Tancredi's 'O Patria - Di Tanti Palpiti': When a Vision of Love Wipes Away All Wrongs

Even though the earliest operas were story-telling theater with more 'sung declamation' than 'singing', the music then functioned to lift speech to a higher emotional content in melody, and thus enhancing the communication of drama. With the advent of the spectacular virtuoso singers of the Baroque era (thanks in no small part to the proliferation of castrated male sopranos AKA the castratos), though, the performance focus shifted from story-telling to mass entertainment where the plot merely served to hold together fabulous virtuoso arias and a string of spectacular stage spectacles. There was a lull when Gluck and then Mozart came along to correct the imbalance and restored dramatic cohesion to opera without sacrificing the quality of its music.

But spectacular singers have a way of swaying the balance of things and the focus of the opera in the period immediately following Mozart shifted once more toward showcasing the voice/music even at the expense of letting the plot of the story stray too logically leaky to be believable. This period from 1795 - 1840 or so is what we now refer to as the Bel Canto era, one of the chief protagonists of which was Gioacchino Rossini.

Bel canto operas were composed by voice-loving composers to the voice-worshiping audience... it pushed to the limit what singers could do with their vocal cords and lung capacity. Long and spun out melodic line both subtly and supplely navigated, with fiery virtuoso ending cadenza that reminds of the glory of the Baroque period (but it has to also fit with the story now, and not just done for show).

Castration of singers was banned in the early 1800's, but the audience of those days were still very used to hearing the male soprano voice from the heroic male lead role, so the composers assigned some prominent male roles to the coloratura contraltos/soprano sfogatos instead (these were the equivalent of today's coloratura mezzo-sopranos). Male roles composed for the female voice are what we call 'trouser roles'.... Among the most beloved one of these to the opera enthusiasts (if not by the singers who have to cope with its obnoxiously difficult music) is Rossini's Tancredi: a plump virtuoso title role generally unjustly known only for his famous entrance aria even though the rest of the many things he sings in the course of the opera is just as splendid. Click on this if you'd like to hear more about the opera and which recording you can't do without, otherwise let's have a listen at Tancredi's famous testimony to the immortality of the bel canto style.... The entrance aria;O patria - di tanti palpiti:

The setting of this scene, as you can hear in the undulating waves of the cellos, is the ancient seaport of Syracuse. The water is calm and the climate soothing. The sun dances reflectively atop the shimmering waves. The air is cooled by a gentle breeze as screechy sea gulls (violins and oboe) make playful dives past Tancredi's ship masts. The water washes over the sand in two gentle waves as Tancredi's feet touch the shore of his homeland for the first time since he was forced to leave in his childhood...

"Oh patria! Dolce e ingrata patria!....... O fatherland! Sweet yet thankless fatherland!
Alfine a te ritorno!.......... I return to you at last!"

Though no one is around to witness his landing, the woodwinds register their awareness of his presence.

"Io ti saluto, o cara terra......... I salute you, beloved land
degli avi miei: ti baccio!.......... Ancestral home: I kiss you!"

The air here remembers who he is now as the strings echo the winds' earlier greetings.

"È questo per me giorno sereno,.. And what a peaceful it is for me,
comincia il core a respirarmi in seno... in my breast my heart begins a new beat."

His excitement is abruptly shifted as the horn alerts the strings of his other passion.

"Amenaide!.............................. Amenaide!"

Oh, right, we know their story, don't we?

"O mio pensier soave,............. O my tender thought,
Solo de' miei sospiri de' voti miei celeste oggetto!.... Sole heavenly object of my sighs and vows!"

You know an Italian when the boy can talk himself into a real state...

"Io venin alfin: io voglio,........ I've come at last: I wish,
Sfidando il mio destino, qualunque sia,.... In defiance of my fate, whatever it may be,
Meritarti, o perire, anima mia........ To deserve you or perish, my soul."

If ever a mere thought of a woman can turn an ironclad knight into a tuneful lovesick puppy...

"Tu che accendi questo core,........ You who set this heart afire,
Tu che desti il valor mio,................ You who arouse my daring,
Alma gloria, dolce amore,.............. Divine glory, sweet love,
secondate il bel desio;................... support my burning desire;
Cada un empio traditore,............... let fall the wicked traitor.
Coronate il mia' fe!......................... Crown my valor!"

Enthusiasm like this is well worth egging it on, so urge the fun-loving flutes. And if those cellos could line up and mime a military march dance to back up the persuasive prodigal homeboy, they sound like they surely would!

"Di tanti palpiti, di tante pene,....... Of all aches and pains,
Da te mio bene, spero mercè.......... I hope, my dear, to make them up to you.
Mi rivedrai, ti rivedrò!....................... You will again see me, and I you!
Ne' tuoi bei rai mi pascerò............... Your beautiful eyes will sustain me."

Arousal is universal...

"Deliri... sospiri................................... Delirium....sighs,
Accenti... contenti!............................. Exhilarations....contentment!"

Breathe! You really wouldn't want to pass out before you hear this final section!

"Sarà felice, il cor mel dice................... Of my fate, my heart tells me,
Il mio destino vicino a te!.................... My destiny blossoms by your side!
Mi rivedrai, ti revedrò!.......................... You will see me again, and I you!
Ne' tuoi bei rai mi pascerò!................. Your beautiful eyes will sustain me."

Tancredi's entrance aria is really typical of the bel canto style rondo, of course. The slow opening introduces the context, and the jovially virtuosic fast ending cabaletta drives home the character's resolve. Though, musically wonderful as it is, especially as sung here by the positively and virulently infectious Vesselina Kasarova, it is also a prime evidence of how hard it would be to actually stage this work to please today's rather attention-deficit audience. Tancredi spends nearly 9 full minutes here saying something that would take about 5 seconds to state in real life... all the while all the other characters present in the scene would have to act as though frozen in time with the clock ticking as it would if they're traveling near the speed of light (which is really only a Smorgishly longwinded way of saying 'slow').

And so... opera seria like Tancredi usually come in the 'stand and sing' variety of staging - which, to be sure, may very well be preferable to the 'never stay still for a second even when you're making the audience dizzy' school of staging that seems prevalent in Regietheater today...

At any rate, a last confession of the day: if this clip was the first time you've been exposed to music from Rossini's Tancredi, then I have very likely spoiled your chance of enjoying other recordings of the opera aside from the RCA Red Seal's CD set of it.... And perhaps the Naxos label one with Alberto Zedda conducting the also very excellent Ewa Podles in the title role.

Just listen to how Kasarova sings a single phrase, 'mi rivedrai, ti revedrò,' differently each time she repeats it... The lass isn't just making a prerequisite pass through it while preparing to rev up for a fiery show-stopping finale - like most other singers would be doing. She is really Tancredi reveling in each spontaneous moment of youthful passion as they spring up on him. I have no trouble believing that if Rossini had asked her to add a couple more repetitions to the thing she would be coming up with still more variations - as if Tancredi has stored in his pent up desires endless shades and visions of what romantic bliss he has in mind for himself and his lover! That most of the notes she sings and the words she intones have in common with what is dictated by Rossini's score and Rossi's libretto seem coincidental...

Opera is not merely a supposed suspension of disbelief here. Hearing her is believing him!

If you got here from the SmorgZone's push-RCA's-Tancredi-CD-propaganda article (and the label isn't even paying me for it), you can click here if you'd like to return to it. Otherwise the bel canto music indulgence class is dismissed until our next meeting. Good music and happy listening!