Threaded Order Chronological Order
| re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA | |
| Posted by: Michael_Portantiere 08:43 pm EST 02/15/21 | |
| In reply to: re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA - Chromolume 07:34 pm EST 02/15/21 | |
|
|
|
| "Opera roles are not generally adapted in terms of keys. Some individual arias are. But outside of roles in early operas changed over time in various ways because they were written for castrati, or specific adaptations (by the composers) for alternate voices (Werther and I Puritani come to mind), full roles themselves are not changed." Yes, WERTHER and I PURITANI, and THE BARBER OF SEVILLE is another major, famous example you didn't mention. "I don't think Pav's voice worked in the same way. And again, the score wouldn't permit him to really take advantage of the brilliant upper register that was his calling card. For someone like Domingo, this might have made more sense. Also, we're talking A LOT of music, not just a handful of songs as in most musicals. I'm sorry to say this, but in this case, your argument really does not make sense. Make of that what you will." I wish you would look/listen to HAPPY FELLA again to reacquaint yourself with how high so much of it is written, even in the original keys. In the same vein, I would say that very little of it is written in a lower baritone range. So, again, even if the original keys would have been a little too low to show off Pavarotti's voice in a film -- and I'm not sure they would have been -- only slight transpositions upward would have solved that issue. That makes perfect sense to me, even if it doesn't to you. P.S. I'm pretty sure that two or three of the ensemble numbers in the score, including the title song, end on high Cs for the sopranos. It's not written for Tony to join in on those high notes, but Pavarotti certainly could have done so without in any way destroying the integrity of the piece. "I also think that learning a role in fractured English such as Tony might actually be harder, because one would have to learn that specific take on the dialect. Tony's lyrics are not academic in that sense, they are written from the standpoint of an American trying to write pidgin dialect, and it's not necessarily how a true Italian might speak. You're also giving the studio(s) a lot of credit for having 'lots of time' for rehearsal/retakes/etc - how much money was going to be spent on this???" Now, there's an argument of yours that makes zero sense to me, so I'm not going to address it. |
|
| reply to this message |
| re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA | |
| Last Edit: Chromolume 09:04 pm EST 02/15/21 | |
| Posted by: Chromolume 09:02 pm EST 02/15/21 | |
| In reply to: re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA - Michael_Portantiere 08:43 pm EST 02/15/21 | |
|
|
|
| Much as I love Loesser, I'm not going to trust him for Italian or English with an Italian dialect. He got "Spozalizio" wrong. It's a 4 syllable word in Italian, not 5. It might have still made sense for the Americans to sing it as 5 (we Anglicize things like that all the time), but the native Italians, starting with the trio who begin the number, would not have pronounced the word that way. That's actually always bothered me. But there's really also no way to change the music in any credible way so that the word could be sung properly. We're stuck with it, lol. I just think that a native Italian with English as a second language (i.e. Pavarotti, not Tony) might have to take extra time to lean the specific way Loesser wrote the dialect, as opposed to how it would naturally sound if he were saying the English words as an Italian. Not such a hard concept to understand. |
|
| reply to this message |
| re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA | |
| Posted by: Michael_Portantiere 11:21 pm EST 02/15/21 | |
| In reply to: re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA - Chromolume 09:02 pm EST 02/15/21 | |
|
|
|
| You're absolutely right about "sposalizio" (note the correct spelling), though I would say that even when Italians pronounce it as a four-syllable word, those elided vowels at the end, "i" and "o," tend to make it sound like two quick syllables, at least to American/English ears. To your other point, I expect that Pavarotti would have had no problem learning how to sing, for example, "she was-a send-a me her photograph" even if he wouldn't actually pronounce that phrase that way in his authentic Italian accent. For that matter, if some of Pav's pronunciations might not have been EXACTLY what Loesser wrote, I'm guessing (though I can't be sure) that he probably wouldn't have minded very much, as long as it sounded natural. :-) |
|
| reply to this message | reply to first message |
| re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA | |
| Posted by: Chromolume 12:19 am EST 02/16/21 | |
| In reply to: re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA - Michael_Portantiere 11:21 pm EST 02/15/21 | |
|
|
|
| Grazie for the spelling correction. ;-) And yes - we as Americans hear the elided "io" as 2 syllables, but a true Italian would make the distinction. It actually would have been an interesting detail if Loesser had set it "correctly' for the Italian trio at the beginning, but did the 5-syllable version for the American ensemble. But he may not have known the distinction (or might not have considered it a big deal in any case). I think we can just agree to disagree on the whole Pavarotti casting issue. Perhaps we could consider the issue of casting Netrebko as Mame instead?? :-) |
|
| reply to this message | reply to first message |
| re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA | |
| Posted by: Michael_Portantiere 10:33 am EST 02/16/21 | |
| In reply to: re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA - Chromolume 12:19 am EST 02/16/21 | |
|
|
|
| Yes, or since the three Italian servants only sing the word "sposalizio" once each at the very top of the song, I guess those performers could fudge it and sing the word on four notes rather than five, if that would make you and me feel better. The rest of the number is sung by the American characters, and although Tony himself says "sposalizio" at least once during the show, he never sings the word :-) "I think we can just agree to disagree on the whole Pavarotti casting issue." Sure :-) And FWIW, I do agree with you that Domingo would have been a better fit for the role from a purely vocal standpoint. |
|
| reply to this message | reply to first message |
| re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA | |
| Posted by: Chromolume 11:56 am EST 02/16/21 | |
| In reply to: re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA - Michael_Portantiere 10:33 am EST 02/16/21 | |
|
|
|
| Yes, or since the three Italian servants only sing the word "sposalizio" once each at the very top of the song, I guess those performers could fudge it and sing the word on four notes rather than five, if that would make you and me feel better. | |
| reply to this message | reply to first message |
| re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA | |
| Posted by: Chromolume 08:47 pm EST 02/15/21 | |
| In reply to: re: This gives me hope for a film of THE MOST HAPPY FELLA - Michael_Portantiere 08:43 pm EST 02/15/21 | |
|
|
|
| and THE BARBER OF SEVILLE is another major, famous example you didn't mention. "Una voce poco fa" used to be transposed up a half step. Otherwise, the only "changes" were essentially in the fioratura material, which would have been open to improvisation anyway. A lot of that also comes from tradition, not so much an earnest attempt to "change" the score. But ok. ;-) |
|
| reply to this message | reply to first message |
Time to render: 0.020071 seconds.