Marcelo Álvarez, a lyric tenor who at his best would not have the vocal bite or thespic intensity for a part like Luigi, was proclaimed to be suffering from a cold. He survived, but the crucial role was pretty much totaled. Blythe, like Greenspon or the valuable Claramae Turner with the NYCO, used to play the Trittico trifecta of La Frugola, the Principessa, and Zita. But she has withdrawn from the first of these, a delightful character which, if done with zest and imagination, can pick up a goodly stretch of the early going in Tabarro. Since for Blythe endurance cannot be the issue, it must be those inconvenient high A’s. So the assignment has been given to MaryAnn McCormick, who has them, along with a pleasing light mezzo midrange, but not (here we go again) the timbre and depth essential to the low phrases, or more than a scant idea of the part’s considerable theatrical potential.

Two down, one to go: Gianni Schicchi. Great little piece, with touches of the old commedia, not to mention the other Commedia, Dante’s divine one. And that’s awkward for this production’s update (to 1959, which would mean that Gianni is swindling Donati’s friends and relatives just as Marnie is cracking safes up in UK—is ’59 thievery a theme this season, or is there some sort of off-year anniversary?), since it stipulates that the opera’s action has to have predated the great Florentine’s discovery of our trickster/hero in Hell (and way down there, Circle IX!), i.e., before 1300 C.E. ^(I)  And here we have Placido in his latterday, faux-baritone phase. Yes, remarkable that his voice still retains its easy-listening midrange timbre and remains free of rime or wobble. And true, that when he caps the description of his scheme with a G at “à tale da sfidar“, he sings the best single male note of the evening.

Also true, that when he follows with the next wordnotes on “l’eternità” (the real musical and dramatic destination of the solo), it is anticlimactic in a way it is not with any good baritone or bass-baritone voice, G or no; and true that his tenor of course does not in this tessitura have the thrust to kick off an ensemble, proclaim authoritatively, etch the profiles of phrases tellingly, or create sufficient contrast between Schicchi’s tone and that of the faked Buoso; and true that interpretively he has always been a gifted generalist, not a specific delineator of character with either voice or body, and that Schicchi is a role that requires exactly those attributes. In short, it’s ridiculous to try to build a performance of Gianni Schicchi around this voice and this casually genial presence, and since everyone involved must surely know that, it’s cynical as well.

Atalla Ayan sang a clean, slender, generic Rinuccio, and Kristina Mkhitaryan a light, equally generic Lauretta, neither getting any sense of mood or tempo variation from De Billy. Blythe was again distinctly audible and energetic, though lacking any deep-mezzo or contralto-ish hue as Zita, and Kevin Burdette was directed into a cheap, campy playing of Spinelloccio. The basses, Muraro (Simone) and Philip Cokorinos (Ser Amantio), were capable.