Parepa-Rosa English Opera: Il Trovatore; Albert Laurence Benefit

Event Information

Venue(s):
Academy of Music

Manager / Director:
Carl Rosa
Clarence D. Hess

Conductor(s):
Carl Rosa

Price: $1; $.50 reserved

Event Type:
Opera

Record Information

Status:
Published

Last Updated:
28 November 2021

Performance Date(s) and Time(s)

23 Mar 1870, Evening

Performers and/or Works Performed

1)
aka Troubadour
Composer(s): Verdi
Text Author: Cammarano
Participants:  Parepa-Rosa English Opera Company;  Gustavus F. Hall;  Albert [baritone] Laurence (role: Count Luna);  William Castle (role: Manrico);  Zelda Harrison (role: Azucena);  Euphrosyne Parepa (role: Leonora);  Mrs. Boudinot

Citations

1)
Advertisement: New-York Times, 23 March 1870, 7.
2)
Review: New York Herald, 24 March 1870, 3.

“This gentleman, a baritone in the Parepa-Rosa English Opera troupe, had a slimly attended benefit last night. The ‘Trovatore’ is not very attractive in its English shape, and notwithstanding the peerless vocalism and acting of Mme. Rosa in Leonora and the charming interpretation of the gypsy by Mr[s]. Seguin, the Manrico of Mr. Castle (a character which he is utterly incapable of singing or acting), and the Count di Luna of Mr. Lawrence (which was the worst we have ever seen on the stage), the opera fell flat. Mr. Lawrence broke down in the ‘Il Balen,’ so that he had to come forward and make an apology. Mme. Parepa Rosa was the great feature of the evening. This company ought to give Verdi a wide berth for the future.”

3)
Review: New York Post, 24 March 1870, 2.

“Melancholy has marked Mr. Albert Laurence for her own, or if Melancholy has not, Misfortune certainly has. This gentleman came from abroad to join the Parepa opera troupe, bringing with him an excellent reputation as an accomplished lyric artist of the best Italian school. For a while he was cast in parts that gave him but little to justify his reputation. Then he was lost in the misty mazes of the far West, and wasted his sweetness on the desert air of Chicago. Returning with the troupe to the metropolis, his benefit was announced, and ‘Trovatore’ was the opera selected, to give the beneficiary the always favorite part of the Count of Luna.

“The performance took place last night at the Academy of Music. The first act passed off well and vigorously, Parepa and Castle singing in superb style. In the second act, after the familiar anvil chorus, and Azucena’s scene with Manrico, the Count appears, to tell in the sweetly sensuous strains of Il balen the story of his love. Instead of singing, however, Mr. Laurence approached the footlights and addressed the audience in the vernacular, saying that immediately before the performance he was seized with a sudden and inexplicable hoarseness, and begged their indulgence. He then attempted the aria, but, after essaying two or three bars, was obliged to give it up, and the conductor passed on to the chorus of Nuns. Owing to Mr. Laurence’s hoarseness the soprano-and-baritone duet in the last act was omitted.

“Parepa had before this appeared here as Leonora, though with an Italian company. In the English version she is scarcely as effective. The roughness of our language for vocal uses seems specially apparent in operas like ‘Trovatore,’ where the Italian words have become so familiar. In the aria of the last act, Madame Parepa made her finest effort. Her cadenza was something superlative, including several notes in the highest range of which the human voice is capable. Her acting throughout was careful and satisfactory.

“Mrs. Seguin sang Azucena’s music with taste and fair dramatic power, being better than several of the recent more pretentious representatives of the part. In the higher notes of the music, however, she meets with difficulty. To her charming singing is chiefly due the encore given to the slumber duet of the last act.

“We have had occasion to speak lately of Mr. Castle in slightly depreciatory terms; but the tables are turned. If in ‘Martha’ he failed to answer expectation, in ‘Trovatore’ he has far surpassed it. His Manrico is the best performance he has yet given us. It is at once dignified and tender. For the aria known in the Italian version as Amor, sublime amore, Mr. Castle uses his voice with charming effect, and produces one long sustained note of exquisite beauty. In the last act—so trying in its demands—he is more than successful. His friends have every reason to congratulate him on his meritorious personation of last night—a personation which should be repeated as soon as Mr. Laurence shall have sufficiently recovered to take the part he fain would have filled last night.”

