AP Entertainment Review: Renee Fleming triumphs opening Met season in Verdi's ``La Traviata''

MIKE SILVERMAN, Associated Press Writer

29 September 2003

New York (AP) --

Five years ago, Renee Fleming disappointed her admirers when she withdrew from the Metropolitan Opera's new production of Verdi's "La Traviata," saying she needed more time to master one of the most challenging soprano roles in the repertory.

Some things are worth waiting for.

On Monday night, Fleming scored a triumph opening the Met season in that same production, her voice as opulent as the lavish Franco Zeffirelli sets that depict the lifestyle of the 19th century Parisian rich.

The role of Violetta, the courtesan who finds true love, sacrifices it, and then dies of consumption, demands rare vocal and dramatic resources from any soprano who would make it her own.

Act I, with the famous aria "Sempre libera," requires coloratura agility and pinpoint precision above high C. The music in the second and third acts is not as taxing, but it calls for subtle vocal shadings as Violetta gives way to infirmity and despair.

Fleming was dazzling in the coloratura, singing with an amplitude and ease perhaps unheard in the role since the heyday of Joan Sutherland. But that was more or less to be expected. After all, Fleming has thrived on roles requiring bel canto fireworks, and her last Met appearance was in the Bellini rarity "Il Pirata."

Less certain was how affecting she would prove in scenes like the confrontation with Giorgio Germont, the disapproving father of her lover, Alfredo. When he demands that Violetta give up Alfredo to save the family name from scandal, her world shatters. She resists at first, begs him to relent, and finally agrees, knowing she has lost her last chance at happiness.

Fleming moved gradually and with superb artistry from outraged dignity to heartbroken acceptance, creating tremendous pathos with a subdued vocal line in her solo, "Dite alla giovine." Baritone Dmitri Hvorostovsky, as the elder Germont, was a worthy partner for her in this great scene.

Again and again, Fleming used her distinctively creamy timbre to wonderful effect. There was little of the mannered, swooping attack for which she has been criticized in the past, though traces of it surfaced in the second verse of her third-act aria, "Addio del passato."

It didn't hurt the persuasiveness of her portrayal one bit that she looked absolutely gorgeous throughout the evening, whether as the exuberant hostess of Act I or the wraithlike creature of the final scene.

As Alfredo, tenor Ramon Vargas sang with elegance and bright tone. Principal guest conductor Valery Gergiev led the Met orchestra in a performance of mostly crystalline clarity, except for some coordination problems between pit and the singers that briefly marred Violetta's deathbed scene.

Fleming's reluctance to have taken on "La Traviata" before now is understandable. (She actually sang the role for the first time in Houston last spring.) Despite her fame, she has specialized for much of her career in showcases where she has had little competition -- the operas of Mozart or Strauss, or works on the fringes of the repertory, like Dvorak's "Rusalka."

Now she has staked her reputation on one of the most daunting of roles in one of the most popular operas ever written, putting herself up against memories of such legendary singers as Rosa Ponselle, Licia Albanese and, above all, Maria Callas.

It's a gamble that has paid off, for her and her audiences. Fleming is due to sing eight more performances of "Traviata" through Nov. 1, and then returns for three more in February and March. Most are already sold out.

As gossip columnist Liz Smith wrote in Monday's New York Post: "Renee has made this the hottest ticket in town. It's like the good old days when opera stars electrified public imagination."