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Since we in New York are not going to hear Rolando Villazon until (at the earliest) April 8, La Cieca thought it would be interesting to share a recent document of his singing. Here’s a scene from Act 3 of Werther, as sung in Paris earlier this month.
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/1EpdcOzw8o4" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
(Thanks, tenore23!)
I bought the CD and I am listening to it right now. Some thoughts on it — Tamerlano’s “Ciel e terra” …who thought this was a good idea? I’m all for Villazón exploring new repertoire (and potentially non-destructive repertoire)… he attacks it with dashing flair, but some of the interval leaps are rather ugly, and there’s a certain beauty that’s lacking from the whole affair.
The Serse “Ombra Mai Fu” left me cold, and “Crude Furie” is a mixed bag: his runs are faring much better than I thought they would, as are his trills, but the ugliness of the interval leaps is omnipresent. Tamerlano’s “Tu, spietato” … is just bizarre. Towards the end it becomes nothing but affectation and the whispering/whimpering tremulous voice he uses for the very end is simply off-putting. Congratulations, I guess, on trying to imitate a death rattle, but from “Fiamma…” onwards it just gets ridiculous, the dramatic intent getting in the way of the music.
On a bright note, he did quite a good job on the Serse “Piu che penso,” though at times it can be too forceful – some of the attacks are too violent, specially on grace notes, but the overall delivery is more pleasing than on the opening Tamerlano- I thought his cadenza was actually quite well done and, at moments, lovely. His Rodelina “Pastorello D’un povero armento” is quite lovely as well.
“Cosi la tortorella” and “Caro Figlio” from La Rezurrezione are good- the line really services Villazón’s voice and there is more beauty present in his voice at this point than there has been throughout the previous tracks in the CD, with the notable exception of the arias mentioned earlier.
The CD is definitely a mixed bag, so purchase it at your own risk.
I am quite sure that ‘leaks’ published here, before some Opera management wished to /or we forced to hold a news briefing to the ‘main’ Press on something they had wished to sit on: would be seen as a ‘threat’, Fair Play. You live in a bubble if you think music reporters don’t use such sites as ‘tip off points’/ The ploys to justify ringing and making ‘shirt-front’ inquiries they would be otherwise reluctant to do . Irking managements ‘part of their bread & butter’…. is a No No!’ On the other hand, how polite for a reporter to ring up and ask if there is any truth to…..’which what has just (accidentally!!) come to their attention on some website’? That way they cannot be accused of being rude or arrogant.
The Logical Tenor,
Here are some reviews. Perhaps,you should also listen to the excerpts on youtube and elsewhere and judge yourself:)http://www.musicalcriticism.com/recordings/cd-villazon-handel-0309.shtml
http://www.operatoday.com/content/2009/03/rolando_villazo.php
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/music/cd_reviews/article5939492.ece
Erda, I went ahead and bought it and listened to it. You can read what I thought about it at #261
Are we also not forgetting the advanced wizardry of digital recording editing techniques? I know of one powerful bel- canto voice that decided to do a recital of Wagner scenes, once. One piece they attempted, they had 18 takes ;or should we say ‘stabs at it’. Long gone are up to 25 minute recording takes ‘put in the recording can’.
The defense is of a principle. It is not about just Villazon, or Brewer, or whomever. I can promise you we are not Villazonistas, whoever they are. (I know, they have a forum in France.) And I am pleased to see I wasn’t moderated after all, because when I initially posted my thoughts, they definitely did not appear. Thank you, LC, though I really and truly won’t bother people here anymore, it’s too tiring and I am not accustomed to people thinking I am a terrible person. Anyway, maybe principles can survive. It would be nice to think so.
Has anybody else noticed the strange thing with opera covers today? Just look at the Amazon Widget here: most ‘mod’ covers are but of stars ‘ clumsy groping and hugging each other’, checking out each other’s possible bad breath.
Logical Tenor @ #261 – Thank you for your review of Villazon’s Handel CD. As I know little or nothing about baroque music and my technical knowledge is minimal, it was interesting to read your take on it.
Odnalor222 @ #247 – I’ll be at the concert in Amsterdam and I’m assuming you’ll be going to either Berlin or Hamburg, so I think we’ll miss each other again. Enjoy it, though – whichever one you’re going to.
And good luck with finishing your paper, Fair Play – perhaps you can get back to it now!
Straniera, I tried to be as detached as possible. I won’t call the CD a trainwreck since there are some very good things in it, but I couldn’t have called it a complete success either. I think that maybe some selections could have been replaced by others more suited to Rolando’s current state and the end result could have been a lot better.
Well, well, well… It seems that these fanatics claiming to be high musical authorities finally realized that the more they try to defend him on these blogs the more evident is their fear and the insecurity they feel to see his hero’s career falling apart.
They obviously don’t believe in his talent. If they did they wouldn’t care about comments, blogs, youtube videos, etc. They took on the task of defending him with such determination that it’s clear to see they are in panic!
Their war of words on this and other blogs has just made the snowball grow bigger. Good job!
As we can see, not only they don’t have musical taste but they are not very smart either. It was fun chatting with you!