4)
Review: New-York Times, 24 March 1870, 5.

“Il Trovatore’ was sung at the Academy of Music last evening and with sufficient art to warrant warm critical praise, and with sufficient effect to justify the applause heard during the entertainment’s progress. No one of Signor Verdi’s works calls for more vocal vigor and histrionic energy than this popular, if well-worn, part of the operatic repertory, and it is agreeable to say that while the superb voice of Mme. Parepa Rosa, and the fresh tones launched by Mr. Castle and Mrs. Seguin are almost always adequate to the task of filling so large a house, their acting, and that of their associates, was, last night, so good as to leave little chance for fault finding on that often-suggestive score. The impression made was proportionally deep and favorable, though the indisposition of Mr. Laurence affected it seriously. Mr. Laurence, who benefitted by the performance, was seized with a hoarseness but a few minutes before the curtain rose, and was compelled to preface a proof of his indisposition offered in an unsuccessful attempt to sing ‘Il Balen,’ with an apology. This unfortunate occurrence detracted of course from the completeness of the representation, but is especially to be regretted as having deprived a conscientious singer of an opportunity to make known here a personation spoken of in very commendatory terms. As usual, therefore, the rehearsal of the story was affected with most richness of sound and genuineness of talent by Mme. Rosa, whom the performers above-named aided with exceptional fire and good fortune. There is no need to review the salient incidents of the evening, but it should be mentioned that an organ-point by Mr. Castle in the duet, we believe, in the third act, bore testimony to a remarkable capacity of lungs, and to an enduring liking of an audience for feats of all sorts; that the ‘Miserere’ was admirably given in respect of volume and sound, variety and purity of vocalization, and emotional expression by Mme. Rosa; and that Mrs. Seguin was versatile enough to personate Azucena with a great deal of dramatic force.”

5)
Review: New-York Daily Tribune, 24 March 1870, 4.

“Last night was set apart for the benefit of Mr. Albert Laurence, and the first performance in the city of an English version of ‘Trovatore.’ So far as the luckless troubadour was concerned, the success of the evening was unqualified; but Mr. Laurence was the victim of one of those dreadful mishaps which even the best of singers cannot always escape. Just before the curtain rose, his voice, which had been in good order all day, suddenly left him without conceivable cause or warning. He struggled through the first act as well as he could and at the beginning of the second he made a very well worded apology and explanation which gained him general sympathy. There forward he had the good will of the audience if he had no more. We regret his misfortune the more, because those who have heard him elsewhere in the part of Di Luna are confident that he would have made a great [hit?] but for this accident. Madame Parepa Rosa was the Leonora. She has sung the part here before in Italian, and we all know that she sings it superbly and acts with even more than her usual excellence. She was in full voice, and did ample justice to a character which peculiarly suits her powers. Hardly less admirable, in a somewhat different way, was the Azucena of Mrs. Seguin. No singer that we can remember, except Adelaide Phillipps, compares with her in this beautiful role. Every night that Mrs. Seguin is heard her reputation rises, and she is now undoubtedly one of the most popular of American lyric artists. Mr. Castle as Manrico made a good third in an admirable trio. No one who has recently sung the part has sung it better except Lefranc, and no part that Castle sings exhibits more fully the best qualities of his voice and the extent of his culture. Mr. Hall was an acceptable Ruiz, and the chorus and orchestra were excellent.”

6)
Review: New York Clipper, 02 April 1870, 414.

“On Wednesday, ‘Trovatore’ was presented for the benefit of Mr. Laurence. The attendance was about the poorest of the series of performances given by the troupe in this city, and the performance much below the required standard, if we except Madame Parepa’s Leonora. Mr. Laurence was too ill to do himself justice.”