La Boheme 2 - Mirella Freni sings "Si mi chiamano Mimi", Scala, 1965

Rodolfo: Gianni Raimondi, Musetta: Adriana Martino, Director: Franco Zeffirelli, Conductor: H. v. Karajan

The most beautiful Mimi.
Text:

Sì.
Mi chiamano Mimì,
ma il mio nome è Lucia.
La storia mia
è breve. A tela o a seta
ricamo in casa e fuori...
Son tranquilla e lieta
ed è mio svago
far gigli e rose.
Mi piaccion quelle cose
che han sì dolce malìa,
che parlano d'amor, di primavere,
di sogni e di chimere,
quelle cose che han nome poesia...
Lei m'intende?

Rodolfo: Si.

Mi chiamano Mimì,
il perché non so.
Sola, mi fo
il pranzo da me stessa.
Non vado sempre a messa,
ma prego assai il Signore.
Vivo sola, soletta
là in una bianca cameretta:
guardo sui tetti e in cielo;
ma quando vien lo sgelo
il primo sole è mio
il primo bacio dell'aprile è mio!
Germoglia in un vaso una rosa...
Foglia a foglia la spio!
Cosi gentile
il profumo d'un fiore!
Ma i fior ch'io faccio, ahimè! non hanno odore.
Altro di me non le saprei narrare.
Sono la sua vicina
che la vien fuori d'ora a importunare.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Mirella Freni
• La Boheme
• Mimi

[uptilthesky]

It must feel like first love to go out with Freni's mimi, so sweet and innocent. The libretto can sound like some boring waffle from another singer, but Freni made it totally charming here.

[84years]

who can surpass mirella.This clip works perfectly ,its overtaken my mind.

[andreaandrewmilne]

This is fabulous! Illica and Giacosa's libretto contains such a mix of poetic vision and realisme about the games of love. It is not the Mimi is superficial or foolishly delicate, non non non. She presents a vision of the divine power and compulsion of love, as if from the lips of a votary of Aphrodite herself. Yet her tragedy is that she is fated to die, even though she is possessed of this knowledge, and so wants to share her life. This is a heart breaking conception.

[andreaandrewmilne]

I am a cynical gal, but I have to smile with recognition and at the same time reach for the tissues when she sings "Mi piaccion quelle cose, che han sì dolce malìa, che parlano d'amor, di primavere, di sogni e di chimere, quelle cose che han nome poesia...Lei m'intende?"

[andreaandrewmilne]

This is the song of love believed in by everyone who is really alive and so must invite another to share her heart. When we make love, it is this combination of delicacy, surrender, yearning for togetherness and heaven storming idealism that we express through our bodies. And it is entwined with our truly goddess-like capacity to make new life. When she sings of the pointlessness of being alone - "Ma i fior ch'io faccio, Ahimè! non hanno odore" - I am just weeping helplessly :-)

[andreaandrewmilne]

Anyway, of course she knows Rudolfo has hidden the key, and winkingly pretends not to know, then uses it as a pretext to linger to test if he likes to flirt with her, and then is overtaken by his passion, and then by her own torrent of unstopped love. The overall humour is that Mimi’s heart pours forth far greater poetry than the hapless Rudolfo has been able to scribble :-)

[andreaandrewmilne]

Which is why he is about to fall in love helplessly with her, rather than his abstract dreams or some beautiful eyes he might see on the street! Ha, she is the neighbour who in fact comes to bother him at exactly the RIGHT moment. Beautiful!!!!

[andreaandrewmilne]

Actually, Freni & Raimondi are classics, but I feel Netrebko & Villazon are even better, because they express the more modern oscillation between surrendering to transcendental affection, and almost disbelief that this is possible. Also because they look so cute, ones imagination is thirsting for them to be in each others arms to prove their love! That is one truth about being young - the power of attraction overwhelms metaphysical doubts about the veracity of love. Oh yes :-)

♥♥ andrea

[andreaandrewmilne]

@MariaCaIIas You are exactly right :-) ....as I try and say more fully in my comment above ♥ andrea

[MariaCaIIas]

@uptilthesky do you really think so?? I always thought that Boheme has one of the strongest libretti in operatic history... the play between apparent simplicity but in reality hidden complexity that it establishes for Mimì here is beyond beauty measures...

In fact it is so strongly matched with Puccini's infallible musical and theatrical inspiration that even boring Mimì(s) have been carried quite successfully by it....

what a bliss to have a real Mimì singing it here...

[MrPipposiculo]

Mirella Freni ossia , Mimì forever