“Tenor Domingo collects opera gong” [BBC News]
La Cieca is delighted to note that two of the best-remembered and most-coveted “Live from the Met” telecasts have at last been made available on DVD. Otello (25 September 1978) and Cavalleria rusticana/Pagliacci (5 April 1978) are now available at the Met Opera Shop and online at www.metoperashop.org, “as well as through other outlets.”
La Cieca’s cher public will be happy to know that both these releases may be purchased at amazon.com:
Otello really is a gem, with Jon Vickers in excellent form (a stray high note or two notwithstanding), a superb balance of passion and intelligence. The vocal and physical dignity he brings to the role firmly places the work on the plane of high tragedy. The Desdemona is (as you all know) Renata Scotto, in a part that is not a natural fit vocally — her timbre is narrow and steely where one would want a more plush sound. But to hear her phrasing a line like “Oh! come è dolce il mormorare insieme” or “Guarda le prime lagrime” is to remember just how specific and committed an artist she always was. (More, including previews, after the jump.) Read more »
Plácido Domingo answers some of the usual questions and reveals when opera is boring in the current Newsweek.
“In Adriana Lecouvreur, Domingo manages to portray plausibly a character young enough to be his grandson. He is the dashing Count Maurizio, who is entangled in a romantic triangle with the celebrated actress Adriana and a scheming princess. The count’s excuse for two-timing Adriana is perhaps the most original in the history of cheating. He’s planning an invasion of Lithuania, you see, and he’s financing the coup with a play-for-pay arrangement with the princess.” Our Own JJ reviews the Met’s revival of Adriana Lecouvreur in Gay City News.
Placido Domingo has been named the winner of the first $1 million Birgit Nilsson Prize for achievements in classical music. [via AP]
Katherine Jenkins apparently has already begun her vocal studies with Placido Domingo! In fact, the legendary tenor has gone so far as to lend the Welsh songbird his own personal orchestra parts for “Nessun dorma!”Â
Sopranos Deborah Voigt and Patricia Racette and mezzo-soprano Susan Graham made their drag king debut on Sunday night, and for once the gender confusion has nothing to do with Rufus Wainwright. The trio of songstresses donned tuxes for a spoof of the Three Tenors at a gala honoring Placido Domingo‘s 40th anniversary at the Met. The ladies quickly stripped down to “shimmering gowns in which they delivered the aria ‘Nessun Dorma’ that was a signature piece for The Three Tenors.” Photo by Ken Howard, Metropolitan Opera. [via AP]
Plácido Domingo will sing the role of Maurizio in Cilea’s Adriana Lecouvreur at the Metropolitan Opera for six performances in February 2009, replacing Marcelo Ãlvarez, who, as we heard before, is jumping into the title role in the Met’s new production of Verdi’s Il Trovatore. As the press release from the Met notes, “With these performances of Adriana Lecouvreur, Domingo returns to the role of his Met debut, forty years ago on September 28, 1968. Since then, Domingo has only sung the role of Maurizio once at the Met, in 1983.” And, wouldn’t you know it, there’s YouTube documentation of [...]
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