All-IN4Art with Aprile Millo

Aprile Millo [Photo: Beth Bergman]

In our latest letter from Florida, Robert J Carreras talks to the great spinto soprano Aprile Millo

"All things old become new again, and all things new...," whenever I repeat these words, I always attribute them to the Divine Miss M of opera.

“Art is long and life is short...Give it your all and God will reward your heart and soul.”

"If the Puccini work calls for two candles, there will be two candles.”

“You can sing along if you want…But don’t!”

"Viva Musica! And love to all of you who serve music...we are the archangels. Fly and soar above the clouds and take us with you."

"I like the elegance of the music – the open, the courageous, the decadent – the stories about people who are ready to live.”

"Tradition isn't a bad word...it is a bridge that binds all the generations of servants to the towering world of music.”

Get ready for it, trailing away from opening salvos, the raconteuse meets the eager ear of an adoring fan with her racontage. A story is not far behind.

Her fans have opera stories too, and they meet at the "Millo Pole" to tell them. In an April 2004 Newsday piece, Marion Lignana Rosenberg refers to her as “the high priestess of that old-time operatic religion.” Planet Hugill’s own, Robert H, puts shine on her as, “...one of the major spinto sopranos in the late 20th century.”

The opera-eminent Renata Tebaldi saw something of herself in her; and so, Tebaldi took extraordinary measures. Tebaldi was her mentor, advisor, and the two became close friends. In 2018, the Divine Miss M of opera received the Amici di Verdi – Verdi d’Oro Award; she is now on a list of 14 that will WOW your opera-eyes. The Verdi d’Oro Award is hers in honor of a lifetime of deep service to the music of Giuseppe Verdi.

Her every moment today is pestered by mind's eye pop-ups of how to improve on the old-world tradition of OperaVision D’Oro, her opera-education initiative and accademia based in Busseto.

I simply know her as the Divine Miss M of opera, …Aprile Millo.

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All-IN4Art

1.) ­Grazie mille Aprile. As part of All-IN4Art now, per favore italianita, help me become new again. Or old again?

* Please choose a word for the kind of day you want today to be.

Helpful or meaningful

* Aprile, wuz up?

I am in the incandescent city of New York, that never sleeps, prepping for some concerts next year, and several masterclasses…as I watch a rainbow-colored sky dazzle…as the sun makes its return home…leaving in its wake a canvas washed in colors only God could make.

Aprile Millo as Aida [Photo: Beth Bergman]

2.) In your experience with musicians, is there a level of musical talent that can only be understood as a gift?

I’m sure a talent such as Mozart cannot be classified as anything other than a gift, a proclivity, a prodigious understanding far beyond the years given.

I think all musicians and dancers – to some degree – have to be touched by something magical, to connect themselves and their life to the sacrifice, and to the polishing of their knowledge for their talent. Some are born with gifts that have to be developed, which of course is a privilege to watch. I believe all of those that seek to serve the arts have a special calling. For me, it was never a profession. It was a vocation.

3.) How can music effect positive change in the world?

By the very nature of a performance, we are forced to surrender collectively in order to enjoy a combined effort by a group of people, to give and to receive. There is nothing more beautiful than the exchange of information – sometimes beauty, sometimes truth – in that kind of a setting.

We are almost like children asked to suspend our disbelief, and there, in the dark, we listen and those of us on stage…we give generously. It’s so important to teach people to learn, by that collective endeavor, that people can give and receive…and that all people can find ways to communicate.

Only by all of us working together can anything be a success. And I think music is a direct conversation with the soul. By using, of course, the human voice…it is even more precise, as it is something we feel inside of us. The human voice would be the instrument most directly able to influence an emotion, especially as it carries a word and a sound to convey that emotion.

4.) You've been granted a wish to do anything life-changing you want for others. You can make your wish come true musically, of course.

* What would you do?

I would find…in some way…a message that would inspire everyone to see each other as family. To welcome each other and their differences as gifts. And to ignite in every heart, the death of racism and bigotry. Replacing it with curiosity and inclusion. All of God’s children are created equal. And God himself gave us choice. Who are we to take that away from anyone? That would be my greatest wish.

* Whom would you involve?

