St. Louis Woman
“I had a reputation that I was not easy to work with… But that was because they knew I was very professional, very correct and always, always successful.”
Only one diva could say that and not only get away with it, but make us adore her all the more. [St. Louis Beacon]
I’d love to hear La Bumbry’s Ortrud and Kundry. Seems to me those roles would have fit her like a glove.
Hans: Can I say how pleased I am to read your comment about Borodina’s Carmen? I wasn’t expecting much from the performance, but I found it extraordinary. I left the theatre that night thinking, “Well, I never have to see that opera again.”
dcrazmo and Hans: I saw Borodina and Alagna in Carmen ten years ago at the Met and was (suprisingly) blown away. I fell in love with Borodina the moment she stepped on stage and the two of them were on fire in the final scene. The audience response was huge.
kashania: It was really amazing, right? One of the most committed live performances I’ve ever seen. This lumpy Russian woman was suddenly and inexplicably the sexiest woman ever. And sang like a mofo to boot. Alagna rose to her level, and it was just great. Can’t imagine Garanca coming close.
dcrazmo: That was my first live Carmen and I’ll never forget it. Borodina was incredibly sexy. I also vividly remember Rene Pape’s Escamillo, jumping into the air while singing the high F in “Votre toast”.
That’s right, Pape, I forgot! And who says they don’t make ‘em like they used to?
I too found Borodina’s Carmen enthralling. To the point that I don’t remember who else was in the cast. Don’t think it was Alagna. Richard Leech perhaps?
Carmen is a role that surprisingly does not work based on the physical attributes of the singer. Resnik was terrific in the role too.
Interesting about Borodina’s Carmen. The woman has the most gorgeous mezzo voice of our time, but she has never struck me as having much of an inner flame — even though she was pretty damn good as superbitch Marina in that TV broadcast of Boris from, I think, Covent Garden, around 1990 — the first time I really became aware of her. I’ve always thought she was rather beautiful at that point in her career too,
By the way, Kashania, maybe Grace was moving a bit gingerly because her 3-D vision was compromised by Eboli’s eyepatch. In an interview she claimed that someone had asked her afterwards whether she was suffering from conjunctivitis. Or rather, CON-JUN-CTIVAITUSS.
@27 iltenoredigrazia : “Carmen is a role that surprisingly does not work based on the physical attributes of the singer. Resnik was terrific in the role too.”
Resnik was my first Carmen, in Vancouver, once upon a time, with Richard Martell(sp) as Jose. I remember her making a grand exit backstage with her tenor walking three paces behind, in a beautiful camel hair coat, carrying her luggage. I later saw her in a wonderful performance of Carmen at the Met, with her and Vickers colliding and sparking off each other as only the best singing actors can do. She may not have had the most beautiful instrument, but she was an excellent artist and had a long and varied career in more than one fach (after all…it’s just a matter of color and tessitura).
I did see Borodina as Carmen, several years ago in San Francisco with Cura, and wasn’t bowled over, but that was the season when the opera house was being renovated and they were in the civic auditorium, a barn, so that might have had something to do with it. She and Cura had little chemistry.