Tosca who "came back" - silly question!
Michael Volpe
The famous story of the Tosca who "bounced back" after her leap... who was
it??? Was it at the Met btw?
Sorry for the frivolity....
Mike
Skip
she sang Violetta?
"Michael Volpe" <mic...@perillo.freeserve.co.uk> wrote in message
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Mike Richter
It comes up regularly. The event has been ascribed - sometimes reliably
- to virtually every large soprano who has sung the role. DFD reports in
one of his books that his teacher claimed the honor; if so, she may have
been the first.
The bouncing Tosca seems always to have been performing in a small house
with simplified staging. I've never heard of such a thing at the Met,
Covent Garden or another great house.
Mitchell Kaufman
> Wasn't that Caballe? Or was it Caballe who looked like a Wedding cake when
> she sang Violetta?
I don't know, but when I saw Caballe as Tosca at the Met, she walked offstage in
a huff at the end instead of jumping from the parapet. (In her defense, she was
reportedly suffering from phlebitis at the time.)
Great singing, though.
MK
Skip
needed 20+
Mattress's for that leap.
"Mitchell Kaufman" <forg...@iaint.disclosinit> wrote in message
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Leonard Tillman
>Just a quick question...
>The famous story of the Tosca who "bounced
> back" after her leap... who was
>it??? Was it at the Met btw?
I won't swear to it, but it seems to have been our beloved Zinka M.
(...And yes, at the Met.)
>Sorry for the frivolity....
No problem. - Frivolity is often healthful.
LT
A country whose citizens reside in their automobiles -- an incarnation.
VocediVendetta
"The famous story of the Tosca who "bounced back" after her leap... who was
it?"
I've heard this story told about Kirsten, Callas, Milanov, Caballe and just
about any other soprano you care to name. I don't know if it ever really
happened. Like many a good story its probably apocryphal.
comes...@webtv.net
Exactly where did she (and the director) think she was *going*? : )
~ Roger
Mitchell Kaufman
> Tosca "walked offstage in a huff"?!
>
> Exactly where did she (and the director) think she was *going*? : )
Postgame spread?
MK
Skip
<comes...@webtv.net> wrote in message
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Leonard Tillman
If a "huff" is a new style of *cloak*, could this opera be
rewritten so as to "segue" into another of Puccini's works, Il Tabarro?
cathy wells
In the book "Great Opera Disasters" by Hugh Vickers (MacMillan London
Ltd., 1979) he writes:
"Let us begin with the most famous of all disasters. Though it has a
certain legendary quality it did really happen - and in fact I have
run it to earth".
He then attributes the story to "City Center, New York, 1960" but does
not name the soprano, other than to say a "large young American". I
have to admit I'm not familiar with "City Center", I alway thought it
was a place, not an opera company. So no, it's not the Met or the NYCO
(they didn't perform Tosca in either 1959, 1960 or 1961 seasons).
In any case, here's how Hugh Vickers reports the story in his book:
Whereas most such disasters depend on some element of misunderstanding
and incompetence among the stage-management, this catastrophe is -
delightfully - due entirely to ill-will, in this case between the
stage staff and the soprano. With diabolical cunning they permitted
her, after several stormy rehearsals, to complete her first
performance without mishap until the very last moment, when Tosca
throws herself off the battlements of the Castel Sant'Angelo. What
normally happens is that on her cry "Scarpia, davanti a Dio" she hurls
herself off and lands on a mattress four feet below (who but Callas
has ever looked totally convincing at that moment? - Her outstretched
hands haunt the memory). But in this case it was not Callas but a
large young American who landed not on a mattress but - perish the
thought - on a trampoline. It is said that she came up fifteen times
before the curtain fell - sometimes upside down, then right way up -
now laughing in delirious glee, now screaming with rage…. Worse still,
it seems that the unhappy lady was unable to reappear in any other
Opera Center performance throughout the entire season because the
Center's faithful audience, remembering the trampoline, would have
burst into laughter. She had to remove herself to San Francisco, where
of course no such grotesque incident could possibly occur....
cathy wells
>now laughing in delirious glee, now screaming with rage..... Worse still,
>it seems that the unhappy lady was unable to reappear in any other
>Opera Center performance throughout the entire season because the
>Center's faithful audience, remembering the trampoline, would have
>burst into laughter. She had to remove herself to San Francisco, where
>of course no such grotesque incident could possibly occur....
>
>
Oops. Errata: the title of the book is "Great Operatic Disasters".
