La Cieca wonders exactly when that would have come together since the soprano is booked for Don Pasquale through November 18 of this year, followed by guest performances of La boheme in mid-December and concerts at the start of the new year.

Does anyone recall if that Anna Bolena was officially announced? The closest La Cieca can find is a post on the Netrebko fan blog from November. The first officially scheduled Bolena for Netrebko is in April 2011 in Vienna, followed of course by the opening night of the Met’s 2011-12 season, but you all knew that.

And about the “odious” part, now honestly, “Miss Netrebko can never ascend to the dramatic vocal heights of Miss Callas vocally as Anna Bolena and accept this reality, however the artist may certainly equal someone such as Miss Scotto…. The Metropolitan audience who applaud even banal performances wildly, cannot be counted on to do so this time. There are effete knives out for Miss Netrebko in certain quarters of the city to make certain she will NOT be favourably compared to Miss Callas.” I mean, honestly.

1:00-4:30 BBC 3: The Royal Opera House Manon with the Venus-of-the-Steppes and Steps-on-his-Penis.   (Do I really need to list anything else?)

1:00-5:00 CBC TWO: Mireille from Paris.  Runner-up to Trovatore for the Confusing Opera Plot award.  It gets a better performance than it deserves.

1:00-4:00 DEUTSCHLANDRADIO KULTURE: Gretry’s Andromaque.  If you like things that are off the beaten track, but not so far off you can never find your way back again, this is a contender.

1:00-5:00 FRANCE MUSIQUE: Iphigénie en Aulide, Iphigénie en Tauride, Iphigénie in Brooklyn, Iphigénie Does Dallas, and If a Génie Meet a Génie Coming’ thro’ the Aeschylus.

1:00-5:00 NPR World of Opera: Pelléas and Mélisande from Duisberg.  Not a bad performance, considering that Ozawa conducts the whole show from his hotel suite in Munich.

1:00-5:30 WETA: Il trittico from the Castleton Festival.  For my money, the only serious rival to the Manon.  It will be interesting to hear what kind of show Maazel is paying for over there.

1:30-5:30 BARTOK RADIO: Francesca Zambella’s production of Christmas Eve, better known as Vakula the Smith, better known as I Cherevichki, better known as The Tsarina’s Slippers, better known as WTF Is This Crap, and not known at all as Happy Herman the Walrus Bender, this is the show that set East-West relations back at least a decade.

1:30-5:00 WFMO: L’elisir d’amore from Chicago.  Like an infestation of bed bugs, once Nicole Cabell and Giuseppe Filianoti get into your computer, you can never get rid of them.

2:00-5:00 CESKY ROZHLAS VLTAVA: Il trovatore from the Liceu, the infamous production in which everyone is nude all the time, including Fiorenza Cedolins.  Of course, you won’t be able to see all that on the broadcast.

[Interviewer] TS: Can you just explain what this World Economic Forum thing is?

AN: What?

TS: You’re an ambassador –

AN: I don’t know. They told me something, so I said, ‘Thank you, it’s great.’ I think it’s a great honour.

TS: But you don’t know what it is?

AN: I don’t even know what I have to do.

TS: I think there’s a conference in Dar es Salaam you have to go to.

AN: Me? Oh – I had no idea. Wow. I don’t know.

[pause]

TS: Is that a Chopard watch?

AN: Yes. These are diamonds that are sparkling. Chopard is beautiful, they make in such a beautiful style, but the jewellery I’m going to wear in Manon is not Chopard.

Best new production at the Met:

From the House of the Dead

Worst New Production at the Met:

Attila

Best Revival at the Met:

La Boheme

Worst Revival at the Met:

Der Fliegende Hollander

Best NYCO production:

Don Giovanni

Best “off-Broadway” opera production:

Il Mondo della Luna (Gotham Chamber Opera)

Best Performance by a Diva:

Anna Netrebko in La boheme

Worst Performance by a Diva:

Renee Fleming in Armida

Best Performance by a Divo:

Jonas Kaufmann in Carmen

Worst Performance by a Divo:

Marcello Giordani in Turandot

Best Performance in a Non-Diva Role:

Stephanie Blythe in Suor Angelica

Worst Performance in a Non-Diva Role:

