La Boheme Arias

(please note this page is still undergoing construction - but, impatient as usual I have published it)

In an effort to get to grips with the famous arias in the operas I have watched I shall be dissecting the opera in order to gain a better understanding of these arias and hopefully finding translations and videos of the arias themselves. This will take some time as over the last year and a bit I have seen and enjoyed so many operas. I start with ....


La Boheme

(the above picture is ENO's La Boheme with Alfie Boe as Rodolfo, the very first La Boheme production I saw on TV .... in English)

Arias
1. Che gelida manina
2. Si, mi chiamano Mimi
3. Quando m'en vo

 

1. Che gelida manina

A sense of cold pervades Puccini's La bohème. Most of the opera takes place in the depths of winter, and its characters are poor young artists (or their mistresses) in 1830s Paris, struggling with lack of warmth as well as lack of money. In Act I a poet, Rodolfo, sits working in his garret on Christmas Eve but is interrupted by an attractive young woman, his new neighbour, asking a favour.
As they talk, she mislays her door-key. Conveniently, the lights go out; so they search for it in   darkness until, accidentally or otherwise, their fingers touch. And in this most  tender of seduction arias (that requires a tender top C) Rodolfo observes how desperately cold her hand is – che gelida manina – and how it needs his own to bring it back to life. Playing for time (the aria proceeds with gentle stealth), he tells her he's a poet whose fantasies have been hijacked by the beauty of her eyes. And then he asks her, somewhat late in the proceedings, who she is.

Rodolfo:

Che gelida manina!
Se la lasci riscaldar.
Cercar che giova?
Al buio non si trova.
Ma per fortuna è una notte di luna,
e qui la luna l'abbiamo vicina.
Aspetti, signorina
le dirò con due parole chi son,
che faccio e come vivo.
Vuole?
Chi son? Sono un poeta.
Che cosa faccio? Scrivo.
E come vivo? Vivo.
In povertà mia lieta
scialo da gran signore
rime ed inni d'amore.
Per sogni, per chimere
e per castelli in aria l'anima
ho milionaria.
Talor dal mio forziere
ruban tutti i gioielli due ladri:
gli occhi belli.
V'entrar con voi pur ora
ed i miei sogni usati e
i bei sogni miei tosto son dileguati.
Ma il furto non m'accora,
poiché vi ha preso stanza
la dolce speranza!
Or che mi conoscete,
parlate voi.
Chi siete? Via piaccia dir?


English translation


Your little hand is so cold!
Warm it a little.
What’s the point in still looking?
It’s too dark to find it.*

But luckily there is a moon tonight
and here, the moon is our neighbour.**
Wait a moment, signorina,
I will tell you who I am,
what I do and how I live.
Would you like that?
Who am I? I’m a poet.
What do I do? I’m a writer.
And how do I live? I live!
In my happy poverty
I fritter away all my great wealth
of poems and love songs.
In dreams, in hopes
and castles in the air,
I am a millionaire.
But now my great fortune
has been robbed by two thieves:
your beautiful eyes.
When they came in with you,
all my old dreams
and hopes melted away.
But losing them does not hurt,
because in their place
is sweet hope!
Now you know me,
it's your turn to speak.
Who are you? Will you tell me?

* looking for key Mimi has lost
** the attic flat is so high up

 Dame Kiri Te Kanawa sings Mi chiamano Mimi

2. Si, mi chiamano Mimì

Still in the dark in Rodolfo's garret, this is the young woman's reply. Her name is Lucia but, as she explains, they call me Mimì -  mi chiamano Mimì - and she claims to lead a quiet life as a simple seamstress, loving all things gentle and poetic. That seamstresses in 19th-century Paris tended to supplement their meagre income in other ways is, at this moment, beside the point: she presents as a paradigm of fragile innocence, and the brief resume of her life offered in this aria magically evokes the awkward self-awareness of a girl who finds herself an object of desire.
The way the music opens out when she describes the distant prospect of spring sunshine bringing winter to an end, suggests her quiet demeanour actually conceals a passionate, romantic soul. And sure enough, the aria leads into a love duet that closes Act I with the words, jointly exclaimed, Amor! Amor!

