Incidentally, Ena and Juan Carlos were very close. Someone living today (Juan Carlos) can relive Queen Victoria through his memories of talking to his own grandmother.
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“Carmen”
by Georges Bizet
Carmen is one of the most beloved operas of all-time but it was a major flop to begin with. Bizet found great opposition; many found the plot to be “immoral.” Initial audiences were shocked, scandalized and confused by the work. Most reviews were critical. Bizet died shortly after Carmen was completed and never lived to see its success.
“The music of Carmen has since been widely acclaimed for brilliance of melody, harmony, atmosphere, and orchestration, and for the skill with which Bizet musically represented the emotions and suffering of his characters.”
Carmen is a French opera with a libretto by Henry Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy based on a novel by the same name, written by author Prosper Mérimée.
Read more at Suite101: Carmen – Bizet's Opera: Introduction to Georges Bizet's Tragic French Opera http://opera.suite101.com/article.cfm/carmen_101#ixzz0t9fDu1Kk
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Nicolette’s Voice
Nicolette's voice/performance is a composite of Ellen Beach Yaw, Maria Callas, Claira Lardinois and Emma Calvé.
Nicolette's preparation for the role of Carmen is a description of Emma Calvé's (1858-1942) preparation for her role as Carmen. Ms. Calvé was considered the quintessential Carmen for many years. “She was a dramatic singer noted for her acting ability, stormy personality, and dramatic intensity. Contemporary accounts of her voice describe it as extraordinary. Her next triumph was Bizet's Carmen. Before beginning the study of this part, she went to Spain, learned the Spanish dances, mingled with the people and patterned her characterization after the cigarette girls whom she watched at their work and at play.” - Wikipedia
In 1894, Emma Calvé made her appearance as Carmen at the Opéra-Comique, Paris. She was immediately hailed world-wide as unequaled in the role. Her “many charms of voice, figure, and personality combined to make” Calvé’s Carmen one of the most brilliant performances ever given in opera. – Wikipedia
“Ellen Beach Yaw (September 14, 1869 – September 9, 1947) was an American coloratura soprano, best known for her concert singing career. Yaw had an extraordinary vocal range and could produce unusually high notes. Known as ‘Lark Ellen’ or ‘The California Nightingale’, she was reportedly the only known soprano of her era who could sing and sustain the D above the high D. She was also able to trill in major thirds or fifths (trills usually involve rapidly alternating notes over an interval of a minor or major second, requiring enormous talent and control). Miss Yaw’s voice is high soprano of crystalline lightness and purity and of a range so extreme in altitude that... it was the wonder of the European continent.” – Wikipedia
I saw Ginger Costa-Jackson sing Carmen at the Seattle Opera House and she was exquisite, perfect in every way for the role:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIyFs6PU2Hk
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“Coloratura” and “Bel canto” singing
“A lyric coloratura soprano is foremost a coloratura soprano which means that her range extends to the sixth octave where here voice resonates bright and clear. Another representative characteristic is her flexibility and agility singing cadenzas and rapid successions of notes with ease.
A lyric coloratura should be able to sing anywhere between a C4 to an F6, and some times even higher than that. Singers of this caliber improvise intricate cadenzas to demonstrate their skill and natural talent.
You can hear some coloratura here:
http://choirly.com/lyric-coloratura-soprano/
“Bel canto (Belcanto, bel canto) (Italian, beautiful singing), an Italian musical term, refers to the art and science of vocal technique which originated in Italy during the late sixteenth century and reached its pinnacle in the early part of the nineteenth century during the Bel Canto opera era. Rossini, Bellini, and Donizetti are the best-known exponents of this style, which flourished from approximately 1810 to 1830. Bel canto singing is characterized by a focus on perfect evenness throughout the voice, skillful legato, a light upper register, tremendous agility and flexibility, and a certain lyric, sweet timbre. Operas of the style featured extensive and florid ornamentation, requiring much in the way of fast scales and cadenza, emphasizing technique over volume.”