Carlo Guelfi in Aida

Maestro of the Year:

Riccardo Muti

Einspringer of the Year:

Rachele Gilmore in Les Contes d’Hoffmann

Worst Night of Filth:

Tosca on opening night

And now the honorary awards (the “Lorgnette d’argent”) also nominated by you, the cher public:

• Best Bitch-fight: Luc Bondy vs. Franco Zefferelli
• Most Anticipated Cancellation: Angela Gheorghiu (not) in Carmen.
• Lifetime Achievement:  Charles Anthony
• Special Recognition for Outstanding Excellence in the Fields of Tireless Indefatigability and Persistent Proflicacy: BETSY_ANN_BOBOLINK

Libretto by Modest Tchaikovsky after the play “Kong Renés Datter” by Henrik Hertz

Iolanta: Anna Netrebko
Graf Tristan Vaudémont: Piotr Beczala
René, König der Provence: Mikhail Kit
Robert: Alexei Markov
Ebn-Hakia: Alexander Gergalov
Alméric: Andrei Zorin
Bertrand: Fyodor Kuznetsov
Martha: Natalia Evstafieva
Brigitte: Eleonora Vindau
Laura: Ekaterina Sergeeva

Musical Director: Valery Gergiev

Orchestra and Chorus of the Mariinsky Theater, St. Petersburg

Festspielhaus Baden-Baden, 2009

Iolanta

So if Marc Hervieux is your favorite new tenor, please don’t put me in the “crosshairs” just yet. I freely admit I have yet to hear him live. 

Mr. Herviex is French-Canadian and according to the insert his success almost sounds like a fairy tale. A “late bloomer” who became a successful pop star, he then crossed-over into opera with ease because, “unlike the recent crop of tenors who are pre-packaged for mass-market appeal, Hervieux has a true depth of talent that rivals that of any of the great opera stars on the world stage today.” (Oh, really?) There are quotes praising his “thrilling and absolutely first class” performances, and “his brilliant top voice.” He has evidently sung with Mehta in Israel, Gergiev in Russia, been a principal artist at the Met since 2006, and performed opposite Renée Fleming, Bryn Terfel, and Anna Netrebko.

Since I knew nothing about Marc Hervieux, I went to the Met Archive to see what he had sung there. No matter how I searched, his name never popped up. I then checked with friends who work at the Met, and they remembered him as a cover, but were unsure whether or not he had actually gone on, and you only show up in the Met Archive if you actually sing a performance. Digging a little further, I found a biography on his agent’s website, where it states that he was “on call” as Cassio at the Met.

That same biography describes a career that got off to big start singing lyric roles like Des Grieux, Hoffmann, Romeo, Faust, Rodolfo, Alredo, etc. More recent appearances include dramatic roles like Cavaradossi, and Canio. That would explain this CD; a lyric tenor doing what all lyric tenors do these days, trying to become a dramatic tenor.

In fact, the CD insert lays it out for you. It state that Hervieux “has the voice of a lyric tenor but, like Jussi Bjoerling, Giuseppe Di Stefano, Luciano Pavarotti, and some others of his illustrious predecessors, he is able successfully to sing tenore spinto. This is because of the relatively dark color of his vocal timbre, the richness of his medium [?], and especially his solid breath control.” That is all well and good if it were true. But on this new CD, Mr. Hervieux sounds taxed to the max by the demands of the spinto repertoire.

There is undeniably a voice here, possibly an important one, but at the moment it is all over the place. A warm, generous, middle voice gives way to a throaty, nasalized passaggio and strangulated top. There are indeed echoes of great tenors from the past in Mr. Hervieux’s singing. Unfortunately those echoes are from their declining years. Spread, effortful, colorless top notes remind you of late Di Stefano. He lunges and hooks all over the place like Carreras did towards the end, and he exhibits a marked tendency to drive the pitch sharp as Mr. Domingo has done for the better part of two decades. (And before I am disemboweled, I am talking about the later years of these great singers, not their prime.)

The solid breath control mentioned in the liner notes is nowhere in evidence. Phrase after phrase either fizzles or gets cut short because the singer runs out of air. His Italian sounds strange and unidiomatic. (Example, the word “mia” should have the accent on the first syllable (”MI-a”), not the second (”mi-A”). A phrase here and a high note there offer a glimpse of what the voice could be but isn’t.

