Pearls of wisdom
“It’s the end of the world as we know it, remarks Betsy Ann Bobolink. “Word has reached House of Bobolink that in a recent experimental staging (unnamed, but you should be able to decipher the clues) not one character rolled on the floor, nor collapsed to the floor, nor even knelt on the floor!!! All characters behaved like recognizable bipeds; that is to say, they stood, they walked, they sat, some even reclined on furniture provided for that purpose.”
Clutching pearls, she continued, “If one of the most cherished of all operatic cliches is so rudely flaunted, can Extending-Arms-from-the-Elbows be far behind? Thank the Good Name of St. Sondra Radvanovsky, no such heresies are displayed in today’s Chattable offerings.”
11:00-3:00 LRT KLASIKA: TANNHAUSER from ROH. Johan Botha falls to the floor several times, an event which usually passes unnoticed. 2 F.K.
11:45-2:00 ABC CLASSIC FM: Parry’s JOB. Peter Coleman-Wright quite Wrightly spends most of his time writhing in agony on the floor. (No data to rate.)
12:00-3:30 SVERIGES P2: RUSALKA from Goteborg. (No data to rate.) The entire Ball scene is staged on the floor, with the dancers waving their legs in the air.
12:00-4:00 ESPACE MUSIQUE: MATILDE DI SHABRAN 2 F.K. Both Juan Diego Florez and Olga Peretyatko roll around quite a bit, and if that doesn’t send a frisson up your spine, you’re beyond hope.
1:00-4:30 WFMT American Opera Network: LUCREZIA BORGIA. 4 F.K. Fabiano’s on the floor as dictated by the script; Fleming falls to the floor in sympathy. There! Now THAT’S real theatre.
1:00-4:00 BBC 3: A RAKE’S PROGRESS from Scottish Opera. (No data to rate, but Edgar Montvidas shows promise) Lots of kneeling, groping, wallowing.
1:00-5:00 CBC TWO: A FLORENTINE TRAGEDY and GIANNI SCHICCHI from Canadian Opera. 2 F.K. Of course he’s lying down; he’s DEAD, Numb Nuts!
1:00-4:00 DEUTSCHLANDRADIO KULTUR: Schweitzer’s ROSAMUNDE. 2 F.K. If you haven’t heard this, it’s worth a listen. Features a parade of soldiers marching on their knees.
1:00-4:00 DWOJKA POLSKIE: LE NOZZE DI FIGARO from Verbier. 2 F.K. Having Barbarina crawl around is a nice touch, floor-wise; I mean, you don’t find lost pins floating in the air like gnats, right?
1:00-5:00 FRANCE MUSIQUE, also RADIO 4 NETHERLANDS: CAPRICCIO from Paris. 3 F.K. Just because they’re aristocrats doesn’t mean they can’t fall to the floor in an alcoholic stupor.
1:00-4:30 NPR World of Opera: LE NOZZE DI FIGARO from Glyndebourne. 2 F.K. It is de rigeur that the Count, Countess, Figaro, Susanna, Cherubino roll around in lust, but having Don Curzio skooch across the stage on his butt like a puppy with worms is icing on the cake.
1:00-5:00 NRK KLASIK and NRK P2: SIEGFRIED from Munich. 3 F.K. Dead dragon – check. Dead Mime – check. Sleeping Brunnhilde – check. All very proper. (Sleeping demi-goddesses suspended in mid-air, indeed!)
1:00-4:30 WCNY, WQXR: FAUST from San Francisco. 3 F.K. Everybody gets floor-time in this production, including Wagner, who has to catch the rat before he can sing about it. Kudos for inventiveness.
1:00-5:00 RADIO CLASICA DE ESPANA: Bernstein’s “Jeremiah” Symphony. (No data to rate.) Concert performances are difficult to put on the floor, but these folks manage. The sight of those trombone slides going up and down, up and down, will bring tears to your eyes.
1:00-5:00 RTP ANTENA 2: A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM from Chicago. 3 F.K. Titania’s on her Bottom, naturally.
1:00-4:00 WRR: LA CENERENTOLA. 2 F.K. Teresa Berganza was a notorious flooraphobe, so the stage was rigged with various tripwires to bring her into compliance.
1:30-6:00 BARTOK RADIO: PARSIFAL from Bayreuth. 2 F.K. (Burkhard Fritz is worth your time) Bayreuth is showing dangerous modernist tendencies by NOT staging this under a highway overpass.
1:30-5:00 MDR FIGARO: Concert featuring Chrysanthi Spitadi. (No data to rate.) I am not familiar with the work of Chrysanthi Spitadi. Can she be floored? Does anyone know? Or is that Czech for “No flash cameras”?
1:30-4:30 RADIO OESTERREICH: MIGNON from Geneva. 2 F.K. (Best show of the day.) A horizontalist’s dream opera; lots of writhing, rolling, mopping, swabbing. Bravi!
2:00-4:00 CATALUNYA MUSICA: Music of the Early Classic Period with Jaroussky, Lemieux. Philippe Jaroussky on the floor! (Be still, me heart.) With Marie-Nicole Lemieux ! Now there’s a non-event.
2:00-5:30 CESKY ROZHLAS VLTAVA: LA CENERENTOLA from Paris. 3 F.K. (for Camarena). Both step-sisters end up on the floor, dejected and defeated.
2:00-6:00 KLARA: LES PECHEURS DE PERLES from The Netherlands Opera. 3 F.K. Castronovo and Lapointe are on the floor during the entire opera — usually together. Massis does not lie down, but she does lean precariously at one point.
