Saturday's Matinée Performance at The Met - La Traviata

Over the years, 'La Traviata' (Music by Giuseppe Verdi, Libretto by Francesco Maria Piave) has been the most performed Opera by The Met. Thus, The Met has a rich Hertiage to uphold, every time it stages this performance. Sad to say, Sunday's Matinée Performance, described in such glowing terms by Margaret Junkwait and Ira Siff, fell far, far short of such standards. Not that the singers were not good. They were. Poplavskaya can sing Violetta well and the conducting by Noseda certainly showed a thorough understanding of the Score. But the presentation of the Willy Decker production, with Act 2, 3 and 4 all compressed into a non-stop/'let's get this over with' tempo left the listener uninspired by the deep emotion and meaning that Verdi or, for that matter, Alexandre Dumas fils had in mind. Perhaps one should remind The Met, if anyone is 'listening' that less is more can sometimes be deceiving and that sticking to basics may not be, after all, 'passée.'