Desperate times

call for desperate measures, don't they?

Or else, what would Juan Diego Florez do in bed with Pedro Suarez?
Andrea Bocelli would have done the trick...





Funny appearance of JDF in the video though, and nice view of the Met's hall (3'47).

Sonnambula, Met HD

Met HD Simulcast

March 21, 2009

Pathé Vaise

Amina - Natalie Dessay

Elvino- Juan Diego Flòrez

Rodolfo - Michele Pertusi

Lisa - Jennifer Black

Conductor - Evelino Pidò

Director - Mary Zimmerman

Let's not waste any time on Mary Zimmerman's production: it's a total failure. In every aspect of it. On every level.

In a sense, she made it quite mandatory to focus on the music and the singers, which is actually pretty fine with me with this particular piece.

I've said it before, and I haven't changed my mind, I like Pidò's reading of the score, and the Met orchestra did a spectacular job to carry it through. I was pretty impressed by the four major roles; Jennifer Black was a delight to watch and listen to, and Michele Pertusi and Natalie Dessay were superb.

I'm sorry to say however that I only had eyes and ears for Juan Diego Flòrez.

Here he was, as perfect as I had hoped he would be. The first act reached a whole different level when he finally appeared onstage, and he already had left me extatic at the intermission (he did deliver an exquisite "Prendi: l'anel ti dono").

But his "perche non posso odiarti" and especially his five "infedel" overwhelmed me so vividly I couldn't really concentrate after that on anything but his lines.

Even Dessay's "ah non credea... ah! non giunge" couldn't really move me... until his two lines "Io più non reggo, a tanto duolo" that prompted yet another burst of tears. All that via a Met HD simulcast.

All photographs Ken Howard for the Metropolitan Opera.

About this Sonnambula's production at the Met:
- "Can't quite let it go yet", Maury D'Annato, My Favorite Intermissions
- "The Blunder" ; "The fallen idol", An Umamplified Voice

Met 2009-10

Complete season here, HD broadcasts there.

Evidently, I'm hugely disappointed Riccardo Muti's Attila (new Pierre Audi production) won't be part of the HD season next year, because it means a trip to NY if I really want to see it (Feb.23 to March 15 with Muti, March 19 to 27 with Armiliato conducting). The cast includes Ramón Vargas, Violetta Urmana, Carlos Alvarez and Ildar Abdrazakov.

La Fille du Régiment will be back with Laurent Pelly's successful production (Vienna 2006, London 2007, NY 2008). Juan Diego Flórez will be paired this time with Diana Damrau (Feb.6 to 22, 2010). Amazingly enough, if I could catch the premiere of Attila, I could also attend the last performance of La Fille.

Ambroise Thomas' Hamlet is also appealing, with Natalie Dessay and Simon Keenlyside (March 16 to April 9), conducted by Louis Langrée. The production comes from Geneva.

Frittoli, Gheorghiu, Alagna, Kwiecien will sing Bizet's Carmen conducted by that intriguing Yannick Nézet-Séguin (premiere on New Year's Eve).

Offenbach's Les Contes d'Hoffman will be performed from Dec.3 to Jan.2, with Rolando Villazón, Anna Netrebko, Elīna Garanča and René Pape, under the baton of James Levine.

Robert Lepage’s production of Berlioz's La Damnation de Faust will also be back (Oct.23 to Nov.17).

So if some French fellow like myself want to see XIXth century French operas with great casts, the only reasonable option at this point is to move to NYC. Other bloggers commenting the 2009-10 Met season:

• An unamplified voice
• Mostly opera
• SarahB
• Maldito Candelabro (in Spanish)

Also:

• "After Cutting to Make Ends Meet, Met Plans Eight New Productions", Daniel J.Wakin for the NY Times

JDF for Xmas

This Sunday night at 7 pm (Paris time), Arte is devoting 45 minutes to Juan Diego Flórez in a program called after his latest soloist CD, Bel Canto Spectacular. With extracts from two recitals (Baden-Baden and Vienna). Rerun on Dec.26 (9am).

JDF & Bartoli's Sonnambula

La Sonnambula

Vincenzo Bellini

The line of Amina was initially written by Bellini for Giuditta Pasta, a mezzo-soprano, before being turned into a soprano role by Maria Malibran in 1833. Therefore, this combination was the perfect excuse for Cecilia Bartoli to push for this project. Furthermore, the marketing campaign is rather easy to set: first recording with a mezzo as Amina, and "world premiere recording on period instruments".

