Virginia Zeani, who died on 20 March at age 97, proved that with innate talent honed by ideal training, a lyric soprano may conquer posterity despite career mishaps.
The Romanian had a voice of alluring texture, which she suggested was influenced by hearing Romani violinists in Solovăstru, her Transylvanian village.
She developed a sinuous aural expression of dor, a Romanian word evoking longing for an absent beloved. Her rueful, yet expressive soft singing made arias such as ‘Caro Nome’ a continuity of emotional expression, rather than the customary coloratura chirping.
Likewise, Zeani was able to look and sound convincingly irked when asking pointed operatic questions about why she, as Tosca or Violetta, was doomed to suffer. Other key roles ranged from Elisabetta, Elvira, and perhaps most famously, Blanche de la…
