Proof of his lover’s betrayal is right there in his hands: a letter Luisa wrote swearing fidelity to another man.
How could this be? Rodolfo, the count’s son, has a hard time accepting it. He and Luisa were so in love. How could she betray him? How could she deceive him?
In the Act II, Scene 3, aria “Quando le Sere al Placido,” Rodolfo takes a moment alone to grapple with the news. But his mind keeps straying back to the quiet evenings they spent together, under the soft light of a starry sky. Her loving look, her hand in his — the memory is almost too much to bear.
“Allor, ch'io muto, estatico da' labbri suoi pendea, ed ella in suon angelico, ‘Amo te sol’ dicea,” Rodolfo sings. “Silent and ecstatic, I would cling to her every word. And she, in an angelic voice, would say, ‘I love you alone.’”
Could Luisa really have betrayed him? Tenor Michael Fabiano stars in Giuseppe Verdi’s star-crossed romance, “Luisa Miller,” streaming for free the weekend of July 31, 2021, starting Saturday at 10 a.m. Pacific: sfopera.com/streaming
