Puccini Without Excuses: A Refreshing Reassessment of the World’s Most Popular Composer

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1. Bomojaz says:

   May 18, 2010 at 4:54 am

   Review by Bomojaz for Puccini Without Excuses: A Refreshing Reassessment of the World’s Most Popular Composer
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   This is an amazing book, at least an amazing book for me, because of what it’s done for me. I must admit right now that I’m not a major opera fan, not that I don’t like it, and not that I haven’t listened to quite a bit of it over the years – it’s just that my musical tastes lean more toward Louis Armstrong’s Hot Fives and Charlie Parker’s Reboppers. But Berger’s book was so informative and so entertaining and, best of all, so enthusiastic, that the bug he is trying to infect us with regarding the operas of Giacomo Puccini has infiltrated my system and sent me reeling.

   Berger is a radio host on NYC’s PBS station (which I unfortunately have never heard), and his book reads exactly like what a well-informed, passionate d.j. would sound like as he waxed fervently about his musical loves. The book reads as if it were spoken and meant to be heard. This is a delightful and most enjoyable aspect of the book. As he recounts the story behind each opera, Berger interrupts himself with commentary, as if speaking over the performance at hand or hitting the pause button on the CD player. And his comments are highly personal, though not arbitrary or off-the-wall, meant to keep us on target and focused, but not school-marmish. He “speaks” to us like an old friend sharing what he knows and feels.

   The book is a fairly thorough account of the man and his music: we get a brief biographical sketch, the operas (8 of them) in detail, recommended recordings, dvds, and books, Puccini in the movies, a glossary of opera terms and how they apply to Puccini’s work, and more. And everything, even the glossary, has the Berger stamp of authority and élan to it.

   So I’ve already started making a list of CDs based on Berger’s recommendations and until I can get some of them, have put my LP version of MADAMA BUTTERFLY with Erich Leinsdorf conducting Anna Moffo and Cesare Valletti (not on Berger’s list) on the turntable. That’s what Berger’s book has done for me: brought me back to the music of Puccini once again. Pops and Bird will just have to wait.
2. J Scott Morrison says:

   May 18, 2010 at 5:25 am

   Review by J Scott Morrison for Puccini Without Excuses: A Refreshing Reassessment of the World’s Most Popular Composer
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   William Berger has written a book for operatic neophytes (as he did in his previous books ‘Wagner Without Fear’ and ‘Verdi with a Vengeance’) who want to learn more about opera in general and about Puccini in particular, and yet who have little background with which to understand a full-length book about the life and works of a single composer. I am no operatic neophyte, but I learned much from this book and was completely engaged throughout, even when I was disagreeing with some of the author’s points. Make no mistake, Berger has a charming, informal, chatty style that sweeps the reader up into Puccini’s world. My only real complaint about the book is that Berger seems to protest too much about Puccini’s worth. He takes up the cudgels against those pedantic critics and musicologists who cast aspersions on Puccini’s artistic value. It strikes me that the neophyte is not all that interested in this battle in the first place and that this is a battle long since won anyhow. No matter, Berger gets in plenty of blows for Puccini, probably more than Puccini actually needs these days.

   The book has several sections. After a somewhat tendentious introduction, we get a chatty yet informative life and times chapter which also includes a description of what was going on in the wider world of opera and classical music during Puccini’s life. There are fascinating comments about, say, the relationship between Puccini and Toscanini in this section.

   Then we get a chapter by chapter discussion of each of the mature operas, beginning with Manon Lescaut and ending with Turandot. Each opera’s chapter has an exhaustive discussion of each scene of the stage action, followed by really quite wonderful ruminations on the musical and production issues of each scene. Berger’s comments are generally witty and almost always spot on. He also manages to include some of the gossip extant about various productions, singers, stage directors and conductors.

