Rossini: Guillaume Tell 11 years old

Guillaume Tell Recorded live at the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro, August 2013

The hero of this admirably complete August 2013 Guillaume Tell from Pesaro is homegrown maestro Michele Mariotti. The inimitable overture is (mercifully) unstaged and terrifically played, with splendid cello and flute solos: the fine standard never flags. Rossini’s extraordinary 1829 score audibly presages Meyerbeer, Berlioz, Glinka, Verdi and Wagner, among many others. Graham Vick’s direction privileges class conflict, with a clenched fist on the red-and-white forecurtain. The Edwardian costumes place Austrians in white evening garb; the black-clad Swiss polish the floor while the rulers savor a filming (much of that to follow) — the fisherman Ruodi, in a boat with a blonde and fake scenery, with Tell and his family providing tech support. Vick deploys geographical and historical kitsch liberally but not (always) pointlessly. Ron Howell’s pretentious, mannered choreography, however, beggars belief.

Credits

Rossini: Guillaume Tell Cast

Name	Character
Juan Diego Flórez He was 39, now 51 years old	as Arnold

Rossini: Guillaume Tell Crew

Name	Department
Gioachino Rossini as Original Music Composer. He was 220 (76) years old when He died	Sound