ernani’s hiding-place and challenges him to a duel. Refusing to fight an elderly opponent, Ernani declares that he owes Silva his life and asks to see Elvira again before he dies. When he learns that Elvira has been taken hostage, he persuades Silva to let him join in the effort to rescue her. Vowing to kill himself whenever Silva wishes, Ernani gives the old man his hunting horn to sound at the moment he wishes to claim the forfeited life. Silva’s men arrive and Ernani and Silva join them as they set out to reclaim Elvira.

ACT THREE

At Charlemagne’s tomb, Don Carlo seeks safety from his enemies who are plotting his death. He is awaiting the outcome of the meeting of the Holy Roman Empire’s Electors, who have assembled to choose a new emperor. The King tells his servant Riccardo to fire the cannon on the tower three times to signal that Carlo himself has been selected. In that event, Riccardo is to bring Elvira to him. Alone, the King resolves to prove himself worthy of the honor (Romanza: O de’ verd’anni miei).  He unlocks the chapel containing Charlemagne’s tomb and enters.

The conspirators gather in the tomb and draw lots to determine who shall strike down Don Carlo. Silva draws the slip of paper – it bears Ernani’s name. The outlaw is elated at this chance to avenge his father, whose life and possessions were unjustly taken by the King. Silva asks Ernani to cede the mission to him; Ernani refuses, despite offers to release the hold Silva has on his life. The embittered Silva renews his threat of a horrible vengeance.

Three cannon shots proclaim Don Carlo’s election to the throne of the Holy Roman Empire. Emerging from the chapel, he orders imprisonment for the commoners among the conspirators and the axe for the nobles. Ernani claims his place among the latter revealing that he is Don Juan of Aragon. Elvira, who has arrived in a procession of the Electors, pleads with the King for clemency. After contemplating the tomb, Don Carlo declares he will imitate the acts of his great predecessor. He pardons all the conspirators (Ensemble: O sommo Carlo) and orders the marriage of Elvira and Ernani as Silva swears vengeance.

ACT FOUR

A masked guest arrives at the wedding celebration of Ernani and Elvira. The groom becomes increasingly agitated when the sound of a hunting horn is heard and repeated. Ernani sends Elvira into the bridal chamber for some medicine, claiming that he is suffering from an old wound. Alone, he wonders if he has imagined hearing the horn.  He is about to follow Elvira when the masked guest appears and reveals his identity: it is Silva, who has come to force Ernani to keep his word. He offers Ernani poison and a dagger, asking him to choose. Elvira returns and is horrified (Trio Finale: Ferma, crudele). The lovers’ pleading is futile: Silva insists upon the vengeance due him. Ernani cannot bring himself to break his solemn oath. He stabs himself and Elvira falls unconscious as he dies.

	Ernani Salvatore Licitra
	Elvira Sondra Radvanovsky
	Carlo Boaz Daniel
	Silva Giacomo Prestia*
	Giovanna Kathryn Leemhuis
	Riccardo René Barbera*
	Jago Paul Corona
	Conductor Renato Palumbo
	Director José María Condemi
	Designer Scott Marr
	Lighting Designer Duane Schuler
	Chorus Master Donald Nally
	Wig and Makeup Designer Richard Jarvie

*Lyric debut

If you crave the thrill of great singing, you’ll find it in every moment of Ernani. Giuseppe Verdi was composing for virtuoso artists 165 years ago, and today the formidable vocal requirements make this opera something of a rarity. Having produced Ernani only once, in 1984, Lyric is bringing it back this season in a sumptuous new production — definitely an occasion worth waiting for!

The opera was based on a romantic melodrama of 1830, Hernani (yes, with an “h”) by Victor Hugo, of Les misérables fame. That play was given new life a few decades later when France’s greatest actress, Sarah Bernhardt, triumphed as the heroine. Hugo’s plays lost their audience long ago, but we remember Hernani as the dramatic source for Verdi’s fifth opera. This was the first Verdi work not to premiere at La Scala, a distinction in which Venetians take pride even today. When first presented at the Teatro La Fenice in 1844, Ernani scored a triumph.