   Then comes a section called ‘The Puccini Code’ which focuses on the myth of Tosca (one of the weaker chapters in my opinion), ‘what one might expect to see’ in various productions, and a little coda called ‘Puccinian Permutations’ which comments on influences the various operas (and the Puccini style) have had on popular culture; think of ‘Rent’ and ‘Moonstruck’, for instance.

   Finally, there is a section in which Berger discusses recordings of the major operas, with comments about various singers, conductors (and he pulls no punches here) as well as some mention of DVDs and videotapes. He ends this section with a listing and comments about important books on his subject. The book ends with a glossary of terms (helpful for the neophyte, certainly, but without a pronunciation guide, which he had earlier supplied for the names of the operas; that might have been helpful. Can you pronounce ‘morbidezza’ or ‘Regietheater’?). The book contains a fairly full index. Editing and production values are quite good (although I suspect director Jean-Pierre Ponnelle and baritone Simon Keenlyside might have preferred their names be spelled correctly). The paperback’s cover features a blow-up of a photo of the young Puccini taken from a ‘musical celebrities cigarette card series.’ (!)

   I would recommend this book not only to the newcomer to opera but also to grizzled opera veterans who think they already know everything there is to know about Puccini.

   Scott Morrison
3. Rebecca Brown says:

   May 18, 2010 at 6:12 am

   Review by Rebecca Brown for Puccini Without Excuses: A Refreshing Reassessment of the World’s Most Popular Composer
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   Rebeccasreads highly recommends PUCCINI WITHOUT EXCUSES as one of the more unusual books you’ll read about the popular culture of the late 19th & early 20th centuries. It is neither heavy-handed nor trivial because William Berger has a delightful sense of humor & an engaging way of expressing his passion – opera!

   If you’re a movie buff, you’ll have heard snatches of a Puccini aria or musical interlude from THE GODFATHER III to MOONSTRUCK, & if you listen to any of this genius’ legacy: LA BOHEME, MADAME BUTTERFLY, TOSCA, & his other five operas, you’ll find the music quite familiar.

   You’ll find out why William Berger thinks Puccini is relevant in today’s world in his analyses of the eight operas, the last of which is the unfinished TURANDOT. & you’ll also find that Puccini’s life was itself worthy of… a soap opera.

   Even as I was enjoying the read, I learnt a lot — about the history of the times, music, collaborations & domestic drama. Bravo!
4. HL says:

   May 18, 2010 at 6:55 am

   Review by HL for Puccini Without Excuses: A Refreshing Reassessment of the World’s Most Popular Composer
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   Finally, someone has validated Puccini’s worth as a composer! While other attempts have been made at this, they tend to take an approach that is very objective and scholarly. While this is one way to approach an analysis of music, this book’s straightforward, at times downright blunt, approach is a refreshing antidote to the overly cerebral tone of many other books. Puccini knew all the ‘rules’ of composition and chose to ignore or modify many of them in order to get to the raw emotions of his characters and audiences alike. It has long been my feeling that anyone who claims not to enjoy Puccini’s works is either too caught up in academic snobbery or too afraid of his/her emotions to feel the beauty of his works. This book is a vindication for not only Puccini and his operas but for his fans and those who perform his works.
5. partmaudite says:

   May 18, 2010 at 7:32 am

   Review by partmaudite for Puccini Without Excuses: A Refreshing Reassessment of the World’s Most Popular Composer
   Rating:
   I would only recommend this book to someone beginning to explore Puccini who was desperate for a guidebook. With the exception of the useful biography in the beginning there is not much in here that one could not discover on their own by listening to recordings of the operas.
   
   I found most of the commentary shallow.
   
   Potential buyers should know that most of this book is a summary of Puccini’s major operas (Edgar is not included).
   
   Part Three, “The Puccini Code” is quite disappointing. I had hoped I would gain some deeper appreciation for Puccini but I came away unsure that there was anything I did not discover on my own.

