Dicapo in the News

Opera News Review
La Traviata

John W. Freeman
Opera News, June 11, 1999

La Traviata as a chamber opera, with its cast of eleven doubling as the chorus (Annina singing along at the parties)? Don't try this at home, but somehow Dicapo Opera Theatre made it work. The group scenes looked like cocktail parties in a hotel room, but Dicapo's tiny stage, decorated with a sharp eye for period furnishings (by John Farrell) and costumes (Diane Martindale), focused attention on the lovers and father Germont -- the opposite effect from that of Franco Zeffirelli's massive productions.

Seen at the second of eight performances (Feb. 19), this pocket Traviata was staged by Michael Capasso with only a couple of false steps, such as Alfredo's return at the end of Act I and his apparent challenge to the Baron (rather than the other way round) in the gambling scene. A couple of late cast changes -- Hak Joon Kim's agreeably lyric but anxiously cautious Alfredo, Charles Robert Stephens' vocally firm but dramatically disengaged Germont -- didn't flap Oleksandra Hrabova's remarkably detailed, sensitively responsive, wholly convincing Violetta.

The Ukrainian soprano looked, acted and sounded the part with gripping sincerity, wearing her costumes and jewels in Act I with the classy assurance of a Jarmila Novotná, singing her Act II duets with the vibrant intensity of a Licia Albanese. Hrabova's bright, steady, expressive voice handled a full range of dynamics without any lapse of composure, and her attentiveness to the other characters followed a legato line of motivation. In "Sempre libera" her passagework sounded accurate yet spontaneous; in "Addio del passato" one felt the purity of despair.

Another major asset was the sure hand of podium veteran Anton Coppola, who understands, as few nowadays seem to do, how this score should be led, with natural, breathable tempos and a minimum of traditional indulgence.

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