Maretzek Italian Opera: Rigoletto

“’Rigoletto’ is always a favorite opera in this city, and its announcement attracted to the Academy last night one of the largest audiences of the season. The performance was fairly good, Ronconi deserving the greatest praise for his noble acting and for his artistic vocalization. Miss Kellogg’s Gilda is a familiar representation, and has always been admired. Lefranc sang in the last act of the opera with better effect than in the earlier acts, and secured an encore for the famed quartet Bella Figlia d’amore.”

“The most numerous and most fashionable audience of the season witnessed, in spite of the storm and of several counter attractions, the presentation of ‘Rigoletto’ at the Academy of Music last evening. The performance can be declared the most successful of the season, and was the most symmetrical of Verdi’s very dramatic operas given here in some years. The fact that Miss Kellogg and Signori Lefranc and Ronconi took part in it, supplies the best explanation of its excellence. The talent and popularity of each of these artists suffices to make an entertainment in which any one of them cooperates satisfactory, at least, and their confederation, amid favorable circumstances, could have but the one effect. Miss Kellogg was heard yesterday to especial advantage. Her voice gains continually in power and flexibility, and her style in finish and refinement. Miss Kellogg’s acting progresses also, though it has scarcely kept pace with her improvement in the management of her voice. Last evening it would not have suffered by a deeper tinge of emotion toward the close of the opera, but for simplicity in the early stages, and for earnestness and force throughout, it could hardly have been bettered. M. Lefranc was slightly hoarse or fatigued, and had not as complete command of his resources as on those exceptional occasions when his execution is faultless, but the weakness was rarely observable, and his two songs were given with great finish and emphasized with a desinvoltura of bearing not to be exacted of most tenors in his class. Signor Ronconi is at his best in ‘Rigoletto,’ where histrionic abilities, sought for in all the artists, and even in Sparafucile, must be possessed in a high degree by the representative of the jester. Signor Ronconi’s embodiment of Rigoletto is, as we need but hint, conspicuous for the actor’s fitness to interpret dramatically the rôle, and the varied situations of the story, and especially in those involving a discovery of the Duke’s treachery, with the after incidents, the singer gave the words and music their fullest significance. The performance above-named had the cooperation of Mme. Lumley as Maddalena, and of Signor Barili as Sparafucile. It was accompanied by a great deal of applause, and the famed quartet and ‘La donna e mobile’ were repeated, in deference to demonstrations of delight of unmistakable genuineness.”

“In spite of the storm the opera house was crowded last night, the triple attraction of Miss Kellogg, Lefranc, and Ronconi in the same piece drawing a large as well as a fashionable audience. All the three principal singers were well placed in their respective rôles. The character of Gilda demands in certain scenes a degree of passion and power which Miss Kellogg does not often display, but it gives full scope to her charming delicacy and prettiness, and even in the most exacting portions she was good. Ronconi has perhaps never appeared to better advantage as Rigoletto, although there are a few passages in which the failure of his voice is painfully conspicuous. Still the mixture of comedy and pathos in his delineation of the jester, the buffoonery only half concealing the most awful tragedy of suffering, showed us this superb artist in a light wherein we have never seen his equal. The scene and celebrated duet with Gilda at the end of the third act were admirable, both in a musical and a dramatic sense. Signor Lefranc was happily in good voice, so that his Duca was delightfully done. The minor parts were respectable.”

“It is not often that a manager’s heart is gladdened by the sight of such a crowded audience as that which assembled at the Academy of Music at the matinee on Saturday last. Especially may it be said that such an experience is peculiarly rare to the operatic manager. The opera on the occasion was ‘Rigoletto,’ and it was carefully sung by Kellogg, Lefranc and Ronconi, who may be heard in it again this evening.”

“The matinée performance of ‘Rigoletto’ last Saturday drew one of the largest audiences the Academy of Music has ever held.”