The thing is, I never liked period instruments and I still don't after listening to this new release.

And - how should I put that as gently as possible? - Cecilia Bartoli does not make for a good Amina. Despite all my sympathy for the woman, her Amina will not be remembered as a defining moment for the role. Of course one could argue that nobody is used to listening to Amina as a mezzo and that's why her performance is not appreciated at its true merits. That assumption is obviously relevant, yet my dislike of Bartoli's Amina has little to do with it - but rather speaks to the essence of bel canto. This style demands a perfect breath control to live up to the expectations of the score, yet Cecilia Bartoli fails to provide it in this studio recording.

I'm rather embarrassed for her, truth be told, because if what's burnt is the best she could do with the score (and why wouldn't it be? it's a studio recording after all), it's definitely not flattering.



On the other hand, both Juan Diego Flórez and Ildebrando d'Arcangelo are insanely brilliant here, and that alone requires to buy the CD (JDF's highlight must be in Act II, "perché non posso odiarti"). The chorus and Liliana Nikiteanu deserve praise as well (I'm much more skeptical about Gemma Bertagnolli's Lisa).

The conduction of Alessandro di Marchi starts off as messy and strangely dissonant (especially in "In Elvezia non v'ha rosa", and the period instruments don't help) but, by the second scene of Act I, is showing interesting colors and nuances that keep developing throughout the entire piece.

This CD is presented in a book-like packaging, which is OK I guess, until you realize how hazardous this may turn out to be for the protection and conservation of the CDs. The iconography chosen is highly reminiscent of Madama Butterfly's (awkwardly anachronic and off topic).

Long awaited release

The new studio recording of Bellini's La sonnambula with Cecilia Bartoli and Juan Diego Flórez will be released on October 17th.
Via Cecilia Bartoli's website.

A frog in the throat

Picture shamelessly stolen from Intermezzo

So it seems the end of the season is hard on Juan Diego Flórez. His London recital yesterday evening will not be remembered by posterity, as Intermezzo reports on the problems he had with his voice. Let's hope he'll learn someday not to have such a busy schedule throughout the season, or else I'm afraid his voice will be lost way too soon.

Rigoletto in Dresden

Dresden Semperoper
June 30, 2008

N.B. This review only takes into account this performance, not the televised evening on June 21 by Arte.

If it hadn't been for Juan Diego Flórez singing Il Duca di Mantova, I wouldn't have gone to Dresden.
Yet if it hadn't been for Diana Damrau, I would have been quite disappointed by the musical performance (my comments on Lehnhoff's staging are still processing in my brain and will be the subject of another post later on).


First of all, let's face it: Rigoletto being one of my favorite operas, I am very critical about it, especially since a nearly perfect version exists, the one recorded live at La Scala by Riccardo Muti in the mid-1990s and already mentioned several times on this blog (the staging is out of the question, obviously).

And in this constant comparison of mine between any performance and the Muti version, the first thing to completely fall apart was the conduction of Fabio Luisi.
It's not the worse I have ever heard (Kubelik and Giulini put the bar pretty high), but it was uninspired (despite grandiose gestures from Luisi), clumsy at best, sometimes incredibly heavy and slow, and most of the time flat and rough.
On the last part, I can forgive Luisi for making things simple and easy, based on the poor performance of the orchestra. The Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden is obviously not at ease with the Italian repertoire (unless Luisi specifically asked the musicians not to play together, the flute to ruin the whole thing and an unidentified violin to suddenly play a note when nothing was written about it on the score). It was a huge disappointment for me, because I didn't expect the orchestra would be an issue.

The Staatsopernchores also had some major issues: specifically the Italian diction and the unison. Living in a city whose Opera House, if nothing else, has a fantastic chorus I always emphasize, the landing was harsh and unforgiving.

To get over with the bad news, both Sofi Lorentzen (Maddalena) and Matthias Henneberg (Monterone) were weak; the first being inaudible and inexpressive, the later having too weak a technique (but it should be noted the program clearly states he was a late subtitute for scheduled Rainer Büsching).

