Aria from Diva - Wilhelmenia Wiggins Fernandez

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Fernandez sings the aria "Ebben? Ne andrò lontana", from Act I of Catalani's opera "La Wally." The piece is a haunting reverie on the theme of traveling alone and far from home. Catalani died in 1893 of consumption at the age of 39, only a year after the triumphant premiere of "La Wally" at La Scala.

This performance plays a prominent role in the 1981 French romantic thriller, "Diva" - and is an excerpt from the DVD. Roger Ebert, film critic for the Chicago Sun Times, rates the movie 5 stars out of 5.

This was one of the most frequently "favorited" videos on BestArts.

The opera, based on a German novel, has a libretto by the young Luigi Illica, who went on to collaborate on the texts for "La Boheme," "Tosca" and "Madama Butterfly." It tells of a wild, headstrong Swiss mountain girl who loves one local huntsman and is loved by another. Eventually she wins her true love, the pair embraces high in the Alps, an avalanche entombs the hero and she leaps after him to her snowy death.

The libretto for the opera is available (in Italian) at http://www.karadar.com/Librettos/catalani_wally.html

A plot summary of the opera is available in English at http://www.spikesworld.spike-jamie.com/opera/LA%20WALLY.pdf

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