Weekend roundup
Our publisher JJ (so recently browned out in Queens) expresses his thoughts on the Lincoln Center Festival’s Grendel in his Gay City News review. La Cieca herself picks up the slack on the podcast desk with her presentation of the second act of Maria Stuarda on Unnatural Acts of Opera. Meanwhile, the endlessly inventive Billyboy ups the ante of gay sensibility when he imagines Judy Garland, Bernadette Peters, Carol Channing, Gollum and darling Roger Darling as the cast of an iconic 1980s sitcom — part of the most recent episode of The Entertainment Beat with Frances Gumm.
Oh, and this is something La Cieca just discovered on YouTube. When you think “adorably cute Rossini tenor,” your first thought is Juan Diego Florez, of course. But here’s someone to give you second thoughts: Maxim Mironov!
Cenerentola has fared really well on video. Between this production, the Abbado-Ponelle film (my all time favorite opera movie) and the production from the saltzburg festival with Ann Murray, we are really spoiled for choice. If only there was one suitable DVD of TOSCA…
D.I.T. — given the Algerian setting, I think he may have been signed by Cadinot.
Perhaps he’s just short on top and I can live with a few missng high notes to get everything else. Yes he’s a cutie but also the voice is perfect for this repertory. I think the conductor is on love with him!!!!
While he makes me want to drool on myself, the quality isn’t that great. I wonder if people would be praising him if it weren’t for his good looks. While the voice is flexible and coloraturized, the tone becomes bleated in some instances, and the high notes when connected sound a little nasal. Otherwise, like in the cabaletta, the sound becomes so pinched at the top, that it’s barely audible, almost “topless”.It’d be interesting to hear him in Bellini or Mozart.
My goodness….I remember back in the day when I used to wear that exact same outfit to the clubs! Seeing him like this is just like looking in a mirror.
Now…which Rossini multiple-tenor opera should we cast JDF and this cute little huggybear in? “Armida”?
“La Donna del Lago”? Of course, they have to wear jockstraps only.
An “Otello” in the buff? (I’ll volunteer to apply Otello’s bodypaint!)
If someone has already done the ‘Net searches, what will he be doing in the next few years…and where?
(Did anyone else see the San Francisco “Seraglio” years ago when Kurt Streit came out during the Overture and did a striptease down to tighty-whities? I want that director to start working with young MM right now.)
He is schedule for Italiano at Pesaro in August.
I’ll just say this, as someone who has had to sing in the nude, it’s very difficult to breathe correctly (he does have fairly decent abs!). So I blame the costume for the tension you hear. When you can’t take a full breath for fear of looking like a beached whale, something has to go. I’m sure he has a fine voice, put him in a nice shirt where he can let his abdomen expand and you’ll hear something different.
Nasal, bleaty, aspirated coloratura…..sounds like Florez to me. Oh wait, at least this guy sings on pitch!
I was going to say he sounds just like Florez too… The sound is just as tight and forced, with the same timbre to my ears. To operaguyny, I don’t think he knows how to release low and use low support. All his breathing seems to be high. The coloratura is aspirated, but it seems to be the norm these days with Rossini. Gone are the days of the Sutherland-type coloratura. I don’t think he has problems with the high notes per se, I got more of the feeling that he’s afraid of them… Good performance, yes, and what a dumb boring set. And yeah, I think he’s screwing the conductor…
P.S. – That facial hair is ridiculous. Maybe the conductor likes it that way…lol.
I think I have a new term for the latest Rossini tenors…necktie tenors….I know it’s a thrill for when they can sing this high, this fast, somewhat accurate coloratura (I’d STILL like to find a tenor that can sing a good trill), but I just wish for more even scale, ease of line, and pleasing to the ear…some of them sound like it’s a high wire act….
As far as Maxim is concerned….2 observations…there ain’t no WAY that conductor and him aren’t schtuping each other…and he’s cute..not close to my type…give me that cute, wide eyed, curly headed Peruvian Juan any day….or for that matter Charles Castelnuovo…latin luvers that can sing are MY drug of choice