Aside from the bel canto era and style of opera, there is also a bel canto method of singing, which can be used even in verismo, Wagnerian, Verdian, and modern styles. Eva Turner had the bel canto technique, as did Elena Nicolai, Todor Mazarof (Masaroff), Ghena Dimitrova and Maria Caniglia; all powerful voices that used the bel canto technique.
The sopranos Maria Callas and Joan Sutherland were probably the best-known bel canto singers of the postwar period.”
- https://www.britannica.com/art/bel-canto
“Almost baritone-like in power. She used this part of her voice for dramatic effect, often going into this register much higher on the scale than do most sopranos” description of Maria Callas' voice by Walter Legge. -Wikipedia.
Conductor Nicola Rescigno was once asked if it was true that Callas had three voices; he replied, “No, she has three hundred voices!” A soprano’s voice ranges from the A below middle C to high C: two octaves above middle C. Rarely, a soprano will be able to reach higher octaves. Maria Callas was reported to have sung the high F above high C.”
Among those singers I have heard, Joan Sutherland is the incomparable.
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Enrico Caruso
And, finally, a real person
Enrico Caruso (b. Naples, Feb. 25, 1873; d. Naples, Aug. 2, 1921) was the 18th of 21 children and the first to live past infancy. His family was very poor. His was a ‘rags to riches’ story.
Everyone agreed Caruso had a phenomenal talent, a love of life, and ‘a roaring sense of humor, which he transformed into caricatures’. http://www.henryrosner.org/caruso/museum/. Caruso’s enormous talent and work ethic, combined with his devotion to his performance which caused him to entertain both on and off the stage, his sense of humor, and his complete lack of self-indulgence and self-pity made him a great performer. He rarely seemed to ask what was owed to him but always what was owed to his audience. Talent alone cannot make a performer like this. It was possibly the poverty of his youth which contributed to his dedication and work ethic.
The story of Enrico Caruso placing the sausage in Melba’s hand during a tender performance of La bohème—singing ‘Such a cold little hand, let me warm it’—is true. And delightful: he used Melba’s own flaws against her (her temper, which she used to punished everyone). Melba had to control her temper or ruin her own performance; suddenly there was a cost to her rages. I don’t know if she learned anything, but it was a great joke nonetheless. And a brilliant move on Caruso’s part.
As a youth in his native Naples, Enrico fell in love with a local girl whom he wanted to marry. The girls' father deemed him too low class to marry his daughter, stating that Caruso would never amount to anything as an opera singer. Just a few years later he became the most famous singer in the world, making him a wealthy man.
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0142297/bio
“Puccini was looking for a leading tenor for a performance of ‘La Boheme’ in Livorno. Puccini was so impressed with the range and tone of the young Caruso's voice, that he reportedly mumbled in awe, “Who sent you to me? God himself?” After an unfriendly reception of Caruso’s performance in Naples, he vowed to never sing in Naples again, and he never did.” But Caruso did request to return to Naples to die, which he likewise did.
Caruso began singing for the Met in 1903. After his New York debut November 23, 1903, the Metropolitan was “Caruso's artistic home. In eighteen seasons there he sang 607 times in thirty-seven different operas. He sang at the Met until he returned to Naples to die. No artist within memory ever kindled the rapport with his public that Caruso did.”
“Enr
ico Caruso was not always liked by the critics although audiences loved him. The critics complained of 'his tiresome Italian affectations' and pined for Jean de Reszke” (a formerly famous tenor who you never heard of).
“I heard him only six times before his death,” Mr. Lu cioni said of Caruso, “but I've never again heard anything like it. He absolutely believed in what he sang. You know, the voice had a beautiful dark baritone quality, but then going up it would suddenly have a burst of sunlight.”
https://www.nytimes.com/1973/02/20/archives/met-remembers-caruso-whose-voice-few-can-forget-met-plans-salute.html
Caruso was the first recording star in history who sold more than a million records with his 1902 recording of 'Vesti le gubba' from 'Pagliacci' (Clowns) by 'Leoncavallo'. His voice had a combination of the full baritone-like character with the smooth and brilliant tenor qualities. His range was broadened into baritone at the expense of the higher tenor notes, Caruso never sang the high C.”