I don’t know how much to blame conductor Yannick Nezet-Seguin. Aria after aria sluggishly stumbles by with no thought to musical shape or forward motion. Things do not improve in the three opera intermezzi that pad this already short– approximately 54 minute — program.  Karajan and the Berlin Philharmonic could make magic of the Intermezzo from Cavalleria Rusticana at a plodding tempo, but Nezet-Sequin and the Orchestre Metropolitain do not.

To sum up: Buy the new Jonas Kauffman German Opera Arias CD instead.

In years past, many people viewed the wonderful works of Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, and the rest of the Russian masters as inaccessible to the western world. The complicated language, demanding emotional intensity of the legendary Russian poets, and often vocally demanding writing can make for a deterrence to the singer considering such repertory. These works require an immensely talented singer, one with great range vocally and emotionally. If anyone had doubts that Anna Netrebko was any longer an artist of this caliber, In the Still of Night will lay those to rest.

In the interest of brevity I will not detail every nuance, every color and every perfectly crafted phrase that Ms. Netrebko uses to great effect in her recital, as the list would be almost endless. The only downside I can find in this performance is the occasional strain in her absolute top register, above A is my guess as almost all of these works I’ve never heard before.

But for all the beauty Ms. Netrebko brings to these songs, her voice is best in the story of a spurned lover begging for forgetfulness in the Tchaikovsky song “Zabit’ tak skoro.” Her voice is so well suited to heartbreak, and the hint of breathlessness that she brings to the opening makes the anger in the climax of the piece seem all the more desperate.

Every opera lover has their own analogy to Ms. Netrebko’s voice; I like to call it “dark-chocolate-covered honey drops wrapped in golden foil.” In this hour-long recital, Ms. Netrebko uses every color available in her shockingly large palette to its perfect ability. Every sound is drawn beautifully from the masterwork poetry, heartfelt and touching. I truly feel that the emotional commitment to these songs is unmatched in her previous work. If this is an indication of things to come I will be devoting many more hours to listening to her.

Daniel Barenboim has a feel for this repertory like few others in this world. His interpretations are playful, doleful, virtuosic, folksy, and all around wonderful. He plays every song as if he has orchestrated it in his mind, and you hear the colors of every instrument in his accompaniment. He supports Ms. Netrebko wonderfully, and together they exemplify the relationship between singer and pianist. One need only listen to “Sred’ mracnikh dney” to hear how expressive several bars of music can be, and how amazingly it can set the tone for the song.

After listening to this album I wondered, where’s the rest? Who among today’s great artists will have the courage to take on a Fischer-Dieskau like project of recording the great Russian songs? For a while I hoped Dmitri Hvorostovsky would be that man, but since his decision to move directly to Eurotrash I doubt his urge to record that kind of Magnum Opus.

I hope dearly that Ms. Netrebko takes the time to cement her legacy in recording the great works of her compatriots. Her voice and skills are uniquely suited to this repertoire, and it would be not only a service to her audience but her country to undertake such a project.

Conductor: Marco Armiliato; Mimì: Anna Netrebko; Musetta: Nicole Cabell; Rodolfo: Piotr Beczala; Marcello: Gerald Finley; Schaunard: Massimo Cavalletti; Colline: Oren Gradus; Benoit/Alcindoro: Paul Plishka.

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• Libretto
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The real-time chat is, as usual, over at La Casa della Cieca.

(Photo: Cory Weaver, Metropolitan Opera.)

It’s La boheme, starting right now, on Sirius and RealPlayer.

The real-time chat is the usual location.

Our Own JJ goes gaga for Anna in the New York Post.

An Austrian website thie morning reported  the rumor that Anna Netrebko is expecting again. [OE24.at]

La Cieca thought you’d never ask.  

Your doyenne is told that:

When Kate Lindsey rejoins the Bartlett Sher Contes d’Hoffmann next season, she will not only do battle with Ildar Abdrazakov, she will sing the Barcarolle with his Mrs. In other tangentially Hoffmann-related news, Aleksandra Kurzak seems to have disappeared from the 1010-2011 roster.  So sorry, Aleksandra!