In 16th-century Spain, the hero is an aristocrat disguised as an outlaw who’s leading a revolt against Don Carlo, the king (he’s fictional, and not to be confused with the hero of Verdi’s opera of that name). Having blamed Carlo for his own father’s death, Ernani longs for revenge. Carlo is pursuing Elvira, with whom Ernani is in love (and she with him). But Elvira also has a third suitor — her own aged uncle, Silva, who’s all set to marry her, although she loathes him!

After Ernani’s revolt against the king fails, he appears at Silva’s castle disguised as a pilgrim. Outraged upon finding him alone with Elvira, Silva craves vengeance. Carlo arrives, demanding that Ernani be handed over, but Silva refuses; preferring to observe the Spanish law of hospitality, he has concealed the bandit, planning to take his own revenge on Ernani later. After Carlo departs, Silva and Ernani — realizing that Carlo is their mutual enemy — suspend their quarrel and plan to seek vengeance. Once they achieve it,
however, Ernani’s life will be in Silva’s hands! Ernani gives Silva a hunting horn: the bandit makes a vow that the moment he hears the horn sounding, he will kill himself. Eventually Carlo magnanimously pardons the conspirators and awards Elvira’s hand to Ernani, but during the wedding feast, Ernani hears the horn! A disguised stranger reveals himself as Silva and recalls the oath Ernani had taken. Despite Elvira’s pleas, Ernani keeps his vow and stabs himself. Curtain!

“The truth about Ernani’s characters and their emotions and situations are universal,” says director José María Condemi, who staged Tristan und Isolde last season. “The opera is about the constraints imposed by the characters’ positions in society — and the raw passion they exhibit in response to those constraints. There’s an incredible amount of power in play. How power is used or not used, how the characters struggle with the power they have — that makes the opera so exciting.”

Lyric’s Ernani, Italian tenor Salvatore Licitra, realizes that “this story, especially compared with modern life, isn’t so believable — but pay attention instead to the sentimento of the opera, because that’s the real target of Verdi. Look at the love, passion, bravery, and trouble in this opera.” Licitra admires his character’s decision to keep his oath to Silva: “He’s being completely honest and true to himself. In life you have to be brave enough to keep your promises, so this is a positive message for everyone.”

In Verdi’s mature masterpieces, Lyric’s conductor, Renato Palumbo, feels that “you can use more of your head and your brain” than in earlier works like Ernani, where “you have to use your heart. You have to understand the atmosphere, and you also can’t be afraid to get your hands bloody. There is incredible power inside this score — don’t be afraid of realizing that power. When you handle a bomb, be careful, because you can lose an arm — it’s the same in early Verdi! In conducting this piece, use this incredible power of life, this passion. It will be boring if you treat this score as you would the later Verdi.”

This is a special opera not just for the soprano-tenor couple, but also for the baritone character of Carlo, the king, who inspired Verdi to a new style, says Palumbo. “It’s more thoughtful, deeper than before. It’s also not pure lyric or dramatic — it’s in the middle. In some moments you have Donizetti’s style, in some moments verismo style.” Ernani is also a spectacular opera for the chorus, “which Verdi uses to give the opera its tinta [color]. The chorus is suggesting things, commenting, and again, in a new style — more rhythmic than before. Not before Verdi do we have this big chorus in Italian opera, and not after him either. He was the major composer for the chorus.”

Great tenors, from 19th-century legends to Domingo and Pavarotti, have long rejoiced in this opera’s dashing title role, and Licitra is no exception. “Singing Verdi is always a lesson for each singer,” he says. “We should consider his music a kind of caress — a massage of the vocal cords. And in each Verdi opera you also have to show so many colors, so many ideas about the character.”

A perpetual problem for Ernani in recent decades has been finding suitable performers to sing it. “When it’s done with a great cast — people who can not only sing, but also act — I think it really is stunning,” says Sondra Radvanovsky, who sings the prima-donna role of Elvira. “And where else does a girl get three guys who are all after her? The music is gorgeous, with so many great tunes – people just go ‘WOW!’ when they hear it. It deserves to be as well known as Ballo or Trovatore.”

