Be Jealous. Because I Am!!! And Other News

Hearing about anything exciting that happens at the Met makes me want to drop out of school and just live in the Met. Not a bad life. I'll make friend with the Grand Tier Restaurant people, get great food. I'll steal an usher outfit and show everyone how well I know my way around. Plus, you get paid to watch the opera! Usher!!!!!!!!!!! (Dream college job.)
If anyone would like to support me in my new life style feel free to let me know. If you knows someone who knows someone who can get me a little space where I can live in the Met, that's cool. If a friend of a friend can arrange to get me free tickets every night that would be pretty great also.

What prompted this ramble? Well, hearing about the fabulous tribute to Franco Zefferelli is one thing. The 347th performance of Boheme is another. Oh wait, they're the same thing. A star studded event that cut right in the middle of the performance, after the famous and illustrious Act II. Some of the guests were (just to name a few) Rosalind Elias, Richard Stilwell, Lucine Amara, Eva Marton, Leona Mitchell and Justino Diaz. Nice. I was there in spirit of course, but it's not the same. Oh yeah, I heard the actual performance was good, too. Just if you were wondering.

In totally unrelated and random news:
So I have two major crushes in the opera world. It's bad, because they're both married. There's also the age thing. Whatever. Brad Pitt is old(er), too. =P So anyway, my two major crushes are:

Juan Diego Florez. You don't even know. No, you really don't know. Julia Trappe is lucky she got there first. So, JDF is staring in Rigoletto in Peru right now. I'm temporarily moving my home from the Met to Peru. Opera Chic has a couple of videos showing the ever amazing Juan Diego in the ever amazing role of the Duke of Mantua. *sigh* Dear Peter Gelb, give this man a Rigoletto. I seem to be ordering Peter Gelb around a lot lately. Still, Juan Diego deserves it.

Dmitri Hvorostovsky. Married before I got there. Oh, well. It started with the Onegin last season where my friend and I dubbed him "white haired guy." For a while that's all we talked about and our other friends thought we were nuts. Well, she got over him. Umm... me? Not so much. He's still one of the best barihunks in the business and the NY Times knows how to tell it to you straight. He's just fabulous. Really, really fabulous. (P.S. In the first video of him I really wish they didn't make him wear a wig... oh well)


Quick Recap:
I'm dropping out of school and living at the Met (it's a secret of course). I'm then taking a vacation to Peru and seeing JDF in Rigoletto. I'm stealing some one's job as an usher at the Met. Oh, and I also told you me two secret (not really, it was quite obvious) operatic crushes.
Get it?
Got it?
Good.



Happy Listening!! =)

Knock on Wood, Don't Break a Mirror, and Just DON'T GIVE THEM BACK LUCK!

The Met announced that FINALLY Ben Heppner and Deborah Voigt will be together (as in singing at the same time) in Tristan und Isolde. It's a miracle, I say. Here's what the Met says:

"Deborah Voigt and Ben Heppner, originally scheduled to star in all six
performances of Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde this season, are scheduled to sing
together on Friday night. Illness has prevented them from taking the stage
together until this final Tristan of the season, conducted by James Levine. To
celebrate their very first full performance together—anywhere—of this epic
opera, the Met will stream the performance live on its website."

As it says, at 7pm tonight go to the Met website and the Tristan will be streaming LIVE. Yes.
We need to quarantine these two or something, though, because they can not get sick. Can't. Can not.

Happy Listening!! =)

Let's Get Ready for HDDDDDDD!!!!!!!!!!

Okay, this list isn't official, but I'm going to put it here anyway so that we can plan our lives around it. Alright? Cool.

Saturday, October 11, 2008, 1:00 pm
Salome
Franck; Mattila, Komlósi, Begley, Kaiser, Uusitalo

Saturday, November 8, 2008, 1:00 pm
Dr. Atomic
Gilbert; Cooke, Arwady, Finley, Fink, Owens

Saturday, November 22, 2008, 1:00 pm
Le Damnation de Faust
Levine; Graham, Giordani, Relyea

Saturday, December 20, 2008, 12:00 pm
Thais
López-Cobos; Fleming, Schade, Hampson

Saturday, January 10, 2009, 1:00 pm
La Rondine
Armiliato; Gheorghiu, Oropesa, Alagna, Brenciu, Ramey

Saturday, January 24, 2009, 1:00 pm
Orfeo
Levine; de Niese, Murphy, Blythe

Saturday, February 7, 2009, 1:00 pm
Lucia di Lammermoor
Armiliato; Netrebko, Villazón, Kwiecien, Abdrazakov

Saturday, March 7, 2009, 1:00 pm
Madama Butterfly
Summers; Gallardo-Domâs , Zifchak, Giordani, Croft

Saturday, March 21, 2009, 1:00 pm
La Sonnambula
Pidò; Dessay, Flórez, Pertusi

Saturday, May 9, 2009
La Cenerentola
Benini; Garanca, Brownlee, Alberghini, Corbelli, Relyea


Right off the bat count me in for Cenerentola, Sonnambula, and Faust. The rest I'm planning on seeing anyway. My new season resolution (since my new year starts with the season/school) is to see all the HD transmissions and to see as many operas as possible!!!
I'll let you know when the official list is out. =)


Happy Listening!! =)

Ben's in, Deb's Out...

And the Met Tristan is in chaos.

Otello 3/1/2008: Curtain Call Photos

I'm not sure why they're so blurry. It's either the lack of flash or my hand shaking like a leaf. I had to stop my natural instinct which was to clap like a crazy person. So I compensated for screaming (a little too loudly) brava after brava. Fond memories...