But, to be sure, neither Anne Sofie von Otter nor Gerald Finley will be involved in the revival of Capriccio. The perhaps less capricious Sarah Connolly and Russell Braun are more likely casting. Meanwhile, Waltraud Meier will return to the Met for her first local Marie in Wozzeck — not Katarina Dalayman as was previously conjectured!

Mean, moody, mysterious Marina Poplvaskaya will be next season’s Elisabetta in the new Don Carlo production (conducted by yummy, youthful Yannick Nézet-Séguin). Fear not, Pat Racette fans: she’ll be “very involved” in Verdi, ya know.

Opposite David Daniels in Orfeo ed Euridice will be the debutante Kate Royal (or, as she is billed in Paris, “Kate Royal with Cheese.”)  Barihunk fanciers will squirm with delight to hear that Lucas Meachem will sing Mercutio, and Gesamtkunstwerk fans will want to watch for a “brother act” in the new Das Rheingold, the prima of which will represent only the third occasion on which these siblings have shared the Met stage.

Fans of Fabio Luisi (and who among us is not?) will exult in the news, er, gossip, that he will conduct new productions of Manon in 2011-12 (Anna Netrebko/Piotr Beczala) and Ballo the following season with Karita Mattila, a bit of casting after which La Cieca will editorially insert a “[?]“.

And if you’re wondering about the Rossini, do rest assured that Le Comte Ory will return in 2012-13.

Now, just in case you’re about to accuse La Cieca of usurping Brad Wilber’s traditional role of chronicler of the Met’s future, rest assured that the indefatigable Brad is still active in his guest spot at Sieglinde’s Diaries: Future Seasons at the Met. Not only is he active, but he is most interested in hearing any soupcons you, the cher public, may have to add to his trove of knowledge. In particular, he is looking for details about future revivals of La Sonnambula, Der Rosenkavalier, Giulio Cesare, and “any and all Mozart.” He’s also trying to fill in the gaps (five or six operas) that could fill in the 2011-2012 season. You can contact him at the email address on Sieglinde’s page.

It’s difficult to discern exactly what attracted Domingo this role. The opera comes across as a fairly minor effort (Alfano is best-remembered for composing some additional music for Turandot after Puccini’s death), and the title role is not one that offers vocal challenges or irresistible arias appropriate for a musician of his stature and skill. My best guess is that it was Cyrano and not Alfano that Domingo wished to be associated with. The opera’s story is a familiar and much-adapted one and the character of Cyrano is iconic, so perhaps Domingo wished to add his interpretation to the historic gallery of Cyranos that includes everyone from Kevin Kline and Steve Martin to José Ferrer and Gérard Depardieu. 

If Domingo is slightly less than credible as a master swordfighter, particularly in an awkwardly staged duel with his romantic rival-turned-ally Christian (a dashing Arturo Chacón Cruz), he is entirely convincing as a heartsick man tormented by his love for an unattainable woman. He handles the vocal demands of the role gorgeously, showing deep, rich colors and easily navigating Henri Cain’s French libretto and a score from the far perimeters of the standard repertory.

As Roxane, the woman Domingo pines for, Sondra Radvanovsky feels a bit like luxury casting. Her unique soprano sound can be so glorious in great Verdi roles that hearing her sing the relatively undistinguished, though plentiful, music Alfano has composed for Roxane simply makes the viewer wish she were employing her talents in a more vocally thrilling dramatic soprano role. She provides an effective counterbalance to Domingo as a lovely, expressive vocal and physical performer, and if she’s never quite heart-stopping in the role, it’s probably because no one could be. The Radvanovsky/Domingo romantic chemistry isn’t exactly Netrebko/Villazon ca. 2006, but it isn’t exactly Gheorghiu/Alagna ca. 2010, either; both stars are strong enough singers and actors to be thoroughly convincing while acting out the steps of a very familiar plot.