Caruso had a 10-year relationship with soprano Ada Giachetti, who was separated from but still married to wealthy manufacturer Gino Botti (divorce was not legal at the time in Italy). Ada had four children with Caruso, two of whom survived. In 1908 Ada ran off with the chauffeur and then attempted to extract money from Caruso for herself and her new lover. Caruso took Ada to court and she had 3 months in jail. I found in the New York Times archives the headline in 1908: ‘Caruso very glad wife has eloped: Says she did not come up to his standard, and he bade her begone.’ http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=950DE0D8123EE233A25757C1A96E9C946997D6CF
‘For the rest of his life, Caruso sent Ada Giachetti money. At one point, Ada received the money from Caruso's wife, Dorothy.
http://www.henryrosner.org/caruso/museum/
In 1918 Caruso married American Dorothy Park Benjamin, 20 years his junior, who bore him a daughter, Gloria. Dorothy was with Caruso when he died at 49 years of age. Caruso said he married Dorothy ‘Because I want somebody who is completely my own.’ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caruso_(song)
Almost every Italian has at some time heard or read Enrico Caruso’s instructions to his young wife: “Dorothy, fammi portare al sole”.
Dorothy, have me taken into the sun
Enrico Caruso, asking his wife to return him to Naples, his home town, to die.
“‘Work, work, and again work,’ was his answer when Enrico Caruso was asked his rule of success. Another time he said, “This is how I have succeeded. I never refused an engagement and I have never been without work with the exception of two months in Naples after my second engagement…I never refused to work. If one would come to me and say, ‘Will you go to such and such a place for the summer and sing?’ I would ask ‘How much will you pay me?’ The answer is ‘Two thousand dollars.’ But I say, ‘The price for that was three thousand.’ ‘Never mind,’ they say, ‘two thousand dollars is all that can be paid this summer,’ and I refuse. ‘Very well,’ they say, ‘we get so-and-so.’ Then I make quick thoughts in my head”--describing swift geometric patterns on his brow—“and I say, ‘I will go.’ Otherwise I lose the summer and the experience. And the experience is everything.” http://www.henryrosner.org/caruso/caruso3.html.
Caruso’s death was initiated with a performance. He tended to overstrain his voice. In the winter of 1920 he ruptured a blood vessel in his throat while singing in ‘E’lisie d’Amore’ (The Elixir of Love). Recovered from this injury, Caruso was stricken with pleurisy.” I read somewhere that, during his last performance, he kept singing while blood was gushing out of his mouth, but I can’t find the reference at the moment. He truly was driven and had enormous discipline. Caruso contracted pneumonia and developed a complication in the form of pleural inflammation (plerisy), followed by abscesses in his lungs. After a series of unsuccessful surgeries Enrico Caruso died on August 2, 1921, in Naples, Italy.
For a biography of Caruso’s life, check out Dorothy Caruso’s “Enrico Caruso-His Life and Death”.
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“Enjoying Opera with Dale Harris”
If you are interested in learning more about opera, and I cannot stress this enough, get “Enjoying Opera with Dale Harris” on audiobook (and Audio CD if you can find it). This is fascinating and entertaining while being informative, with excerpts from opera of the best in the business. This collection is absolutely delightful.
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A young prince’s childhood
The relationship between Alejandro and his father is inspired by the relationship between Juan Carlos and his father Juan de Borbón, Count of Barcelona (6/20/1913-4/1/1993) as described in the book Juan Carlos: Steering Spain from Dictatorship to Democracy, by Paul Preston.
King Juan Carlos de Borbón is the great-great grandson of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, with a resemblance to Prince Albert.
“A Borbón cries only in his bed” and “never cries before anyone else's eyes” were Don Juan's words to his son.
