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Carol A. Hess, Ginastera's Bomarzo in the United States and the Impotence of the Pan-American Dream, The Opera Quarterly, Volume 22, Issue 3-4, Summer-Autumn 2006, Pages 459–476, https://doi.org/10.1093/oq/kbl016
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Scene XI of Bomarzo, by the Argentine composer Alberto Ginastera, finds the humpbacked Duke of Bomarzo alone on his wedding night. Having failed—not for the first time—to realize his manhood, he now thrills to an erotic dream in which the physical repulsiveness, effeminacy, and impotence that have plagued his existence temporarily vanish. To complement the Duke's unfolding fantasy, Ginastera offers a ballet “en tempo [sic] aleatorio.” (See Ex. 1.) While dancers writhe in semidarkness, the chorus, stationed in the orchestra pit, sighs on indeterminate pitches, alternating with the percussion. Their only texted utterance is the word “love,” whispered, according to the composer's instructions, “in all the languages of the world.” As the climax approaches, the singers roam the chromatic scale with increasing volume while the percussion intensifies and seminude dancers mimic Bomarzo's frenzied fantasy.
This passage, which combines music, gesture, text, and erotic fantasy within circumscribed chance procedures, deftly sums up some of the paradoxes in Bomarzo. Much the way sexual fulfillment eludes the protagonist, Ginastera's second opera has ultimately failed to satisfy. Yet Bomarzo seemed initially destined for success. At its world premiere in Washington on May 19, 1967, it was warmly applauded. Unlike many a twentieth-century opera, Bomarzo was also deemed commercially viable: during the Washington run, CBS “rushed [in] a recording crew” and issued a three-record set.1 Months later, however, Bomarzo was banned at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires by the military regime of Juan Carlos Onganía, in power since June 1966. The reason given was its explicitly sexual content. The banning only piqued curiosity about Bomarzo in the United States, and on the eve of the New York City Opera's performance, in March 1968, interest was running high.2 Yet Bomarzo fell flat. Unlike their counterparts in Washington, New York's critics tagged it as dramatically unpersuasive and musically fallow; in fact, the two critical contingents might as well have been discussing different works. Subsequent performances of Bomarzo, both in the United States and elsewhere, have been few and far between.3