The production is tasteful and fast-moving, cleverly employing mirrors in a variety of scenes that keep reminding Cyrano of his physical shortcomings. A key scene in Rageneau’s bake shop makes effective use of supernumeraries bustling about with cakes and the big battle scene is clearly, if somewhat uninspiringly, staged. One often-used set piece — Roxane’s balcony, among other things— bears an unfortunate resemblance to a wooden parking garage and Radvanovsky is (literally) saddled with a floor-length baby blue bow/cape combo in her first scene that would be judged “too much” even at a Texas beauty pageant, but director/designer Znaniecki and costume designer Isabelle Comte have otherwise made safe choices that don’t distract the audience from the narrative flow of the work.

The problem here is that Alfano’s Cyrano de Bergerac is so musically undistinguished that a bit of visual distraction would be welcome. (Patrick Fournillier’s capable conducting, like the central performances, seems more distinguished than the music itself; his efforts with the Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana are reminiscent, in the score’s weakest moments, of, say, Miley Cyrus’s “Party in the USA” as played on a Stradivarius.) As it is, the production plays a bit like a sung-through Masterpiece Theater production with a higher-than-normal budget.

The two charismatic stars— well, two, plus a truly inspired false nose (which, like a silent film star, delivers its best work in close-ups) — make this DVD worth a rental; it’s difficult to imagine this opera being given a better production. But it doesn’t make much of a case for Cyrano as an unjustly neglected classic of the form — like the unfortunate-looking hero himself, Alfano’s opera is perhaps best-suited to dark, lonely corners.

Then the star tenor Rolando Villazon canceled the remainder of his 2009 engagements. Luckily Maltese tenor Joseph Calleja was willing to rearrange his schedule and make a role debut as Hoffmann.

Then Rene Pape decided not to sing the various bass nemeses of the titular poet, so Alan Held stepped into the breach. Then Angela Gheorghiu and Roberto Alagna finally decided to call it quits as the “love couple” precipitating the willful Romanian diva to cancel her participation in the new “Carmen” production with Alagna. The production’s Nicklausse, Elina Garanca was less than surprised and very likely delighted when she was called upon to don Gheorghiu’s mantilla as Bizet’s gypsy heroine and let her alternate, the talented Kate Lindsey step into her trousers.

[Gualtier continues, with a spoiler or two, you've been warned, after the jump]

So I wasn’t surprised when one source said that she was told “You won’t like the new Hoffmann and my other source said “the production is dark, stark and visually uninteresting” which sounded rather like that other unsuccessful production that opened at the Met just a few months ago…

Well, happily they are wrong. Sher said in an Opera News interview that his conception is part Kafka and part Fellini. The Fellini I could see but the Kafka didn’t seem a good fit. Happily, the Kafka comes in (rather watered down) as the bleak reality that Hoffmann drinks to escape from in Luther’s tavern. The sets are black and stark and the tone somber. However, when we shift into the tales of Hoffmann, the product of his absinthe-soaked imagination, Spalanzani’s workshop/salon is right out of Fellini with bright saturated colors, transvestite clowns and a surreal circus sideshow atmosphere. It works like a charm.

Sher’s very successful Il Barbiere di Siviglia also has rather stark plain settings mainly consisting of moving door frames, orange trees and a mottled beige back wall occasionally enlivened by a giant anvil descending from the ceiling. The success of the Barber is in his personenregie -- evocative stage groupings, inventive physical business, characterizations that are naturalistic but heightened with dramatic gesture and costuming and meaningful, real interaction between his principals. Much of same applies here.

During the orchestral prelude to the prologue we see Hoffmann in a drunken stupor on the floor beside a writing table strewn with papers. Various sordid characters from the later acts lounge in the background while the poet is clasped in the arms of Stella, played by Netrebko, sporting  a Louise Brooks bob and 1920’s flapper dress. During the opening chorus, Lindsey dressed as the Muse in a chemise and top hat enters and chides the poet for neglecting his writing in the pursuit of a singer.

The various characters move offstage and Stella also moves from Hoffmann’s arms into costume as a diva on an opera stage. The students file in to the tables and we are in Luther’s tavern. But the writing desk remains throughout -- even into the Olympia act as a reminder of Hoffmann’s true salvation -- his writing. The Nicklausse/Muse figure becomes the central figure in the drama, onstage throughout, observing and even directing the actions of other characters and seemingly able to be invisible when desired.

