Gratuitous Friday* – Dorothea, Vesselina, and Luca, (and Mozart)

I just found a Luca Pisaroni fanpage on Facebook; joining the group made me look back at my Luca posts. Due to the ephemeral nature of YouTube and the fact that Dropbox abolished the Public folder, I am missing a lot of music from my old blog posts**. I am not sure I even posted this one before, but it’s worth a replay either way. 

This is that slightly kinky "I'm going to smell your hair and there's nothing you can do about it"** version of Publio. (And, of course, the amazing vocal and dramatic talents of DR and VK!)

Happy Weekend!

*It’s Friday somewhere!

**I'd love to go back and replace all the missing files, but my energy's probably better spent finding new stuff. 

***This is a paraphrase of the observation made by opera blogger, Earworm. I cannot find the particular post where she said this (it may have been in a comments section of my blog), but here is the link to her blog.

In Memorium Nikolaus Harnoncourt

RIP Nikolaus Harnoncourt: cellist, conductor, musicologist, musician, artist. This man helped influence my love of Bach (through his chamber music recordings, the B-minor Mass, St. Matt Passion, the Gamba sonatas, and, especially his participation in the intrepid Bach cantata series on Telefunken). Later he taught me to listen to Mozart (and Beethoven and Schumann, and even Brahms and Verdi) in different ways. Fortunately, his expansive recorded legacy ensures that he will always be with us.

Speaking of Mozart, here is the finale from his quintessential 2003 La Clemenza di Tito.

Vesselina (and Véronique and Charles) in my Mailbox...

Mozart Week continues at my house! This arrived today:

I finally tracked down a copy of this 2006 recording. It's hard to believe I haven't tagged any posts with LCdT for almost a full year. A while back I featured Tito's three arias sung by Charles Castronovo, not realizing they were from this recording. A quick search did not reveal any other clips from this CD over at the Toob. In the next week or so, I will see what I can do to address this gap.

Random Thoughts While Listening to Lirico Spinto on France Musique

I wish I understood French. I don't even understand most of the singers' names in French. Even the French singers. 

Most of the time, I really dislike Maria Callas' voice (Sorry, everyone. I know that's a special kind of operatic heresy.) She made some truly dreadful sounds. (Gluck – see below)

Sometimes, I really like Maria Callas' voice. She made some absolutely lovely sounds (now and then)! (Bellini – see below)

Speaking of Bellini, almost everything he wrote sounds the same to me – even the bits that I already know. 

Almost everything Gluck wrote also sounds the same to me – even the bits from Orfeo/Orphee; although I definitely like Gluck better than Bellini.

Anna Moffo had a pretty spectacular voice (I know, that's not really news.) At least Bellini is really pretty when she sings it.

Véronique Gens also has a spectacular voice, especially when she’s singing in French.

James King sounded pretty darned good back in the early 60s – even singing Gluck in German.

Vesselina Kasarova has at least three voices, and she uses them all to great effect, especially in this Orphee excerpt in the Gluck program. (It's credited to an RCA CD, but I think it's the same performance as on this DVD.)

Richard Croft's voice is still god-like. (Also not news, but...oh my!)

Google Chrome continues to aggravate by automatically translating (or trying to translate) any page that's not in English. OTOH, it does provide a hearty giggle now and then. For example, this aria from I Capuleti e i Montecchi  entitled "O, fifty flip" (O, quante volte).  

The Bellini Program

 The Gluck Program

From Kasarova to Lehtipuu via Other People's Blogs

Today, for some reason (probably because I saw the CD on the shelf), I decided to listen to Vesselina Kasarova's Lieder recital from 1999. Then I decided to see if I had ever gotten around to ripping it to iTunes. 

Aha! There it is in iTunes, but there's no cover photo (iTunes is not great at tracking down classical album covers.) So, of course, I Google images for "Kasarova Lieder."

The first image was the CD cover (now duly saved and linked to the files in iTunes). The fourth image linked me to a blog post by Smorgy called Why I Love Vesselina Kasarova. That Smorgy loves Kasarova is not news, but why Smorgy loves Kasarova was a new story for me. And it's a wonderful story. Her post also touches on indiscriminate "music criticism" that has little to do music or with actual criticism.

Ö1 Radio: Broadcasts of Mozart Past – Mitridate, Re di Ponto (1997)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart:

Mitridate, Re di Ponto

Bruce Ford (Mitridate)

Cyndia Sieden (Aspasia)

Christiane Oelze (Sifare)

Vesselina Kasarova (Farnace)

Heidi Grant Murphy (Ismene)

Toby Spence (Marzio)

Larissa Rudakova (Arbate)

Camerata Salzburg

Sir Roger Norrington

Live recording from the 

1997 Salzburger Mozartwoche 

on Ö1 Radio now!

Manic Mozart Monday – Vesselina Kasarova is Vitellia (in Recital)

This audio recording is from her 1997 Mozart Arias recital disc with Colin Davis conducting. She makes Vitellia sound angry, desperate, and yes, at one point even a bit tired. Imagine what Frau Kasarova could do with this on stage (and with Maestro Harnoncourt conducting!) Add her to the list of Sestos I'd love to see move over to Vitellia!