I’d like to find a way to bridge the gap between the wise elderly and the ambitious vibrant youth. If that can be done, then we bring the best of the past forward into the hope and possibility of the future. An informed future, not mindless uncaring and self-centeredness. I would hope that it be something to inspire everyone to gather as a family to make things happen.

5.) Aprile, do you believe there is a greater purpose to musical talent?

If one is very lucky, a musical talent can be of service not only to your community and to your profession, but to the world. I do believe in a greater purpose, because I believe that God has gifted us with music. Especially for me, music has been a way to bring peace, to tame the savage beast, to enchant with poetry, to give example through story, and to be something that excites and enthralls.

When you can elicit a sense of awe and exultation, you have been given a very great gift indeed. You lift an audience, a society, and possibly the world into a better humour…a sense of hope and a desire for beauty which oftentimes lends a timeless feeling of peace and the possibility of redemption. No greater purpose could you have.

Aprile Millo & Renata Tebaldi [Photo: Millo Private Collection ]

6.) In one word, please describe a classical music performance that eclipses all others.

That’s almost impossible – to just say one. I have been completely destroyed at a performance – in a good way – of Horowitz playing the piano…of a recital of Tebaldi, where you had the feeling that you were in a mythical world with a mythical creature on stage. And the love affair that was going back-and-forth over the footlights, could almost take your breath away.

I’ve seen Alicia Alonso and Rudolph Nureyev dance. On that same evening, I was privileged to see Baryshnikov.

Callas, on her last performance tour at the Shrine Auditorium. People were literally dangling over the boxes to catch a better glimpse, to feel close to her.

Perhaps the greatest performance I ever saw was in a little studio at Carnegie Hall with my mother and father, singing the duet from Cavalleria Rusticana. In that moment, I saw what opera could do through my mother and father…and the strength of their magnificent voices and personalities, and their incredible ability to disappear into the roles.

I watched and had no mother and father at that time. I only saw the characters.

I’ve never been so moved in all my life. And that afternoon, I wanted to follow the look of transfiguration on my parents’ faces whenever they did opera. I wanted to go to that world. The one that caused that kind of look…it changed my life forever.

* How does that happen?

Magic.

It’s the alchemy of a particular human being using their body and their experience of life and translating all of that into sound. The variations are endless, but the effect is absolute.

Magic.

* Take us to one experience of this in your life, only one.

It would have to be what I quoted above about my mother and father. Anytime they would hear music, their faces would transfigure. When they sang, they disappeared. They were no longer themselves. They were someone else. I wanted to follow my mother and father into a world that would cause that look of transcendence on their faces…and as I said above, in the quote above, they changed my life forever.

7.) Pick three classical music titans from the past to spend the day with.

Chopin. Verdi. Claudia Muzio.

* What would you do with them?

Exchange ideas. But for the most part, I would ask questions of certain pieces that they wrote, and what inspired them. With Verdi, it would be literally just being in his presence and…of course…asking many questions about what he would want. With the great soprano, I would love to explore her art and what drove her and what inspired her.

* What would you like to learn from, or about, them?

I would most likely tell all three of them their music inspired in me. I’d like to know their feelings about life, and more importantly how death transfigured them…both when they were alive, and now that they are on the other side. They already have given me a glimpse of paradise in their work. It would be incredible to ask them directly.

Aprile Millo & Luciano Pavarotti [Rosenbloom Private Collection ]

Finally, Divine Miss M of opera, tell the Planet Hugill audience anything you'd like...

I would like to send a message to all the young people who are striving to have a career. Be strong life-warriors. Be inventive like gladiators for the arts. Take every day, every person, every experience, as a color splashed across and onto their canvas.

That canvas is what is used to make more beautiful and more truthful and more exquisite sounds to carry your public to someplace special.

Take them far away from worry and pain, and give them a glimpse of a world they will not see until they die. Take them someplace and tell them a story they will not forget, through the beauty of your sound coming through the uniqueness of your human body and your human experience.

The triumph of the human body communicating emotion, in front of sometimes 4000 people…over an orchestra of 75 to 100 people – all without a microphone. The last bastion of human communication without a plug.

Could anything be more beautiful?

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La fine

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