In the opera world of the 1860s, more than the mere Alps separated Italy from Germany. The battle between the influences of Giuseppe Verdi in the Italian opera world and the supporters of Richard Wagner and European Romanticism in Germany was an epic one. As a result, sides were taken and lines were drawn, figuratively speaking. In Italy, an artistic movement known as Scapigliatura felt that Italian culture had fallen into the doldrums, but that it could be revived by learning lessons from elsewhere, notably Germany and its version of Romanticism.
One of the notable members of the scapigliati was poet and composer Arrigo Boito (1842-1918). Hailing from Padua and the son of a painter and a Polish countess, Boito studied music at the Milan Conservatory, finishing at age 19 in 1861. Seven years later in 1868, he was able to mount his first completed opera—and only completed opera, as it turned out—Mefistofele. Writing both the music and libretto, Boito followed his aesthetic leanings and based Mefistofele on Goethe’s Faust. The timeline is somewhat telling: Mefistofele and Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg premiered the same year.
The first performance of Mefistofele was a perfect example of the battle raging between the Italian opera world and the Wagnerites. This overlong first version elicited boos, riots, and public disorder, and was closed by the police after its second performance. Boito later made substantial cuts and revisions to the work and enjoyed a considerably better reaction when he was able to mount it in Bologna in 1875.
For the remainder of his career, Boito made his way as a librettist rather than as a composer. At the same time, during the 1870s and 1880s, Verdi’s world of Italian opera inevitably fell victim to the changes in European music. Following his Aida in 1871, Verdi felt removed from opera’s direction and unofficially retired. In 1880, Verdi’s publisher, Giulio Ricordi, in an effort to get Verdi composing again, engineered a collaboration on a revision to Verdi’s Simon Boccanegra with Boito as the librettist. Subsequently, with Verdi’s composing spirit having recovered, Boito penned the libretto for Verdi’s final two operas, Otello and Falstaff.
• • • • •
Knoxville Opera, long absent from the stage since 2020’s production of Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette due to the Covid-19 shutdown, is making its return with a production of Boito’s Mefistofele this weekend. KO last produced the 1868 Boito opera in 2015 in a production that I, as reviewer, felt obligated to describe using phrases like “luscious stage pictures” and “choral and orchestral sound on a monumental scale.”
In this week’s KO production, making his KO debut in the role of Mefistofele is bass-baritone Hidenori Inoue. Receiving training in Kyoto and later a Master of Music degree from the Manhattan School of Music, Inoue has sung a number of the major bass-baritone roles, including the roles of Leporello and the Commendatore in Don Giovanni, and the Bonze in Madama Butterfly before the shutdown hiatus. His upcoming roles will include Sarastro in Die Zauberflöte and Don Fernando in Fidelio for Austin Opera.
Also making a Knoxville Opera debut is soprano Abigail Santos Villalobos in the role of Margherita. Villalobos has been a member of the Belmont University School of Music faculty since 2019. She received a Masters and a Doctorate from Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music. She premiered and toured nationally at Lyric Opera of Chicago, Opera Unlimited, San Diego Opera, Houston Grand Opera, and Fort Worth Opera. Earlier, Villalobos was a member of the notable apprentice program at Santa Fe Opera.
Tenor Kirk Dougherty (Faust) made a notable debut with KO in 2018’s double bill of Mozart’s The Impresario and Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi singing Rinuccio. Dougherty is scheduled to sing the Duke in Rigoletto for Opera Orlando next month, a role he did in January this year as well.
In other roles, there are some familiar and welcome faces from previous Knoxville Opera productions. Allison Deady is singing Marta; Tim Pope is singing Wagner.
Stage director is Brian Deedrick who directed the 2015 production; KO artistic director Brian Salesky, leaving the company after this season, is music director and conductor. The Knoxville Symphony Orchestra will be onstage with a chorus of over 100 singers.
• • • • •
Knoxville Opera: Boito’s Mefistofele
Tennessee Theatre, 604 S. Gay Street
Friday, March 4, 2022, at 7:30 PM and Sunday, March 6, at 2:30 PM
Tickets and Information