Stauffenbergall, Dresden
July 1, 2008

As for my dear JDF, I must admit all my love did not prevent a bit of a let down. Of course his voice is gorgeous and all, but the thing I was afraid of turned out to be true; and that is, he is too bad an actor to own a character full of villainy (at least that's how Lehnhoff tried to picture him).
He has neither the facial expressions nor the body language to successfully portray Mantova, and his singing is too bel-cantoish to fully explore the dark side of the character (of course I'm absolutely devastated by this conclusion). But I had prepared myself for that, so the fall is less painful, let's say (see how self-persuasion works?).

The thing I was definitely not expecting was a more technical problem; when JDF arrived on stage (having seen him live already two times this season and numerous others on DVDs and TV broadcasts), I immediately though to myself how tired he looked, hoping this fact would have little impact on his singing. Well, if all the notes were spot on, the tempo was not. On several occasions, there was a noticeable shift with the orchestra (most of the time he was late, as if he had trouble remembering the notes), that was more and more recurrent and culminated in the last act. This reminded me of his run at the Met of La Fille du Régiment when, by the end of the run, this cloud shadowed his performances on one or two occasions. In Dresden, the ones and twos became more like tens and twenties.
So all and all, I must admit I was disappointed by my dearest tenor.


On the other hand, Željko Lučić as Rigoletto was a pleasant surprise. I would have liked his voice to be a bit more expressive, but his stage presence was pretty good and his singing quite memorable (slightly less though than Renato Bruson in the Muti version).

Stauffenbergall, Dresden
July 1, 2008

Undoubtedly the real star of the night was Diana Damrau.
I was sceptical about her acting for about two minutes and then, I was simply blown away by her stage presence. Absolutely blown away.
She owned the stage and the character, with her entire body, with her entire soul. Her eyes were so expressive it was unbelievable, her movements were so fluid and natural, her hands were perfectly complementing the whole body.
The end of Scene 12 (Act I) when she faces Mantova alone was the turning point for me. From that time on, it seemed like she was the only one on the stage.
During the Tempesta scene in Act III (with the wonderful quartet Verdi wrote), which theatrically is one of the biggest challenges of the role (because you have to stand there for an awful long time so it's hard to make it believable), she also was extraordinary and I just couldn't get my eyes off of her.
The last scene, the bag thing was totally surreal (but Lehnhoff is also responsible for that). Instead of the usual girl dying on the floor and whispering the last replicas, she got up, very slowly. At first, I though "Now, what is that?" but then, I was completely fascinated by her portrayal - the image was so reminiscent of Lucia di Lammermoor and so powerful. What a magical way to end the opera...

In other words, she was perfect, nothing less.

Oh, and did I mention her singing was exquisite, too?


YouTube extracts (from the June 21 performance broadcast by Arte):

- "Pari siamo!.....Figlia! Mio padre!", Željko Lučić & Diana Damrau
- "T'amo ripetilo!", JDF & Diana Damrau
- "Addio, addio", Diana Damrau & JDF
- "Caro Nome", Diana Damrau
- "Si, Vendetta", Željko Lučić & Diana Damrau
- Last 10 minutes of the opera, Željko Lučić & Diana Damrau

The perfect tenor for the job

The thing about Gounod's music is that it can quickly seem heavy and solemn if sung by the wrong kind of tenor.
One has to have a light enough timbre and an excellent French diction to be able to showcase how aerial this music really is. Both criteria are of the utmost importance which is why, one of the best tenors ever, according to me, Franco Corelli, made such a mediocre Faust. He obviously had a magnificent timbre perfect for Gounod, but his diction was horrible. On the other hand, Nicolai Gedda was less emotional but the combination of his voice and his diction was a recording marvel (this is also why he is the ultimate Nadir).

Nowadays, nobody speaks French properly (not even the natives, no wonder), and the tenors have lost that leggero touch so many before them had (Gigli, Bergonzi, Corelli, DiStefano ...).

The only true leggero tenors left are Juan Diego Flórez (it seems like a post without mentioning his name is out of the question these days) who, despise his "stacatoish" way of singing (and his too ostensible rrr), is actually amazing once a century, when he sings one aria composed by Gounod (such as "Ah! Lève toi Soleil" from Roméo et Juliette he performed last March in Parma), and Roberto Alagna.

As I am watching the broadcast of Roméo et Juliette from last December at the Met, with Roberto Alagna as Roméo, I suddenly remembered why it is that I fell in love with him some years ago.
He can be so brilliant singing French operas.
Truly the best tenor to do so since Nicolai Gedda.

