It seems that the world of opera will never have enough of Figaro. Mozart tells us how he got married, then Rossini how he came to work with the Almavivas. And Saverio Mercadante, with no help from Beaumarchais, shows us come tutto si cangiò two decades later. The Countess has given up being loved by the Count, but she wishes her daughter, Ines, will have a different kind of marriage. Figaro and Susanna can’t wait to get rid of each other, and maybe she has a point, for his schemes have developed at this point to outright crime. And Cherubino now is colonel – and plans to marry Ines. Since the opera is called “The Two Figaros”, one wonders who is the second one – it is none other than Cherubino, who assumes the name of Figaro while he tries to figure out how he can win the Count’s consent for the wedding.
Mercadante is no Mozart and, if he comes closer to Rossini, the difference is no abysm, but a whole world. At least in this opera, he does not show a great talent for invention – melodies take for ever to take flight and, when they do, it is really earthbound. But he knows how to keep things buoyant and it’s all entertaining if very forgettable. Actually, the whole opera had been entirely forgotten after the intended first performance in Madrid in 1826, when the prima donna Letizia Cortesi proved to be more schemy than Figaro, Susanna or Cherubino and used her connections to have the performances cancelled after a couple of tantrums. The only extant complete score was found again no sooner than 2009, when it came to the attention of Riccardo Muti, who conducted it in Ravenna and Salzburg, producing a recording with a stellar cast: Eleonora Buratto, Rosa Feola, Antonio Poli et al.
The Manhattan School of Music’s production is the opposite of stellar – the cast is mainly composed of advanced students and some of the fun of it has to do with this not being another professional engagement for A-listers. Everyone involved seemed to be having fun and so the audience. Conductor Stefano Sarzani was able to serve this music all the energy it needed without putting too much pressure in his young singers and his small orchestra. As a result, nobody was caught short and the whole evening had a sense of spontaneity and team spirit. The chorus was keenly rehearsed as well. Director Dona D. Vaughn too proved to be very shrewd in choosing the right farcical approach that does not require true acting abilities, even if some of her singers did act well. The colorful sets were simple yet functional, as much as the costumes were appealing.
I was ready to write that having learned the work in Muti’s recording, it would be unfair to make comparisons with this evening’s cast, but that proved to be not entirely fair. For instance, today’s Cherubino, Joanne Evans was far preferable to the one in the recorded performance. Ms. Evans has a slim, flexible and fruity mezzo, sings with perfect sense of style and is a bête de scène. Under the guidance of the right conductor, she could be a perfect Ariodante or Serse. Although Carolina López Moreno (Susanna) doesn’t efface memories of Eleonora Buratto, the morbidezza of her Mozartian soprano is hard to overlook. And she has a charming stage presence too. The other singers in the cast all had promising voices and relished the opportunity of introducing this piece of operatic curiosity to the public in New York.
I HEAR VOICES 
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