Happy Listening!! =)

Les Indes Galantes

I'm always happy to be learning about whatever opera I can get my hands on. I love it when some one says "Oh, listen to this, it's my favorite." It's even better if I've never heard of it before. Obscure operas are treasures and who doesn't love treasure? Hearing a new singer that blows you away is the same way. It's a new discovery that you're so happy you made. Hearing a new opera and a new singer (both that are amazing) at the same time can be overwhelming, but in this instance I'm not sorry it happened.
I have to thank Sarah Noble at Prima la Musica (one of my favorite blogs) for posting this hysterical clip from the opera "Les Indes Galantes" and, as she promised, it's been stuck in my head all day. Needless to say, the conductor dancing at the end makes it. I don't know what's more ridiculous the production or how well the cast pulls it off! The fabulous singer I discovered was Patricia Petibon, the soprano that's kicking butt in her headdress in the slip. She's spectacular, really. Search for her on youtube, I'm sure you'll find other amazing things she's done.
Despite some of the ridiculous dances in the production, the opera itself is great. I love the music. It's one of those productions that's hard to watch, wonderful to listen to, but once you've started watching you can't stop!!!

How many opera's have you seen like that? Hard to watch, but great to listen to?
Or better yet, how about the other way around? Hard to listen to, but beautiful production?



Happy Listening!!

Heppner Talks About His Health

Poor Ben Heppner. Getting misdiagnosed by TWO New York doctors? It's rough stuff. I just hope he gets better.



In the meantime, I think they should let Gary Lehman sing the HD transmission, but Robert Dean Smith is scheduled. I would have thought Gary Lehman deserved it. After all that...



Happy Listening!! =)

This Weekend's Excitements

Well, yesterday there was the NYCO's Madama Butterfly Live from Lincoln Center on PBS. I came in at the end of Act I and found the two stars in wonderful voice. James Valenti not only possessing a beautiful tenor voice, he also possesses a lovely tenor physique!!!! No exaggeration needed. Shu-Ying Li as Cio-cio San looked and sounded graceful and wonderful. Susan Graham was the host. I was slightly surprised as I was expecting Renee Fleming, opera's new Katie Couric and the Met's poster girl. Susan Graham looked like she stole Ms. Fleming's wardrobe stylist and her hair. Fleming let Susan borrow her hair since she sorta likes the new corn-row Shakira style hair from the Met's Thais.

Speaking of Renee Fleming...
"I'm a Pilates nut. I found that it's really changed my body. After two children you think you will never in your life have a flat stomach again, and I'm here to tell you that Pilates can do it."
was among other fascinating comment's regarding geography, courtesans, and being booed at La Scala.


This weekend, to my disappointment (although I wish him will), Juan Diego Florez is in Peru for his wedding. =( =( Around this time last year Mr. Florez and Julia Trappe were married in a "private and secretive ceremony" in Vienna. Now they are both in Peru for a- I am guessing- religious ceremony. All I have to say is: Ms. Trappe, you're lucky you got to him first.


Unless you're not too tired from this Saturday's Tristan and Isolde HD transmission I recommend these two wonderful television programs that air this Sunday. Two of the John Adams episodes have already aired, but tune in anyway, it's such a great show!!! Let it be known that since watching the movie "1776" at age ohhhh I would say 8 or 9, I have been enthralled by this point in American history and by the story of John Adams. Also, since the age of 8 or 9 I've also been enchanted by all things Jane Austen.
Well-rounded? Yes, you could say that.


Happy Listening!! =)

Wagner Makes Me Bang My Head Against the Prompters Box

Well, not me, but Gary Lehman.

At the beginning of the third act of Tristan und Isolde Mr. Lehman was laying on a pallet. It slowly to quickly slide down the severely raked Met stage. His head slammed audibly onto the prompter's box. The audience "gasped, and some screamed," says SarahB who was there last night. Mr. Lehman's costars and some stage managers ran to his rescue and, after helping him stand, escorted him off stage. The curtain closed and after ten minutes an announcement was made that Gary Lehman was feeling better and wished to restart the scene. Needless to say, he got a large ovation at the end of the night. What a trooper!
Note: Deborah Voigt was the Isolde last night.







This is quite a bit worse than the incident at the Figaro this year. Simon Keenlyside (the Count) was throwing things off of the Countess's desk and one of the objects proceeded to roll right off the stage and bonk a cellist right in the head. She left at the end of the act and didn't return the rest of the performance. Ouch.





I want to see the HD transmission more than ever. Lord knows what will happen then!!!





Happy Listening!! =)

Anthony Minghella 1954-2008

I saw on the Met website "In Memoriam: Anthony Minghella 1954-2008" and I thought it couldn't possibly be THE Anthony Minghella. Not the one who directed the amazing Madama Butterfly? No... How could that be?

Sadly, it's true. The indisputably talented and admired director died today of a brain hemorrhage after surgery for tonsil cancer, says the New York Times. It's so tragic because 54 is so young to die.

My only consolation is that he made such beautiful art while he was here. From "The English Patient" to "Truly Madly Deeply" to Madama Butterfly everything he did was effecting and beautiful. The production of Madama Butterfly was enough to bring me to tears. The whole stage was like a canvas and Anthony Minghella just spread beautiful paint all over it. Whether it was the wall of flower petals or the little puppet people every aspect was graceful and (allow me to use it again) beautiful!


Anthony Minghella
1954-2008

Rest in Peace