★★★★☆
This week Plácido Domingo turned 78, and on Wednesday night he sang his 29th role for the Royal Opera. No longer the hero or the love interest, and taking baritone rather than tenor roles, Domingo was hailed with an ovation worthy of a star at his curtain call after singing the part of the repressive Giorgio Germont in Verdi’s La traviata. Domingo also appears in the cinema broadcast on January 30, allowing fans more of a chance to see what could be his final staged performance at Covent Garden.
Although don’t bet on it. What began as a baritonal experiment for the Spanish singer as retirement approached has become a strange, lingering twilight. On the Royal Opera House stage the prompter’s box was