stay with the tenor Airam Hernández At the door of the Liceo it is like joining a small party on Las Ramblas: almost all the workers of the house stop to greet you. Before beginning to stand out as a soloist, he spent six years singing in the theater choir. To say that he knows even the prompter, the mythical Jaume Tribó, is to fall very short. Now, the canary returns through the front door to play the Roman proconsul Pollione in the opera ‘Norma‘ of Bellini next to the Catalan Martha Matheu as the female lead. Marina Rebeka, Sonya Yoncheva, Riccardo Massi, Varduhi Abrahamyan and Teresa Iervolino also participate in the production, under the direction of sunday hindoyan.
Hernández guides us through the corridors, like Pedro through his house. Arriving backstage, we can start chatting about memories of him. “I took a leave of absence that I could renew annually, a maximum of five times,” he explains. “Every year they told me: ‘Airam, you know you’re not going to come back, right?’
An image of the rehearsal, an image of the production and the tenor Airam Hernández at the Liceo
Italian-style rehearsal time is approaching, the one that is done with the entire orchestra already in the pit, but with the choir and singers sitting on chairs on the stage, concentrating on the music and forgetting about the 1,200 crucifixes that surround them . I ask him if he needs time to vocalize. «With all the time we’ve been talking?», He answers me between laughs. He tells me that he usually warms up just enough, so as not to get too tired. “I think it was Kraus who said that we get paid to sing on stage, not in the dressing room,” he ends with a laugh. So let’s see the audience and the stage directly. Hernández must have left a good memory, because after his first intervention the choir bursts into applause for his former partner.
an emblematic opera
Singing ‘Norma’ is not easy for anyone. Added to the complexity of an opera is the enormous popularity of the title and the host of performances by figures as huge as Callas, Pavarotti, Sutherland or Caballé. In fact, Mathéu is the first Catalan to tackle the role on the Liceo stage since ‘La Superba’ did it, and the second Spanish: Ana María Sánchez, played the priestess in 2002.
Another Norma from this cast, Marina Rebeka, says: «When I talk to Marta Mathéu I always think of Caballé; the people of the south have this light, the sun in the smile». But he also points out that comparisons, as far as voices are concerned, are simply impossible: «The same singer sings differently from one function to another, what matters is whether what you do is liked or not, whether it works or not, because life is change. Mathéu nods, and acknowledges that «Norm’s is not an easy role, but I have felt very comfortable working on it».
Still, something about the celebrities that have come before them resonates in their voices. Airam Hernández, before accepting her first Pollione a few years ago, consulted with her teacher Mariella Devia: “I worked on her role with her, and when she gave me her approval, I accepted it.” As for him, Mathéu fondly remembers his classes with Caballé after winning the Audience Award in the contest that bears his name in Zaragoza in 2007: «He asked me to sing ‘Depuis de jour’ by Charpentier, because It brought back good memories.” At the end, she remembers Mathéu, hugged her and told her: «Sing with your heart and everything will be fine. You have an angel and you have to make it fly.
forest of crosses
In their staging, Ollé and Alfons Flores turn the stage into a forest with 1,200 crucifixes. Norma is still a priestess, just not from 1st century BC Gaul, but Catholic. The play, for the stage director, “is about the contradiction between the religious leader and her as a woman, a human being, a daughter and a mother” when he falls in love with her enemy, Pollione, and has two children with him.
The production by Àlex Ollé, commissioned by the Royal Opera House, culminates a season in which the Liceo has opted for local talent, with outstanding roles defended by voices such as Serena Sáenz, Elena Sancho Pereg, Sara Blanch, Joan Martín- Royo and Roger Padulles.