Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, CompleteVarious
General
Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete
Various
English wit and humor -- Periodicals
The evening of Saturday, Aug. 21st, will long be remembered by the
habitués of the Opera. From exclusive sources (which have been opened to
us at a very considerable expense) we are enabled to
communicatemalheureusementthat with the close of the saison de 1841,
the corps opératique loses one of its most brilliant ornaments. That
memorable epocha was chosen by Rubini for making a graceful congé to a
fashionable audience, amidst an abundance of tearsshed in the choicest
Italianand showers of bouquets. The subjects chosen for representation
were apropos in the extreme; all being of a triste character, namely,
the atta terzo of Marino Faliero, the finale of Lucia di Lammermoor,
and the last parte of La Sonnambula: these were the chosen vehicles
for Rubinis soirée dadieu.
As this tenor primissimo has, in a professional regarde, disappeared
from amongst usas the last echoes of his voix magnifique have died
awayas he has made a final exit from the public plafond to the
coulisses of private lifewe deem it due to future historians of the
Italian Opera de Londres, to record our admiration, our opinions, and
our regrets for this great artiste.
Signor Rubini is in stature what might be denominated juste milieu; his
taille is graceful, his figure pleasing, his eyes full of expression,
his hair bushy: his comport upon the stage, when not excited by passion,
is full of verve and brusquerie, but in passages which the Maestro has
marked con passione nothing can exceed the elegance of his attitudes,
and the pleasing dignity of his gestures. After, par exemple, the
recitativi, what a pretty empressement he gave (alas! that we must now
speak in the past tense!) to the tonic or key-note, by locking his arms
in each other over his poitrineby that after expansion of themthat
clever alto movement of the toesthat apparent embracing of the fumes
des lampeshow touching! Then, while the sinfonia of the andante was in
progress, how gracefully he turned son dos to the delighted auditors,
and made an interesting promenade au fond, always contriving to get his
finely-arched nose over the lumières at the precise point of time (we
speak in a musical sense) where the word voce is marked in the score.
His pantomime to the allegri was no less captivating; but it was in the
stretta that his beauty of action was most exquisitely apparent; there,
worked up by an elaborate crescendo (the motivo of which is always, in
the Italian school, a simple progression of the diatonic scale), the
furor with which this cantratice hurried his hands into the thick clumps
of his picturesque perruque, and seemed to tear its cheveux out by the
roots (without, however, disturbing the celebrated side-parting a single
hair)the vigour with which he beat his breasthis final expansion of
arms, elevation of toes, and the impressive frappe of his right foot
upon the stage immediately before disappearing behind the coulissesmust
be fresh in the souvenir of our dilettanti readers.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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