I love opera. To me it is the perfect art form, it has everything - drama, passion, glorious singing, acting, death, murder, vengeance, love, sacrifice - each opera usually has an amalgam of these properties and if you add to that singers on top form then the entire experience is simply sensational. Doesn't always happen but the chance of a glorious performance is always lurking and when it happens, then there is nothing better.
So when I was asked if I would like a copy of The Maestro's Voice I said Oh yes please and when I started reading it in the middle of the night after one of my recently restless attempts at sleeping, it kept me awake until the sun rose. I then finally fell asleep but grabbed it again as soon as I could and did not put it down until finished.
Wow, what a simply terrific read. I knew nothing about the author but see from the press release that Roland Vernon was the winner of the inaugural Daily Mail First Novel Award (mem: must get hold of his first book now) and he himself used to be a professional musician so he knows what he is talking about when it comes to opera.
"New York 1926: Rocco Campobello, the great tenor, one of the most revered entertainers in the world, collapses on stage. He emerges from this brush a changed man: a fallen but enlightened colossus. Casting off the mantle of celebrity, he embarks on ajounrey into his dark and sinister past which takes him back to his impoverished early life and to the city that made him: Naples"
Rocco remembers his father who he abandoned when he became an opera star, he remembers his childhood friend and fellow singer, who he betrayed and also abandoned, a woman he had an affair with who he left and ignored when she told him she was expecting his child - he returns to Naples to make reparation for all his mistakes in his life and in so doing, finds himself at odds with his wife Molly whose life is totally wrapped up in his and whose identity and self esteem depends on her position as the consort of the most famous tenor in the world.
There are also darker forces at work - Mussolini is rising to power, Rocco's old friend and sponsor Don Graziana, in reality a high ranking member of the Family, moves against him when he learns that the
tenor has decided that his career is ended. This coincides with the return of his son Bruno, who hates Rocco for being favoured by his father and who is eager to take over his position.
Rocco meets the widow of his childhood friend who has a young,handsome and talented son with a tenor voice who he, in turn, takes under his wing and becomes his mentor. Rocco then finds himself falling in love with the widow......
My goodness me, I thought, this is a true operatic drama with dark forces and jealousy, love and hate all intertwined. The book's narrative moves at a positive operatic pace, each scene seemingly aching for an aria, a duet, a trio, a tenor singing an impassioned love song, an orchestra in full flow. On comes the evil enemy, a bass, has to be and dark cello chords in the orchestra. It is wonderfully done and the writing is also like a piece of music, it enthralls and grips and urges you on to the final conclusion.
The musical background and the life of an opera singer is fascinating. All opera audiences, whether they will admit to it or not, are waiting for a singer to fail - will the tenor reach his top C? Will he be as good as he was in Trovatore in Rome last year? How much longer can his career last? His voice is not as good as it used to be, his vibrato is getting worse and so on and so forth. We are also pretty merciless about all this - opera lovers are pretty unsympathetic on the whole - we also tend to contrast a current singer with someone in the past, someone much better (Oh you should have heard Callas do it my dear....). The terror and hard work which all opera singers feel and do is well hidden from the audience and the life they lead, which appears glamorous to outsiders, is not so wonderful all the time. There is hard, hard work and the knowledge that somebody is going to come along and take your place as soon as you show signs of failure. So, It is in this context that we, the reader, feel the shock and horror of Campobello's serious collapse with which the books opens and the panic when it seems it may all be over.
I have said that this book moves forward like a four act opera and the final act is drama of the highest with the denouement taking place in the opera house itself with Campobello having to be the most cunning of them all to fool his enemies and to achieve his desire. (Thoughts of the ending of Godfather III came to mind when reading this section - that appalling ending is also in an opera house with the tension building up with the glorious music). By the time the reader reaches these final pages we are all with Campobello and we are willing him to defeat his enemies and emerge victorious.
And at the end, he realises what his talent has done to him:
"I tried to copy him but my father and I were different. He was master of his own soul. But me? My master was something else. I gave my life to the Voice, every ounce of me and so my soul withered away, a hollow little hell inside. With its own rats, eating away, spreading poison.......there's nothing left of me.....I have become an empty man"
It all appears to be too late.....or is it?
Stupendo Maestro....
