“I am prepared and I have the right”

Turandotthe last opera of Giacomo Puccini, returns this Friday, May 17 to the Teatro Colón after five years, on the centenary of the death of its author, with the original idea and stage conception by Roberto Oswald, and the realization by Aníbal Lápiz. The replacement has the collaboration of the Italian Embassy in Buenos Aires and the Italian Institute of Culture of Buenos Aires, within the framework of the Divina Italia cycle.

Turandot tells the story of a cruel Chinese princess who demands her suitors answer three riddles if they want to marry her; If they fail to do so, they will die. Calaf, a foreign prince who hides his name, accepts the challenge and solves the three riddles. Turandot refuses to give herself to Calaf and he proposes a riddle to her: before dawn she must guess his name. If he does, he will die; If not, she will agree to marry him.

“It is interesting that Puccini’s first and last operas, Le Villi and Turandot, are the only ones with fantastic themes. There is something cyclical, as if Puccini knew it was his last opera”, reflects the Italian musical director Beatrice Venezi, who will make her debut at the Teatro Colón leading the Orquesta Estable.

“I love this city,” says the young 34-year-old director, full of enthusiasm, about to fulfill one of her life’s dreams: directing at the Colón. “I am very proud of her,” she confesses. It is a great responsibility, it is a very important theater recognized throughout the world. AND I also have something very personal with Argentina because my boyfriend is from here.. “I am really very happy,” she says in very good Spanish and assures that she did not learn it from her boyfriend.

It is his third time in the country, he had never stayed as long as now in Buenos Aires, he directed several orchestras on other occasions, but the Teatro Colón was a dream that seemed unattainable.

Instead of the inconspicuous black suit, Beatrice chooses to lead in ball gowns from a particular designer. “Men and women lead differently, we have different arm proportions, the internal arrangement of the organs as well. We’re different. I believe that a woman can win in any field when she accepts differences.. I know perfectly well that it is historically a job for men, but I do it with the certainty that I am a woman, I can do it because I am prepared and I have the right“, it states.

-Is this the first time you have directed Turandot?

-What is your vision of the score and what would you like to convey?

-One of the things I want to deliver to the public is, for example, the sense of direction towards death that exists throughout the first act, especially at the end of that act. It is a constant of the entire work. A second element is magic. Because it is a story, a fable, in a suspended and not real time, which Puccini indicates with the suspended use of harmony.

-In general, the particularity of Puccini’s language is that in the narrative there is a dynamic very similar to cinema. Does it influence in any way your indications about the dynamics of the work?

-Yes, it is a peculiarity that I like to see reach the public. That’s why I choose some tempi so as not to lose speed and continuity in the narrative. At the same time, there is the typical structure of Italian opera, with recitative and arias. In the aria with the expression of a feeling or emotion. The meeting point between innovation, speed and modernity, on the one hand, and the tradition of Italian work, on the other, is something that excites me every time. I can only imagine the depth and how much thought there is behind all this work.

-What can the story of Turandot tell us today?

-All of Puccini’s works refer to the human condition. I am very touched by the reaction of the people in Turandot, which is the chorus, with a prominence and weight that it does not have in previous works. He is a real character, like in Greek tragedy. And he is also the voice of our society: suddenly they want to kill someone and then the opposite. I think that the choir, more than Calaf and Turandot, tells us a lot about ourselves, about our society.

-Another singularity, in addition to the choir, is the size of the orchestra.

-Yes it is huge, especially because of the percussions. There is also a band, the choir is also huge, it also includes a children’s choir.

-Liù’s character is very Puccinian, willing to give her life for love in exchange for nothing, she is a character that did not exist in the original story. A theory circulates that Puccini used the character to exonerate the suicide of his lover. What is your vision?

-Yes, there is the original story by Carlo Gozzi, and also another version of Turandot written seven years earlier, in 1917, by Ferruccio Bussoni. The meaning is very different and there is no Liù. And, yes, they say that Liù’s incorporation is autobiographical: Turandot, the ice princess, is Elvira, Puccini’s wife, and the lover, Doria Manfredi who sacrifices herself, is Liù. We don’t know that, but we do know that Puccini wants to tell us something through Liù: love as a universal value. And also the magic that love makes, by transforming, humanizing, the ice princess.

