Nie ward es zu niedrig gesungen!

The production of Beethoven’s Fidelio at the Theatro Municipal has barely survived the dengue epidemic. It seems that the whole season has to be rescheduled because foreign soloists preferred to stand clear of the risk of catching the disease. The results: a Cenerentola was cancelled and a Fidelio first said to feature Cheryl Studer and [...]

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Schäfer als Wandererin

How competitive is a soprano when we come to Lieder? Most people would not hesitate that low voices have a clear advantage in this field, especially the baritone, whose more spontaneous vocal production, less problematic passaggio and the darker tone colour the text in a more varied and immediate manner. The mezzo-soprano would take a [...]

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Risquées, but not really dangereuses

Those who have read Chorderlos de Laclos’s epistolary novel know that there is nothing univocal there - readers are supposed to use all their imagination to read between words the meaning of which rarely correspond to their face value. Those who saw Stephen Frears’s adaptation for the screen of Cristopher Hampton’s play based on the [...]

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More Mozart from the Met

If Mozart’s La Clemenza di Tito is now part of the repertory of the world’s opera houses, James Levine has had a great share of responsibility in it. He saw in Mozart’s last opera a “neglected masterpiece”, helped to make it widely known in a Unitel production directed by Jean-Pierre Ponnelle available on VHS, LD [...]

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Spitztentönen aus dem Seraglio

Mozart’s over-the-top-on-purpose Singspiel Die Entführung aus dem Serail has been performed only 67 times in the Metropolitan Opera House. Some might say that the German dialogues might have something to do with that; I would rather blame the impossible casting: something like the German version of a soprano drammatico d’agilità, a flexible lyric tenor with an [...]

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La fille s’amuse

I’ll be quite honest and confess I went to the Met tonight with a negative disposition. I am a bit fed up with Natalie Dessay’s recent interviews in which she tells stories about herself and her artistry different from those she used to give ten years ago (yes, I have a good memory…) and I am still [...]

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Tame Tamerlano

Tamerlano is probably Handel’s bleakest opera - the plot is so gloomy that even modern audiences may find it depressive: there are no light comprimario servants to make fun of their masters’ predicaments, the good guy is incredibly phlegmatic, the damsell in distress tries to save herself alone during the whole opera and even tries to get [...]

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Washington

As you could see, I was in Washington too, a city I had last visited in 1985! I’ve had a great time there - the National Gallery is a must-see: their Da Vinci is lovely, their Bronzinos are amazing, their Pontormo is probably the best one I have ever seen, the Vermeers are a classic, [...]

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