#adriana lecouvreur

Angela Gheorghiu (Adriana Lecouvreur), Massimo Giordano (Maurizio, Conte di Sassonia)
© Michael Poehn / Wiener Staatsoper

Renata Tebaldi sings Adriana Lecouvreur (1961)

The aria proper is sung with exquisite grace, but the lines from Racine’s Bajazetare marred by two ugly aspirates: “Del sultano Hamuratte m’arrendo hall’imper.” Tebaldi would never have allowed herself such a thing when singing, but her diction curiously seems to fail her when she does not have the music to support her.