The previous Otto Schenk production (of which I was quite fond) had a very strong Olympia act but Sher’s version matches it. The atmosphere is often rather louche -- scantily clad showgirls in garters and pasties show up in every act except Crespel’s bourgeois Munich home. There is a use of doppelgangers -- sometimes there is a stageful of ballerina Olympias all dressed alike and Hoffmann also has a stageful of top-hatted Magritte-like doubles as well. Sher has some lapses in his direction as well. Notably, in the Olympia scene the doll sometimes moves like an automaton and at other times, mysteriously moves like a real girl. Are we to see Olympia as Hoffmann sees her through his rose colored glasses? Then Hoffmann needs to be placed in some kind of relation to her so that we are looking at him seeing Olympia. Also perhaps the lighting needs to be changed to a pinkish glow to indicate we are seeing her through the poet’s eyes. Sher’s use of the chorus (aided by some dancers choreographed by Dou-Dou Huang) is full of variety and life, enlivening each scene.

Whereas the colorful Olympia act matches most of the visual flair and inventiveness of the Schenk production, the Antonia act rather falls short. The set here again is stark and bare. The palette again is blacks and blues with just a few fly pieces -- one of a doorway and others of trees painted on a scrim -- with only a chair and a piano strewn with music (replacing the writing desk of the Prologue and Act I and suggesting the historical Hoffmann’s flirtation with his other muse, musical composition including operas). Sher does have a wonderful silhouette on the upstage scrim of a sinister carriage bringing Docteur Miracle on to the scene.

However, during the entrance of the ghostly vision of Antonia’s mother and then the final trio I was hoping Sher would flash the opera house interior again on the back scrim as Pressburger and Powell did in their movie version and Schenk did in the last production. Evidently he was afraid of repeating this touch so the whole finale is rather visually dull with Wendy White as the Voice of the Mother just strolling along upstage and then coming downstage. The entrances of Dr. Miracle in the Schenk production were tour de forces -- I vividly remember the athletic younger Samuel Ramey in 1991 materializing out of the deceptively solid-looking cloth scrim walls and suddenly appearing out of the fireplace in a flash of smoke and fire. No such feats were asked of Alan Held who just strolled in and out of the scene -- like Niklausse/Muse sometimes visible to the other characters, sometimes not.

The Prologue seems to be set in the 1920’s, the Olympia Act circa 1910 and the Antonia act seems to be in the World War I period. Oddly the Venice Act has the entire cast in full 18th century fig. However, decadence rules with nearly naked female supers in pasties, black-stockings and powdered wigs caressing each other. Perhaps this is a costume ball or else Hoffmann’s imagination has placed him in another historical era? Never mind, it looks good. At the end figures from Hoffmann’s previous loves re-enter the stage -- the dancing Olympias cavort with Giulietta courtesans. In the final tableau Hoffmann sits at his writing desk, surrounded by his characters and engrossed in his writing -- the failures of life transmuted into the glory of art.

Musically, the edition is the one Levine used in 1981 in a Salzburg production and repeated at the Met in the Schenk production -- the framework is Choudens with some Oeser additions -- including the trio for Coppelius, Niklausse and Hoffmann in Act I and the gorgeous “violin” aria for Niklausse in Act II. Spurious non-Offenbachian additions from the Monte Carlo edition of 1904 flesh out the Venice act (probably the work of Andre Bloch -- namely the tuneful “Scintille Diamant” aria and the catchy septet) which is placed last as Act III. Meanwhile more authentic material written by Offenbach and compiled by Michael Kaye in his scholarly edition has yet to be heard at the Met.

Levine seemed rested and more involved in this production than he was in the Bondy “Tosca” dress rehearsal where he rarely looked at the stage and only seemed immersed in orchestral details. Tempos were varied and appropriate and the orchestra played well. The singing was a mixed bag. Evaluation of the lead tenor will have to be put off since Calleja was announced as suffering from a cold and was replaced after Act I by David Pomeroy. The cold was not initially evident and the Maltese tenor sounded sweet yet robust. Later, Calleja showed some strain in a few high climaxes in Act I and apparently opted to rest up for the premiere and preserve his voice. Though this was a dress rehearsal most of the leads sang full-out except for both tenors.

