The Sun.
London, England, 1864-04-27 00:00:00

THE ROYAL ITALIAN OPERA,

"Un Ballo in Maschera."
The loveliest of all Signor Verdi's operas, " Un
Ballo in Maschers," was repeated last evening at
the Royal Italian to a brilliant and delighted
audience. From tae stealthy opening of the Over-
ture, an opening that always sounds to us as though
it came burdened with muttered intimations of the
approaching conspiracy, up to the pathetic tumult
of the grand Finale, where Dake Richard expires
amidst the lamentations of his court, having been
struck down by the pistol shot of Renato in the
midst of the gay wild hubbub of the masquerade—
the Four Acts of tLis most charming lyrical drama
" went off " with admirable effect under the baton of
Mr. Costa. Yesterday being the second performance
of the opera this season, both orchestra and chorus
were brought into due subordination at last by the
potent wand of the conductor. 'There was no op•
portunity left for cavilling last night, therefore,
any longer at the over-zeal either of the instrumen-
talists or of the choral singers : as there had been
opportunity for thus cavilling on the first occasion,
namely, on Satnrdiy. And by this evidence (as it
were, upon second thoughts !) of moderation on the
part of the chorus and the orchestra, the principal
performers, no less than the composition itself, as
now rendered at the Royal Italian, were very con-
spicuously bentfitted. Mademoiselle Lagrua, for one,
was thereby enabled, quite unmistakably, to add
yet another leaf to the boy garland she is fast
winning for herself here in England—her Amelia
taking rank now side by side with her Norma
and her Leonora. It is in the tender lathes of it,
indeed, even a ye: more bewitching impersonation
at tin-es than the .King's Favourite, Signor Mario
again was in noble voice last evening, to the evident
exultation of a crowded house. So that it needs
hardly to be said, what we will yet say, that his
Riccardo was from the first a masterpiece at once
of acting and of vocalisation. His impersonation
of the Duke retrains still to this hour wholly and
absolutely unrivalled. The character in itself is
one of the most eminently dramatic within reach of
a prim° Lenore, and allotted to a consummate artist
like Signor Maria, one who is great as an actor no
less than as a singer, it wins our sympathy through-
out while it commands our admiration. A more
bewitching performance, again, than Mdlle. Battu's
Oscar, we have certainly not within our very recent
recollection. It acts with the charm of a spell
upon the usually sedate and undemonstrative
Covent Garden habitues. A most graceful page she
makes, in all the variations of costume and situation
—and one who sings the lovely melodies allotted to
Oscar not merely charmingly but deliciously. Ot
Signor Graziani we may here say, at once, that we
have never yet heard him to greater qdventage
than as the Duke's friend and secretary in the
lovely double of " Gustave"—this opera of Verdi's
Un Bale in lalaschera." Greziani's Renato in
the fourth act especially was just everything we
could in reason have wished. His romanza " 0
dolcezze perdute," in which he laments the lost
happiness of his undoubting love for Amelia,
was given with the most exquisite delicacy—
a delicacy all the more apparent in that
tender lament composed fur the baritone, inter-
woven as the articulated notes of the singer
are iu this romanza with the refined breath-
ing forth, almost, one might say, sighing, of the
flute accompaniment. As a matter of sheer neces-
sity with the audience, Signor Gretziani was, at the
close of the second verse, instantly encored. There
were several other encores during the night—
equally as a matter of course; but the ab
eence of one other, would have been a cause
of nothing less than bewilderment to us but that
the " sit uation"—as for that matter must be always
provokingly visible at every performance of " Un
Ballo in Maschera"—but that the "situation,"
we say, at the moment, precludes the audience
from following its instinct and demanding
a repetition. We mean here, of course, no other
than Oscar's delicious, warbling, riant " Saper
vorreste," with its trilling refrain, " Tra lit, ld, Id"
—sung in the midst of the dance and frolic
of the masquerade, immediately before the
assassination—and which e_quisite onorccau
was carolled lest night by Mdllo. Battu
with bewitching espieglerie ! The gem and
glory of this beautiful opera, however, has yet to
be mentioned—mentioned e mean, of course, in
regard to the rendering of it last evening at the
Royal Italian Opera. For, as to its celebration,
otherwise—who is not already familiar with
it? "It" here signifying that delicious quir-
tette, namely, at the close of the filth scene
of the second act, the quintette led off
by Riccardo's "E scherzo od e follia "—how
sung by Mario, those who have ever heard
him sing it will ricall, nothing less than grate-
fully, to their r emembrance! It is that superb quin-
tette, in fact, the very climax of the beauty of which
is capped, so to speak, by Oscar's impassioned cry
soaring above, piercing through, the chorus, in
sounds of dismay—
" B sara dunque spento
In breve a tradimento ?
Al sol pensarci l'anima,
Abbrividendo va
Armando and A,lgri, the conspirators, and with
those t wo the hag, Ulriea, participate with the page
Oscar and the Duke Riccardo in " rendering

