Decorative Elements
A delicious CP error completely and unashamedly stolen from Parterre Box, an opera blog, which I was reading today because I had just returned from seeing Das Rheingold*:
Returning from last season, mezzo Kate Lindsey was again excellent as Hoffmann's devoted but cynical muse, Necklace.
That's "Nicklausse". Even if the reviewer, Mike Silverman, didn't have the production notes handy, wouldn't you think he might have the common sense to think, "'Necklace' doesn't sound like a person's name--I ought to Google that"? I mean, that's what Google is for.
* Last week I was rhapsodizing about "Das Rheingold" and the Ring cycle in general to a friend, and visibly radiating enthusiasm for the upcoming Met production, and she asked if I thought "Rheingold" might be a good starter opera. I said, "Oh, no! Oh, no no no no." "Carmen" is a good starter opera. "Lucia di Lammermoor" is a great starter opera. Maybe "Boheme" or "Barber of Seville". Something with lots of tunes, something at least reasonably familiar. I thought it was Mark Twain who said something on the order of, "Wagner has magnificent moments and dreadful quarter hours", but apparently it was Rossini: at any rate, that's certainly true of "Rheingold", for the uninitiated. Jim slept through most of it. Even I will confess to not being completely enthralled for the entire three-hour production, although the finale was killer.
Returning from last season, mezzo Kate Lindsey was again excellent as Hoffmann's devoted but cynical muse, Necklace.
That's "Nicklausse". Even if the reviewer, Mike Silverman, didn't have the production notes handy, wouldn't you think he might have the common sense to think, "'Necklace' doesn't sound like a person's name--I ought to Google that"? I mean, that's what Google is for.
* Last week I was rhapsodizing about "Das Rheingold" and the Ring cycle in general to a friend, and visibly radiating enthusiasm for the upcoming Met production, and she asked if I thought "Rheingold" might be a good starter opera. I said, "Oh, no! Oh, no no no no." "Carmen" is a good starter opera. "Lucia di Lammermoor" is a great starter opera. Maybe "Boheme" or "Barber of Seville". Something with lots of tunes, something at least reasonably familiar. I thought it was Mark Twain who said something on the order of, "Wagner has magnificent moments and dreadful quarter hours", but apparently it was Rossini: at any rate, that's certainly true of "Rheingold", for the uninitiated. Jim slept through most of it. Even I will confess to not being completely enthralled for the entire three-hour production, although the finale was killer.
posted by pyramus | 7:07 PM
1 Comments:
OH, that's not fair. I had a high-carb lunch and ... OK, when you get a baritone and a bass yelling at each other in German, I tend to nod off.
I sort of passed out when Alberich was getting no where with the Rhein-maidens and woke when the giants showing up to collect payment for building Valhalla.
The uncharitable voice in my head says M. LaPage thought up that ending and worked backwards. (No more Wagner for me, I fear. Gimme Garanca's Carmen dancing up a storm any day.)
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