uprising at the koch?
La Cieca hears vague rumors from here and there that there something major is going to happen with New York CIty Opera this week, possibly as early as today. According to an insider over the weekend “wagons [were] circling,” perhaps in reaction to the admission that the company has spent down over 2/3 of its endowment in past months to cover last season’s debts and current operating expenses.
In the meantime, tickets for the fall 2009 season are not yet on sale.
squirrel, alto: Both of you mind your manners and remember La Cieca’s motto: “In meiner Villa hat jede Dame das Recht, sich zu verhüllen oder zu enthüllen, so weit es ihr beliebt.”
Sorry, Cieca. I had no idea I was being unmannerly by defending the right of expression by an earnest and first-time poster of heartfelt opera memories above, however prolix his/her word-count. I apologize if it seemed so.
Alto; not counting church basements and graduate school, three and a half.
First was at ENO in 2001. The second was at that little summer opera festival in Princeton, NJ that lasted for a while. The third was the same C Alden production but at Glimmerglass where it originated. The half was at NYCO.
Without going off topic and going on too long, I’ll just say that looking through the ENO program made me remember that I DID think it WAS musically fine and that the modern staging was effective. Sarah Connolly sang the title role.
I don’t have the NJ program anymore but remember Phyllis Pancella was Lucretia (very good) but that the production had tin foil and shower curtains in it which made everyone looked like a SNL Flash Gordon sketch. (Very bad.) It was also in the middle of a heat wave so the McCarter was like a sweat box.
At Glimmerglass Michelle DeYoung sang the title role, Nathan Gunn was Tarq., Bill Burden was MC, Christine Goerke FC, Eric Owens as Collatinus. I thought it was very good but by the time the Glimmerglass show reached NYCO (half) it just felt to me like the casting was more effective and the production more striking. That definitely had a lot to do with Monica Groop who I thought was far superior to DeYoung IN THIS ROLE. DeYoung didn’t sound comfortable singing that low for that length of time. (Vocally, I thought she was much better off as Venus or Branngena at the Met.) Groop is more of an alto, Alto.
I know that this will cause the clouds to part and for me to be struck dead, but I thought Nathan Gunn was ineffective IN THIS ROLE. He’s a very good and intelligent singer but everything about him, including the way he sings, reminds me of Clark Kent. Mr. Nice Guy not Mr. Rape Guy. INHO, Mel Ulrich was more effective IN THIS ROLE than Gunn. Ulrich’s voice is definitely NOT as beautiful, but it’s bigger and it has a snarly quality that worked better FOR THIS ROLE. Ulrich’s non poster boy presence also worked to his advantage.
In the hard cover, revised edition of my earlier run on post, I will change my sentence to read “ONE OF the best productions of the Rape of Lucretia I have ever seen†and give you a foot note. How’s that?
Mit Gefhul: I remain impressed.
Mel Ulrich has entirely retired from opera and has given up singing as a profession. Could not make a living. Very sad. I always liked him a lot. But he’s not gay, and that can work against one in the opera business, I’ve heard said! [just kidding] I do regret the loss of Mel in the profession.
I do think Esther will sell tickets. The reason I think so is the amazing turnout at Carnegie Hall for Antony and Cleopatra. No, not every ticket holder and subscriber came, but so many people showed their loyalty and patience after a lonely year of no performances. I think they’ll hang with NYCO. The Met is a wonderful place much of the time, but the core NYCO crowd is more proletariat. They’ll come. Interestingly, during the lonely Robin Thompson years (post-Kellogg), no one came to the Saturday night Traviatas and Carmens. That’s what happens when the Marketing Department makes artistic decisions. I do not believe NYCO will crumble imminently. I think Steel inherited a huge mess (not unlike our president), and everyone should simply let him do what he does best – fundraise and bring things in under budget. In his time at Miller, from what I hear, he put together a board and raised the budget more than tenfold.