Even if his voice is not as secure and light as it used to be, he still makes a great service to Gounod's music. And I suddenly feel better to have my ticket for the upcoming Faust in Orange...

A chat with Natalie

Yesterday, Natalie Dessay took one hour off her busy schedule to chat with her fans (her French fans basically, as the whole thing was exclusively in French).
Anyone who knows her character a bit understands she loves doing this kind of stuff, one of the reason why she's so popular in France. Of course most of the questions asked were conventional ones that were ultimately boring, but she did manage to give one or two news worth mentioning here.


First, as she once again repeated she doesn't want to do solo concerts (time constraints between her work and her family life and a genuine dislike for this kind of performances), she also indicated that she has indeed scheduled a joint concert with who else but Juan Diego Flórez for July 2010 (she didn't specify the location but from the discussion, it seemed pretty obvious it would be in Paris).


When asked which was the higher note she ever sung, she answered a high A in Léo Delibes' Le Roi l'a dit performed in Saint-Etienne in 1990.
This has of course no intrinsic interest but as singers are judged on their high notes, it can explain why she became a star (although of course there's no chance she can still sing that note).


Finally, she gave everybody a word of wisdom, quoting a Chinese proverb she says is always in a corner of her mind: "L'homme doit se méfier de la célébrité comme un porc doit se méfier du gras." (don't ask me, I have no idea how this can be relevant to anything).

2e Fille

A few notes after hearing yesterday's broadcast from the Met of La Fille du Régiment (previous review of the premiere here and of JDF's encore there). I basically concur with my previous impressions about both the conduction of Marco Armiliato, the speaking parts and the performances of Palmer and Corbelli. I thought JDF was lacking unison with the music at times (nothing serious, just a small tiny shift of nanoseconds) and almost missed a note at some point, but these critics are just picky because he is really magnificent and unique. Dessay's voice had some issues on this Saturday matinee, and I am indeed worried as well. For the French audience that stayed home last night and listened to the performance via the radio (France Musique), Natalie Dessay was kind enough to do an interview from her dressing room at intermission time, in which she sounded a bit upset and admitted she mixed up the lines in "Salut à la France", repeating the first verse in place of the third one (something I hadn't notice, to be honest).

"Salut à la France", not so much in French though

Overall, this run of La Fille du Régiment is a bit disappointing.

It took me a while to realize why, because Juan Diego Flórez was as wonderful and exquisite as always, Natalie Dessay doing what she's best at: acting in a comic opera* is a joy to watch.
Felicity Palmer and Alessandro Corbelli were irreproachable and, having previously seen the broadcast from last year's run at Covent Garden, I already knew I liked the work of Laurent Pelly on this one (despite the usual ugly set of Chantal Thomas - one has to understand Pelly always works with the same team and Chantal Thomas is the set designer on this overall pretty good team).

The first issue of this run is Marian Seldes, who filled in last minute for Zoe Cadwell. She doesn't obviously have the comic talent of Dawn French and Agathe Mélinand, who adapts the librettos of Pelly's productions (probably the best element of that team), was well aware of the situation, as she added some replicas, in a desperate attempt to compensate for the lack of comic presence of Seldes.
Most noticeably, whereas Dawn French was only justifying the absence of Duke Scipio (to be married with Marie) by "olympic obligations" (in English dans le texte), Marian Seldes also adds "Bobsleigh team" (also in English).
The other problem with Seldes is her French diction, or her lack of rather. For a native French like myself, this was truly unbearable.
Furthermore, the notary (Jack Wetherall) was also disastrous (Covent Garden had the intelligence to cast a French actor, Jean-Pierre Blanchard); these two ruined the first scenes of Act II (despite the efforts of Felicity Palmer).

"Tous les trois réunis", scene 10 of Act II
Covent Garden 2007

Yet those points can seem picky to anyone who does not understand French (i.e. the vast majority of the Met's audience). And they can only partially explain my relative disappointment. Nor could the (also) very poor diction of the chorus or its stiffness (once again, chapeau bas to Covent Garden for the excellence of its chorus - both singing and acting).

