parterre box

81 comments

• NYCOQ says:

  Mattila is just looking her age these days to me. She’s what 49 or 50? We keep forgetting that most public figures (read: Renee et al) have gotten a lot of work done. Especially living in a city like NYC it’s kinda hard to tell what 50 really looks like. It’s quite jarring when you visit other parts of the country and see what “real” middle-aged people look like and it doesn’t help when you work in “the business”.

  on March 6, 2010 at 6:53 AM
  • NYCOQ says:

    Not bitchy Cruz…she does look old. Add the pregnant thing in this production and her face looks waaaay beyond the child-bearing years. The lighting is atrocious in this production as well.

    on March 6, 2010 at 6:58 AM
  • rapt says:

    What? Only outside New York are there women who can’t afford “work”? This assertion makes me feel uneasy, with its identification of NYC with what must be a small slice of it. (Though I can believe that the assertion may well be true for the sample of people within “the business,” which may be what was really meant to be emphasized here.)

    on March 6, 2010 at 10:16 AM
    • NYCOQ says:

      Rapt…I would say the same if I lived in L.A. or any other area (read: Palm Beach, Miami, etc.) where plastic surgery seems to be de rigeur. Hell, the person I work with the most has had major work done and STILL will not step foot on stage without lifts as well. I guess what I meant to say is that one loses all perspective of what a natural face (or body) looks like these days. Looking at the paintings of Emelie du Chatelet she looks quite middle-aged. So I guess that was the look they were going for with Mattila.

      on March 6, 2010 at 6:26 PM
• rysanekfreak says:

  How’s this for synchronicity?–if that’s the word.

  I had The Nose on Sirius. The music had just started. I also had the TV on with no sound. And up came one of those Omnaris commercials with a picture of a giant nose just dominating the screen. I wish I could have frozen the picture and then listened to the rest of the opera that way.

  I was glad that the audience seemed so enthusiastic. The percussion section deserved a special bow. And Mr. Popov sure did sing high.

  on March 6, 2010 at 8:36 AM
• Regina delle fate says:

  The work Renaaay has had done is very convincing – at least from the auditiorium. I don’t know about close-up.

  on March 6, 2010 at 8:39 AM
• flamingopera says:

  Sad news: Philip Langridge passed out last night around 10pm. May he rest in peace

  on March 6, 2010 at 10:51 AM
  • armerjacquino says:

    Oh no. That is sad news indeed.

    on March 6, 2010 at 10:52 AM
    • Krunoslav says:

      I was just going to post this. Recently discovered bowel cancer, it seems. For all the complaining some of us do about unnecessary British imports to North America there are those who have never fallen into that category and he has been one of them. His work in PETER GRIMES, BILLY BUDD, DAS RHEINGOLD and MOSES UND ARON at the Met was outstanding. A *real* artist.

      on March 6, 2010 at 10:56 AM
    • Jay says:

      Terrible news re: Langridge, although nothing is showing up on Google, just a crytic Wiki link cites his dates as 16 December 1939 – 6 March 2010. But thus far there is nothing else online that I’ve been able to find.

      on March 6, 2010 at 11:01 AM
  • suzyQ says:

    Didn’t know that he was ill. Very sad indeed.

    on March 6, 2010 at 10:55 AM
• aloki miyeyi says:

  From Wikipedia:
  “Émilie also liked to dance, was a passable performer on the harpsichord, sang opera, and was an amateur actress.”

  What a temptation it must have been for some of our Matilla-denigrating parterrians to fly with that one! Alfred Hitchcock told Francois Truffaut that he kept a log of all the critics who wrote that his film was for the birds, and insisted that he named the film just so he could have that amusement.

  Here we see a very accomplished singing actress, who happens to inhabit the body and voice that she has, etching a detailed and riveting characterization while giving a certain amount of visceral pleasure from the sound of her voice. How dare she be so competent.

  Also from Wikipedia:
  “A crater on Venus has been named in her honor, ….” Such wags, those astronomers.

  on March 6, 2010 at 11:12 AM
• Blue Byrd says:

  This production is coming to Amsterdam in a fortnight, for a mere three performances. Looking forward to catching one of them.

  on March 6, 2010 at 5:40 PM
  • Blue Byrd says:

    Apparently, Mattila will only be in two of them; the performance on 20 March will feature one Karen Vourc’h. Can’t say she rings any bells.

    Any thoughts on Vourc’h? Any idea what to expect?

    on March 6, 2010 at 5:48 PM
• MontyNostry says:

  I think Vourc’h is a lightish French soprano.
  http://www.karenvourch.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=93&Itemid=94
  Love that apostrophe in her name. It makes it look like the name of an alien race in a Star Trek movie.

  on March 6, 2010 at 5:54 PM
• pernille says:

  Now why did they pick a woman who wasn’t REALLY a mathematician, but a physicist? ( And the tag is “sort of” wrong – it should be “physicists dancing in underwear”

  For a woman who really WAS a mathematician go to
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonya_Kovalevskaya

  Now I would love an opera about her ( it would be in Russian, of course, Swedish just doesn’t cut it) and Anna Netrebko could sing the role of Sophia/Sonya. We have the conductor and orchestra that can do it… all we are lacking is a composer – unless someone has an unknown manuscript by Prokofiev hidden away.

  on March 7, 2010 at 1:45 PM
• MontyNostry says:

  Surely a role for Maija Kowalewska, pernille.

  on March 7, 2010 at 1:47 PM
  • pernille says:

    Oh thank you for saying that!

    on March 7, 2010 at 2:29 PM
• pernille says:

  Listening to the clip from the opera, it sounds like
  Kaija Saariaho is not following in the footsteps of Sibelius, but is rather inspired by the sounds from the great Finnish shipyards!

  on March 7, 2010 at 2:32 PM