Also, I meant to say I'm not familiar with an opera company called
"City Center" as separate from the New York City Opera. It's always
been my understanding that they were one and the same, in which case
this story could not have happened at the NYCO because, as I stated,
their own records show they didn't perform Tosca in 1960 or two
seasons either before or after.
Cathy
Georio
act were recruited at the last minute, without benefit of rehearsal, from the
local college football team. Their instructions from the stage manager: "Just
chase the soprano -- you know, the fat lady with the tiara!" Which produced
the fabulous spectacle of an entire platoon of soldiers leaping off the
parapet after Tosca. (I think I owe this story to the late great Victor Borge.)
I did see a Met Tosca in the 80s where Caballe was in no shape to jump, so she
just raised her arms in roughly the position of 2:45 o'clock and trudged
offstage.
Parterrebox
The understanding here was that Tosca imperiously moved to another part of the
battlement (invisible to the audience) from whence she would make her leap.
Renata Tebaldi used the same staging idea in order to avoid making a visible
leap.
Evelyn Vogt Gamble (Divamanque)
Despite people who claim they witnessed it (date, location
and soprano subject to change, depending upon who's telling
the story), I'm under the impression that the incident falls
under the heading of "Urban Legend". (Of course, once it
made it into print, how does one catch up with the rumor?)
Hugh Vickers, in his "Great Operatic Disasters" claims it
really DID happen (with a more or less uknown young American
soprano - whom he neglects to name) at New York's City
Center in 1960. (I still beg leave to doubt it.)
Evelyn Vogt Gamble (Divamanque)
cathy wells wrote:
>
>
> He then attributes the story to "City Center, New York, 1960" but does
> not name the soprano, other than to say a "large young American". I
> have to admit I'm not familiar with "City Center", I alway thought it
> was a place, not an opera company. So no, it's not the Met or the NYCO
> (they didn't perform Tosca in either 1959, 1960 or 1961 seasons).
"City Center Opera" was the forerunner of NYCO, which did
not yet exist (as such) in 1960, did it?
Georio
leap.<
Perhaps. I didn't see Tebaldi (I was just a gleam in me muddah's eye). But on
the Met official recording she lets out such a bloodcurdling scream at this
point I have always imagined she followed it up with an Olympic caliber
nosedive. When called upon to scream in all her commercial recordings Tebaldi
always obliged with one of those V.C. (Vocally Correct) diva screams that dear
Mignon Dunn once described as "just a messed-up scale" ... but on the Met
broadcast (the one with Tucker/Warren/Mitropolous) she lets out a shocking
screech that has always sounded to me like her way of saying, "Take THAT,
Maria!"
cathy wells
The NYCO was founded in 1943. My library has (had?) a book that was a
history of the NYCO (I believe the book is called "The New York City
Opera - An American Adventure" by Martin Sokol, if you want to check
for it in your local library.). At the back of this book is an
appendix that is a year by year list of each eason's performances.
And going two years behind and two years forward you still won't find
any performances of Tosca.
And here's this from the NYCO's own website: "It was a well-received
performance of Puccini's Tosca, featuring American singing sensation
Dusolina Diannini in the title role, that christened New York City's
newest opera company on February 21, 1944. Audiences flocked to City
Center on West 55th Street, the new company's first home, to witness
the promising start of what Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia billed as
"the people's opera company."
So I guess I AM right in thinking that "City Center" is a place, not
an opera company and while it's highly unlikely, it's possible that
Hugh Vickers is referring to another opera company that performed at
CIty Center in 1960. And if it proves that there =was= a production of
Tosca mounted at the City Center theatre in 1960, it may prove to be
the source of the Tosca urban legend.
By the way, you can find the page I quoted from "Great Operatic
Disasters" on the web at
http://www.studiomoore.com/great_operatic_disasters.html
Cathy
Helmut Fischer
last 7 years. Also she prefered to walk of the stage.
Helmut Fischer
Giovanni Abrate
Giovanni
(whose mom was a Giannini)
"cathy wells" <cwel...@NOSPAMhotmail.com> wrote in message
news:3d4b5bc4...@netnews.att.net...
Andre Storfer
among other things, an opera company.
To a New Yorker of my generation, City Center meant that location in
Manhattan, and still does.
Lincoln Center, debatably the cultural center of NYC, was supposed to
replace "City Center." It may hve physically, I find it too large for my
tastes, and by extension, too cold.
In so far as "Bouncing Toscas" are concerned, that story was in
circulation as far back as the late '40s, and probably very shortly
after the premiere of the Opera.