From what I could hear of Calleja, his odd timbre -- reedy with a narrow vibrato in the middle which shifts into a sweet plangent top -- is well-suited to French music and his diction is quite acceptable if not idiomatic. Despite the narrowly focused sound, Calleja’s voice is large and fills the house without forcing. I noticed that he did tire in the upper register at the end of Act I and may have marked one or two high notes.

One of the difficulties of Hoffmann is stamina in a demanding tessitura over a long evening -- the tenor is rarely offstage. Successful Hoffmann’s have either had a baritonal foundation giving them strength (Rene Maison and Placido Domingo) or a very focused tone with pronounced heady ring girded by a sturdy technique (Alfredo Kraus and Richard Tucker). Only when Calleja is fully recovered from his cold will be see if he belongs in the latter camp.

Pomeroy has a bright generic American tenor with one color and dynamic but a reliable command of most of the notes. He seemed musically unsure several times, made some musical and linguistic mistakes and had to drop out of one big note in the septet in Act III. Hopefully, he will not be called upon to deputize for Calleja at the prima.

Alan Held is an artist who never fails to deliver a fine performance but also never quite achieves the recognition that his gifts deserve. He was fine as the Three Villains though this staging asks him to be much the same physically in each incarnation. His singing is secure and stylish and he always delivers the goods. Alan Oke though he got some laughs in Franz’s couplets in Act II failed to bring the gallic touch and humor to the four Servant roles that Jean-Paul Fouchecourt did so superbly quite recently. Oke’s voice is unmemorable and he fades into the background in his other roles. He also missed a crucial entrance in Act II.

Barihunk.com fave Michael Todd Simpson in his Met debut assignment sang Hermann and Schlémil but kept his shirt on leaving us to dwell on a rather ordinary vocal endowment. Veteran bass-barihunk (daddy division) Dean Peterson sang sonorously and well as Luther and Crespel.

The ladies are a mixed bag. In the final ensemble in the epilogue it was the voice of Netrebko that dominated the other ladies and reaffirmed why she is a star, despite the sniping and complaints you read here (not from our doyenne of course). Netrebko is more of an enthusiastic peasant type rather than the frail wilting flower and she displayed the most powerful female instrument onstage. She appropriately concentrates on the reckless passion of Antonia for music and love rather than her more morbid qualities. The concentration, richness and projection of that sound emanating from a plumper but still petite frame is a phenomenon of nature. The diction and timbre is more Mirella Freni than Ninon Vallin or Geori Boué but the acidic tang these sopranos were either blessed or cursed with (depending on your taste -- some wines don’t travel) is entirely absent from the fruity, round punch of Netrebko’s rich sound. Her diction is still not really clear or crisp but more accurate than when we last heard her in French opera as Juliette.

She looks gorgeous, tears the roof off in the trio, sings some lusty high D’s, fakes a pretty good trill by exaggerating her vibrato and walks away with the evening’s honors. Add in the distinctive vocal thumbprint and the personal charisma and say what you will, it adds up to a star. Frankly, she could and should sing the other two roles (transpose the Olympia music down a half-step) since it makes better sense dramatically and the Kaye edition offers a choice of coloratura showpiece arias for Giulietta.

Here the Met opted for a mezzo-soprano Giulietta, the Russian Ekaterina Gubanova who didn’t impress me in her Met debut role as Helene in War and Peace. Evidently she has scored some successes in Europe and England as Brangaene and Amneris, so I was willing to give her another listen. The tone is medium to large, suitable for Carmen and also Giulietta. The tone is attractive and dusky without being really memorable. Flatteringly costumed as Giulietta in corset and crinoline skirt, she seemed attractive enough without really suggesting fatal allure. Good enough but not really a tour de force. Borodina can sleep soundly!

The audience was more taken with the petite Korean coloratura Kathleen Kim, who also is jumping in for another cancelling coloratura as Zerbinetta in Ariadne auf Naxos this season. Kim’s sound has a nice soft roundness about it in the upper reaches and she sang some lovely chime-like variations in the second verse of the Doll Song. Her trill however is not pretty or well-defined. Her doll movements were well done but inconsistent -- probably to a lack of clarity in Sher’s direction. Ruth Welting and Natalie Dessay have outdone her in the physical acrobatics department. However, Kim’s youth and freshness won the audience over.

