La Fille du Régiment
Starring Pretty Yende, Stephanie Blythe, Kathleen Turner, Javier Camarena, and Maurizio Muraro, conducted by Enrique Mazzola. Production by Laurent Pelly. From March 2, 2019.
By
La Cieca
Streaming and discussion begin at 7:30 PM.
For whatever hapless tenor gets assigned the plum role of the opera’s hero, Tonio—and the aria “Ah, mes amis” in which those nine notes are located—it’s the kind of vocal mountain only a troubadour with a blast-furnace for lungs could scale.
And yet the payoff is grand: as we learned last night from the Met’s latest revival of Laurent Pelly’s staging, people positively meet their maker over those notes, swooning, howling, applauding for minutes on end—especially when the aria appears as easy and secure as it did for Veracruz-born Javier Camarena last night, especially when the tenor finds it in himself to showboat with a dazzling encore of nine more C’s, as Camarena did. — parterre box
Photo: Marty Sohl / Met Opera
La Cieca
James Jorden (who wrote under the names "La Cieca" and "Our Own JJ") was the founder and editor of parterre box. During his 20 year career as an opera critic he wrote for the New York Times, Opera, Gay City News, Opera Now, Musical America and the New York Post. He also raised his voice in punditry on National Public Radio. From time to time he directed opera, including three unsuccessful productions of Don Giovanni. He also contributed a regular column on opera for the New York Observer. James died in October 2023.
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Topics: opera in exile
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People: Javier Camarena, Laurent Pelly
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Works: La fille du régiment
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Places & Organizations: Metropolitan Opera