If the story were proved to be true, we might all be grateful that no
damasge was done to the 'D' or 'CC' trains.
AES
cathy wells
their mistake. I just cut and pasted that from their website.
Cathy
Proud Clarion
>it??? Was it at the Met btw?
I believe it was Carol Neblett, and the "scene of the crime" was New
Orleans.
PC
REG
not sure it needed a mattress.
"Proud Clarion" <proudc...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:20020803142917...@mb-fh.aol.com...
Mark D Lew
(Divamanque)" <evg...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> Hugh Vickers, in his "Great Operatic Disasters" claims it
> really DID happen (with a more or less uknown young American
> soprano - whom he neglects to name) at New York's City
> Center in 1960. (I still beg leave to doubt it.)
I beg the same leave. I think Mr Vickers is writing some creative fiction here.
mdl
Evelyn Vogt Gamble (Divamanque)
Well, there's "walking" and there's "walking" - I imagine it
was more a frantic, distraught attempt to evade her pursuers
(which could be made believeable), than a leisurely stroll
toward the wings, wasn't it?
Another solution might have been to bring the curtain down
just as she mounted the battlement, but what happens if the
responsible stage-hand is asleep at the switch, and leaves
the poor woman to totter there indefinitely? (Or to be
visibly perceived to descend a hidden set of stairs behind
the set?)
Dr. Speedbyrd:>
BLA BLA BLA BLA!!!
Dr. SpeedbyrdŽ
Hallowed be my name....
David7Gable
>
It is apocryphal. Apocryphyal does not mean false. It means "not subject to
definitive verification."
-david gable
GRNDPADAVE
>Date: 08/04/2002 3:22 PM Central Daylight Time
>Message-id: <20020804162249...@mb-fl.aol.com>
authenticity" which seems closer to *false* than to *unverifiable*.
==G/P Dave
Evelyn Vogt Gamble (Divamanque)
REG wrote:
>
> When I think of Neblett in her prime, certain things were bouncing, but I am
> not sure it needed a mattress.
LOL! Anyway, the "bouncing Tosca" story was around long
before Neblett made her operatic debut. I think I first
heard it - recounted as being from a "first person" witness
(aren't they always?) - when I was first learning opera back
in the early 1950's.
David7Gable
"of doubtful
>authenticity" which seems closer to *false* than to *unverifiable*.
>
The authenticity can be doubted for good reason--one doesn't know how reliable
the sources are--but it can neither be proven nor disproven on the evidence.
"Of doubtful authenticity" is a good definition, but apocryphal is not a simple
synonym of false. For something to be simply false, there would have to be no
doubt about the falsehood rather than the probability of falsehood. This is
precisely the nuance the word is intended to convey, as its origin suggests.
There would have been little point in introducing an adjective derived from the
word Apocrypha into the language if all it meant was "false." Apocryphal means
"like the stories in the Apocrypha," stories that are reported only in the
Apocrypha and not subject to verification by any other book in the Bible.
Indeed, this lack of corroboration for the Apocrypha in other parts of the
Bible was the rationale for the Protestants suppressing it. The story of the
bouncing Tosca is like the stories in the Apocrypha. People say it happened,
and maybe it did, but there's no proof.
-david gable
Evelyn Vogt Gamble (Divamanque)
David7Gable wrote:
>
> >My dictionary (Webster New Collegiate) gives the definition [of apocryphal] as
> "of doubtful
> >authenticity" which seems closer to *false* than to *unverifiable*.
> >
>
> The authenticity can be doubted for good reason--one doesn't know how reliable
> the sources are--but it can neither be proven nor disproven on the evidence.
> "Of doubtful authenticity" is a good definition, but apocryphal is not a simple
> synonym of false.
I'd say it means pretty much the same as "Urban Legend" -
there may be a germ of truth there, but no one can prove it,
because no one really knows where it originated.
michael farris
"Evelyn Vogt Gamble (Divamanque)" wrote:
> the "bouncing Tosca" story was around long
> before Neblett made her operatic debut. I think I first
> heard it - recounted as being from a "first person" witness
> (aren't they always?) - when I was first learning opera back
> in the early 1950's.
The version I (over)heard at an opera performance was Stella Roman (I forget where
it was supposed to have happened). In this version she didn't so much bounce as
not entirely disappear from view (she was afraid of jumping and had mattresses
piled up too high).
-michael farris (who didn't really believe it)
David7Gable
>there may be a germ of truth there, but no one can prove it,
>because no one really knows where it originated.
>
Exactly.
-david gable