A little extra
Sometimes an encore outshines the concert preceding it. Such was the case at a recital last October in Parma, Italy, when the soprano Lisette Oropesa decided to add a fourth, unrehearsed encore to her programme. A problem loomed: the selection, ‘Sempre Libera’ from Verdi’s La traviata, requires a tenor, which had not been arranged. Sensing the impending void, Liu Jianwei, a music student from a nearby conservatory, rose from his seat in the auditorium and belted out the offstage tenor part, to the apparent delight of Oropesa and the audience. Audience video captured the moment and clips soon ricocheted across social media, YouTube and TikTok. Liu later met Oropesa backstage and offered what turned out to be an unnecessary apology.
The French word ‘encore’ (literally, ‘again’) first appeared in English in the early 18th century, used by audiences of Italian opera in London. It, complete with a blazing cadenza. Backstage, violinist Adolf Busch urged Serkin to perform an encore. ‘What shall I play?’ the 18-year-old Serkin asked. ‘The ,’ Busch replied, jokingly. The pianist took him at his word and delivered Bach’s entire work. Serkin later recalled that the only remaining audience members were Busch and his wife, the pianist Artur Schnabel and the musicologist Alfred Einstein.