As with Trovatore’s Leonora, Radvanovsky in this opera is “in love with the wrong man. If you were a smart girl, why would you go with Ernani when you could have the king? Hello?!” It’s important to Radvanovsky to communicate the character’s youthfulness: “So often these Verdi women are played so dowdy, but Elvira is young, 16 or 17. You want the first-time feeling of being in love.”

Radvanovsky finds her role well written “if you have the upper extension, the lower extension, the trills, the coloratura, the legato — Verdi demands everything! I love all the ensemble work, and riding above the orchestra and chorus. It’s so thrilling, but to do it, you
need a voice with thrust — that’s what Verdi wanted.”

Palumbo anticipates that Ernani will make a stunning impression on Lyric’s audiences. In the Verdi repertoire, he concludes, “the operas’ stories may be different, but Verdi is always Verdi, with the heart that is impossible to find anywhere else in opera.”

The emotionally charged action of Verdi’s Ernani moves from a boisterous rebel camp to an opulent Moorish castle to royal catacombs to an elegant Spanish palace — settings as vivid as the old-fashioned historical romance on which the opera is based. This swashbuckling tale presents a thrilling opportunity to bring a seldom seen masterpiece to life onstage.

When general director William Mason asked Lyric’s production design director Scott Marr to create a new Ernani production, Marr turned initially to 16th-century Spanish art, design, and architecture for inspiration. After reading the libretto, he studied El Greco’s paintings “View of Toledo” and “The Assumption of the Virgin” to get a sense of the “color palette, the darkness and
shadows.”

After listening to the opera, however, Marr altered course. “The story is tragic and dark, but the music is lighter. The romanticism of the 1800s, when Verdi wrote Ernani, can’t be ignored. There’s a richness to the overture, but the opening chorus of bandits is somewhat lighthearted musically.” Marr’s first sketches reflected “a darker world, but the music led me in a different direction.”

Because Italy had the greatest influence over 16th-century art and architecture throughout Europe, Marr’s research expanded as he designed Ernani’s richly detailed sets and costumes. “I fell in love with paintings by Titian, Raphael, Veronese, and Caravaggio,” he recalls. The Renaissance masters’ color palettes and fabric textures plus Spanish architecture and fashion of the time will show their influence onstage. Marr’s research binders bulge with images of Moorish latticework, tilework, and textiles, “all incredibly fascinating. The combined influences provide so many more possibilities in creating the environment to tell the story.”

Marr has used “colder tones” for the costumes and castle of Silva, the elderly grandee who is the dark heart of the doomed love story. “His costume will be black cut velvet encrusted with silver. The castle displays his wealth and stature, with massive thrones, stained-glass windows, and elaborate chandeliers.” Marr is working closely with lighting designer Duane Schuler to create striking light-and-shadow patterns: “In doing this opera I’m designing for different vantage points around the theater, so everyone has some visual image to savor,” Marr says. For instance, “the six chandeliers will cast patterns and shadows that will be best seen from the higher seating areas.”

Warmer golden tones will reflect the “enlightenment” of Don Carlo, the king-turned-emperor who also loves Elvira but ultimately yields her to Ernani. His costumes will be “regal Spanish colors — wines, purples, reds,” says Marr. The final scene, in Ernani’s palace, is described by the designer as “a portico setting, an airy environment with the sky visible, a sort of Spanish-Italian hybrid, with open Moorish latticework that has light shooting through, creating patterns on the floor. Again, this is designed to look attractive from the higher seating perspectives.”

Many of the 246 costumes embody textures and colors inspired by Titian: “There’s a lot of richness and darkness of velvets, silks and satins, with Spanish lace and ornamentation” as accents, Marr says. “Elvira’s wedding dress for her marriage to Silva is based in part on a portrait of Eleonora di Toledo, wife of Cosimo de’ Medici — a cage-like design that’s a metaphor for her captivity. Ernani’s costume will “emphasize his virility and earthiness with warm leathers. His pilgrim’s disguise in the wedding scene is inspired by El Greco’s portrait of St. Bernardin.”