The "ironing scene", "Au bruit de la guerre", scene 3 of Act I
Ken Howard for the Metropolitan Opera, April 21, 2008

fin de l'air "Au bruit de la guerre", scene 3 of Act I
Covent Garden 2007

My real discontent is the conduction of Marco Armiliato.
Or more accurately, the instinctive comparison I made with Bruno Campanella, who brought fuzz and lightness to this piece in London. In perspective, although far from mediocre, Armiliato does not play in the same league as Campanella. I won't say his reading of that piece is rigid or heavy, but it's undoubtedly the main reason for my relative upset.

"Salut à la France", scene 7 of Act II
Sara Krulwich for the New York Times, Met April 21, 2008

Relative because, all and all, nobody can come close to the combination Dessay/JDF in that particular piece.

scene 7 of Act II
Covent Garden 2007

Met Photo Gallery of La Fille here.

* It must be said that Dessay didn't get all the credit she deserved on opening night. After the arias of bravery of JDF (including the perfect 18 high Cs), her "Il faut partir" was sensational and brought tears to my eyes.
But then again, JDF was also sensational in his emotional aria, "Pour me rapprocher de Marie" (surprisingly full of sensitivity and honesty).

A well-orchestrated encore

La Fille du Régiment
Met premiere, April 21

Sara Krulwich for the NY Times
See the piece published in the NYT about that encore.

Flórez singing as brilliantly as he does, it was obviously a delight to hear him again in "Pour mon âme/Ah mes amis!" (Act I) on the opening night of La Fille du Régiment.

What was frustrating however, is how set up this encore was; and how naive the audience was, to think they had anything to do with it (one would think New Yorkers are not that naive).
Sure, JDF received a well-deserved ovation after his first run of "Pour mon âme". Yet, as I deeply agree with Maury d'Annato that the public response is to be judged upon its volume rather than its length, the ovation at the Met was not that impressive. I've heard much more fervent responses in Europe - none of which ever rewarded by an encore by the way.
As Maury also sharply noticed, M.Armiliato was indeed pretty quick to turn back the pages of the score when people were anarchically cheering.

Peter Gelb, the Met's GM, is undoubtedly the guilty part in that faked spontaneous highlight. JDF conquered Europe last year in that role, from London to Vienna and of course Milan, where his encore made headlines all over the world (ending the century-long ban set by Arturo Toscanini himself).

It was only right that he should equally perform and bis in New York as well.
For NYC image's shake.

Early news from Lima

Update #2: some new videos have been posted: "La donna e mobile" and one of my favorite arias from Rigoletto, "Bella figlia dell´amore". See the links on the blog of our Peruvian friend.

Update: The review from Lima is now also available in English (see at the end of the column in Spanish). Thanks for the translation, Gonzalo!

So... Our new best friend, the now well-known Peruvian blogger, has posted his review from yesterday's premiere of Rigoletto in Lima. Only in Spanish for now, but he has promised to translate it in a few hours... I am so not fluent in Spanish though... Yet, thanks to Google for the translation, you can have a glimpse of his feelings about the evening and the performance of JDF [I swear this blog is not becoming a tribute exclusively dedicated to Juan Diego Florez, it just happens that it's the only thing I really care about at the moment]. As accurately noted by our friend, the timbre of JDF's voice is very different from the usual one, in that role (I too, suspect I will be a bit out of my comfort zone here - as a matter of fact, listening to the extracts he posted, I already noticed that). Also, JDF seems to lack the fluidity that comes when you know your role to perfection. With a crazy schedule and these appearances in Lima added to it only a few months back, therefore pushing his role debut (originally scheduled for Dresden in June), it's no surprise JDF understudied the piece. Evidently, all those details were forgotten when he sang “Parmi veder le lagrime”, and the end of the performance seems to have overwhelmed our Peruvian blogger. He then writes a little about the other aspects of the performance (this I will read carefully when the translation is completed).

More news from JDF

March 28 update:
Don't look for the link anymore, the Peruvian blogger must have been overwhelmed by all the visits from here - or simply was contacted by the Teatro Municipal in Lima, and deleted all files.

March 30 update:
Video on YouTube here, "Questa e quella" during the dress rehearsal (the orchestra is in desperate need of help there); photographs here.

Photograph by Carlos Guerrero

Of course you must know I'm interested in the role debut of Juan Diego Florez as Il Duca di Mantova (Rigoletto) in Lima in a few days (March 31). Especially since I'm going to attend the next run of JDF performances in June in Dresden.

