blood wedding
La Cieca hears from several authoritative sources that Diana Damrau will sing the autumn revival of Lucia di Lammermoor at the Met, replacing the gravid Anna Netrebko.
La Cieca at this point can only image the wattage of the dramatic sparks to be generated between la Damrau and her Edgardo, Rolando Villazón!
UPDATE: Although there’s no audio of Damrau singing Lucia (the Met production will be her role debut), here’s something in a neighboring Fach:
Villazon should be replaced as Don Carlo in London. Singing that role might be vocal suicide for him. Kaufmann wouldn’t be ideal for the role, but who would?
Villazon sang Don Carlo in Amsterdam in 2005, a performance out on dvd. He sounded fine but his acting makes me want to take over for Phillip and get rid of him. This Willy Decker production took some heat for the ending (among other things) but given Villazon’s over the top Carlos, it was strangely apt.
Kaufmann is doing the first revival of the London Don Carlos. The historical Carlos was mentally unbalanced (inbreeding – like his cousin Dom Sebastian in Portugal) so Decker had Villazon play the part that way, though Villazon does tend to be a bit hyper whatever part he takes.
Gualtier – Nebsie’s London Times interview was in January, the Boheme filming in February – all they are doing is miming to their recording so they might not need to speak at all!
I doubt if Kaufmann will be free to replace Rolando if he drops out of the London Don Carlo in June, but he is definitely doing the revival. You Americans think Don Carlo can only be sung by robusto tenors like Corelli and Domingo, but Luis Lima sang it at Covent Garden and he and Cotrubas are absolutely heart-breaking on the dvd, more moving than Freni and Placi from the Met around the same time (even though Mirella and PD have more appropriate voices)
Are any of you familiar with Aquiles Machado? He’s been all over Gallery HD for the last month in Tales of Hoffman. The production is gorgeous, as is his singing, but I don’t like his acting very much. But he might be a good Don Carlo; not as big a voice as Domingo perhaps, but, as Redina pointed out, it doesn’t need to be sung on that scale all the time. I rather liked Richard Margison in it, with Galina Gorchakova.
Wow. Diana Damrau will sing her first Lucia di Lammermoor opposite Piotr Beczala. They are both fantastic. Wish I could be there!