The Long Goodbye

The long goodbye - Music - Times Online

Domingo is back, but here and in our exclusive podcast he tells Richard Morrison about his plans for a life without singing

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The most famous face in opera is gaunter than when we last met, four years ago. But the charisma is undimmed. Plácido Domingo is back in town. Last night he received a Lifetime Achievement award at the Classical Brits, and on Monday he sings the title part in a little-known opera that Covent Garden would not have staged in a hundred years, but for one compelling reason: Domingo wanted to do it.

It is probably the 121st operatic role that the 65-year-old tenor has played onstage — estimates vary. Domingo’s professional singing career does, after all, stretch back nearly five decades: he appeared in the Mexican premiere of My Fair Lady in 1959. So how much longer can we expect that glorious, burnished voice to grace the stage? “I am far from indestructible,” Domingo says. “I have my difficult moments, like every performer does. And when age starts to seem important, singing isn’t so easy. Every morning that I wake up and find I can sing, I consider myself lucky. But the logical thing is that I won’t be singing in opera much longer. It is so demanding, vocally and physically.

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“I will conduct, and continue to direct the opera companies in Washington and Los Angeles. And I have my young singers competition. I will be in music always. But the singing? I don’t want to predict, but it must be close to an end. Maybe two or three years. Maybe.”

Even nine months ago Domingo might not have mused so darkly in public about the inexorable march of time. Last July he sang Siegmund in the Royal Opera’s Die Walküre and (with a little help from Bryn Terfel) gave Covent Garden regulars the Wagnerian night of their lives. When the performance was repeated at the Proms (Domingo’s belated debut there, surprisingly) the eruption of cheering, stamping and general ecstasy almost brought down the Albert Hall. “That night was amazing,” Domingo recalls. “The British public! They went crazy! It made me feel so fulfilled.”

Since then, however, Domingo has stuttered — for the first time in his life. Like the superstar footballers in his beloved Real Madrid he has been given a sharp reminder

that he is as vulnerable to the passing years as any other mortal. In December, singing Parsifal, another of the huge Wagner roles that he has taken up in recent years he had to stop halfway through a performance. Tracheitis, inflammation of the windpipe, was diagnosed.

It proved to be more serious than a sniffle. Domingo was out of singing action for three months: his longest break in 47 years. He had to cancel appearances at New York’s Metropolitan Opera in Samson et Dalila, and also the early performances of the opera he sings at Covent Garden next week, Franco Alfano’s Cyrano de Bergerac.

Then he pulled out of Die Walküre in Paris. Nothing to do with illness this time, apparently. Domingo cited "lack of time to prepare" for Robert Wilson’s avant-garde staging. Nevertheless, it hasn’t been the smoothest of seasons.

So why does he go on? Surely he must have played all the major tenor heroes and villains that even his prodigious vocal and dramatic range equips him to tackle. "Yes, every great role that I could have done, I have done," he says. "But I can still do new pieces. I have two coming up: The First Emperor by Tan Dun at the Metropolitan Opera (this December, staged by the acclaimed Chinese film director Zhang Yimou); then Daniel Catán’s operatic version of Il Postino in Los Angeles in 2009. I will play the poet Pablo Neruda. And I look forward to finding more little-known operas, like I found Cyrano."

Domingo came across Alfano’s 1937 score almost by accident, through his hero-worship of a great tenor of the past. "I have great admiration for the Chilean tenor Ramon Vinay, because he was a great Otello and also sang Siegmund, Parsifal and Tristan. I found out that he sang Cyrano at La Scala in 1948. So I searched the opera out and found I really love it. Alfano, who is better known for finishing Turandot after Puccini died, wrote beautiful music.

There’s a superb earlier work called Risurrezione (based on Tolstoy’s novel about a young woman’s degradation)."

Cyrano, however, is not the expected Puccinian outpouring of Italianate melody and passion, as Domingo recognises. "Remember that by 1937 Berg had written Wozzeck and Schoenberg had written Moses und Aron. Alfano was conscious of this new wave. OK, you can say Cyrano sounds a bit like Debussy, Dukas and some of the Russians. But Alfano is still himself."

One thing’s certain. The character of Cyrano — the poet with the conspicuous conk who sacrifices his own happiness to woo the girl he loves for his inarticulate friend, Christian — is surely one of the noblest in opera.

"Absolutely," Domingo agrees. "Even when Christian is killed, Cyrano stays loyal. He goes to see Roxane every Saturday but doesn’t tell her for 14 years that it was him writing the love letters. She only realises that when he’s dying. It’s a fabulous story, a tearjerker. I think that the public will love it."

And the nose? Will its size be a talking point? "Well, I didn’t want to look like Pinocchio," Domingo replies. "In the end we decided on a nose looking like mine, only bigger."

Was it Laurence Olivier who thought that if you got the nose right the rest of the characterisation would follow? "In this case," Domingo laughs, "that’s particularly true."

The most extraordinary aspect of Domingo’s achievement — his Protean ability to be the greatest Otello of our age, but also to pour his heart and soul into supposedly "lightweight" music such as Spanish zarzuelas — is symbolised by his two latest recordings (both on Deutsche Grammophon). One is of Parsifal: a stunning live performance done at the Vienna State Opera. The other is an album of luscious Italian and Neapolitan romantic songs, called Italia, ti amo.

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"Such beautiful, inspired melodies," Domingo says. Including, it transpires, one written by his son, Plácido Jnr. "Yes, he wrote it as a gift for Marta and me on our 40th wedding anniversary. Because he wrote it in Italian, we decided to put it on this recording."

Domingo notches up one more unique achievement this summer. The Three Tenors may be history, but he will be singing at the World Cup without Messrs Pavarotti and Carerras. That means he will have performed at five successive World Cups — "Like Lothar Matthaus and Antonio Carbajal, the Mexican goalkeeper of the 1950s," Domingo points out.

He clearly knows his football. So who’s going to win the Champions League, Arsenal or Barcelona? "Oh, that’s a difficult question!" Domingo says. "Barcelona is a great team but Arsenal have had a great campaign. As a Spaniard I support Barcelona, even though Madrid is my team. But what I really want is an attacking game. All this careful, careful play is a nonsense. A 4-3 result, without penalty kicks! That would be great."

Cyrano opens on Monday at the Royal Opera House, (020-7304 4000). www.roh.org.uk; Italia, ti Amo is released by DG; The Classical Brits will be broadcast by ITV1 on Sunday (4.45pm)