2:00-5:00 LYRIC FM: THE APOSTLES. 2 F.K. (Coote, Groves, Umbrailo are nice). No chairs out in the wilderness, so sitting on the floor is just about the only option.
2:00-5:00 RADIO STEPHANSDOM: Vivaldi’s ARSILDA (no data to rate). Not many people know that “The Red Priest” was a cover for Vivaldi’s REAL nickname — “Mr. Mirror.” At parties he would feign drunkeness just so he could lie on the floor for a better peek.
2:30-4:00 YLE KLASSINEN: Busoni’s ARLECCHINO. 2 F.K. It’s commedia dell’arte: you do the math.
2:00 -- 5:00 weta.org -- Verdi’s OTELLO -- Ecco il lyin’ around with Kassimira Stoyanova, Peter Sieffert, Franco Vassallo and the Vienna State Opera.
SOS — Recording aficionados. Can anyone help me connect to RADIO SLOVENIA TRETJI so I can get the CRNE MASKE by Mikaj Kigoj at 2:00 today? M. Croche wanted this especially, so I owe it to him to try.
Crap. I picked the wrong night to hit the bars in Taipei. This opera, rarely done up until now, is recommended to the 1920s-curious. I’ve posted commentary on it before, but someone else would need to find the link.
Kids, try this:
http://tvslo.si/predvajaj/v-zivo-radio-slovenija-tretji-program-ars/ra.ars/
And… I just found the story of this opera and I think I need to go wash my brain out now. Strange stuff.
http://www.sng-mb.si/en/performances-opera-ballet/black-masks/
I dunno, I’d consider the strange a plus. I think the major risk the opera runs is that the music isn’t strange enough for the Andreev play. That said, this performance is a major reconstruction of the opera, incorporating a lot of previously unheard music.
Espace-Musique MATILDE DI SHABRAN is at 13:00 not 12:00 un point c’est tout
PSA for parterrians in the UK: extraordinary bargains on iTunes. The Solti Verdi collection (AIDA, BALLO, DON CARLO, FALSTAFF, OTELLO) and Strauss collection (ARABELLA, FRoSCH, ELEKTRA, SALOME, ROSENKAV, ARIADNE) are available for £7.99 each.
Sorry, missed a couple- the Verdi collection also includes TRAVIATA and BOCCANEGRA.
why oh why can I no longer get the chat rm??? I am listening to Lucrezia B w. renay and m. fabiano and actually liking her and like him a lot. but I can’t get on the chat since summer began, even using firefox and googlechrome servers not to mention safari. any ideas? thanks.
Have you updated to the latest version of Java ( I believe it is ) I hadn’t and was denied access a while back. Then I updated and things were fine. It’s worth a try.
I am sorry that I was unable to chat today as I was busy picking kumquats.
I think Fleming was better in the Washington DC Borgia than in the San Francisco one (heard today). There was too much wildness and not enough bel canto today. Yes, Fabiano was good. The baritone (Kavaliow?) was excellent. Loved his cabaletta embellishments.
In the theater, Renee was perfectly awful, coloring by numbers at best. But the evening for me was a great success. Elizabeth DeShong was terrific as Orsini, fabulous Michael Fabbiano was, well, fabulous, and the baritone very good. The conductor, Riccardo Frizza, led a much more stylish bel canto performance than any I have heard lately in NY by Armiliato or Benini. The tacky production was no surprise, having seen it previously in DC, where I opted for La Rad (excellent) in the alternate cast which carried over piccolo Grigolino and a bland performance by Kate Aldrich.
Conducted in his usual way by Uncle Placido.
Johan Botha falls to the floor several times, an event which usually passes unnoticed
On the contrary, I should think the event would register in the bright red DANGER zone on seismometers around the world.
LOL, BB!
It would have to register at least a 9.0 on the Richter scale.
Hope there are no tremors in your neighborhood!
X0X0
Betsy?
“If one of the most cherished of all operatic cliches is so rudely flaunted,”
-- Not to be pedantic (mich?), but that doesn’t seem to mean what you think it means. Which is “flouted,” ja?
Not to seem like a person who would try to escape responsibility for a literary error (mich?), but have you ever seen Marilyn Horne extend her arms from the elbows? That’s flaunting, baby.
Jeez, what’s next? Spelling? Punctuation? Subjunctive case? If I were any kind of a was whiz I’d whir my way outta this whizbang whiz-wasser and float my flaunted flouts to make the flur fly.
And don’t try to tell me “flur” is not a word. It is the singular of that weather condition you get in the wintertime. I am getting tired of explaining that to people.
Hans Lick?
“Not to be pedantic . . . but that doesn’t seem to mean. . .”
Not to be pedantic, but I believe that your sentence has a misplaced modifier because the phrase “not to be pedantic” modifies the clause’s subject, “that,” when the subject who is not pedantic would seem appropriately to be “I.”
I saw Fleming sing Borgia at SF last season. She doesn’t just fall on the floor in sympathy. Her acting was very touching and powerful. What surprised me was that for the first part of “era desso” she is on the floor with Gennaro but then she starts to rise up as the coloratura picks up. Then as the music swells to her infamous cadenza (although she didn’t go up tp high G this time) she is on her feet almost cursing Alfonso with the colortura (because she blames him). Then by the end she slices her own throat with a dagger. To me it was the most powerful Borgia final I have ever seen.