Mimi:

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?
Mi chiamano Mimì il perchè non so...
sola mi fò il pranzo da me stessa
non vado sempre a messa
ma prego assai il Signor,
vivo sola soletta là
in una bianca cameretta,
guardo su li tetti e in cielo.
Ma quando vien lo sgelo
il primo sole è mio,
il primo bacio dell'aprile è mio...
il primo sole è mio.
Germoglia in un vaso una rosa,
foglia a foglia la spio,
cosi gentil il profumo di fiore,
ma i fior che io faccio ahimè,
i fior che io faccio ahimè,
non hanno odore...
altro di me non le saprei narrare
sono la sua vicina che la viene
fuori d'ora a importunare.

English translation


Yes. I am called Mimì,
but my name is Lucia.
My story is brief.
I embroider silk and satin,
at home or outside on the street…
I'm quiet and happy, and
my hobby is making lilies and roses.
I love things that
have a gentle magic,
that speak of love, of springtime,
of dreams and hopes.
all those things that have the name of poetry ...
Do you understand?
I'm called Mimì, I don’t know why…
I eat my supper alone
I don’t always go to mass,
but I  still pray to the Lord,

I live quietly alone here
in a little white room,
overlooking the rooftops and the skies.
But when the thaw comes,
the first sun is mine,
the first kiss of April is mine…
the first sun is mine.
A rose grows in a pot,
I watch it leaf by leaf,
the scent of a rose is so gentle,
but the flowers that I make, ah me!
the flowers that I make,
don’t have any fragrance.
I don’t know what to say,
I am just your neighbour who has come
here bothering you.

Mirella Freni sings Quando m'en vo

3. Quando m'en vo' 

from Act II of the Italian opera La Boheme 

Setting : The Cafe Momus
Synopsis : Having spotted her occasional boyfriend, Marcello, Musetta

sings of how everyone always notices her beauty when she goes out. 

Musetta: 

Italian Lyrics - "Quando me'n vo"
Quando me'n vò soletta per la via,
La gente sosta e mira
E la bellezza mia tutta ricerca in me,
ricerca in me
Da capo a pie' ...
Ed assaporo allor la bramosia
sottil che da gl'occhi traspira
e dai palesi vezzi intender sa
Alle occulte beltà.
Cosi l’effluvio del desio tutta m'aggira,
felice mi fa, felice me fa!
E tu che sai, che memori e ti struggi
Da me tanto rifuggi?
So ben:
le angoscie tue non le vuoi dir,
non le vuoi dir so ben
Ma ti senti morir!


English Lyrics - "When I walk" or "Musetta's Waltz"
When I walk alone in the street
People stop and stare at me
And everyone looks at my beauty,
Looks at me,
From head to foot...
And then I relish the sly yearning
which escapes from their eyes
and which is able to perceive
my most hidden beauties.
Thus the scent of desire is all around me,
and it makes me happy, makes me happy!
And you who know, who remember and yearn
you shrink from me?
I know it very well:
you do not want to express your anguish,
I know so well that you do not want to express it
but you feel as if you are dying!

4. Donde lieta usci - From Here She Happily Left

Act 3 - Mimi sings her farewell to Rodolfo

5. Vecchia zimarra - Old Coat

Final act, Musetta has found Mimi on the street, very sick, she is dying, Musetta and the Bohemians all try to do their bit to find money for medicine and a doctor to help Mimi, Colligne decides he must part with his coat and sings this aria lamenting the loss of his favourite old coat - there are English subtitles with this video below, hoping it will remain on youtube as this recent run at ROH was my very  first live Boheme and one I shall never forget!!
My blog entry for La Boheme Royal Opera House http://annez-reflectionz.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/la-boheme-royal-opera-house.html