Kate Lindsey has impressed me mightily as Cherubino and Stephano, so I was happy to see such a plum role land in her lap. The tone has some of the resiny quality that the young Susanne Mentzer had and she commanded the stage in each scene. She gets a final star bow after the other ladies -- including weltstar Netrebko! This role should mark a step forward in her career -- a well-deserved success.

So to sum up: the jury is still out on whether Calleja has a Hoffmann in his dulcet throat. Bartlett Sher has produced a production that while it doesn’t always charm visually is full of dramatic detail and life. Netrebko lashes the sniping parterre chatters into submission with diva vocal delivery and the other ladies do nicely, if unmemorably. Kate Lindsey makes her mark taking one for the team and Alan Held shows why he is still standing while so many others have left the field. Levine seems back in form. The show is worth seeing and will probably improve with repetition as everyone except for Held and Levine is quite new to his or her role.

So, while you’re getting your radio tubes revarnished or whatever it is you do, put your mind on this, my dears. Shall the chat format this season be the comment-based one we have followed recently (which allows for archiving of the comment thread, and helps out parterre.com’s circulation numbers) or the “instant message” form we used in previous seasons?

Your comments and discussions on this issue will help guide La Cieca in her continued service to her cher public.  The complete broadcast schedule follows.

December 12 (12:30 PM) Puccini: Il Trittico.  Ranzani; Racette, Murphy, Blythe, Licitra, Pirgu, Lucic, Corbelli

December 19.  Offenbach: Les Contes d’Hoffmann .  Levine; Kim, Netrebko, Gubanova, Lindsey, Calleja, Held

December 26.  Strauss: Elektra.  Luisi; Bullock, Voigt, Palmer, Schmidt, Nikitin

January 2 Humperdinck: Hansel and Gretel.  Davis; Persson, Kirchschlager, Plowright, Langridge, Croft

January 9 Strauss: Der Rosenkavalier .  De Waart; Fleming, Graham, Schäfer, Cutler, Allen, Sigmundsson

January 16 Bizet: Carmen .  Nézet-Séguin; Frittoli, Garanca, Alagna, Kwiecien

January 23 Barber: Vanessa (Archive Broadcast from February 1, 1958).  Mitropoulos; Steber, Elias, Resnik, Gedda, Tozzi

January 30 Verdi: Stiffelio.  Domingo; Radvanovsky, Cura, Dobber, Ens

February 6 Verdi: Simon Boccanegra.  Levine; Pieczonka, Giordani, Domingo, Morris

February 13 Donizetti: La Fille du Régiment .  Armiliato; Damrau, Palmer, Te Kanawa, Flórez, Muraro

February 20 Strauss: Ariadne auf Naxos.  Petrenko; Stemme, Kurzak, Connolly, Ryan, Schmeckenbecher

February 27 Puccini: La Bohème .  Armiliato; Netrebko, Cabell, Beczala, Finley, Cavalletti, Gradus, Plishka

March 6 TBA

March 13 Shostakovich: The Nose .  Gergiev; Popov, Gietz, Szot

March 20 Janácek:: From the House of the Dead (performance from Fall 2009).  Salonen; Margita, Streit, Hoare, Mattei, White

March 27 Thomas: Hamlet.  Langrée; Dessay, Larmore, Spence, Keenlyside, Morris

April 3 Verdi: Aida.  Carignani; Papian, Zajick, Licitra, Guelfi, Colombara, Kocán

April 10 Mozart: Die Zauberflöte .  Fischer; Kleiter, Shagimuratova, Polenzani, Gunn, Pittsinger, König

April 17 Verdi: La Traviata .  Slatkin; Gheorghiu, Valenti, Hampson

April 24 Puccini: Tosca .  Levine; Mattila, Kaufmann, Terfel, Del Carlo

May 1 Rossini: Armida .  Frizza; Fleming, Brownlee, Ford, Zapata, Banks, van Rensburg

May 8 Berg: Lulu .  Levine; Petersen, von Otter, Lehman, Schade, Pittsinger, Morris.