ITALIAN OPERA.
II Don Giovanni was performed on Tuesday night ; but we really derived from it more mortification than pleasure. Very, very few Italians cordially love the music of Moz.1RT; and in that number we fear none of the present corps dopera can be in- cluded. They are all accustomed, they are all trained, to regard a song as a mere outline—a sketch which they are to fBI up ad libitum. Take, for example, ROSSINI'S most popular air, " piacer " every new singer endeavours to give it an altered read- ing,—the time is changed, the passages are recast; the aim of the singer is not to sing the motive of the author, but one as un- like it as possible ; and applause is given precisely in the degree in which this fept is accomplished. The monotony of ROSSINI'S basses is subservient to this end : they vibrate, for twenty-four or more bars together, from the dominant to the key-note, and there is neither danger nor difficulty in working ad libitum on such a foundation. Every thing that MOZART writes, on the con- trary, is perfect and entire, wanting nothing. Proceeding on a prin- ciple not only unlike, but opposite to that of ROSSINI, he produces instead of a sketch, a picture finished and completed in every part. It is plain that singers accustomed to the former style, must be placed in fetters, which they wear uneasily and awk- wardly, by the latter : they want to be escaping into roulades, but MozAar binds them hand and foot—" My melody," he says, " you shall sing, and no other." CARADORI alone (as the representative of Zerlina) felt at ease : her execution of the two lovely airs was in the best taste. Gist's power was occa- sionally manifest : nothing could be finer than her recognition of her father's murderer, and her description of the scene in which he entered her chamber ; it was more vivid, more energetic, than that of any former Donna Anna that our memory reaches _to : and the same spirit was infused into the air "Or sai chi I. onore but her general performance of the character will not merit a like eulogium. The part of Don Giovanni is one that any singer may well be ambitious of sustaining, and we know this to have been eminently the case with TAMBURINI. We believe he did his best ; and his portraiture of the gay and reckless libertine was certainly successful. He restrained those exuberances in which a singer of such extraordinary flexibility of voice might fairly have been expected to indulge, and delivered some passages most admirably. RIMINI'S performance was only conspicuous for the marked indifference with which he went through it. He exerted himself but once, and then to do mischief. His " Il mio tesoro was execrable. A constant and unmeaning alternation of bellow- ing and whispering, with three distinct changes of time, and sundry ad libitum, deformed this most exquisite aria. Zuc ELM'S Leporello wanted animation : the performer seemed to think a part in an opara by MOZART too serious an affair to be trilled with. But the defects of all the singers put together, were as dust in the balance when weighed against those of the conductor. Whether from ignorance or design, it seemed to be his sole aim to divest the opera of all its beauty. His attack commenced on the Overture, in which MOZART has committed the sin of not marking a piu mosso: this COSTA supplied, and by a vigorous application of the baton, succeeded in rendering its conclusion almost worthy of Roast rem. The same effort was repeated throughout ; and thump ing, nodding, and stamping, were employed, either alternately or in combination, to urge on band and singers. Where the singers, as in "La ci darem la mano," had good taste enough to let Mo- zAar have a hearing, and firmness enough to resist the dictation of his baton, it was applied to hurry on every symphony, however
short, that intervened. The band, moreover, were stimulated not to accompany, but drown the voices ; some of which, in "Non ti
fidar," and " Sola, sola," were wholly inaudible: no wonder that
they passed without a band. " Protegga ii giusto cielo" was deformed by another process: one voice sung loud and another
soft, and its beautiful melodious flow was interrupted by barbarous pauses and changes of time. The Prompter, too, did his best to aid the Conductor's efforts; for with stentorian voice he diligently read every word of the opera. Nor were the Chorus-singers, on this occasion, disobedient to his commands : the glorious finale of the first act was a mere noisy chaos, in which neither form nor shape, neither feature nor proportion, could he recognized. The opera drew a crowded house, but a general feeling of dis- appointment seemed to pervade the audience.
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