miss adventures

Il Maestro Dice

I remember when Roby went to see his beloved Paolo Conte at Royce Hall, he donned a suit and brought with him a handwritten letter. It was the moment of his life then because he wholly idolized and worshipped Conte's work, and had not met him until he finally came to LA. He showed me the letter. "Caro Maestro," it began, and proceeded with all the respect and politesse of one carefully treading among giants.

This is how the Italians treat their artists, as maestri, masters, specialists, the closest thing to divine on earth. I came closer to grasping this tonight when I had the singular privilege of seeing Pavarotti in his Farewell Tour. It was my third and most complete Bowl experience this season, given that the amphitheatre was absolutely filled to capacity and we got fireworks at the end. But I digress. Back to the Master.

To be fair, he half-assed it a bit. He remained sitting for both acts, mostly hidden behind a grand piano. The trademark scarf wrapped around his neck looked more like a faded beachtowel that might have had an Italian flag imprint on it. I mean, yeah, the red-white-and-green was there, but did he just whip this off of the Amalfi coast before hopping on the plane? (Maybe Pavo doesn't "hop" anywhere.) He had sheet music, or lyric cheat sheets, spread out on the surface before him, which he seldom took his eyes off of when singing. And there was none of the verve of his glory days, which you can only now see on an old Three Tenors videocassette or the Classic Arts Showcase, if you're up that late. Luciano kind of moaned out the first act, like the main activity was sitting there and he just happened to be singing.

Between songs, the lovely Cynthia Lawrence impressed an audience mostly unfamiliar with her reputation. (I, for one, had to Google her.) At intermission, everybody asked her name, who she was. The lady next to me knew who Mascagni was, but not Ms. Lawrence. (I, for two, had to Google him.) But she was brilliant, and evocative, and at her highest notes I closed my eyes so tightly, when I opened them I had tears.

But Il Pavo was, indisputably, the man of the hour. He seldom spoke, except to repeatedly say sotto voce (how appropriate), "Tank you veddy much." My main complaint with Pavarotti is that, although he probably has the more signature pipes of his contemporaries, being comfortable with only Italian really limits his work. Both Ms. Lawrence and Pavo butchered Ave Maria ("in prayer for those in the hurricane"), because she didn't know the Latin and he preferred to sing it in Italian. Maybe they thought they could pull the wool over the thousands, but at least one patron in the audience sat stiffly in tight-lipped disapproval, hearing peccatoribuses and gratia plenas wailed in all the wrong places. I could let this slide. But when it was time for the second encore, and Granada...

I love this song. It's one of my favorites because 1) Ricky Ricardo sings it, 2) it helped me learn Spanish, and 3) it was one of the few pieces we had on CD at our house when I was a teenager. Between Domingo and Carreras, I prefer the latter's version because everything about him is vigor and gusto. That said, the rule should be that Granada is only sung by Spaniards, with all the character and precision that a native speaker can inject. With Pavarotti, it was something like eating a burrito in a Roman pizzeria. He blurred many words that should have been punctuated, sang it languidly as if we were drifting along in a gondola. OK, I think I have exhausted as many Italian stereotypes as I could, in one post...

With all this criticism, I admit that it was still an incredibly emotional experience for me. Sometime during the performance, everything clicked, and I sat there mesmerized as if everything I've loved and learned culminated into this deep appreciation. I thought, to be able to fully appreciate events you go to, people you know, things you own, is much rarer than it seems.

After his third encore, people began calling for Nessun Dorma. I hardly thought we would be so lucky, and given the few bursts of energy Luciano was able to summon, I didn't think it would happen. Plus, no background choir. So, Sig. Pavarotti, in his Farewell Tour, still left us wanting, which is exactly the mystery we would expect of a true master. To fill the void of Nessun Dorma, they began shooting off fireworks, and attention spans were successfully diverted to the pwetty sparks.

He sang, "Non c'e' piu', non c'e' piu'," and the words were the music, healing my soul, making me whole. There is no more.

Final note -- I jokingly referred to him as "Il Pavo" because Italians like to shorten long names, and give their celebrities a definite article to accentuate importance. But I do realize in Spanish it means "turkey."

posted by Lucy Sloan @ 12:29 AM