   Sometimes, Berger could not help taking unwarranted strikes at Wagner. This is strange for someone who wrote a book about Wagner and certainly knows better than to resort to clichés about his operas. At one point he even suggests that racial purity is a theme in Wagner’s opera. If there are arguments to be made here, they should be made and not stuck in, unjustified, in a book on Puccini. He levels a similarly unjustified charge of racism on some of Puccini’s critics. Mispronouncing “Turandot” . . . “slightly racist.”

   My advice, save your money and buy recordings or tickets. Puccini’s brilliance is there. You do not need Berger to hold your hand through the process.
6. Tom S. says:

   May 18, 2010 at 8:09 am

   Review by Tom S. for Puccini’s Ghosts
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   An unhappy middle-aged woman, estranged from her family, goes home after many years for her father’s funeral. While putting his effects in order, she recalls the long-ago summer of 1960, when she was a reckless, dreamy 15-year-old. Piece by piece, memory by memory, we witness the devastating series of events that destroyed her and her world.

   This is my favorite kind of mystery–a psychological suspense story of the heart and mind. The main character, Liza, is a vivid creation, and her family is unforgettable. PUCCINI’S GHOSTS is a haunting, heartbreaking, peculiarly British tale in the style of Ruth Rendell and Minette Walters, by one of the best new voices in mystery fiction. (Her previous novel, HALF BROKEN THINGS, is also excellent.)
7. Beverley Strong says:

   May 18, 2010 at 8:51 am

   Review by Beverley Strong for Puccini’s Ghosts
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   Retired opera chorister, Lila DuCann, returns to her home town to bury her father, after an absence of many years. The unexpected grief she experiences causes her mind to slip back and forth between the present time and the time when, as a 15 year old, she took part in what was to be a local production of Puccini’s opera, Turandot. Her uncle George conceived the crazy plan of producing the opera in a large, local barn, using untrained locals as singers and musicians, with Lila’s mother Fleur, a former small time singer, in the lead role and Lila in the secondary female role. Fleur, always an unstable wannabe, sees herself as an undiscovered diva and behaves accordingly, while Lila discovers that she has an undiscovered talent as a soprano. Geoge introduces Joe, a friend from London, as the male lead, who immediately becomes the object of Lila’s first major crush. The ensuing fiasco highlights the entire family’s terrible unhappiness, and results in tragedy and misery all around. It’s not a happy book but is certainly a brilliant piece of writing.
8. J. Chad Davis says:

   May 18, 2010 at 9:05 am

   Review by J. Chad Davis for Puccini’s Ghosts
   Rating:
   Morag Joss’s previous novel, Half Broken Things, was a well-written, entertaining psychologic thriller from the alternating perspectives of an omniscient narrator and the primary protagonist. In that book, the protagonist was an elderly woman with significant emotional trauma from her childhood which was gradually revealed through the book.

   In Puccini’s Ghosts, the protagonist is an elderly woman with significant emotional trauma from her childhood which is gradually revealed through the book. In a nearly identical fashion to the previous book, chapters alternate – including changes in font – from the present to the past and change from the protagonist’s viewpoint to that of an omniscient narrator. In this story, the climax is significantly less compelling than in the previous book, and the prior trauma is likewise less attention-getting. While the prose is excellently written and entertaining, the literary device is identical to the previous novel while the novel itself is much less worthy. If you simply enjoy this type of novel, then it won’t be a waste of time to read it, but if you’re looking for something compelling and markedly different than the prior novel, this isn’t it.
9. K. Honsharuk says:

   May 18, 2010 at 9:53 am

   Review by K. Honsharuk for Puccini’s Ghosts
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   i found this book to be very well written and i think the author did a great job of evoking a creepy, sad and dysfunctional mood. usually that works for me, but i couldn’t wait for the book to end. i think the only reason i finished it was to find out what horrible thing befell the family, b/c it was clear something did. there was such buildup, i suppose the ending couldn’t help but be a disappointment. also, i found the style to be mostly introspective, and that became wearying after awhile.

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