this lovely concerted piece :—one of Signor Verdi's
most brilliant, as it is certainly also one of his
most popular cotapositions. Given as it was
last evening, it was redemanded with enthusiasm,
and listened to throughout, on its repetition,
with unabated Adnairation. Almost equally
effective—certainly as succeisful in proportion to its
merit—wrs the masterly finale to the third
act, where Renato takes his disgraced wife,
homewards from the moonlit field to the
jeering of the libertine chorus—

'We la trafoclia nautO in commedia
Placevolissnna ala 1 all ! al I

Of Mademoiselle Tag who was the Sorceress, we
prefer saying
nothing at all, for os Ulrica she
unquestionably tails to make any impression what-
ever. The rest of tha characters, being none of

them of any
importance, may be passed by without
being particularized. The opera, as a whole, is
put upon the stage with a minute regard
to its completeness, not unworthy even of the
reputation of this great lyrical establishment. The
final scene, or rather " spectacle," namely, the ball-
room in the palace,
superbly illuminated and gor-
geously decorated, filled with a radiant and ever

moving throng of pierrots, harlequins, punehinellos,
ballet dancers
.and masqueraders, some among them
sumptuously costumed, is, as an illusion, just
simply in one word, magnificent. The marvel to us
is, not that the opera should now have been re-
vived, but that two years should have been allowed
to elapse without any performance_at all of " Ua
Ballo in Maschera" at Covent-garden—knowing

full well, as opera-goers do, the ever-living charm
of the libretto, that is, of the mere story related
in the libretto--a btory that, once upon a time, one
might not unrfaionably have thought, that Auber
had long ago made his own exclusively, by royal
right, as one may say,
of his puissant genius as a
composer ! And out wonder that during the last
two years this Italian double of" Gustave" has not
been beard at Covent Garden, is.,not diminished, of

course, when we remember the lovely, fresh

and sparkling music wedded anew to the
old tale by the younger genius of Verdi—a
genius that (happily) shrank not from auda-
ciously daring a comparison, even of melo-
dies, with the brilliant Frenchman ! However,

after the lap c of these two yews the charming

opera is revived, and we are thankful. To•mor-
row, Donizetti's "La Favorita," will be repeated :

and on Saturday, for the firat time this s;ason, with
Wachtel as Jean ©t Leyden, and Madame Destinn

as Fides, the patrons of the Royal Italian will have

produced for them, as Mr. Gye's establishment can

Produce it, "Le Proi)Lte"—we were going to say
Meyerbeer's mast.rpiece, but that we have too

grateful a remembrance of his "Huguenots."

THE COUNT DE CHAMBORD'S STUD I—Fourteen
horses, said to belong to the Count do Dames, but
in reality the property of the Count de Chambord, have just
been sold at the French Tattersall's for the sum of 72,400 f.
One, a lady's horse, was purchased by the Duke de la
Rochefoucauld for 8,400 f, and another by M. Saldanha for
10,400 f. Theaverage prioe of the 14 amounted to not less
than 5,100 f,