Staged at La Scala, 2011, Barenboim conducts, with Peter Mattei, Bryn Terfel and Anna Netrebko,
Bonus: Mattei very nimble at Rossini’s Largo al factotum,
Sunday palate cleanser: Faust goes to Mars
Jonas and Bryn in La Damnation de Faust. What more could a woman want?
Well, for starters, a production that was not this weird: Hawking walks and snails mate in mawkish opera
That’s Stephen Hawking they are talking about. Let’s hope he got royalties. The actor playing him looks like an old Alan Rickman. The caged dancers wear Hanes-style undies.
Could someone explain the whole mess, please?
Jonas Kaufmann (Faust),
Bryn Terfel (Méphistophélès),
Sophie Koch (Marguerite),
Edwin Crossley-Mercer (Brander)
Conductor: Philippe Jordan
Best to close your eyes and enjoy the singing.
I hope Bryn & Jonas each got paid enough to pay off the mortgage and put the kids through college.
Sunday palate cleanser: Salome
Salome by Richard Strauss, after Oscar Wilde’s play in the translation of Hedwig Lachmann
Staged at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden
1997
Salome – Catherine Malfitano
Jochanaan – Bryn Terfel
Herodes – Kenneth Riegel
Herodias – Anja Silja
Narraboth – Robert Gambill
Sunday palate cleanser: Bryn in Amsterdam
Sunday palate cleanser: Le Nozze di Figaro
Happy Mother’s Day!
Sunday morning Suo Gan
Yesterday I was watching Empire of the Sun, which is a troubling movie in many levels (but not quite as troubling as JG Ballard’s other works), and the Welsh lullaby Suo Gân punctuates a key scene of the film.
Bryn Terfel performs my favorite version of Suo Gân. You can buy the MP3 from Amazon, but it was also used in this beautiful short film, The Dinner Guest by Joe Gleason, to great effect:
Here’s Bryn, with a piano accompanist,
Today is the Feast of the Epiphany. May God bless you and your family and loved ones.
Wagner without tears: The Ring!
The Metropolitan Opera is doing Wagner’s Ring, and The Manolo is thrilled.
Bryn Terfel is playing Wotan.
Here’s the big guy singing Wotan in Die Walkure,
However, as much as I love BT, I do not like Wagner.
So it’s great that The Manolo has provided Anna Russell and The Ring of the Nibelung for our cultural edification,
Now, if we could get BT to do Mrs. Russell’s analysis, life would be perfect. Eye patch optional, of course.
And I would pay for that.
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