FULL The Firebird or Eldfågeln Movie Sweden 1952 Tito Gobbi
Popular Singers in this Opera Recording
Information on the Performance
- Work Title: The Firebird or Eldfågeln
- Composer: various
- Libretto: various
- Venue & Opera Company: Studio and on location in Sweden
- Recorded: 1952
- Type: Movie
- Singers: Tito Gobbi, Nicolai Gedda, Sven-Erik Jacobsson, Leon Björker, Gösta Björling
- Conductor: Bertil Bokstedt, Lamberto Gardelli
- Orchestra:
- Ballet: Ballet of the Royal Opera Stockholm
- Choreographer: Maurice Bejeart
- Stage Director: Hasse Ekman
- Costume Designer: Harald Garmland
Information about the Recording
- Published by: SRF
- Date Published: 1952
- Format: Broadcast
- Quality Video: 3 Audio:3
- Subtitles: yessubs, othersubs
- Video Recording from: video.kiwi FULL VIDEO
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON THIS PERFORMANCE
Ballet numbers:
Meeting with a stranger (to the melody of French songs); Large classical pas de deux (to music by Tchaikovsky); The Firebird (to music by Stravinsky)
Tito Gobbi sings Neapolitan songs “Torna” and “Marechiare”, Swedish folk song “Oh, beautiful Vermeland!”, As well as scenes from Mozart’s opera “Don Giovanni”.
Nikolai Gedda sings the Swedish folk song “Oh, beautiful Vermeland!”
The film features artists from the Stockholm Royal Opera and Ballet Theater
The film was restored in 2004 from the archive film of the Swedish Film Institute.
Description:
The impresario of the famous Italian baritone Mario Vanni, whose role was brilliantly played by Tito Gobbi, is desperately trying to seduce him with a tour at the Royal Swedish Opera. Neither a substantial fee, nor the example of Jussi Björling, who was born, as you know, in an Eskimo igloo, can overcome the horror of the thermophilic Mario before the polar night and ferocious polar bears. Then the enterprising impresario resorts to the last, most effective means – by cunning he drags his protégé-baritone to the
performance of the touring Swedish ballet troupe, in whose prima ballerina Linda, Mario quite predictably instantly falls in love. And you have to, poor fellow, go to Stockholm.
After the tremendous success in the play Don Giovanni, the administration of the Royal Swedish Opera is giving a sumptuous banquet in honor of Mario, Nikolai Gedda, as soloist, and the choir of Swedish tenors perform the Swedish folk song “Oh, beautiful Vermeland!”. Gobby-Mario, does not remain in debt, performing, in response, a Neapolitan song.
The Swedish ballerina, who is also pretty tired of the already cold climate, breaks off her engagement with her Swedish fiancé (director of the Stockholm Opera) and goes with Mario on a romantic trip to Italy, where the baritone seriously surprised her, having managed to persuade the company of real Sicilian picciottos to learn this a Swedish folk song, which he sang under her window among the cacti as a soloist at the head of their choir in pure Swedish. And how do you think he succeeded in such a trick? The resourceful Mario told the gullible picciotto that Vermeland was a sweet Swedish wine when in fact it was just the name of a dreary Swedish province.
However, the whole horror lies in the fact that suddenly not only singing, but also boxing habits wake up in our Mario. During a small but lively discussion about whether the Swedish prima should take a one
– year break from their artistic career in order to be able to accompany Mario on his big tour of the Americas, including performances at the Metropolitan Opera, Mario sends fragile ballerina in a deep knockout. (To reassure the impressionable audience, it should be noted that the very moment of the impact was not included in the frame.) The ballerina forgives Mario, but returns to Stockholm, where she begins rehearsals of Stravinsky’s Firebird. It soon turns out that the artist’s vestibular apparatus is hopelessly destroyed and the unhappy woman has to leave the stage.
As for her ex-fiance, he was so frozen during his life in the Arctic latitudes that he decided to move to the Antarctic, and went with his ice show on a tour of South Africa, where he came across Mario, who had arrived in Cape Town with a concert. Only then, having learned that Mario and Linda had long been separated, the unlucky groom rushes headlong to Sweden and renews his engagement with the retired ballerina. Meanwhile, Linda’s rival ballerina, who finally reached the coveted role of the Firebird, falls victim to her own cunning, cutting her toes with a razor placed in the shoes in which Linda was supposed to dance, but which she has not replaced since then. careless dresser. The ballet master of the Swedish Royal Opera, Russian émigré Yasha Sakharovich, persuades Linda to take a chance and go on stage instead of an evil understudy,