Although Marr admits that it took him a while to fall in love with Verdi’s early masterpiece, “the more I listened to it, the more I got into the research and studied the libretto, the more it’s consumed me. I keep going through the scenes in my head — it’s so exciting and thrilling to create these ‘paintings’ onstage.”

That excitement will be contagious when the tapestry-inspired show curtain rises on Ernani in October.

Discography and Videography

CDs

Sutherland, Pavarotti, Nucci, Burchuladze; Welsh National Opera, Bonynge. (Decca)

Freni, Domingo, Bruson, Ghiaurov; La Scala, cond. Muti. (EMI)

(IN ENGLISH) Patterson, Gavin, Opie, Rose; English National Opera, Parry. (Chandos)

Pre-1960

Cerquetti, Del Monaco, Bastianini, Christoff; Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Mitropoulos. (Bel Canto Society)

The Decca and EMI performances are both complete, the former with the added interest of  “Odi il voto,” the aria Verdi composed in 1844 for the tenor Nicolai Ivanov. This creates a notably thrilling conclusion to Act Two, as sung by the exceptionally well-cast Luciano Pavarotti. There is strength from Richard Bonynge on the podium and in the other three principal roles, even if one can’t help wishing that Dame Joan Sutherland had been offered the role of Elvira several years prior to this performance (of course, her matchless trill and coloratura ability are still huge rewards for listeners). This is one of baritone Leo Nucci’s finest achievements in Verdi, and the Russian bass Paata Burchuladze, who sings an imposing Silva, was still in fine voice at the time.

Plácido Domingo has enjoyed many successes in this opera’s title role, not least of which was at La Scala under Riccardo Muti’s baton. The other star in this live performance is the great Renato Bruson, whose innate elegance eminently suits the heavily legato-oriented role of Carlo. Mirella Freni and Nicolai Ghiaurov do not enjoy their finest hour vocally, but their vivid personalities come through nonetheless. Riccardo Muti, of course, has no superior in Verdi, and he brings a welcome precision and dramatic flair to every scene.

Don’t pooh-pooh the idea of listening to this opera in English — you can hear four  musicianly singers in the leading roles on Chandos’s recording, with the marvelous baritone Alan Opie outstanding as Carlo. And if you want a really rip-roaring Ernani, there’s never been anything like the 1955 Florence performance under the legendary Dimitri Mitropoulos. There are major cuts, but the singing is incandescent. If anyone deserves pride of place, it’s Ettore Bastianini, whose Carlo is a staggering display of bronzed tone and authoritative delivery. But not far behind are Mario Del Monaco, Anita Cerquetti, and Boris Christoff – a cast of Olympians.

Alas, the Leontyne Price/Carlo Bergonzi recording on RCA is no longer in the catalogue, but a few websites may still have it. Do try to track it down!

DVDs

Mitchell, Pavarotti, Milnes, Raimondi; Metropolitan Opera, cond. Levine, dir. Samaritani. (Decca)

Freni, Domingo, Bruson, Ghiaurov; La Scala, cond. Muti, dir. Ronconi. (Kultur)

Neves, Guelfi, Berti, Prestia; Teatro Regio/Parma, cond. Allemandi, dir. Alli. (Dynamic)

The Met’s 1983 production of Ernani, staged especially for Luciano Pavarotti, is a visually sumptuous affair. Of illuminating stage direction there is little, and the tenor basically simply stands and delivers. The other three principals work harder to create character onstage, with Sherrill Milnes’s Carlo taking the lead in terms of sheer presence and theatrical vitality. He, Pavarotti, Leona Mitchell (often sounding almost spookily like Leontyne Price), and Ruggero Raimondi are all in refulgent voice, under James Levine’s incisive baton.

The color scheme of La Scala’s production is as dark and somber as the Met’s, but it isn’t quite in the same league in terms of sheer grandeur. Similar, too, is the lack of really penetrating work on the part of the stage director, leaving the principals somewhat in the lurch. They perform, however, with the professionalism one would expect of such eminent singers, with Renato Bruson ultimately giving the most memorable portrayal.

I haven’t yet been able to see the Parma performance, but it will be of interest to Lyric audience members since Silva is sung by the Italian bass Giacomo Prestia, who debuts in that role at Lyric this season.