Well, some extracts from the dress rehearsal (audio + one video) have been posted by a Peruvian blogger.
The sound is not very good and the conducting of Michele Mariotti has more to do with Kubelik than Muti (which is definitely not a compliment coming from me). I'm yet to be convinced that JDF's voice is not too light to sing the role, though things are looking brighter for me with the "Possente amor mi chiama" extract where he sounds really... interesting.

The director must be a child of Franco Zeffirelli, and that's one of the reasons why the upcoming performances in Dresden are so promising (let alone JDF and Damrau): Nikolaus Lehnhoff will be in charge.

Photograph by Carlos Guerrero

The great voice is back

So...
Remember the fishbone story Juan Diego Flórez had to deal with a few weeks ago, causing him to cancel (amongst other things) his performances in Chicago (Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia)?

Well, last week, JDF made a triumphant return in Parma (reported on Opera-L) and used this recital as a giant rehearsal for both Rigoletto and Orphée et Eurydice.

Welcome back JDF, see you soon in NY and Dresden...


Next scheduled performances:

- Lima, Teatro Alejandro Granda del Callao, Rigoletto, role debut as Il Duca di Mantova, March 31 and April 3
- NY Met, Donizetti's La Fille du Régiment (Laurent Pelly directing, with Natalie Dessay): April 21, 26, 29, May 2, 5, 8 and 16
- Madrid, Teatro Real, Gluck's Orphée et Eurydice (Paris version, in French that is), May 27, 30 and June 2
- Dresden, Semperoper, Rigoletto, June 21, 24, 27, 30, July 3

2008-09 at the Met

The 125th season at the Met will open on Sept.22, 2008 with a gala performance from Renée Fleming (extracts from Massenet's Manon, La Traviata and Strauss' Capriccio) and will feature 6 new productions (including the Met premiere of John Adams' Doctor Atomic).

Amongst the new productions, Berlioz's La damnation de Faust is an interesting attempt to make this opera available to everyone. This Robert Lepage's production was first created for the Saito Kinen Festival in Matsumoto (Japan) in september 1999 and already traveled to Paris (Opéra Bastille in 2001 and 2004) and Bruxelles (Théâtre de la Monnaie, 2002).


Massenet's Thaïs should be a great opportunity for Renée Fleming to shine.

Another new production will be Puccini's La Rondine, by future Paris Opera director Nicolas Joël, with Duane Schuler as lightning designer (a very recurrent artist here in Lyon). Angela Gheorghiu and Roberto Alagna are supposed to share the stage. I hope Peter Gelb has already thought of alternative names for when they cancel (say, three days before the premiere).

David McVicar's new production of Il Trovatore should have New Yorkers all excited, although the cast seems a little weak (except for Dmitri Hvorostovsky of course).

Finally, last but not least, a new production of Bellini's La Sonnambula will feature the well-known couple Natalie Dessay/Evelino Pidó (who performed this piece in Lyon in Nov.2006, my reviews in French here and there, with a recording by Virgin Classics) with the notable addition of Juan Diego Flórez, in the Ricordi edition recently rediscovered.



The oldies are back with Zeffirelli's production of La Bohème and Cavalleria Rusticana (Roberto Alagna and José Cura will share the role of Turiddu, with Andrea Gruber as Santuzza, a much better cast than last year's performers) and Pagliacci (Alagna/Cura as well as Canio), and finally with La Traviata (enough with Zeffirelli already).

Interesting cast in Donizetti's L'elisir d'amore (Gheorghiu, Villazón/Calleja, Terfel), Eugene Onegin (Mattila, Hampson).

Finally, I want to point out the return of fantastic Ewa Podles as La Cieca in Poncielli's La Gioconda (dream cast indeed with Deborah Voigt as Gioconda, Aquiles Machado as Enzo and Olga Borodina as Laura).

A pain in the throat

La Fille du Régiment, 2007

I get that you can't always be lucky in life, and that you can indeed become sick over almost everything.

But when I hear (via this or that) Juan Diego Flórez is canceling both his Kansas City recital and all the performances of the upcoming production of Il Barbiere di Siviglia in Chicago over ... a fishbone, "les mots me manquent" (I'm speechless) to use a very recurrent expression of mine.

But then again, fishbones are a real con to eating fish anyway.
Doctors told Flórez to cancel all engagements til the end of March.
He'd better keep his April 21st one at the MET though.
I hope I'm not flying over the Atlantic to attend the premiere of Donizetti's La Fille du Régiment without Flórez. That would be a real pain in the ass.