I, for one, would like to see her in a few more girl's roles (even though, I think we all agree that she's an awesome Mezzo in Pants!)

Watching the Radio – Vocal Treasure from Ö1 Radio

Among the vocal fun on Austria's  Ö1 Radio this week:

Weber’s Oberon, in a recording from 1996, featuring youthful performances by a few familiar singers:

Vesselina Kasarova (Fatime)

Peter Seiffert (Hüon von Bordeaux)

Bo Skovhus (Scherasmin)

Deon van der Walt (Oberon)

Inga Nielsen (Rezia)

Conducted by Marek Janowski

And Monday’s episode of Apropos Musik is 50 minutes of operetta, Broadway, and film music sung by your favorite opera stars. Slumming? No, not at all! It's kind of fun to hear lighter tunes (particularly the operetta) sung by such wonderful voices. The program features: Diana Damrau, Piotr Beczala, Anna Netrebko, Rolando Villazon, Elina Garanca, Renée Fleming, and others. (Well, perhaps AN's voice is not quite so operetta-friendly any more; but still, it's a nice little program)

P.S. "Lied der Eliza aus dem Musical "My fair Lady" is Ich hat getanzt heut' Nacht (gesungen auf Englisch– and DD pulls it off rather well, except for a little odd back-phrasing.)

Sunday Brunch – Vesselina Presents Malin with “The Rose”

I just noticed that of my gratuitous idols (at the top of the page), Malin Hartelius is one post behind the others. Well! I just had to do something about that! And Vesselina Kasarova is a great bonus in this clip. This Zurich performance is at least seven years old. I wonder if MH will be taking on the Marschallin soon. Maybe not for a few years…

I love how Octavian has to coax Sophie out of the cupboard! I’ve not seen this entire performance, so I’m not sure who the cadaverous dude is who seems to get so much screen time. Ignore him and enjoy the bliss that is MH’s Sophie.  Himmlische indeed!

Sunday Brunch, Expanded Edition – Mezzos in Pants

This is a great U-TOOB playlist featuring one of our favorite opera phenomena: mezzos playing men. This playlist includes Sarah Connolly (a lot), Alice Coote, Joyce DiDonato, Vesselina Karasova, Angelika Kirchschlager, Elina Garanca, Isabel Leonard, Helene Schneiderman, and Kate Lindsey and costars some of our favorite sopranos, too (Miah Persson in at least two!!!)!

And then check out La Clemenza di Tito from La Monnaie for more mezzos in pants. (I have a crush on Swedish mezzo Anna Grevelius as Annio, but I am not sure if I have a crush on her, or on him.)

2012 Lieder Recitals from Schwetzingen Still Available

So, I was over at Dorothea Röschmann – an appreciation, checking out a notice about the Berlin Philharmonic's November 2013 concert of Schumann’s scenes from Faust*. The rest of the vocal cast is compelling too, and includes Martina Janková, Werner Güra, Christian Gerhaher, and Luca Pisaroni. 

On that same page, there is a link to the (still active) archive recording of DR’s wonderful 2012 Schwetzingen SWR Festspiele Lieder recital. (Earwormopera published the sung texts) In fact, most all of the 2012 Schwetzingen programs are still available from Südwestrundfunk SW2. The site says the recordings are available for a year, which means they’ll be disappearing soon (to be replaced by the 2013 programs, no doubt.)

More about Vesselina in São Paulo (another Stream-of-Consciousness Post)

I pointed out a blog post about Vesselina Kasarova's concerts in São Paulo the other day. Well, Bela went back to hear the concert the second night! And over at SmorgZone, you now can find two arias from that program. Isn't the internet cool? 

While browsing VK's website, I found photos of her debut as Eboli (right) in Don Carlo last year in Zurich. The production is by Sven-Eric Bechtolf, and gee, don't those trees look familiar. (Do you remember what other opera we've seen them in?) I do admire the Zurich Opera's recycling program. I wonder if anyone has ever tracked their reuse of sets and set pieces (like the doors from the restaurant in Ariadne reused in Arabella.) But, I digress. 

"Unexpected Song" Blogs about Vesselina Kasarova

VK and Bela

My new blog buddy Bela had a front-row seat to a VK concert last night in São Paulo, and I am a teensy bit envious. Bela is a music student in Brazil, who shares her experiences as a student and as an opera fan in a blog called Unexpected Song. 

Bela manages to get behind the scenes frequently, and her enthusiasm just spills off the screen. I almost feel like I am there with her when I read her posts. I highly recommend her blog and I suggest starting with today's post:

Vesselina Kasarova, the sweetest opera singer ever!

Gratuitous Luca Pisaroni (and friends) Post – from La Clemenza di Tito

Pisaroni, Kasarova, and Schade

This 2003 performance of Mozart's La Clemenza di Tito was my first exposure to:

• Luca Pisaroni
• La Clemenza di Tito
• Michael Schade
• Vesselina Kasarova