Juan Carlos was sent away from home at eight years of age, with many of the details similar. The amount of education an 8-year-old prince had at that time in history was enormous. “His would have had a very formal, very restricted and highly evolved life with many tutors from the time he was able to talk. He would have been taught politics, history, current law, memorized the names of all his ancestors and their various ranks and life stories. He would have had a military tutor to teach him tactics and demonstrate all the great war theories. He would have had a naval tutor as Spain was a naval power and he would have been taught about exploration, expansion and how to command at sea. Because Spain was also a center of the arts, he would have had art lessons from the most famous painters (Goya taught the Enfanta) and had religious instruction in the Catholic Church since he was a babe in arms: mass twice daily, prayers before and after every meal and everything in his life blessed and sanctified by his very own retinue of priests under the command of at least one cardinal. Mathematics and French, Italian and English would have been part of that schooling. He was most likely taking music lessons on one or more instruments and been taught to quote the great Spanish poets. He would have been taught to ride well and have his own household by that age under the aegis of someone appointed by the king, usually a high counselor of some sort. He would have had his own physician, master of the hunt, gentlemen of the chambers, head of the horse and carried rank in the military which might have been hereditary. At eight years of age, he would have had a better education then today's high school students. (In point of fact Juan Carlos speaks five languages, as does his wife Queen Sofia) He would have been taught enormous public self-control and may have been under great turmoil inside; he would have been an expert at not showing his feelings by age eight.” -- Susan J. Bartroff, editor and human computer
“He would use the boy to court desirable factions, starting with sending Alejandro to school with the political group most in favor with the Crown, playing one side against the other.” Don Juan used the young prince in a political game played with Franco, dictator of Spain. Franco ousted the monarchy with the Spanish Civil War ending 1938 (recall that Ernest Hemingway fought in the Spanish Civil War, inspiring his novel “For Whom the Bell Tolls” If you ever have a chance to visit the Hemingway House in Key West, it is fascinating).
Juan Carlos was sent away to school at age eight. King Juan Carlos, however, did not permit his own son and heir, Felipe, to leave home until Felipe was sixteen years of age.
The reading of the letter, the cross on the forehead, and, in general, Esteban's relationship with Alejandro describes Basilio Garrido Casanova's care of Prince Juan Carlos. The mention made of the letter is as follows: “His father had given him a letter to hand over to Garrido. In it, he gave the teacher instructions about how he wanted his son to be educated. They read it together and, when they reached the part in which Don Juan spoke of his son's responsibilities as representative of the family, tears appeared in the Prince's eyes…Garrido commented years later ‘This child radiated affection despite
the fact that they only ever spoke to him about duties and responsibilities.’”, p. 54.
“Basilio Garrido Casanova was the headmaster of Prince Juan Carlos' first school and founder of the hospice for homeless children of Nuestra Senora de la Paloma. Basilio Garrido Casanova was a brilliant teacher and a warm and sympathetic human being. He made a profound impression on the young prince. Years later, Juan Carlos would say, ‘Sometimes, when I have to make certain decisions, I still ask myself what he would have advised me to do.’”
When Juan Carlos was named royal successor by Franco, he wrote to Garrido the following note: “I remember you with greatest affection and every day allows me better to measure what I owe to you. You have helped me a lot with your example and your advice.”
One has to wonder if Garrido was the influence which inspired Juan Carlos to forego his dictatorship and establish a democratic monarchy.
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Great Palace of Constantinople
“The Great Palace of Constantinople also known as the Sacred Palace was the large Imperial Byzantine palace complex located in the south-eastern end of the peninsula now known as Old Istanbul (formerly Constantinople), in modern Turkey. The palace served as the main royal residence of the Eastern Roman or Byzantine emperors from 330 to 1081 and was the center of imperial administration for over 690 years. Only a few remnants and fragments of its foundations have survived into the present day.” - Wikipedia
The description of this scene approaches the arrival of His Excellency the Earl of Winchilsea, Ambassador to King Charles II, and Countess Winchilsea, to visit the Grand Seignior Mehmed IV, Sultan of Sultans and “God's Shadow upon Earth” in 1650, as described by Katie Hickman in Daughters of Britannia: The Lives and Times of Diplomatic Wives. Honestly, I can make something up, but I would much rather do my research and insure that the events, settings, and people described are as historically accurate as possible. Note, however, that King Charles II reigned 1649-1651, so the scene which follows was 1650 while the scene in “The Serenade” takes place 1895. There aren’t that many books written about travelling diplomats.
The Serenade: The Prince and the Siren Page 48