I Should Be So Lucky Lucky Lucky Lucky

[Incredible news do indeed call for inept pop song references]

Natalie Dessay, Act I, La Fille du Régiment, Covent Garden 2007

Remember when I said yesterday the best way to get tickets is to plan way ahead?
Well, that's true, for sure. To a certain extend.

"Never underestimate the power of luck" is my new motto today. And what a beautiful Sunday it has been. Full of passion, emotions and luck.
Especially full of luck.

This afternoon, I was watching, in total despair, the magnificent Covent Garden's La Fille du Régiment I also talked about yesterday. I was contemplating, with greater desolation, the fact that it will only come back in Paris in 4 years (2012). Who knows what can happen, in 4 years, to the voice of Dessay or JDF. I was therefore envying these lucky New Yorkers who will enjoy this production in April / May.

I went to check the dates of the performances, in order to schedule the day of the broadcast. But then again, and I never say that, this production is going to lack so much with the sound only.
And that's when the lightning struck.
Not only were there still few seats available for the premiere on April 21, but I am indeed on vacation on this very week.

So, ladies and gentlemen, with overwhelming emotion, I will see this fantastic production of Donizetti's La Fille du Régiment live, in a few months. How great is that seriously?



Cast

Conductor: Marco Armiliato
Marie: Natalie Dessay
Marquise of Berkenfeld: Felicity Palmer
Tonio: Juan Diego Flórez
Sulpice: Alessandro Corbelli
Duchess of Krakenthorp: Zoe Caldwell

Production: Laurent Pelly
Set Designer: Chantal Thomas
Costume Designer: Laurent Pelly
Lighting Designer: Joël Adam
Choreographer: Laura Scozzi
Associate Director/Dialogue: Agathe Mélinand (whose name is wrongly spelled on the MET's website - no luck for her there).

YouTube extracts of this production
[London / Vienna performances]

• "Chacun le dit, chacun le sait", Natalie Dessay, Act 1
  
• "Ah mes amis!", JDF, Act 1
• Begining of act 2, Dawn French
• "Le jour naissait dans le bocage", Dessay, Act 2
  
• "Pour me rapprocher de Marie", JDF, Act 2
  
• "Salut à la France", Dessay, Act 2
• Channel 4 report on the production
  

Oh and by the way, I love the weak dollar against the euro too. €450 for plane tickets from Lyon to New York, that's what I call a bargain!

2009-2010 preview

Building of the underground station in front of the Garnier Opera in Paris

In the operatic world, the best way not to be left behind is to plan way ahead. I've never been very good at planning, quite the opposite actually. But since my failure to attend any performance of Donizetti's La Fille du Régiment at Covent Garden last year, with the brilliant production of Pelly (feat. Natalie Dessay and Juan Diego Florez), I've decided to take matters into my own hands, for a change. For the first time ever, I started planning. My record so far is buying tickets 13 months before the performance (for the Lehnhoff's production of Rigoletto in Dresden in June/July 2008, feat. Diana Damrau and Juan Diego Florez). This week, some US Opera Houses started to disclose their 2008-2009 schedules (LA, Seattle, Dallas, Washington). So obviously, I'm now focusing on the 2009-2010 season (exacerbated by the fact that the previews I have read so far about the 2008-2009 season in Europe aren't especially appealing to me). And what a year the 2009-2010 season is going to be. Absolutely amazing. So far, worth noticing, we have:

• Gounod's Mireille to open the first season of new Paris Opera director Nicolas Joël
• La Sonnambula, Opéra National de Paris, in a Marco Arturo Marelli's production, already seen in Vienna (2001) and London (2002), with Natalie Dessay
• Norma, Toulouse, with Anna Caterina Antonacci
• La Fille du Régiment, Liceu Barcelona (march 2010) with Patrizia Ciofi and Juan Diego Florez

And at the MET, some amazing previews as well:

• Verdi's Attila, conducted by maestro Riccardo Muti and directed by amazing Pierre Audi, with Violetta Urmana, Ramon Vargas and Carlos Alvarez
• La Fille du Régiment with Juan Diego Florez and Diana Damrau

Also worth noticing:

• this will be the first season of Dominique Meyer as director of the Wiener Staatsoper