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Ulrica in Verdi’s ‘A Masked Ball’ (1859)
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Classical music's most 'Maleficent' women
12. Ulrica in Verdi’s ‘A Masked Ball’ (1859)
More pitiful than the average villainess, Ulrica earns her keep telling fortunes while dressed as a hedgehog. She tells our hero Riccardo that he will die by the next hand he shakes, which kind of spoils his masked ball. Maleficent rating: two normally, but that falls to just one when wearing the hedgehog costume. Annamaria Chiuri is pictured in a 2005 Leipzig production.