– The characters don’t have the depth of Puccini’s other operas, maybe it has to do with the less realistic genre, right?

-The characters are more cliché than in other operas, they do not have the three-dimensionality of Tosca, Scarpia, Cavaradossi, each one has their own psychology, all expressed through music and dramaturgy. If I think of Turandot, Calaf and Liu, they are like oriental figurines, Puccini uses that Madama Butterfly expression. Although Turandot has more three-dimensionality, theoretically she is the ice princess who never changes, and it is a contrast that still has an effect.

-What is your favorite moment in the opera? I know you are going to tell me that it is very difficult to answer, but you can take the first thing that comes to mind when you think of Turandot

-The truth is that there are many. Surely where the choir participates, for example, in the first act. The ending, with that sense of direction towards death, is electrifying. In questa reggia It is a masterpiece. And, the truth is, Liù’s death is my favorite, everything dissolves: the first violin is left playing alone, the flute alone, and the sopranos of the choir singing. I would like to end there, with Liù’s death, in silence, as far as Puccini went.

Alfano, his disciple finished the opera, and added an ending that is difficult to return to musically after Liù’s death. The piccolo with a super sharp ascending line, like Liù’s spirit rising, and the rest of the instruments descending. It’s divine. Stopping there leaves everyone with their hair standing on end. It is a state of true catharsis. Maybe it could also end with the hymn to eternity that the choir sings at the end. But, of course, if we take out Alfano, poor Turandot, he would sing little.

-Puccini had a lot of trouble finishing the opera, he couldn’t find the ending.

-We know through biographies and thanks to letters that he wanted to do the great final duet between Calaf and Turandot. We know that and not much else. With the end of Alfano it seems that something is not closed, at least that is my impression. It is not understood how Turandot, while a few bars earlier he wants to kill all the suitors, changes his attitude in a short time. So, the magic of love can explain it.

-Half of the nine performances will be under your musical direction and the other by Carlos Vieu. What is it like working with three casts and another director? If the points of view of the work do not coincide, the work must be quite complicated.

-We met here three weeks ago, we talked and We have very similar views on some things and very different views on others.. But in the end, we both worked with the three casts. Then we mix everything a little. Clearly it is complicated, especially for the musicians of the orchestra, the choir and singers. But if we have different visions, like we worked together from the beginning, it works. The orchestra and choir are very receptive, as are the singers.

-What things come into negotiation yes or yes?

-The speed of some passages, for example.

-You are about to publish a book about Puccini, regarding the centenary of his death, what reflections did you have about his legacy?

-It is not a biographical tour that I did, because there are many biographies. I talk about his operas through his life and vice versa. Each chapter has a reference work and I tell what was happening to Puccini in that period, his relationship with the librettists, with Ricordi. And also his relationship with women and politics. He is a very modern character. Not much is known about his taste for art collecting, he was a patronand he also had an interest in cars.

-And for hunting. When he was in Argentina for a long time, they took him hunting in the province of Buenos Aires.

-Yeah. And the photos! They recently discovered the photos he took. He had a taste for image, an incredible look. Some, like those he took in Lake Massaciuccoli, where he had the island, are extraordinary. In others, more avant-garde, you see a composition with the shape of his shoe, his hat. And in his other house, in Viareggio, he was in contact with the architects every day. The house has very modern things for the time, such as an automatic irrigation system in the garden.

-How do you deal with the harsh reality that the number of women directing opera is almost non-existent? After 174 years, Simone Young will be the first woman to conduct Wagner in Bayreuth.

-Look, I started studying piano and my first conducting teacher was Piero Bellucci, a student of Leonard Bernstein. He was excellent. He never talked about the gender difference. I had no limitations. I realized that there weren’t many women, but I thought it was a matter of time… (laughs). Then I faced prejudice, Being a woman you have to show that you are prepared, three hundred times more than a male colleague.. I live with that in a very calm way and I think that I am working for the generations to come.

There will be nine functions of Turandot at the Teatro Colón, with three different casts. The first is this Friday the 17th, at 8pm. It is followed by Saturday the 18th (8pm), Sunday the 19th (5pm), Tuesday the 21st, Wednesday the 22nd and Thursday the 23rd (at 8pm), Sunday the 26th (at 5pm), Tuesday 28 and Wednesday 29 (at 8 p.m.).